Unashamed to Heal

I have a knack for gaining injuries to my extremities in the most unusual ways. Once, I fractured my finger on the carpet, believe it or not. Another time, I burned my hand on a waffle iron when I absentmindedly reached for the handle but instead planted the entirety of my palm on the hot grid. Even stranger yet, as I was opening a kitchen drawer one day, without warning, the front of the drawer freed itself and came crashing down on my toes.

While I have healed from all those strange injuries without much difficulty, I have not fully recovered from one, a sprained ankle some years ago. It was my first time at a trampoline park, and I was practically in heaven. I jumped from one trampoline square to another like a pawn on a checkerboard and even shot some hoops. On my last jump, I came down, not on the springy rubber mat, but on the sturdy frame that separated the many miniature trampolines.

In an instant, I was in excruciating pain. Only a few moments before, I had been laughing as I jumped to my heart’s content, but now my face wore only a grimace of agony as I sat on the ground clutching my ankle holding back tears. There was no way I could walk, so my dad carried me out of the gym to the car. I could not help but feel slightly embarrassed at what it must have looked like to see an eleven-year-old girl in the arms of her father like a baby.

After sitting in the hospital room for several hours into the wee hours of the morning, the physician’s assistant brought in a white splint that I was to wear around the outside of my foot for support and a pair of gray crutches. “You’ll need these for about two weeks,” he said as he adjusted the crutches. My heart sank as he said those words. Two weeks? Impossible! I thought. I had school on Monday, and I could not let anyone see me like this! The feeling of embarrassment that I felt as my dad carried me out of the trampoline park started to crowd my mind as I hobbled out of the hospital on crutches.

When I got home, I resolved I would walk through the door on my own the following Monday morning. After hopping to my bedroom, I tossed the crutches aside and forced myself to stand. It was painful, but I was determined to look “normal” when I returned to school. I took several baby steps with the pain radiating through my ankle. But I was doing it! I was walking all on my own! Sure enough, the next week, I limped into the school without my crutches to lean on.

While I could not disguise my injury, it was less conspicuous than swinging with crutches under my arms. However, little did I know that my decision to save face would reap consequences that would last longer than two weeks. Since then, I have experienced intermittent pain in that ankle, which correlates with that injury. From time to time, when my foot throbs, it is a painful reminder of my decision those years ago.

Had I realized that I would be causing long-term effects to my health, I would have stuck with the crutches, despite knowing I would be the recipient of countless questions about my injury and offers for assistance. Yet my pride took hold of me, and rather than appear weak, I was willing to compromise my physical wellbeing, not only then but for the future.

From that experience, I have learned a valuable lesson about healing, not just physically but emotionally. Our emotional health is just the same; we must be willing to be healed even if we appear vulnerable.

Sometimes when we experience dark mental struggles, we refuse to acknowledge our feelings because we do not want people to see our brokenness. We do not want to look weak. More than anything, we want to look brave and formidable —that we have got everything under our control. Nothing is worse than being in need, so we refuse to lean on God and others for support. We prefer to push through the pain and limp through life’s journey alone. While the pain may lessen over time as we force ourselves to adapt, little do we realize that our silent struggle is not over. As we go through life’s walk, thinking we have left the worse behind us, our untreated emotions flare up, catching us off-guard.

However, when we permit ourselves to express our emotions instead of fighting them, we will find lasting restoration and healing. Allowing ourselves to be vulnerable with God and others who care about us may cause initial embarrassment but is necessary for our recovery. As we lean on their arms, we will find ourselves becoming stronger. It may take us more than a few weeks or months even to experience recovery, but it will be enduring and long-lasting.