A One-armed Woman

Hello. My name is Leigh Saxon. I am 40 years old, and I only have one arm. I used to have 2 arms, but on July 14, 2007, I lost an arm. It wasn't in an accident - doctors had been telling me my arm was dying for several years. They told me I had no hope of saving it, but I still tried. Of course I did. What person wouldn't do everything possible to save her arm? We've all heard about medical miracles... I, for one, certainly believe the Lord is still in the business of orchestrating amazing things. So, our family, with the incredible help of an unbelievable support group, embarked on a journey to save my arm. But despite all our efforts, despite all of our research and medical treatments, despite the illogicalness of it, the Lord chose to take my arm away.

Life with only one arm is difficult. Some days are better than others. At my best, I can be grateful that I still have one arm, and I can thank God for the time I had both. I mean, I could've NEVER had that arm, so even though it's absence is huge in my life, I wouldn't trade my "two-armed" days for anything.

But there are also bad days. At times, I look around with jealousy at all the people who have two good arms. I hear them complain about a pain in their elbow or whine because they don't like the size of their wrists, and I just want to scream, "AT LEAST YOU HAVE TWO HEALTHY ARMS! LOOK AT ME... LOOK AT WHAT I AM MISSING... I WOULD LOVE TO HAVE WHAT YOU HAVE! SO STOP YOUR COMPLAINING AND GET DOWN ON YOUR KNEES AND THANK THE GOOD LORD ABOVE FOR YOUR FULL-OF-PAIN, FAT-WRISTED ARMS!"
Fortunately, I haven't ever actually screamed that out loud.

One problem I have is that I really want to be able to look at my one-armed life without seeing what's missing. I want to see the arm that I have, love and appreciate having it, without longing for another one.... without remembering how good life was with both. Well, it's OK to remember that life, I just don't want to long for it to such a degree that I miss the blessing of my life today. But that's hard to do. I mean, my two arms got along so well! They were meant to work together, and they did! It is a constant challenge to see what I HAVE and not to obsess over what I DON'T have.

Life with one arm is possible, it's just difficult. I mean, I can actually survive with only one arm, I just have to get used to doing things differently than I did before. I have to allow myself time to adjust to living differently. I have a different perspective than I used to, and I can choose for that perspective to be a cynical, unhappy one, or I can choose the perspective of promise... God's promise that all of our circumstances here on earth are for the purpose of drawing us into Himself, and equipping us for good works "...which He prepared beforehand."

Recently, I was reading a book that was given to me by another one-armed mom, Marlo. In it, there is an interesting story about an emperor moth. The author writes about witnessing the moth emerge from its cocoon:

The great disparity between the size of the opening and the size of the imprisoned insect makes a person wonder how the moth ever exits at all. Of course, it is never accomplished without great labor and difficulty. It is believed that pressure to which the moth's body is subjected when passing through such a narrow opening is nature's way of freeing fluids into the wings, since they are less developed at the time of emerging from the cocoon than other insects.

All morning I watched the moth patiently striving and struggling to be free. It never seemed able to get beyond a certain point, and at last my patience was exhausted. I thought I was wiser and more compassionate than its Maker, so I resolved to give a helping hand. With the point of my scissors, I snipped the confining threads to make the exit just a little easier. Immediately and with perfect ease, my moth crawled out, dragging a huge swollen body and little shriveled wings!...My misplaced tenderness had proved to be its ruin. The moth suffered an aborted life, crawling painfully through its brief existence instead of flying through the air on rainbow wings.

I want to fly!!... I don't want to crawl. And even though it doesn't make sense to me that I would fly with only one arm, I choose to trust that the Lord is building within me a jet engine... in spite of my efforts to thwart His every move.

And so, I pray that even though I still have those bad days when I am cynical, belligerent and wallowing in my misery, I will recognize the situation as such and make a choice to change my perspective.

Of course, the above is only an analogy. One difference between actually losing an arm and my real life is that no one you're meeting for the first time ever asks, "How many arms do you have?"

Well, every analogy breaks down somewhere...

A Post From a Friend

My dear friend, Judy, sent me this essay about Paul on his birthday. I loved it and hope you enjoy it, too. Thanks, Judy!


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Paul Did Not Die Here

We got the news early in the morning. Paul had gone home. The chains of illness no longer tortured his body. He was finally free from hospitals and needles and feeling crappy. The only glitch - he left behind an army of people who loved him and wanted nothing more than to watch him live out another eight decades on the planet.

