A LOVE LETTER

Posted on May 19, 2023

A LOVE LETTER to you, the one living with a loved one diagnosed with a life altering illness. I've got you!

I believe you have the power and strength to get out of the fear, hopelessness, stress, impatience and chaos that you’re currently living in as a result of your loved ones diagnosis, and the solution is to change the way you think about your situation. One thing that no person or situation can take away from us is our hope. The Bible says that true hope is unseen. If we can be hopeful for one thing, we can be hopeful for everything, such as contentment, complete healing and a better life.

Learning how to take control of your thoughts will help you better handle any future difficulties because our circumstances are evidence of our thoughts. I’ve lived this first hand through my husband’s cancer diagnosis. First, I had to face my feelings of fear, anger, frustration, hopelessness and overwhelm before I could experience hope and joy in my life again. Once I realized that I can choose to hold onto a thought or let it go, I started changing my perspective on his illness and all of the issues surrounding it and focused on God’s promise of hope. My outlook on the future steadily improved to the point where I no longer live in the fear of what if but now look through the lens of hope and faith. I live in the place of complete healing, where he’s already healed, and life has a very promising outlook.

It is difficult enough to learn that your loved one has received a life changing diagnosis. You’re already riddled with paralyzing fear around the illness, the recommended treatments and the prognosis given to your loved one by the medical community. Add to that the overwhelming impact this disease has had on your finances, relationships, faith and freedom. Your emotions are out of control, your life is in chaos, and you long for the way life used to be, even if it wasn’t all that great. You feel alone and like you have no one to talk to about what you’re going through, as all of the focus is on the person who is sick. You have tried talking to friends or family, but they don’t really understand what you’re going through and don’t know how to react, so they avoid you. You have tried counselors, but they focus more on the past, and you need help with the present and future. Perhaps you have relied on google to help you find relief or answer your questions, and that has led to even greater fear and confusion. You may even pretend that everything is fine because this is all too hard to face. Maybe you’ve done nothing at all because you don’t even know where to start. It’s not your fault that you have little or no direction. There is a lot to untangle when your loved one faces a life altering diagnosis.

You might be struggling with finances because you are missing a lot of work because you have to be the caretaker. Or your spouse can no longer work as many hours, if at all, because he/she is sick all the time or has so many doctor appointments that it interferes with the job. The bills are piling up and the income is going down, and you worry about where the money will come from to pay for the out of control health costs. You might even be to the point where you have collections breathing down your neck while you’re wondering how you’ll pay for food next month. You’re in a situation where you have to decide between keeping the lights on or putting gas in the car knowing that covering the health costs must be a priority. The stress seems never ending.

Add to that all of the lifestyle changes your family has had to go through as a result of the diagnosis. With the necessary changes in his/her diet, you have to learn how to shop and cook differently. Some of the family members don’t want to participate in the new lifestyle, so you have to decide if you’d rather put up with their complaining or cook 2 different meals. Buying healthy, clean foods costs more and adds more heaviness to your already overburdened budget. It takes more time than usual to find new recipes, and the homemade meals take longer to prepare than the ready made processed foods you used to eat. You’ve also had to go through your house and remove all of the toxic products from toiletries to cleaning supplies and replace them all with expensive, safe ones which took much research and time.

Along the way, you’ve lost yourself. In addition to your usual tasks, you take on more of the tasks your spouse can no longer do. You struggle to find time for your own self-care and hobbies that help keep you grounded. Your personal health is neglected because you don’t have time to work out or get needed sleep. You’re running yourself into the ground each day on minimal energy. You would love just a couple of hours a week to just get away from it all and just do something for yourself.

Relationships have changed in ways that are confusing and scary, and you struggle with how to relate to your loved one. You’re already overwhelmed with the other changes, and now you find yourself feeling guilty because you’re not the sick one. You question why it’s not you and feel like it’s wrong to feel joy when your loved one is fighting the illness. Besides intimacy issues, you might not share the same level of faith or outlook on the future which makes it difficult to set shared goals.

You’re frustrated because you have all of these different activities and emotions going on in your life, and you don’t know where to turn for help. No one really seems to understand what you’re going through, and you end up feeling alone, lost, helpless and confused. All you want to do is find hope, but you can’t even focus on that because you don’t know how you’re going to pay your bills, find the time to handle your usual responsibilities or even take time for yourself. Your relationships are suffering because the illness becomes the focus, and extreme stress rules your days. You are feeling a myriad of different emotions that just weigh you down, and you’re just too tired to even keep trying. So you go through your days carrying the load so your loved one can focus on getting well, all the while falling deeper into despair and finding it hard to be physically or emotionally available for anyone.

I’m here to tell you that there is hope. Not only is there hope in the treatment realm as you learn about the many options available that no one told you about, but there is also hope because of God's promises. He is hope and joy! In my opinion, you’re stuck where you are because of how you perceive your situation. You don’t know what’s available to you and your family. You need to stop focusing on the negative diagnosis and issues surrounding it and instead look at it through a lens of hope and look at just taking the next step. You also need to continue to make plans for the future. Vision creates motivation. You need hope and to change your perspective on the illness and all it encompasses.

Our circumstances are a result of our thoughts and beliefs. When we change our thought patterns, we can start to see different results. We are empowered to take control of our thoughts. When you understand the reason behind your thoughts, then you can start to change them. Change can’t happen in your life until it happens in your mind. New thoughts can lead to new energy, vision, hope and eventually improved circumstances.

We will explore your emotions and find the thoughts and beliefs behind them. I will help you discover that you can choose your thoughts and that hopeful thoughts lead to positive outcomes. If you’re tired of the 24/7 stress, contact me for a free Discovery call. Let’s get together and see if you’re ready for me to walk with you into hope and freedom. Message me!

Always Choose Joy!