There's No Place Like Hope

  I have been to two funerals in two weeks. A long time family friend passed away after a long fight with a bad stroke. My family and I attended, tried to console her anguished husband and only son who were left behind. Two weeks later we got the call from her son that his father had been found dead from a self-inflicted gun shot. We made the trek in shock to yet another funeral. Same place, same people.
  I prevailing feeling that I got was "no hope". Suicide can be summed up in those two words I think. It took me back to ten months ago. I was in the hospital and just diagnosed with Lymphoma. A great heaviness enveloped me like a dark cloud. Have you ever felt that way? I know I have. I have even thought the unthinkable. I was making my bed when I came home from the hospital. I was really sick. I happened to remember I have a weapon in my house and my mind started going "there." Family and friend's faces floated past my mind. Who would find me? I finally decided that I didn't want to leave them with that mess. And that is what it is, one big mess. You see, suicide is not an answer at all. On the contrary, it is a big question mark. Throw in a big dose of guilt and you get the picture. The survivors are left with no closure, all the time wondering if they could have done more. I watched my friend's face at the funeral. He looked haggard and worn and full of the grief of not losing one but both parents. It was gut wrenching.
  So what of hope? I believe it is there if we look, even in the small things. After I was determined to live I started to see it. Hey, I just smiled or laughed at a joke. Hey, I was just able to take one more bite of food or shuffle my monkey slippers a few more steps. Wow, look at that bird outside the window. You know, I just love the taste of coffee ice cream. I enjoy the laughter of my children across the dinner table. My little dog sure is soft and follows me around to lie right next to where I hurt. How do they know? And many, many more.
  You know something? Miracles do happen and doctors don't know everything. I am a miracle. I never had to have a bone marrow transplant! 98% of people with Lymphoma do. I am cancer free within a year! I love my short hair so much I keep cutting it! I could list all of the doomsday predictions for my life but why? They were wrong about me and they are wrong about you. No one on this great planet knows how long you will live or how you will respond to treatment. You need to choose life and fight like hell. Prove them wrong and revel in the proverbial jaw drop. Or, "I am amazed at your recovery." A good friend of mine has been diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer and was given gloomy reports. They told her they would probably be unable to operate and that she probably would not make it. Well she did have her surgery and she is making it with flying colors. She came through chemo with hardly any side-effects.
  I can say one thing for sure, our Maker identifies with pain. I believe also that he does not condemn those who find themselves so hopeless and grief-stricken that they can see no way out but a self-inflicted death sentence. I think he would say, "You know, I had so much more for you. We could have gotten through it together. I was listening." I also think that that way out is a selfish thing. It says, "There is no hope."  It leaves way too many people in pain. 
  I am here to click my red Converse high tops and say there is hope. There is someone listening. There are people who care and....there's no place like hope.

Love, Shurie