In Sickness and In Health By Dr. Juan Harrison
In Sickness and In Health
My poor wife seems to spend more and more of her time on the phone lining up meals for surgery patients in our Sunday school class. It almost sounds like a car repair shop report as members are currently recuperating from hip, back, knee and a couple other procedures. Then she’s checking on her dad who recently had a fall with time spent him in the ER. Another friend of her’s is copign with the untimely brain cancer loss of her husband as she keeps tabs on her friend. Throw in another friend helping her husband through dementia and a close cousin suffering the same fate and you’ve got a busy woman on the phone lining up food providers and offering encouragement to others. Throw in her part-time paralegal work for our son and us keeping the grandkids a few times each week and you’ve got one tired woman. We’re not including time alone in her bed as I’ve spent my nights in a recliner the last 3 months after an ice fall. She says she doesn’t sleep as well even though I’m still in the same room.
Any number of you caregivers and widows and widowers have got your own stories to tell how you may have navigated that journey of helping a spouse or family member through the toughest of journeys that ultimately ended as they often do in our elder years. We know we’re gonna face these situations if we live long enough. We get old. Our parents get old; it’s a fact of life. Still when the battle occurs, it often boils down to a lonely one. Even as people offer to help you, it still comes down to you feeling personally responsible for the overall care of the loved one.
About that time, we’re reminded of the marriage vow in “in sickness and in health.” We remember the Bible telling us to “honor they father and mother.” Sometimes you may have been tasked with doing both things at the same time. Seems like the load generally falls on the womenfolk. Some men can help a bit if the spouse need help with a parent.
Fifty years of matrimony fly by in a minute. Where did it go? We were young and skinny and raised a family. Next thign you know, you’re trying to stay out of the nursing home or dealing with hospice. At this point I want to you to keep on keeping on. You’re not alone. You have family and friends to help you make it through. As a believer you have the promise of a new body for yourself and your spouse. Hopefully we can keep in mind that the pain you suffered as you watched your spouse leave this earth and the pain of loneliness you feel may still remind us that we did our best to honor those vows of in sickness and health.
By Dr. Juan Harrison
