Praying mantis arms...

The end of April 2025 will mark 14 years since the onset of polyradiculitis...

In late April 2011, my sister was visiting from Florida. We met at a restaurant to celebrate my birthday. As I shared about my new pet-sitting service, I told her that I had to purchase a smart phone to run the business. I then said, as I balanced my newly acquired, palm-sized computer in my left hand, "These smart phones sure are heavy." 

Little did we know what was about to transpire... 

Within a week, all my limbs suddenly turned to rubber...

My sister later shared, "I thought it unusual when you made that comment because smart phones are not heavy..." 

  

It took two years and eight doctors to receive a proper diagnosis.

It took another three years to discover an underlying cause.

~*~

Journal entry, 4/13/25

Settle Carol...
Yes, I feel I've experienced a shift...
It probably began on March 21, 2025...

That is when I (again) began to consciously walk and hold my body in better form, and I began to use my arms differently. 

I've lived with praying mantis arms for over a decade, though I used to get relief with cervical spine trigger point injections and lumbar epidurals. 
Every six weeks, for over eight years, I'd received some sort of injection(s) into my spinal cord area.

My last lumbar epidural was the week of April 11th, 2022; I think I received it on Thursday, April 14, 2022. 

Little did I know it'd be my last...

On April 28, 2022, I landed in the hospital for three nights; two good-sized blood clots, one in each lung. 

I and my wellness team were all stunned. 

I was then told that any more epidurals were too risky; the combination of epidurals and blood thinners is a high-risk recipe for paralysis. 

I became terrified... 
Without the epidurals, how could I remain mobile?
That same week, one of my providers began offering low-level laser therapy.
It's proven to be a godsend. 

Still without the lumbar epidurals, the cervical trigger point injections did not work as well. 

I gave them up too (in addition to the epidurals). 

It's all steroids; the tiny relief I got with the cervical injections didn't justify the side effects. 

My arms, already suffering from muscle atrophy, weakness, and shooting pains, became weaker, especially my biceps. 

Thus, praying mantis arms became my norm, until the last weekend of March 2025. 

Praying mantis arms: When a person has to keep their arms, from their elbows to their shoulders, close to their torso for support. If one has to reach, she moves super slow, concentrating, supporting the arm hopefully mitigating any kapow-bang-drop response.

Sigh... 
Do I really want to write about this? 
Haven't I written enough about life with polyradiculitis, whom I've come to name Poly Rad? 
To personify it seems to somehow lessen the fear.
Why is that?

Does personification bring it out of the scary condition that it is?
Like bringing it out of the shadows.
Or like exposing that there is no boogey man under the bed. 
Does personification lighten up the heaviness?

Oh my god, the heaviness...
Like my body was filled with iron slivers and Earth was trying to suck me right into her core. 
I would sometimes lay in my backyard, rolling from side to side in tears, looking up at the clouds and trees swaying in the breeze; they made movement look so easy. 

But it wasn't iron slivers in my body.
It was cobalt and chromium slowly poisoning my body from within, a defective hip implant leeching its metals for over eight years.
In 2016, the defective implant was explanted and replaced.
I no longer have the heaviness.

That's a good thing. 

~*~ 

Today, April 15, 2025

My bicep training continues; definitions of tiny bicep muscles are developing. 
I'm practicing to retrain my arms so that I am no longer a praying mantis.

Or maybe I am, just in a human costume.

~*~ 

Trust...

Recently, as I was rereading part of the book of Romans in the Bible, I found myself engrossed in chapters three through five as I read about Old Testament law, believing, and faith.

The section comes across differently when one reads it from a Christian Universalist (CU) perspective instead of an eternal torment or annihilation perspective. 

~*~

Carol, do you feel like writing out your introduction to CU? 

Okay, let me see if I can give it a go without getting caught in the details...

Around September 2006, eleven months after leaving The Way, I was rereading for the umpteenth time the book of Romans in the Bible. But this time I was stopped in my reading tracks as I read Romans 5:12 - 18. This section compares the first Adam (of Genesis) with the second Adam (Jesus Christ). 

According to the Bible, the first Adam's sin brought death to all mankind. All, every single person (and maybe animals too?). And according to this section in Romans, the benefit of Jesus's accomplishments is so great in its undoing of what the first Adam instilled in all mankind (and in the earth itself) that it can't even be compared to the consequences of Adam's action. Is it really that big?  

Wait a minute...

I reread the section again... 

Wow. If that's the case - that Jesus's accomplishment is so much greater that it can't even be compared to the consequences of Adam's sin (which has caused the whole earth to continue in a state of groaning and travailing),wouldn't that mean that all is restored by Jesus' s conception, birth, life, sacrifice, death, resurrection, and ascension... even if one doesn't believe it? All. All. All. What Adam did affected the entire earth. To undo all that, wouldn't that mean that everyone, everyone, is redeemed? Is it really that big? If so, does that mean that Lucifer also is reconciled back to Elohim?

I brought this up with an ex-Way minister who visited our home at the time to teach a small gathering of folks who had recently left The Way. I don't remember his answer other than the beginning of it, "Yeah but..." I can't recall what he said after that, but I do recall what I felt - he was parroting Way doctrine which I already knew. In other words, I'd already thought of the "yeah buts." 

As I reread Romans and pondered the possibility of every single person being redeemed, I thought about "believing" and some ponderings I'd hidden in my heart, even while I was still a Way believer. Even though "unconditional love" was supposedly in the scriptures, I had a hard time seeing unconditional love in the scriptures. To receive God's blessing I had to believe; it was conditional, not unconditional. And believing can be hard work. Though I wondered about that (and a few other things that The Way taught as the rightly divided and only accurate interpretation of scripture), I'd tell myself what I'd been taught -- there must be something amiss with my understanding or with the translation of the scripture. 

