Scars

Today marks 8 years since my brother was diagnosed with osteosarcoma. Bone cancer.

The older a scar gets, the lighter and less visible it becomes. Some become so faint you forget they are there.

Andrew has scars, some I haven't even seen. He has scars up and down and around his leg, and other places on his body from skin grafts. Once, we sat on his bed and joked about how his scars formed a map. "This one could be the river, this one could be the valley..." because yes, some of his scars are not just lines, but deep craters and rivets.

There are other scars that no one can see, and they mark all of our family. I imagine my mother's heart is an entirely new shape and color from all the wounds that have been bound up watching her children hurt. I know that some of Andrew's inside scars affect how he perceives colors, smells, and the media.

My inside scars throb when I hear the clicking sound of crutches moving down a hallway. I remember they are there when people make light of suffering. My scars feel fresh when I notice the bulge of a port-a-cath inside one of my patients, when I see a nurse being insensitive or when I see a nurse being the kindest she knows how.

But I am proud of my scars. Without them, I might not be who I am today. I might be earning a different degree, have a different job, and care more about superficial things.

Without my scars, I would not have such a deep appreciation for the scars that were kept so that I could never deny that Christ suffered for me. In His perfect, resurrected body, He let those scars remain as a testimony to His love. "Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands." Isaiah 49:16.

He suffered beyond my comprehension of suffering so that when Andrew felt alone, broken, and lifeless, someone would know how to help and heal. He kept His scars so that when I was home alone as a fifteen year old with three little sisters while my parents were with Andrew over night, I would feel safe. He kept His scars so that when my mom had to sign papers allowing her children to go into surgery, she would have the strength to do so. When my dad split his time between the office and the hospital, sleeping on a reclining chair for 200 days and passing a kidney stone in his son's cancer treatment room, he was assisted with the divine love of someone who had felt it all before.

Elder Holland once said, "Do not be afraid of scars that may come in defending the truth or fighting for the right, but beware scars that spiritually disfigure, that come to you in activities you should not have undertaken, that befall you in places where you should not have gone. Beware the wounds of any battle in which you have been fighting on the wrong side."

Although we are scarred, our scars make us stronger. Our scars show our strength.

So today, 8 years later, I'm thankful for my scars. I'm thankful for the growth they represent. I'm grateful for my brother, who taught me how to fight and how to hope, and I'm thankful he lived.

And above all, I'm thankful for Jesus Christ and His scars, and that He lives.

Walmart Run

I'm a winner.

The evidence of this statement includes (but is not limited to) the fact that I brought home dinner tonight from the hospital cafeteria (they were serving Thanksgiving dinner and I just wanted something warm and comfy that I didn't cook myself) and that I went to Walmart at 6 a.m. last week. In my socks.

You see, I have clinical at 6:30 at Alta View Hospital in Sandy. Since the hospital is exactly in between my parent's and Benji's parents, we simply go home Thursday nights and sleep over. The issue here is I have to remember all my critical clinical attire: BYU scrubs, BYU name tag, Intermountain student nurse name tag, watch, stethoscope, white shoes. Must be white shoes.

Welllllll since I function on about a minute to minute basis these days....it wasn't until 5:30 a.m. in Benji's parent's basement that I realized I forgot my white shoes. All I brought were my flip flops. You just can't wear flip flops to a MRSA-ridden, high needle-stick potential, professional hospital. Ya just can't.

So I grabbed Benji's car keys and felt a little robber-ish as I spun away from his house with the plan to get home to Emily and steal a pair of her shoes.

While driving I began calculating: 15 minutes to my house. 15 minutes to creep my whole family out as I break into the house and try to find some decent shoes. 15 minutes back to Benji's house. Wake up Benji. Eat breakfast. Drive to hospital. Dang it.

And then I remembered. The commercials of my childhood, that grinning bouncing yellow circle knocking down prices that was replaced with a shining star logo of hope: Wal Mart. Siri. Please give me directions to the closest Wal Mart. Pronto.

(kidding I don't have Siri.)

So I drove to the Wal Mart that was only 7 minutes away, in my socks and BYU scrubs, parked, ran across the parking lot, AND THE DOORS WERE LOCKED. Great. Now I have even less time and still no shoes.

So I returned to the car, dreaming of the invention of a 24 hour Payless, when I saw a blue vest-clad Wal Mart employee walking towards the doors. I'm sure I scared him to death when I veered over to him and rolled down my window, asking when the walmart opened. "It's a 24 hour Wal Mart", he said "but only one door is open." I grinned and cackled and spun around, re-parked, and re-sprinted across the parking lot in my socks.

I would pay big money for the Wal Mart surveillance video of that morning, as a blue and white scrubbed up girl wearing socks ran into the store, grabbed the first pair of white shoes off the rack, put them on, sprinted back to the self check out, swiped the price tag and the credit card and ran back out the door.

The good news is, I made it to clinical on time. And Benji got his car back. And now I have two pairs of white shoes.

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