March Madness

I do love basketball. And I wish Butler had won the final, having spent some time on the campus recently and cheered on the team with the Caponis. But this post isn't really about that, as I'm sure you have guessed. Instead, it is about the blessedness and brokenness that has befallen me this March. It is about how God is calling me to new and deeper growth. It is about the love that has been shown to me by community. And it is about the hope of the resurrection. 

On March 4th I got sick. I was out with one of my communitymates and a group of Peruvians in Cusco and I started feeling funky. Fever, chills, stomach hurt some too. We decided to go home to Andahuaylillas, about a 45 min taxi ride away. Along the way, though, I started feeling worse, and at some point I fainted. Because of the high fever and lots of medication, I was incredibly confused and didn't even realize I remembered a lot about that night until recently. For example, I remember feeling like I was going to fall when the taxi driver carried me into a medical clinic in Urcos, just past Andahuaylillas. I also remember the shot they gave me was the most painful shot I've ever had. I got the shot in my upper butt area, and my entire right leg was in pain. And I got it twice. I had shaken pretty badly through it all, so I was taken back to Cusco and hospitalized until March 7th. They did an MRI on me, an EEG scan (checking out my brainwaves), and I had some GI infection. The Cusco doctors put me on an anti-seizure medication because they didn't know what the shaky convulsions were.

I went home the night before my birthday. I was scared. I was confused. American doctors I had talked to were urgently recommending I seek medical treatment in the US. It started the conversation. I was feeling really weird too. I was always tired. I had dizzy spells. I couldn't hold a conversation because it was so difficult to focus. That especially was difficult for me. I sometimes felt a kind of heat in the back of my head. Completely spacy. And shaky too. 

I was medically evacuated from Peru. I had to say goodbye to Andahuaylillas. I had just gotten there. I had to say goodbye to my life as a JV. I had to say goodbye to my community, who took care of me through the mess of it all. Who cared enough to suffer with me. And to love. I had to say goodbye to all the hopes, expectations, desires. And I wept. 

I went to Indianapolis, where my communitymate's family took care of me. I got a special MRI done, more EEG scans, a chest xray, bloodwork. I got to wear funny hospital clothes. Culture shock was immediate. Everyone was so nice to me. And they spoke my language. And they explained to me what was happening. And they had funny accents. 

And the sky looked different. The sky in Andahuaylillas is a brilliant bright blue. The sky in Indianapolis was a softer blue, beautiful in its own right, but different. The sky in Los Angeles fades into the dusty polluted horizon. The bananas in this country look perfect too. And its a bazaar experience to drink out of a water fountain after having to be so careful about boiling water to drink. 

Thank God, I got the best news possible about my health. I didn't have a seizure and I won't have one. I just had a self-limiting infection with fever that made me pass out, and now that I actually remember it, I wasn't even passed out for that long. My body shook as it was fighting the infection. I was overdosed on the medication, and that caused all the other problems. I didn't even need the medication in the first place, though we didn't know that before, of course. The level of medication in my blood was so high that the doctor called on the weekend to tell me to cut the dosage in half, even though he hadn't made his final assessment yet. And, I had forgotten to take that pill that day, so it should have been even higher. Once I got off the medication, I could think clearly again. It was remarkable, the difference. Scary, even. And I started remembering what happened the day I got sick. Freaky, what a pill can do to you. 

I'm now back in Covina with my family. I visited LMU the day I flew in. I've gotten to talk to some friends, beautiful people in my life. I went on a 5 day silent retreat. As they say in sanskrit, sukha, sweet. 

I said this post was about blessedness and brokenness. I think you get the brokenness part. My life was literally flipped upside down. I thought I had 2 years in Peru. I only had 4 months. I've wept through that loss. I've held that pain. It's the kind of thing that tests your inner strength. Actually, it tests everything about you. You must ask yourself what you believe in. Who you are. It demands your most disciplined self to do what you must.  I'm struck by my own resilience. I've been through shit before, I knew I could get through shit again when it came. And it did. I guess I was right. 

The blessedness is more tremendous than the brokenness, though. Thank God. Just pure gratitude. To my community in Anda, for being with me through the suffering. Especially to Cara, who stayed with me through the nights, and sang with me. To Margaret and the JVC IPO, for doing everything they could to take care of me. To Margaret especially, for honoring my pain and listening. To the Caponi family for taking me in and getting me to the best doctors there are. To all the jesuits and nuns I have talked to in Indiana and back here in SoCal, who have offered their wisdom and help. To all those who found out what had happened in some way or another, and who have added their prayers to my life. For my health. For life. For freedom. For love. 

Through it all, though, I'm actually doing well. A lot of people have asked me how that is possible. The spiritual director I saw during my silent retreat was so surprised when she realized I have only been back for 3 weeks that she almost yelled at me, "you should be depressed!!" But, I'm not. I'm not even in denial. I'm not in shock anymore, either. Instead, there is actually a deep current of peace moving through, that I've been doing the right things. I think they call this grace. I've had deep confirmation that I am going in the right direction. I feel myself opened. More trusting. I realized more deeply how much I believe in the values I tried to live as a JV. And how I want to and will live those values now and every day afterwards. I guess that's part of what they mean when they call us "ruined for life."

I don't know what will happen now. But I do know that, especially in this time of Lent, there is a promise of resurrection. That through the desert, through the journey, the struggle, even in the joy and peace, there is more to come. There is resurrection. We risk the dying that leads to rising. God comes and raises us up to new life. But until I get to see the empty tomb, I wait. I pray. I search. And I trust that God is already and always with me. 

Go in peace, your faith has saved you.