Yesterday, Cecilia had a seizure while on an outing with her group from
Easter Seals.  Her nurse/habilitation supervisor called me to inform me, and I
pondered again the way my life is intertwined with this individual who is so
very challenged.
It has been a tough couple of months with her.  Since
the first of the year, there are some medication changes going on, and her
behavior, never what you would call pleasant, has been along the lines of
“irritating, aggravating, agitating, restless, and aggressive.”  Before she got
home last evening, I did the necessary calling to the neurologist, state nurse,
pharmacy, etc. and then headed out to an eye appointment with her.  (Yes, blind
people need to have eye exams).
She was strangely quiet. (maybe because
of lingering effects of her 60 second petit mal seizure) This was a blessing to
me.  I had to take Our Girl Nettie along as she was picking up glasses, and I
had a bone weariness that had nothing to do with physical tiredness.  There are
just lots of things going on right now.
We got into the optometrist’s
office, and had a long, long wait.  When we finally got into an examining room,
it was another long wait.  When Dr. M. came in, I was surprised by his
compassion and understanding for me and his gentleness with her.  I detest eye
appointments with Cecilia.  I try not to look while they are lifting the
lids to those lifeless eyes and checking for problems.  The one eye is partially
covered over by tissue, and the other is a dull blue lifeless thing.  The first
time I watched, and ended up crying.  It hurts me somewhere inside to see those
damaged, lifeless eyes and to think how much she misses.  The interesting thing
is that I find the same response among the eye professionals.  They are always
moved and saddened when they check her.  I’ve had one doctor blink back the
tears as he wrote the required report for the state.
Yesterday, the
doctor told me quietly that he believes that, though her blindness was caused by
the high concentration of oxygen in the incubator when she was born prematurely
nearly 60 years ago, he also believes that there is years old self-inflicted
damage there as well.  That really made me sad.
The strange thing is, I
love this gal.  She has lived with us over eight years, and she still has me
guessing alot of the time.  Sometimes I can predict what will set her off,
sometimes I can’t.  She is non-verbal, autistic and blind.  Sometimes I just
wish I knew what would make her happy.
She sometimes laughs.  A high
pitched silly giggle that makes me think she’s done something to make life
miserable for someone.  The interesting thing is that she sometimes cries.  One
morning, after Old Gertrude died, she was sitting at the table, with tears just
running down her face.  I had never seen her cry before.  I said to her, “Oh,
Cecilia-girl.  What is wrong?”  I think I had been playing some of Gertrude’s
favorite music, but somehow I thought that it was related to Gertrude’s passing,
so I said quietly to her, “Are you missing Gertrude today?'” and she cried
harder.
She has taught me so much about patience and biting my tongue
and loving when it is hard.  I’ve come down in the middle of the night and she
will have messed her bed or thrown up (something she can do at will) and I will
get her out and clean her up, change the bed and get her in clean pajamas and
tuck her back in.  She never says thank you.  She often acts like she resents my
ministrations to her.  And if she has a good chance, she will do it again. She
has no concept of what it might cost me, and neither does she care.   When I am
guiding her somewhere, she often does this little twist, jerk, downward pull,
intended to make me fall.  She wants things done on her time, her terms and if
you mess up, she will let you know.  If the phone rings, or one of Certain Man’s
many clocks strikes with Westminster chimes, she will make a loud, grunting
squealing noise to say that she doesn’t like it.  (I assume that is her
autism).
Can you see, people, how we often are with our Heavenly Father?
Think about it.  We get ourselves into terrible messes, and given a good chance,
we do it again.  We often don’t thank Him, we resent His guidance, we have no
concept what His love to us cost Him and neither do we care.  We want things
done on our terms and on our time schedule and if He “messes up” we are sure
that the rest of the world knows about it.  We protest ungraciously against the
things of our lives that we don’t like or that rub us the wrong way.
How
very much greater is His love for us than mine for Cecilia.  I am so
relieved that I can be quite certain that He does not harbor some of the
feelings against me that I sometimes do against her.  And yet, I cannot help but
be reminded of how it must feel to Him when I act the way I do.  It keeps me
humble, it keeps me focused.
And sometimes when I think of how sin has
darkened my eyes and what He must see when He looks there to help me do the best
I can do, I wonder if it makes Him weep.