Growing Pains

My mom just had knee replacement surgery. These kinds of circumstances hold many learning opportunities.

Mom has a Degenerative Arthritis. This means that over a period of time her joint cartilage deteriorates until the bones are grinding together. Our bones are not meant to rub together. As a result, much pain is the effect. Similarly, when we choose to live the way we were not designed to live, much pain results. As we attempt to cope, living with or in the pain, Mom went to doctors and had gels injected to minimize the pain; cortisone shots to numb the pain; muscle strengthening to relieve the pressure, etc. We do as much as we can to live with the difficulties produced by the pain. At some point we must do something else. Change.

My mother is going through a tremendous amount of pain the day after the surgery - at the moment far more pain than the damaged knee was causing her. I watched her hurt so bad and I knew I had not seen the knee nearly as much pain. What God showed me was this: The pain of corrective action will sometimes hurt far worse, initially, than living with the pain of our damaged condition. It will often hurt so bad that we revert to the damaged condition if we can. In the pain the day after the surgery, if mom could have turned back time, she would have not had the surgery.

I think about the pains of constantly growing and changing. Often corrective change is painful.

For a hands-on example when working with children, I use a bobby pin or a paperclip. If our goal is to get the paperclip or bobby pin straight, because of the metal's 'memory', it must be bent past straight. When it is allowed to relax, it will be straight. If we only bend it to the point of being straight, when it relaxes, it will return to a bent position.

The truth and victory lies in that if we deal with the pain of change, we never have to deal with the pain of the damaged condition anymore.

In her pain, Mom said, "Nothing that helps you is going to feel good all of the time."