Note: These “Learning to Feel” blog entries are copied here from chapter 5 of my book, New in the Middle. I’ve included them here because they share the main defining moments in my life. Instead of a chronological timeline, I tell my stories in a new way—from the perspective of my emotions.
Learning to Feel: Love
Observing my hand doodling delicate designs and shading in the waves of overwhelm, the positive, hopeful part of my brain rose in defense: “Wait. I have been very loved all my life, and I love many people.” Having been loved throughout the course of my life, love definitely deserved a prominent place in my Emotional Timeline. Flowing down from the pinkish spiral, it seemed fitting to add green, as well as black and white streamers that ended up spelling out my favorite emotion. We are often reminded about the active nature of love. Love is a choice but also an emotion. I’m one of the blessed ones who has felt loved by my parents since my conception. I was wanted, cared for, and have never doubted my father and mother’s love for me. With this blessing of unconditional love, my parents provided a solid foundation for me to understand what being loved by God felt like. Raised in a solid church community and Christian school environment, I never knew a moment of doubt about my own intrinsic value as a human being.
This foundation of love proved to be essential to my survival when tragedy struck. At age 14 what you never think will happen to you—happened. A sled-riding accident severely damaged my spinal cord and left me paralyzed from the waist down. The doctors told me I would never walk and prepared my family and I for the seemingly inevitable—life in a wheelchair. After two operations and a few weeks of hospitalization, Harmarville Rehabilitation Center became my home for the next three months. Here I would learn to live again: learn to dress myself in a wheelchair, learn to maneuver a wheelchair in and out of closed doorways and up and down curbs, learn to cook from a wheelchair, and learn to transfer from the wheelchair to the car, couch, or bed. The wheelchair would become part of me, an extension of my body and of myself. My upper body needed strengthening to lift my body and my mind needed fortitude to face this new future. Now, almost 30 years have passed since this traumatic season, and not too many distinct memories remain, except for one: laying in a hospital bed looking down on the legs that did not feel like my own healthy, running, jumping, horseback-riding legs, I thought about how my legs looked like plastic, like the legs of a mannequin, not human ones, not mine. Not yet fully comprehending the magnitude of change that had come over my life, I didn’t understand yet that the life ahead of me would never again look or feel like my previous life as a normal American teenager.
Though everything had changed, and many rough emotions were to come my way, love was not lacking. The family and community that flooded my hospital room with cards, flowers, and visits assured me every day that life would go on and there were good days ahead. They loved me and would walk slowly by my side through the rehabilitation ahead. Even stronger than familial love, a deep sense, held with childlike innocence, of God’s love settled in my heart. He did not base his love for me on the strength of my legs (Psalm 147:10). He did not require a single step from me to earn or maintain his love. If I had broken my neck and spent the rest of my life as quadriplegic, he would have loved me every breath. Even if I lay in bed the rest of my life and didn’t do one “useful” thing for him, his love for me would not waver. My newly established disabilities did not diminish my humanity in the least bit. As a child of God, I was loved.
That love carried me and healed me. Slowly and surely, the nerves reaching down my legs started to regenerate. Months of in-patient rehabilitation and years of out-patient work meant I regained the ability to walk. Eventually that walking became functional with the help of an ankle-foot-orthosis on my left leg, and the wheelchair fell by the wayside. The scars on my body from the operations healed, and the patient love of family and friends helped me persevere in learning to walk, but emotional triggers, which catapulted me into feelings of rejection for years to come, resided as mental scars. You may be thinking that this is a strange feeling for someone who claims to have been so cherished and cared for all her life. Looking back it becomes obvious to me that these feelings of rejection stemmed simply from being not normal in high school. I needed some serious help in learning to love myself and this newly-disabled body that carried me around.
God knew what I needed. He provided a husband to help me understand my value as a woman and children to help me turn the focus off of myself and my body. They taught me the great joy of giving love, not just receiving. I have been loved by my good man for over 20 years now. Just as my family’s love gave me strength to overcome great physical challenges, Jose’s love helped me live life at a higher level. Suddenly, buried destiny dreams resurfaced: despite my physical limitations, I could work overseas and be a mother! My dream of adopting children came true when Bemin and Benjamin joined our family in 2002, and then a biological son, Isaiah, joined our family. But Jose and I would need each other’s strength-through-love for a great tragedy ahead: the loss of our daughter.
Emma Lynn was born to die. Like Jesus. Mid-way through my second pregnancy, we got the terrible news that our daughter was “incompatible with life” due to a condition we were previously unaware of called polycystic kidneys, a rare genetic disease. Like a nightmare, we felt like this disease had bullied its way into our family, shocking us by its very presence and decimating the great hopes we had for our precious little one. As my pregnancy progressed, Emma squirmed, kicked, and grew. But her kidneys grew faster. By 32 weeks into the pregnancy, her kidneys were adult sized due to the incredible number of cysts. The doctors decided to deliver her by C-section to see if anything could be done for her outside the womb. There wasn’t, and even on life support, she declined rapidly. I had carried her for 8 months, but Jose cradled her in his arms for the last moments of her life on earth.
When we marry, we never know what God will call us to face together. Jose has been consistent when we anticipate challenging seasons; he always tells me, “Don’t worry, Sarah. Whatever comes, we will face it together.” When my parents faced the horror of my accident, hospitalization, rehabilitation, they realized that this tragedy would either bring them closer together or it would divide them and destroy their marriage. The same was true for Jose and I as we walked through a more-than-difficult pregnancy, loving a baby who would not live. Tragedy makes or breaks us. As a purifying fire, it has the potential to strengthen our love.
To read the whole story, continue to the next blog entry.
God has taught me much about living abundantly within the reality of my limitations. To learn more, check out my book on Amazon.
