Strangers; yet we are all connected through one terrible word. Tragedy. It's not unusual to see someone crying, overhear a tense conversation, or look at someones face and see suffering. You recognize the look because you feel it too. Some speak a different language but it doesn't matter, you understand each other perfectly.
All of us wait outside those exclusive doors knowing that someone we love is hurting. Someone we love is walking that delicate line between life and death. A bond built on empathy and understanding is made. You're probably the only person who really gets what the other person is going through because you are walking a similar path. You can't help but pour your story out to someone there because they want to do the same. They want to talk about the person they love and so do you.
We are all weary, yet maintain our constant vigil outside those doors; cringing when the staff come out and call your last name. The last time that happened to us, it wasn't good news. It seems like it never is.
We are all battling some kind of war, aren't we? If I have learned one thing from this it has been to never look at another person without considering what they have been through. How easy it is to judge sometimes, how terrible it is that we do it.
Scott is my brother, his situation is so unfair. It's just not right for someone to suffer like he has. I think of the road he has ahead, not only with this current problem, but the next hill, his journey to get a new liver and I just want to scream. I want to pound my fists and ask why he has to go through this. Why do his children have to carry this burden when they should be worried about catching the bus on time? Why do my parents have to face every parent's worse nightmare-the awful possibility of outliving their child?
We're not alone though.
Just today a 36 year old wife and mother passed after having a heart attack. She was traveling with her 16 year old daughter and her husband to California when her symptoms started. How do I know? Because we were feet away from her grieving family, while praying for them and our own loved one.
The parents of a 22 year old son, have been our constant companions in the waiting room. Their son fell from a barn two days ago and has a massive head injury. They live in Randolph.
Another family in the ICU waiting room prays for their young grandson who was in a car accident and hasn't woke up yet.
There are so many more. We all walk around experiencing the same kind of sorrow, worry, and heartache. We talk but words aren't really needed.
It's a difficult place to be outside those ICU doors. It feels insensitive to others to feel joy when your loved one has a good day. You feel their pain when something bad happens to them, because you know it could have been you. You feel badly because you are grateful that it wasn't you.
"Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost." Romans 15:13
"But they that *hope* upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31
**In the above scripture the *word* is wait. According to the Bible dictionary, wait means hope. I took the liberty of replacing "wait" with hope.
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