Friday, January 22, 2010

Reading The Fine Print


I friend of mine, who lives back east, is having a hard time dealing with the after effects of gastric bypass surgery. The nausea and lack of appetite are getting her down. Those friends who told her gastric bypass was wonderful forgot to tell her that it takes a while for the wonderful to happen.

It's like anything else in life - we need to read the fine print. That fine print sometimes comes in the form of asking the right questions, or doing thorough research. But sometimes the unexpected happens.

Take my dear brother as an example. Diagnosed with Non Hopkins Lymphoma, his choices were a bone marrow transplant or treatment that would put the disease in remission, but not cure it. The remission could reverse itself and if that happened, no further treatment would be possible.

Well, the choice of a bone marrow transplant was a no-brainer. My sister and I tested to be possible donors (we weren't), and I prayed at my parents' grave site, begging them to intercede. The bone-marrow match came through. Going on 3 years later, the results are a nightmare. His body rejected the donor bone marrow, and now he lives in constant pain. If he had known then what he knows now, he says he would have opted for remission.

Sometimes life doesn't play out as we wish even when we read the fine print. We have to rely on G-d to know what's right. The hard part is accepting His decision as final. As humans, we're not wired that way. Which is a good thing. Because I believe sometimes G-d throws bad things our way because He wants to be in our life. He wants us to cry out to Him. For my part, I'm more than happy to oblige.

2 comments:

  1. Hello,
    My name is Jean and I’m a volunteer with the National Bone Marrow Transplant Link. Our organization helps patients, caregivers, and families cope with the social and emotional challenges of transplant survivorship by providing vital information and personalized support services. We subscribe to Google blog alerts, where we found your brother's story.
    We have a number of programs and services for survivors who are suffering from chronic Graft vs. Host Disease after transplant. To learn more, please visit www.nbmtlink.org or call 800-546-5268.
    All the best to you both.

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  2. This is so hard for me to read. That my mother read this and responded to it means that you touched her, and I am grateful for that. I pray that she read your response, but I don't think she did. I want to believe she did.

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