Hello Friends! Welcome back to my blog! In the last few months, my blog was getting an overhaul and upgrade! The beauty of this online space is due to the work of Arun, a long time friend and someone who understands pain. My family and I had some South Indian adventures over Christmas, so I’ll open this year with a fun story about elephants and pain.

I have prayed that I would forget to take my pain medicine. That seems to be the only way I can reduce the medication because I depend on it. Whether that dependency is psychological or actual is a question up for grabs. I have thought a lot about this.  

While in South India over Christmas break, I forgot! One day I actually forgot to take my pain medicine. Through a funny and serendipitous set of circumstances, Jose, Isabel, and I ended up staying at an out-of-the-way hotel that just happened to be near an elephant training center. Wow! After a good night’s sleep, we planned to visit the center before continuing on our journey. What a fun surprise! In their slow-moving giganticness, elephants are fascinating. This center happens to be a place where dangerous wild elephants are re-located and trained.

Waking refreshed, we got ready and drove down some very narrow roads in our quest to view the giants. Perfectly pleasant weather, shady paved paths, bamboo benches, and elephants to view: Life is good. We watched with fascination as the elephants handled the branches with their dexterous trunks, stripping the leaves and tender twigs from the thicker branches. Later we watched a handler give an elephant a bath and take it for a short walk using only verbal commands.

Pictured here is Chandu, an elephant that killed 9 people in his younger days when he roamed the Attapady wilderness. Attapady is the district where Jose grew up. On a regular basis, his family who live there, still see wild elephants. They are a very real danger. We had read about Chandu in the news a few years ago when he was still at large. He lives at the very back of the training center, far from any other elephants, which signals that he might still have some dangerous tendencies. I was grateful for the narrow bamboo pole that protected us from him.

As I walked through the park, I noticed how well I felt. My legs felt much better than I expected them to, and the beauty around me took my attention off of myself. What a morning! I breathed in the fresh air, and as we neared the end of our 2 km walk, I put my hand in my pocket for some reason. To my surprise, I found my pain medicine tablet. What? I forgot to take it? With the inspiration of nature, the long walk, and the interesting elephants, my mind flew into high gear. “Maybe I’m healed! Maybe I won’t have any pain in my knee anymore. I’m going to see how long I can go without my medicine! In fact, I’m going to stop cold turkey in January. 2026 will be a year with no pain medicine! Yes! I’m going to do it!” I marched toward our car with a fresh determination in my heart. My hopes soared. I was on a hope high.

By evening, my hopes soured. By evening I felt the pain come back in, along with fear. From all that I’ve learned about chronic pain, I know in my head to try to not make negative judgements about my pain and fear, but sometimes I don’t pay attention to all those good thoughts in my head. The combination of a beautiful morning I truly enjoyed, and the feeling of well-being that surrounded me had carried me to the mountaintops of high hope and set the stage; now disappointment rushed in—disappointment bigger than an elephant’s backside along with a whole bunch of negative commentary. I felt crushed under the weight of it. “I’m so stupid for thinking I could get off my medicine. Why do I always do this to myself? I make these valiant commitments to stop my medicine, and before the day is done, I’ve broken my vow. I’m such a coward. I need to just stop hoping that I’ll get better and my pain will go away.”

This high of hope followed so quickly by the low of disappointment left me bewildered and confused…and very emotional. Later on, as I reflected on the roller coaster I had just been on, I wondered about it. Hope is not bad—after all, it is biblical. Hope in God is not supposed to disappoint, so I must be experiencing some kind of pseudo-hope when I think about getting rid of my pain or getting off my medication. What is hope in a chronic pain situation? I don’t want to do this up-and-down thing anymore. For the first time, I noticed how this disappointing cycle leaves me very nervous to hope for anything. I don’t let myself feel hopeful very often because I’ve dropped off the cliff of deep disappointment too many times. Better to not hope (about my physical status) at all.

But what should I think about this hopeful part of me that got so inspired that morning? I wondered if I can be gentle toward it? Can I listen to what it has to say? I often condemn my hopeful thoughts and feelings to protect myself from painful disappointment. Maybe…just maybe… I can honor this part of me that still believes life can get better even though I have had so much pain for so long.

What if hope is not just a mental imagining toward something that will happen but also a feeling, a physical sensation? That morning at the elephant training center, I felt well. I felt good. I felt life. I enjoyed the day. When I look back on that beautiful experience, I want to savor that good feeling. Now, I feel a wise caution to not extrapolate the feeling and try to convince God I need those sensations and thoughts each day from here on out. By understanding and experiencing hope as a feeling in the moment, my elephant-sized disappointments can be relocated and contained, no longer as dangerous to me or those around me.

Let’s think about this poem from Anjuli Paschall for a few minutes. In your situation, how can you hold your hope with tenderness?

I feel hopeful.

I feel it in my body.

I hold my hope with vulnerable tenderness.

I resist clamping down on hope.

I resist trying to control it. I resist managing it, minimizing it, or making it more than it is.

Instead, I simply receive the hope available to me in Christ.

I remember, God, that every feeling is an invitation to discernment.

Help me place my hope in You always.

You are my hope and my salvation.

I place all my longing under your care.[1]

My dear friends, how do you navigate the highs and lows of hope and disappointment around chronic or long-term circumstances in life? I’d love to hear your thoughts. We are in this together.

As we begin 2026 together, may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)

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[1] Anjuli Paschall, Feel: A Collection of Liturgies Offering Hope for Every Complicated Emotion (Bethany House, 2024), 163.