It must be hard for the people who saw him on a regular basis and then suddenly did not. Hard for his family, who loved his smile and his charm and most of all his huge, huge heart. Hard for doctors who fought very hard to kill that nasty bug called cancer that felt so at home in his tiny body.

We live two thousand miles away. We did not see Paul every day, or every week. We saw him just a few special times, when he flew to our state to have treatments. We were blessed to have him and Leigh spend weekend days and nights hanging out on our couch and curling up in our huge papasan chair. We soaked up their company as we sat around fire pits and sang campfire songs. It was pure fun to tromp through the woods and throw rocks in the creek to give them a break from hospital routines. Even the drives down to the City and back were a treasure. I got to have long involved discussions with Leigh while Paul and Sam played hot wheels and legos in the back of the car. It was always a joy to have them in our company and in our lives.

And because we live far away, we were not able to attend the funeral. I am sure it was an amazing celebration of Paul's life. I'm not sure I would have been able to sit through it without weeping. Weeping for the loss of such a special life that touched so many people in six short years.

But because we were not in Texas in the weeks after Paul's death, we did not soak it in, as his everyday friends did. It was just a string of words....'paul died this morning...' that did not compute and did not add up. It is easier for us, even to this day, to let those words evaporate with no holding power.

Because Paul is still alive in New York. A year and a half after his death, he is not gone. I look out my back window and see remnants of a fire pit, covered in snow and hibernating until the spring thaw brings back the circle of lawn chairs. I see Paul, huddled in his mommy's lap, holding a long metal stick that has a smoldering marshmallow dripping off its end. Paul is still here.

I glance over to the bulletin board in my office and see a small pencil drawing on white paper. It is the top view of a hot wheels speed boat, carefully drawn and given to me by a sweet little kid who had worked very hard on it while we drove the long highways to VT and NYC. I can still see his face as he handed it over to me, ready to get rid of it so he could jump into his next creation. That Paul is still very much here.

Sunday will be the day Paul would have turned eight. But he won't be at his own party. He is somewhere sweet, enjoying the good life, and waiting to wrap his skinny little arms around his family again. And his family will have the party and celebrate his life anyway. They feel his lack of presence deeply and may never get used to the fact that he is gone.

But for those of us who live in Upstate New York, Paul is not gone. He was here and he is here, today and every day that his spirit lingers in our home.

Happy Birthday Paul. Wherever you may be celebrating today. You will always be missed. But more than that, you will always be remembered.

Yesterday

First of all, thank you SO much for praying for me and for your amazing support. I am so grateful for that and have seen the power of it in my life many times over.

Yesterday went...well. I was smart enought to get to the hospital about 45 minutes early (I wanted to have plenty of time to wander around and cry so that I wouldn't burst into tears and freak out the poor volunteer coordinator). I pulled into the parking gargage, and started crying as soon as I pulled my ticket. It reminded me of when we first started treatment. Paul was young enough (barely 2) that we didn't have to tell him where we were going when we got in the car. About 10 miles into I35 he would fall asleep. He would wake up right as I was pulling into the garage to get the parking ticket, and he would know where where we were and start crying. Fortunately, that didn't last long. He eventually settled in and accepted the hospital as part of his life. And it was definitely part... a BIG part.

Which, of course, is why it was so tough to go back. Alone. The elevators, the cafeteria, the gift shop, the vending machines, the atrium, the waiting rooms, the stairwells, the SMELL... they are all so much of who he was.

So, for close to an hour, I wandered around and cried. I went to the gift shop and stared at the car section. Paul LOVED going there and picking out a car. Because he owned every last one of them already, I always tried to get him to pick something else. I'd show him the squishy light-up frogs and the multi-colored high bouncing balls, the sticker books and the notepad with disappearing ink. He'd take the time to look at everything, and then he'd pick out a car.... just like 3 others he had at home from the very same place.

I went to the cafeteria and looked at all the vending machines. Paul could ALWAYS find a penny, a dime or sometimes even a quarter in these things. (You people have no idea how much change you leave behind at these things - or how much joy a nickle can bring to a 6-year-old). No matter how much pain he was in, he could somehow manage to get down on all fours and look under the machines. Yesterday, I seriously considered doing that myself, but since I was alreay puffy-eyed and crying, I didn't want someone to call security on me!

