I had been through my first surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation when I last saw my radiation oncologist. She was asking about mobility in my left arm and I told her that it works pretty well; but sometimes I can feel what seems to me like the plucking of strings on a fiddle. It doesn't hurt; but I notice it each time I stretch my arm farther than I had become accustomed to do.
Dr. Nadia essentially said that's to be expected. She said what happens around a surgery site is that the body forms scar tissue as it heals. If I favor that arm and don't use it enough, the scar tissue will form in the wrong places and over time I will lack mobility and lose some function in that arm if I do not stretch and snap those stray strands of scar tissue.
Our family has also been through a healing process since our sudden and traumatic departure from the life we loved in Ukraine. There are scars in each of our hearts... all similar and yet unique. I realised this week that our farewell tour to Kiev, Kremenchug, and Germany was very much the awkward stretch, which served to snap the strands of scar tissue that had built up in our hearts.
Our coping mechanism at the height of crisis had been one of favoring, babying, and trying to avoid the use of those heart muscles which had grown strongest during our years on the mission field. It hurt. It stung. And there seemed nothing to be done that could ease the pain or hurry the healing.
We will always carry the scars from this particular pruning. Certain times of year and circumstances might bring on the ache of that old wound; but if we had not made the stretch and taken the risk of going to visit, our hearts would always lack mobility and freedom to love another life ~ this new life in America.
We love and miss our friends and pseudo-family over there. I always will carry a specific fondness for all things Ukrainian and melancholy. I am so very glad to be flavored by my life as a missionary and hope dearly to retain that essence.
Still, today I am thankful for the healing, and the liberating peace that has come with the snapping and releasing.
