Scraped Knees

Leah fell down the other day and scraped her knee. This is not necessarily a new occurrence around our house (Brad calls her the clumsy adventurer) but it was the first cut deep enough to bleed. She might have a tiny scar.

Brad and I mourned that our perfect little baby no longer has a perfect little body. Like most parents, I think, we mourn each little cut and scrape and bruise our girls get. They are inevitable, but we wish we could spare them the pain.

The night after Leah scraped her knee, I spoke with my friend Joanna. She is currently at Seattle Children's Hospital with her adorable 2-year-old daughter. Her daughter has cancer. A bad kind.

Most of the time I try not to put myself in Joanna's shoes. Partly because it's painful and partly because she doesn't need my pity. She needs all the hope I can give her.

But that night as we talked, I couldn't help but make comparisons. Joanna told me about some recent tests the doctors have done on her daughter. The tests are supposed to tell them how well her cancer treatments are working. After they get the results, the doctors will decide if they can do surgery. Surgery would be good because it means that the tumors are small enough to remove. Joanna is hoping for surgery. In a way, she's hoping for scars.

I finished talking with Joanna and went into my room and cried.

Because it didn't seem fair that a few hours earlier I had been mourning over my baby's scraped knees.

Sometimes I wish I lived in a bubble and didn't have to hear about the sad and painful and unbearably hard things people go through.

But most of the time I'm grateful. Not for their suffering, but for what I've learned from them. I've seen seemingly simple people go through incredibly difficult things with grace, strength, and humility. I'm grateful for the opportunities I have had to help them even though anything I do feels small and insignificant.

I'm grateful for my incredibly blessed life. I know that someday it will be my turn to go through difficult things. I hope I can do it with the grace and humility that I have witnessed in others.

I think this is the key:

"Fear not, little flock; do good; let earth and hell combine against you , for if you are built upon my rock, they cannot prevail.

Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not.

Behold the wounds which pierced my side, and also the prints of the nails in my hands and feet; be faithful, keep my commandments, and ye shall inherit the kingdom of heaven"
(Doctrine and Covenants 6:34-37)