Watching Him

It's a very challenging and humbling thing, to watch someone you love go through a difficult, elongated season of sickness.  The emotions are hard to categorize, they come in waves of urgency, gentle pushes, pangs of fear, and overwhelming sadness, as well as thanksgiving that he's still here, enduring and trying his best to fight.

I have the gift of time these days to serve him.  There are errands to run, bathrooms to keep clean, surfaces to sanitize, phone calls to doctors' offices and hospitals, medications to organize, along with all the regular household chores.  One of our specialists told us at the outset that having cancer was like having a full-time job.  He is right.

So what do I do when he's hurting, enduring side effects from the tsunami of chemicals that chemotherapy has introduced into his body?  I stay near, not always in the same room. I rub his feet, one of the only things that helps him forget for a while.  I make sure I have his few favorite things ready to eat in the fridge and on the counter.  I'm desperately trying to keep weight on him.

And today I made him a favorite meal, stuffed peppers and garlic-rosemary mashed potatoes.  Of course he helped me and made sure that I was seasoning correctly.  😋

With the practice of quarantine these days, I realize that Tony is in the dreaded "immuno-compromised" category that the doctors warn about.  He won't be leaving the house anytime soon, nor will I.  I'm trying to watch over his soul, making sure he is well in this lonely, shut-in state.

And while I'm watching him, I'm also staying near to God, listening to His still small voice, reading His word so that I might be able to be useful to my beloved.