Tip of My Iceberg

“My armpits are killing me.”

After crutching around for a week because of a severely sprained ankle, Deb was longing to give her shoulders and underarms a break. She’s part of a year-long mission trip to Puerto Rico to work with college athletes, and the trip has had to be postponed for a bit. Due to her inability to move. Well.

Life is so inconvenient.

Her plans have gotten messed up. By a soccer game. She’s not been whiney. Just needy.

Trust me. She doesn’t like being needy.

Who am I kidding? I’ve fallen into that mindset as well. It changes life when I need to help someone who really is unable to help themselves. Perish the thought that I’d be needy.

I’m not being whiney. Annoyed, yes. But not whiney.

We’d both been looking forward to her orthopedic appointment with the ankle guy. Specialists abound in the world of joints, ligaments and bones, so Deb saw a man who only looks at ankles.

He manipulated, pulled, turned and maneuvered her ankle. Said it was indeed sprained. No torn ligaments. She’d need physical therapy.

She concurred. Only it would have to be done in Puerto Rico.

Which was when she asked him for a boot. Something to get through airports easier than crutching. Something that would allow a little more mobility.

He was quite agreeable. And gave her the boot.

So she walked on it. Needing to finish things up before she left on her trip.

By the time she took off the boot several hours later, her ankle was swollen and bruised. Again.

She’d had several people warn her about not overdoing it too quickly. Folks who’d told painful stories of re-spraining within days of resuming “normal” activities.

Deb sometimes acts as if she’s invincible. That if she sets her mind to something, it will happen just as she imagines.

I’m no different. Pull up my bootstraps, put on my big girl pants and get the job done.

I’m not good at being needy. The mantra of Mom’s voice plays in my head: Don’t be beholding to others. Don’t ask for others to do for you what you can do for yourself.

But there are times when I’m in desperate need of help. Of someone to be there for me. A listening ear. A present person.

It’s a struggle to admit that. To own that need. To receive help from others.

To let them in to see my junk.

God knows my need. He knows how limited I really am.

“For He knows how weak we are; He remembers we are only dust. Our days on earth are like grass; like wildflowers, we bloom and die.”   Psalm 103:14-15

I have limitations. Allowing others in is a challenge because I can be fearful of what others will think of the real me. If they really knew me.

God knows me, my limitations, my needs. And loves me with a passion I can’t begin to understand.

That’s a truth that kicks at my logic.

With or without a boot.