Stuck in the Bur Bush

Today is supposed to be a special day. Normally we celebrate this day like a second birthday for me. Three years ago, I had surgery to remove a brain tumor. Until a month before I was a healthy twenty-something year old woman. I should be dead. At least that's what the surgeon said. I'm very lucky to be alive. However, this year it's a little bittersweet...
           

This past week I was given the results to a second set of blood work. My doctor assured me that the first test was probably just a fluke, but we would run it again to be sure. It was not a fluke. I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder called Mixed Connective Tissue Disease (MCTD).  My body is attacking itself and there is little I can do about it other than ride this flare up until it's over. It's been a few days and I'm over the initial shock, but I'm hurting and frustrated. This is usually the time of year where I celebrate my health, and instead I'm taking extra medication trying to find it again.

I keep thinking about cockle burs. You know those little balls of weeds that stick to you? They don't hurt at first; you don't even know they are there until something pushes against them and drives them further into you. Although they definitely hurt trying to get them off.

That is how I feel about this diagnosis. It's been there for a while. I've felt it a few times, usually when stress comes by and drives it in. And now I notice and I'm hurting. But I don't want to claim this in my body. I've lived through several things that should have killed me, or at least stopped me in my tracks, yet they haven't. I serve a God who has many names. One of them is Jehovah Rophe, the Lord my healer.

"He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. " - Isaiah 40:29

As much as I know this is in my body, I serve a bigger God than any disease. I don't want to claim this. I am claiming healing. I will be okay. I will get through this. I will shake the burs that are trying to stick to me.
                   

And now I'm going to go do my best to celebrate!