Giving Life

As I sit here this morning giving blood, I’m feeling very reflective and contemplative about the power and the significance of responding to our promptings. 

A month or so ago, I saw a flyer. One for a blood drive. My immediate thought was “I should do it”. That thought tried to be fleeting like so many other of my “I should do it’s”. It tried to escape in the chaos of the mundane. Of the busy and frantic of the holiday season. The enemy is really cunning like that. He wants you to forget your significance and your prompting. His best strategy is the busy. It keeps us distracted enough to prevent us from being significant. Or too busy to FEEL. This time, however, God was persistent. As in, heart-wrenchingly, action provoking persistent. The images of myself 8 years ago flooded my memories. Weeks of loss and pain and fear as I endured ultrasounds and blood draws and words like “miscarriage” then “ectopic pregnancy”, “not compatible with life”, “life threatening emergency” were spoken at me while I struggled to make sense of them. To comprehend and feel the weight of these heavy words. Falling back into seeing and FEELING the exact day weeks later that I was told I was no longer pregnant. That the chemo drug did its job. That my HCG levels were practically zero. (As if that wasn’t a hard enough realization, right??) But that very night, collapsing to the floor in pain that cannot be described. I had this overwhelming disbelief that my tube couldn’t be it. It couldn’t be ruptured. Even after all the warnings that it would likely kill me if I didn’t get to the ER right away.... but, my levels were zero. I had endured enough. It didn’t make sense. So instead of responding right away, I justified it as a stomach bug and asked for help into bed. I fell asleep immediately- most likely passing out from shock- as the bleeding filled my abdomen. By a miracle alone, I woke up around 3 AM. Unable to breathe without gasps. Feeling intense pressure under my heart and lungs, I woke Chadd up to take me to the ER. I was in surgery less than 20 minutes later after a CT revealed massive internal bleeding. I had lost so much blood that I required 2 transfusions to restore my body. The surgeon told us how “lucky” I was. Another 30 minutes asleep and I would have bled to death. It’s taken this full 8 years to grasp that. To feel the weight of being that close to death. That close to missing out on knowing and loving and serving God. That close to missing out on a Hadley and a Greyson. Oye that’s heavy. But makes me all the more grateful that God had a plan for my life. While it was close for ME, it was never close for Him. It was done to me according to His will. He knew. It was preparation for a more significant life. I usually don’t recall much of this story because so much of my life was restored after that. But on this day, the day with the blood donation flyer, God kept it present. I think it was a reminder of significance. On one of the most defining, painful, lowest points of my life... someone else had been there to save me. God is funny like that. He could do it alone. Clearly. But he chooses to work THRU us. Someone else had been prompted days?.. weeks...? before, weaving their story (and literally their cells) among mine as part of a restoration plan. I think the same can be said about lots of things we are prompted to do. I’m obviously not saying that everyone should give blood. But I think we can all improve how attentive we are to the prompts we are each given. Whether it be to be givers financially, emotionally, with our volunteering. God is prompting all of us. Guiding us to step into our callings. There are always needs being met that we may never know about when we respond. Ways that we are meant to contribute to significance. But this means taking action to those prompts in order to contribute to a ripple that may drastically impact a life, a moment, possibly even the universe. Today, this is just me responding to a prompt. Choosing to be on the giving end of a need that I know deeply. Having no idea of the story that lies at the other end of this IV. But, knowing the significance of being on the receiving end of that prompt. And seeing firsthand that it is, indeed, life giving.