You heard in the 3 previous blog posts about how my friend Ruth and I had the opportunity to hear Sandi Patty at Carnegie Hall.  The fun we had in New York, and how great the concert was.  You also heard about how I didn’t sleep at all the night after the concert, and cancelled my trip to LA, where I was supposed to have a voice lesson.  How I was both disappointed, and experienced joy and blessing in the day when I was supposed to be in LA.

But that isn’t the end of the story.

You see that night of not sleeping was the second in little more than a week.

The first was the weekend of the wedding of Sarah’s son.  When that happened I was a little scared, but after a few days it was pretty much forgotten.  Now here is was a second time.

Even that wouldn’t have been such a big deal.  Except….

That’s exactly what happened when I first started getting sick in 2011.  These same symptoms. And what had been “normal insomnia” deteriorated into strange symptoms and many nights without any sleep at all.

We had never pinpointed the exact cause, nor had we been able to stop the symptoms when they came.  I just had to ride it out.  And we figured that somewhere in the adrenal support, diet overhaul, hormone therapy, meditation and stress management techniques, that we had cured this thing.

And it seemed as though we had.  Because it hadn’t happened in 6 years.

So here I was in New York, with the second instance in less than 2 weeks.  Racking my brain trying to figure out what could have triggered this.  And scared because the unthinkable had happened.  The thing I feared most – a repeat of my 2011-12 symptoms – had in fact happened.

You know how people say that most of our fears aren’t real?  Who say fear is an acronym for “False Evidence Appearing Real”?  Well, that’s not always true.  Just ask a cancer survivor who gets it again.  Or someone like me, who has a relapse of something horrible.  Sometimes fear is justified.  Sometimes it becomes reality.

I prayed through this, knowing I had a choice to make.  Was I going to live in a state of constant fear, or live in a faith?  It was hard, but I chose faith.  As you saw in Part 3, I also chose to be fully present in the feelings of both disappointment and blessing.

Now isn’t that nice?  See how easily I turned the corner?  Wrapped that up in a neat little package?  Called it done?

Not even close.

Because it happened again, only 6 days after the second time.  And this time I was at home in my own bed, by myself.  Not stressed.  No foreign environment.  No different food.  Nothing unusual.

And now I’m really freaking out.  Now the choice I made to live in faith seems harder to make again.  Because now it feels like a trend.  Perhaps the start of something again.  And since we had never really figured it out the last time, I don’t know what it might be the start of.

What I do know is that I hate feeling like I can’t trust my body to perform when I need it.  To know that I may have to cancel any plan I have at a moment’s notice – all because I haven’t slept.  To know that every time it happens I get a little more worn down than the last time, because the sleep deprivation is cumulative.

So no, it isn’t wrapped up with a bow.  It’s impacting a lot of my life including my voice, as it takes a while to recover from nights of not sleeping at all.  Right when I was starting to build momentum in my new life.  No, It isn’t done.  I don’t know what it is.  I just know that I’m scared.

Again, I have to choose.  How am I going to live in light of this situation?  It may never happen again.  Or it may.  I don’t know.  And the not knowing is so hard.

Right now I’m choosing faith.  I’m choosing joy.  I’m choosing to be fully present with the pain of the unthinkable happening again.  To be fully present with the uncertainty of tonight.  Tomorrow.  Or the nights to come.

That doesn’t mean I never worry.  Sometimes I do.  And then I breathe.  Practice everything I know how to do.  Trust the one who created me and watches out for me.

I don’t want to miss the blessings of today while worrying about tonight or tomorrow.  I don’t think you do either.  I know it isn’t easy to live in the space you’re living, whether it be uncertainty, pain, stress, or disappointment.  Yet, there are blessings in every day too.  Sometimes it’s just that we can breathe clean air.  Or drink fresh water.  Or the sun came up.  Or that we have food in the fridge.  And the power is on.  Though it can be hard to look for those blessings, it’s important.  Because otherwise we’d miss so much joy and richness.

As I said in my last post, when you open your heart, it’s big enough to experience both joy and grief at the same time.

Are you willing to embrace the uncertainty?  Dance with the fear that isn’t necessarily False Evidence Appearing Real?  Not every minute, but at least some of the time?  We can do it.  Together.  Know I’m pulling for you as you’re pulling for me.  And please share your story in the comments.  Fears lose their bite when said aloud.

Previous “Unexpected” Posts

Opportunity Calls

So Many Blessings

Disappointment