I went to the 2nd floor surgery waiting area to visit a friend who works there. She lost a son 5 years ago, and has always been such a sweet source of support. The very first time I met her was when Whit was having his second surgery. She's been with me through the many biopsies, port removals and replacements, radiation, etc. I got to hug her neck and cry. That was good.

Oh, yeah... and then there was the interview. It went well. The volunteer coordinator seems like a very wise and patient person. She asked some great questions, I held it together and was able to answer most of them, and then she suggested a few options for me. I will have to go through orientation first (which will be sometime in February), get a TB test, and then I'll be ready to start! Sounds so easy, doesn't it?

The unexpected blessing of the day was running into all THREE of Paul's doctors at once. I couldn't believe it... they just walked around the corner as I was waiting on the elevator. It is truly a miracle because I have never seen all three of them together at once. Anyway, we stopped and talked for a long time. They were very encouraging of my volunteer endeavors, had some wonderful memories to share of Paul, and howled at a Terrill story I told (long story, but Terrill always had quite a reputation for telling the doctors what to do. Recently, he did the same thing when Whit ended up seeing a new doctor for an ear infection which didn't get diagnosed the way Terrill wanted it to. After he got involved, we had a prescription for antibiotics by the end of the day!) I hadn't expected to see any of Paul's doctors, and I got to see all of them. That was good.

After the interview, I had lunch with "Miss Audra." It was great to spend time with her, talk about Paul, and hear how her kids are doing. Paul loved her so much, and she could get him to sit up in bed and play games even when he was feeling crummy. I can remember many times as soon as we were registered and in a room, he would bug me to call Miss Audra. She always came... even when she was working in a different part of the hospital. That was good.

It is a difficult thing... leaving all "that" behind. Paul grew up there. There is familiarity and comfort in the things that remind me of him. The doctors, nurses and child life workers supported us and comforted us when Paul was sick, and rejoiced with us when he was feeling great. They loved him, too. They miss him, too. And that's good.

And I'm fine. Yes, I cried a lot. Yes, I was sad. Yes, I missed Paul in a way I haven't in a long time. But I don't mind. I don't mind crying. I don't mind hurting and being sad. That's what memories do, and I desperately want to keep those memories.

On the way home, I was still sad. Sad that Paul wasn't in the backseat deciding where we were going to eat dinner when we got home.

But, God is good. He is faithful and in control. He collects all my tears in a bottle, and has my name inscribed on the palm of his hand. And that's good.

Small Steps

I have written before about the on-going saga of what to do with my life. It continues...

After Paul died, I deliberately took a year off from any responsibilities. I don't know if I had any specific reasons why, it just seemed like the right thing to do. I do know that my plan was to spend that year praying and seeking God's direction for how I would spend my time (since both boys would be in school). I didn't want to get sucked back into the mundaneness of life.

I envisioned a vision... you know, some great and glorious "sign" from God on what to do... a huge "aha" moment between me and God when everything makes sense and my destiny is revealed. Well, that didn't happen.

And so I waited and did nothing. Afterall, it was clearly the Lord's responsibility to pony up a plan and I was free to do nothing until He mapped it all out for me. And then a friend kicked me in the butt by saying: You know, Leigh, it's kinda like when you've been gone for the weekend, and you come home and the house is trashed. Your husband and children explain to you that they really wanted to clean up, but they just didn't know where to start.

So I prayed about it some more. And I came to a point of realizing that it was really quite simple.... all I had to do was to take the first step. It wasn't up to me to envision where it might lead, because it might lead absolutely nowhere. But I was being disobedient by doing nothing.

Since I had no direction and no idea where to begin, I just started at the only place I knew. One of my first steps was to call Cook Children's about volunteer possibilities. And here I am today, a few steps later, with an interview scheduled for Wednesday. Honestly, I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm not even certain I can make it out of the parking lot. There is no corner of that building that doesn't hold incredible memories of Paul, and I can't imagine walking down the long corridor out of the parking garage, down the stairs and past the cafeteria. I just hope the interviewer has plenty of tissue and a lot of patience. This might be a complete waste of time. But I'm confident that my next step of obedience is to go.

And so, I'm going. And I'm telling myself that I'm doing so without any expectations or agenda of my own. I'm telling myself that I'm doing this simply out of obedience and that I can handle whatever comes of it. That's what I'm telling myself. We'll see...