A Discussion with God

My thoughts fell like a waterfall I knew in Nice, France, up a hidden hill behind ruins. When I received my scleroderma diagnosis, it felt like the world just fell on my back, and I had to carry it up a hill, like the centuries-old path up the castle in my childhood town. “I can do this. I can manage. It is not going to stop me. I’ll fight. I’ll get up the hill,” I thought. “Mom. Advocate. Poet. Teacher. Friend. I can do it.” My fall was fast, not slow. I went down the hill. My now frail body did not allow me to walk up a hill with such a load on my back. I could barely make it independently, each step being challenging to make. “One foot in front of the other” I had to think three times as hard to make basic movements. Nothing made sense. I tried to calculate algorithms of what I did wrong with my self-care to get this rare autoimmune disorder. “I did not work out enough. I did not eat a nutritious diet. I did not check in with my doctors frequently enough. I did not see the early symptoms,” my thoughts rushed through my mind.

Dr. S, my M.D., kept reassuring me, “There is nothing you could have done. It is not your fault.” She repeated this sentence multiple times throughout one of our sessions. I wanted to believe her, but as I wasn’t the best at watching over my diet and exercise routines, I took the weight of my illness on my lack of self-care early in life. Then, my Catholic imprinted ideals surfaced and added to the mix, “I did not pray enough. I did not attend church regularly. I am being punished. I committed sins beyond repair. I could not save my Mom,” were new refrains to my song, to my waterfall.

I was angry at God for years. I could not save my Mom. God did not save my Mom either, so my anger was deep. One day, I stopped during one of my walks. It was raining that day. We had a year filled with rain. I grounded my feet to the Earth, held my body straight, arms straight against my body, and my head looking up at the sky like a toddler looking up at a parent, “Why? Enough, God. I don’t deserve this illness. You already did not save my Mom. Enough. My kids need me. I am not your puppet. You will stop this game and give me back my kids’ life. Enough. No more shenanigans.” Tears and rain fell onto the ground on which I stood.

I had a temper tantrum. It was needed to break free from the clouds in my head like lightning breaking the sky to open better days ahead. I felt peace and felt the environment as beautiful, holy, a garden, and bliss. The rain slid down my skin to my fingers, a comforting touch like a hand guiding me in my path, and the leaves singing in the wind, “It is going to be okay. There is nothing to fear.”

I remembered my Mom’s smile. I have a journey to take with this illness. I do not know the many paths ahead, but I will take them one breath at a time, watching each leaf from trees on my walks fall one by one. One foot. One step. One breath. One leaf. One.

I walked into a church. I lit a candle. One candle.