Within about three months of seeing this in the scripture and thinking on it, I connected with someone on Greasespot Cafe, the online forum where ex-Way folks gather/ed, who shared with me about Christian Universalism (CU). I'd never heard of such. I thought, Wow. Maybe I can have my cake and eat it too? The only Universalism I was familiar with was Unitarian Universalism. 

I began to study CU. Some of what it taught lined up with doctrine I'd learned in The Way, such as no eternal torment. But The Way taught annihilation of the unbeliever, not eternal torment. A burning hell was in store only for death itself, the devil, and those born of the "seed of the serpent." But they won't burn forever; they (like the unbelievers who don't make it into the third heaven and earth) will cease to exist. 

CU teaches that everybody makes it in; every person will ultimately bow at the name of Jesus Christ - either in this earthly life or after the resurrections of all. 

My favorite book on CU is The Inescapable Love of God by Dr. Tom Talbott. 

~*~

When I reread the Bible these days, I read it from a different perspective than when I was a true believer. When I read the Bible now, I read it not as (necessarily) inspired by God but rather as written by mankind trying to make sense of the world and its happenings. 

Could it be inspired by God?

How do I, how does anyone, define "God"?  

Seems to me any definition of Spirit (i.e. God) would (always?) be lacking, like an insect trying to define humans. 

What of other writings regarding beliefs outside of Christianity? 

Could they too be inspired by God, by Spirit? Me thinks, yes. If such a creator exists, I don't think she/he/it can be defined by a series of words.

So, as I recently reread Romans 3 and 4 and 5 about faith and works and Abraham, something dawned on me. Perhaps, instead of thinking of the word "faith" as "believing," would a reader be better served to think of "faith" as "trust"? For me, this switches the emphasis from the works of the self to a trust in the other. Of course, that means the self believes in the other, yet trust is built over time. And for me, trust is more intimate than working to believe. Trust involves relationship. 

From my journal, 3/29/2025...

What if the "key" to receiving is not believing, but rather trust? 

Believing puts the emphasis on mankind doing: to work to build one's believing. 

Trust puts the emphasis on the "other."

Trust involves surrender and belief.

In order to surrender I must trust and believe the other cares for me.

Trust embodies humility

~*~

I'm still chewing on these thoughts...

Pondering what "trust" means for me...

In what and whom have I trusted...

In what and whom do I trust...

Recalling the oh-so-many times of so-called "answered prayer"...

Answers that have so-often simply unfolded...

These have happened not because of me, necessarily...

Though I do have to at least show up...

Ask, act, accept, adapt...

Trust, trust, trust, trust...

~*~

Treasure Chest....

 As polyradiculitis has stolen so much from my life, I continue to mourn...

Too often, I then judge myself...

The judgement is disguised as, "But think of all the good in your life, Carol..." 

I think of the Homeless, the Bereaved, the Poor, the Orphan, the War-torn...

And I often think of Dad, who lived over 12 years as a quadriplegic. 

If he could appear in bodily form, I think he would agree that even though he couldn't move his body, he found ways to thrive through those years. 

And he couldn't have done it without Mom. 

Recently as I've thought about my current crippled-in-body-and-brain condition, I've thought-felt that I have not allowed sufficient grieving of the piled-up losses. 

And it's not just the losses from Poly Rad, but other losses, some decades old.

Instead of allowing myself to feel into the caverns left by the losses, I try to fill up those caverns with the next thing. 

Can I allow those losses a voice, to speak from the deepest caverns in my soul?

To sit with the losses...

Allow any images to arise...

Ask what is it I am grieving? 

What color is it? 

Where do I feel it in my body?

~*~

When Granddaughter came into the world this past May, I felt joy and some trepidation. Joy in that she is healthy and that her parents love her dearly. Trepidation in that, "What will the world be like as she grows up?" I imagine every grandparent thinks something along those lines. I counter this with the reminder that all known living beings have endured through incredible tragedies and sometimes horrendous atrocities; it's part of being alive on this planet. 

I thought I had prepared myself for her arrival - prepared myself emotionally for the fact that I am unable to help with her infant and baby care. Due to polyradiculitis, I am unable to pick her up or carry her or change a diaper. My arms and hands are too weak. The reality of that fact was one more item on my growing can't-do list. 

Some might say, "Don't confess that, that you can't do!" 

The advice is noted, but would they say to the blind, "Don't confess that you can't see!"? 

I guess there's no real way to prepare for many losses, until they arrive. 

And I grieved, for months after her birth, that I was unable to care for my granddaughter, to help out. 

As a response I would continually remind myself of the silver linings...

And then I'd grieve again...

A couple weeks ago, I took a trip to see Granddaughter. It's not an easy drive. I take the interstate and have to drive through Charlotte. Lord, I don't like that close traffic at the speeds one has to drive to keep from being run over. I most always drive the back roads home which takes over three hours, but at least I'm not wracked by the constant vigilance of zooming among giant tin cans on wheels. 

This last visit with Granddaughter was the most joyful I'd experienced. She can now sit up and crawl. And she loves music!!! I used to "teach" preschool music, singing and dancing with little people. So, this last visit, as she sat in front of me and me in front of her, our eyes and energies connected, as we bopped and clapped our thighs and laughed. 

Son said to me, "Mom, that was a real help. I was able to get some uninterrupted clean-up done in the kitchen. Thanks!" 

My heart sang...

I found my niche...

As Granddaughter gets older, I'll take my big bag of musical instruments...

It can be Memaw's Music Bag...

That is a rich life Carol...

Despite the losses, and maybe in part because of them, you have a huge treasure chest...

And there's still room in it for more...

~*~

One of the songs we shared...

Cypress Choral Music with All God's Critters...