Quarter Mile...

When I began running in University, I ran in the basement of the boys' dormitory on a treadmill.  It was hard work.  I was not a good runner.  Red-faced, I would watch that blinking red light move slowly around the circle, knowing when it made the bottom, I was finished one lap:  1/4 mile done.  3 more laps to go.

Well, on Tuesday my blinking chemo light reached the bottom for the first time.  I've completed 2 of my 8 treatments.  1/4 way done.  

Sometimes I think this is a good way to look at things.  Other times I think I'm damning myself.  I mean, I still have 6 treatments left.  The second half of my treatment is a full month longer than the first, to boot.  

But, I need to feel like I'm moving forward; growing nearer to ending this phase of treatment.  I never thought I would feel like this.  I have been doing really well--only a little bit of exhaustion and some minor stomach issues.  The thing is, when you don't feel like yourself, you don't feel like yourself.

Heck, right now I don't even look like myself (enter buzzed hair because it was falling out by the hand full).  

I praise God because I am a quarter of the way done.  I praise God because I have been feeling relatively good.  I praise God for the generosity and care of my friends and family.  I praise Him because He is good, and good is coming from all this pain.

There is a crying out, too.  I cry out to God because I know that there is more to life than this.  I cry out to Him because in some ways I feel like only a fragment of my former self (I also feel very much more whole in other ways).  I cry out to Him for the child that we have loved and lost.  I cry out to Him for healing.

Friends, as I move through each day, knowing that the darned little red light on my chemo treadmill is inching ever closer to the goal, sometimes I want to give up because it feels too hard and sometimes I want to run as fast as my little body can take me to the finish line.  Strange paradox for sure.