WHAT IS THE DEFINITION OF AN ANSWERED PRAYER?

I suppose a hard and fast believer would say that every prayer is answered. But what when that miracle doesn’t happen? Does the believer rationalise and say that we don’t know the mind of God and He has his own plan? I seem to have a foot in both camps at the moment.

I do believe that what happened in the hospital last week had to have been divine intervention. To be in hospital for an elective procedure, to have the right nurse on duty who took it on herself to order up two extra blood tests and rally her junior nurses into action during the crisis and for OG to pull through was not logical. That day he was too ill to move to the High Dependence Unit and the next day he was well enough to have a liver biopsy? Hey come on! As I have said before it could have been a “coincidence”, but I don’t think so.

But that was then and now he is deteriorating again. The GP is of the opinion that he actually has something called paraneoplastic syndrome which is a very rare autoimmune condition similar to Guillain-Barre but caused by cancer.

So where are your miracles now? Why would OG have been spared last Wednesday only to continue suffering? I think that an obstacle to belief in a Higher Power can be intellect. So, maybe now is the time to put my intellect outside the door and become, as instructed by Jesus, child like. Children have a great way of looking at things and, above all, trust. You can look for rational explanations but for sure there has to be some things the we just don’t understand.

Well, I may be rationalising here (and I’m sure that members of my family and some of my friends would say that I am) but OG has an irrational fear of being in hospital and needs me near him all the times and this is now being organised for us by local facilitators.

We have had the offer of help from the Marie Curie Rapid Response Team who work from 1500 to 0700, the District Nursing Team who cover daytime assistance, McMillan Nurses, the St Barnabas Hospice at Home Team if we need them and equipment to make things easier for us. Social Services will supply nursing care to help fill in the gaps if/when we ask for it.

Prior to Wednesday I had been knocking my head against a brick wall trying to get help and suddenly the wall disappeared and help is there in abundance. As my mad friend the Contessa would say, again, Praise be to God.