I don't know how hard this is going to be to write; I have been sleeping 18+ hours a day for the past few days, and fighting off a fever, chills, nausea, and dizziness. A couple of days ago, about 8 hours too early, I got the most intense feeling that I was detoxing from my pain medication; a feeling I used to get from Percocet when I would wait too long between doses; a gnawing inside my bones; restlessness; extreme anxiety...only one thousand times worse than with Percocet. We chalked it up to the sweat from the fever making the drugs less effective, and changed the patch a few hours earlier than specified.

Today, it happened again. Only this time, an entire day before the patch required changing. We contacted the doctor in the States, and she said my symptoms sounded consistent with a Herx reaction; to drink lots of water, and do everything I was instructed to do to battle a herx (anti-histamines, lots and lots of water [which is hard to consume when you are sleeping and nauseated!], taking this pill that helps flush your system out [which didn't come in the mail until today!], etc.)

So, here I am, going between being blazing hot, to a completely frozen drug addict with the flu, feeling like I'm detoxing from extremely strong narcotics. I've had better days, to say the least.

We have been on the search for a live-in caregiver, mostly for Jack, partly for me, and lastly for our poor, is-almost-never-clean-but-for-the-goodness-of-others, home. It has been interesting, stressful, and difficult on so many levels. Stressful for Matt (he wants someone in place before he leaves for his next out-of-town shift), difficult for us to find candidates at all, let alone someone that I would deem an appropriate replacement for, well, ME. I have probably said this before, but my entire life I have dreamed I would be a stay-at-home mother, (and as a friend so cheekily put it the other day, I am ;)), yet this is not in the way I ever would have hoped it would be.

In the process of this illness, I have gone through a journey of acceptance. Of letting go of taking care of Jack full-time; of learning that this is not a minor illness, but a lifestyle change; of giving up my home, my evenings alone; of losing the ability to bathe in private, or drive a car. I was explaining this (to the same friend I mentioned earlier) that I find illness embarrassing; personally, I find weakness in myself at all, embarrassing.(This is a pride issue, I know. Believe me, God is stripping me of that pride constantly!) I said that I guessed I had a hard time admitting my illness for such a long time to others, because I didn't believe it reflected my personality, or who I am inside. She said she thought the contrary. That I wouldn't be experiencing this, or fighting this, or responding to this in the manner that I am if I wasn't still "me" underneath; that my personality is shining through more than ever in light of what I'm going through. And even though God knows I struggle with pride, He knew I really needed to hear that, too.

It is people: their prayers, their comments, their devotion, their friendship that make me love my life. Despite the garbage that this illness throws our way, those people show up, with their strength of personality, and show me that I am not alone; I am not without strength in their numbers; and, that God is love, through them, whether they intended to be witnesses of it or not. And I am so grateful.

And it is in my husband, the unsung hero, the quiet rock that keeps letting Jesus glue him back into the chaotic sculpture that is our family, who keeps pushing me to be my best--sick or not; who teaches me and shows me everyday what real love means, even when he doesn't know it.

So yes, I am sad. I am sicker than I have ever been. I am angry at Lyme disease, and the fact that I still have it. But I am grateful too. For everything good that God has brought out of this. And man, is it good!

Please pray that we will find the caregiver that is right for us, and that our family will continue to find strength in our weaknesses.

"Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.  But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.  That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

2 Corinthians 12; 8-10