Saturday 14 January 2017

A-Z Blogger Challenge 2016 - Illness: always a difficulty, but if you look closely, also a blessing

Yes, I know the new year has come and gone. I know that we are two weeks into 2017. But real life did not allow me to complete this challenge in its time, and I hate leaving things unfinished, so my aim is to finish it before the end of January. It is, after all, closer to 2016 than February or any month after...

After work yesterday, a colleague was telling me about her stint in hospital for an emergency procedure that she had done before the start of the school year, and inevitably, the conversation ended up as an exchange of family medical stories.

My family has been through the mill with illness. Cancer, heart surgery, kidney surgery, gastric surgery...these are but a few. Recently, over the last 10 years or so, it feels like we've had a medical emergency every year, and in a close-knit family like mine, illness can take over everyone's lives. When it happens, everything in your life seems to take a backseat, and your focus is concentrated on navigating the recovery. But, illness is something that I'd prefer to endure, over other crises or afflictions.

I've seen what drug addictions can do to families. I have seen families break up over the pettiest of disagreements. And as hard as it is to watch someone you love have to suffer through a medical crisis, in my experience, many good things can and have come from it. Illness has brought my family closer each time. It has unearthed strength I didn't know I had. It forced my father, a control freak who refuses to retire with no concern for his own health, to take better care of himself. I witnessed the amazing resilience of children as I watched my 4-year old niece battle leukemia like a pro, and my one month old nephew survive an operation that was supposed to kill him.

Illness can be nightmarish for families. But, it is the one difficulty that always has some kind of positive consequence, even if it is only a bigger appreciation for your own health.
For my family, the positive spin offs and blessings have been plenty indeed.

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