Three Years Ago Today - November 12, 2021

It is exactly three years ago to the day that I graduated from the Pain Rehabilitation Clinic (PRC) at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, a mere few miles from where I am today. For those of you not familiar with my story, I came to the Mayo searching for a diagnosis after going through years of non-effective treatments, medications and doctors. The most significant part of my story is this: I originally applied to the Mayo Campus in Minnesota but was rejected. When I heard this news, I was devastated. I thought I should go to the flagship campus and not to some second rate campus in Florida. Fortunately, God knew better. Weeks later, the Jacksonville Campus called and accepted me. What I didn’t know at the time was the Minnesota Campus did not offer the PRC Program that I needed. The PRC program also had a component for family members to attend on certain days to understand what we as patients were faced with and the program we would be following when we left. My son lives in Jacksonville Beach, a few miles from Campus. God knew I needed to be here in Florida and He made it happen.

If you told me three years ago I would be back here, in a condo on the beach for three months I would have emphatically told you that would never occur. Back then I prayed with all I had for God to get me on a plane and down here. For three solid weeks, God got me out of bed each morning to arrive at what I refer to as “Pain Boot Camp” and He pulled me through each and every painful day and night; through the lectures, the therapy and the boatload of new behaviors we learned and put into practice. There were 24 other brave souls in those rooms with me and we bonded for life. It was such a radical way of treatment, but only in the way that it contradicted every other way we had been previously taught by the medical community to cope. We all dove in, without a life preserver. We were desperate for relief. I don’t think a day went by where I didn’t say to a nurse, “I can’t do this anymore.” And because they are used to ALL patients of the program saying this, their kind and encouraging response was always, “Yes you can. You are already doing it.”

Often, it’s only when I look back that I can see the miracles that happened or those that were going to happen after I left. I’ve spent every day in the last few years working the PRC program. And every day I have wanted to give up. This program requires discipline and is not for the faint of heart. What I do know is that I am not doing it on my own, for in a way, it takes superhuman strength. The strength that can only come from God. God was my life preserver - then and now.

“My strength and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. -Psalm 73:26

Sleep is one of the areas my body struggles with. At times the bed I am laying on feels like a concrete slab. This is never more evident than when I go on an overnight and sleep in a different bed. I remember a night in Portland, Maine that I would have gone to the emergency room had I not known what my body was doing. Those nights have repeated themselves not only in my own bed at home and during the weeks at PRC, but in Kennebunkport, Maine, Watch Hill, RI and Lincoln, NH. My Mayo nurse encouraged me to keep going on these trips, keep working the program and I would see a change. Ha! I found 50 reasons why I would not keep doing this and listed them one by one in a phone call with her. I felt like a teenager when my parents told me I had to clean my room or do my homework and my million excuses fell on deaf ears.

You can imagine my fear when my son gave us a trip to the Cape this past summer. I went into panic mode. Flashing neon “No” signs illuminated my brain. I wanted to call my nurse but deep down I knew exactly what she would say; “Yes, you are going and yes, you can do this.” So I did. Lo and behold, for the first time in 2 years and 8 months, my body slept, actually slept in a foreign bed. Halleluiah and hand me a trophy!

“The Lord will make a way for you where no foot has been before. That which, like a sea, threatens to drown you, shall be a highway for your escape.” Charles Spurgeon

God is a way-maker. If we can only have faith and patience and perseverance. Have all my health issues resolved? Not by a long shot. God’s ways are not our ways. Some things in our lives may never be better or resolved. It’s up to us to recognize the ones that are, to give thanks and praise for every victory He provides, knowing that the true victory is in our walk with Him, no matter how rocky the road.

Today, three years later, I praise Him and thank Him for bringing me to this beach, this place, but more importantly, for never leaving my side during my journey to get here.