faith

Finding God at the Center

Steve · February 15, 2017 · 4 Comments

[An excerpt from my book, “Embraced by God: Facing Chemotherapy with Faith.”]

center1 — Centered and balanced on God, Missouri Botanical Garden. SJG photo.

During the period of remission between my first and second rounds of chemotherapy, I attended the funeral Mass for the brother of a friend from church. As the Mass ended, the musicians began playing a song I love and know well, and the chorus of the old Quaker hymn flowed over me like a cleansing, refreshing morning shower:

No storm can shake my inmost calm,
while to that rock I’m clinging.
Since love is Lord of heaven and earth,
How can I keep from singing?

As a musician and a singer myself, I have always been drawn to this song for what I guess are obvious reasons. I have always felt a “call” to sing and make music, and this old song always resonated within me. There is nothing, I once thought, that would ever keep me from singing. But I found out over time that that wasn’t entirely true. As I experienced some of the tougher days of my disease and treatment, there were times when singing was the last thing I wanted to do. For me, this was one of the more difficult aspects of coping with my disease. It wasn’t that I couldn’t sing; it was that I just didn’t feel like it.

Grappling with Life’s Numb Moments

Steve · February 12, 2017 · 8 Comments

[An excerpt from my book, “Embraced by God: Facing Chemotherapy with Faith.”]

Numb 1 — Hiding from the numbness: Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis. SJG photo

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle. — Albert Einstein

Over the course of my treatment, my chemotherapy drugs have caused what is known as “peripheral neuropathy.” In short, my hands and feet are numb. My size-ten feet tingle when I walk, which sounds a little like a line from a Broadway musical, but it’s far less entertaining. When the neuropathy first kicked in, I kept dropping things (most memorably a full glass of milk all over the kitchen floor) because my sense of touch had changed with the deadening of the nerves in my hands. I learned to laugh while I cleaned up the messes, and my wife learned to never just hand me a drink without asking, “you got it?”

All in all, I guess it’s a pretty small price to pay for the unrelenting work these killer-chemicals are doing to beat the disease into remission, so I’m not really complaining. But nevertheless this numbness is a strange and constant reminder of the whole kit and caboodle—disease and treatment rolled into one unique experience.

In Chemoworld

Steve · February 8, 2017 · 2 Comments

[An excerpt from my book, “Embraced by God: Facing Chemotherapy with Faith.”]

chemo 1 — Another world: Watkins Glen State Park, New York. SJG photo.

Prayer and love are learned in the hour when prayer has become impossible and your heart has turned to stone. – Thomas Merton

The moment the elevator door opens on the seventh floor and I enter the treatment center, I feel as if I am in a different world from the one where I spend the rest of my days and nights. It’s different for a number of reasons: the place itself, my fellow travelers in treatment, and my own state of mind and spirit. Chemoworld, I call it.

The center, although part of a massive, modern and sprawling medical center in St. Louis’ urban and trendy central west end, is generally quiet, and the people around me seem (again, generally) pretty unaffected, at least for a time, by the world outside the walls of the center. The economy may be falling apart, political candidates and parties may be railing against each other, and war may be raging in far-flung regions of the world, but for a few hours none of that matters as much as the battle being fought between life and death in our own bodies. As killer chemicals are sent racing and screaming into our bodies like tiny Kamikaze pilots on a mission, we’re in a different world.

I realize that, so far at least, I have been luckier than many in that my treatments are relatively quick affairs. I’m usually in and out within an hour or two and, while the treatments themselves make me weak and achy for a few days, I’m well aware that many others are not as fortunate. All that could change for me tomorrow, of course. For now, though, I am blessed.

[Read more…] about In Chemoworld

Disease, treatment (and faith) revisited: Ten years of “Embraced by God”

Steve · February 5, 2017 · 2 Comments

This past month I celebrated a few milestones. It has been ten years since I was first diagnosed with a rare blood disease called Langerhan’s Cell Histiocytosis and embarked on a three-year journey of disease, treatment, recovery and remission, and seven years since I finished the manuscript for my book, “Embraced by God: Facing Chemotherapy with Faith.”

In celebration of all that (yes, even the disease, which changed my life positively in so many ways) I am going to publish a series of excerpts from my book over the course of February. If you know someone for whom these words might be of help, please feel free to pass them on. The book is now out of print by my publisher, although some copies might be available out there on the internets. I also have a supply gathering dust in the basement, so let me know if you’d like to purchase a copy for yourself or to pass on to someone you love.

Additionally, I will be giving a retreat based on my book this summer from July 14 – 16 at the Marianist Retreat and Conference Center just outside St. Louis. “Embraced by God” will be a weekend retreat exploring the spirituality of living with cancer and other chronic diseases.

Embracing the Mystery

True faith has nothing to do with jollying people along. It has everything to do with facing the fact that things may be an utter and total mess, may be on the verge of going to hell in a hand-basket, with the conviction that God is at work in the mess.

– Michael Himes

For some mysterious reason, my body has decided to throw a wrench into my otherwise very good life. Even though I’ve been basically healthy for a while now, and my treatments haven’t overly disrupted my everyday life, this disease and its treatment have changed me in many ways – some of which I may never even realize. And even though my doctors and nurses are wonderful, and I’m surrounded by caring friends and family and all their prayers, there is no doubt that this whole thing encircles and encompasses me. It is the great and brooding mystery of my life. So I’ve been thinking a lot lately about mystery.

Living with Expectation, Gratitude and Availability

Steve · January 1, 2017 · 14 Comments

“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn.” – Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Somehow, it’s January 1 once again. We have made yet another trip around the sun. I’m not one for making public declarations of my resolutions (although I do need to step up my walking and watch my portions once again…) but today I return to a question that might lead to a good resolution for all of us to consider on this first day of a New Year: How do we begin each day?

The older I get, my biological clock seems to be replacing the digital one beside my bed. On most days I awake a few minutes before the mechanical one goes off. So waking up is not a problem. Especially when you consider the alternative! I used to joke that I rarely saw the sunrise (“You mean to tell me that there are TWO six o’clocks?”) but now on most days I’m up before the day is. The question is, HOW do we wake up?