Myself Almost Despising: Of Miracles and Sadness

Where do you start to think about a miracle? Let's try to find out.

For many people, a kidney disease, especially the kind that I have called End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD), is a death sentence. I say that not to exaggerate and I could not even begin to tell you the many studies on ESRD that talk about morbidity and sudden death. Almost all of the patients I meet at the local dialysis center and the National Kidney and Transplant Institute would probably move Sir John Suckling to extend his poem "Why so pale and wan" into the longer epic poetry. When you have ESRD you always feel sluggish and lethargic because of the high level of toxicity in your blood. And the worst of all feelings, the fear of death.

Dialysis cannot do it all. A dialysis only performs 15% of the kidney's function. A ESRD patient like me (as compared to a normal person) would usually have 1000% blood toxicity higher. That's how bad it is. If you have that much toxic in your blood, you would also be impatient, irritable, forgetful and very prone to depression. Some people I've read about just lose the will to live.

Depression, yes. I've read somewhere that depression is the main trouble of kidney patients aside from their physical infirmity. Simple ideas such as death, life span and cardiac arrest distracts from normal thought. I go to a dialysis center right at a mall where I get to see a lot of people on my way. Sometimes just looking around depresses me because I feel envious about the hundreds of people that are healthy. Then right at the midst of that throng is a poor unhealthy person like me.

Poor and unhealthy, that's the sad mental script. As soon as you let that thought ruminate in your mind, then the floodgates of depression will start rampaging in: blame, anger, resentment, despair, loneliness, shame, scorn, destruction.

And then you just stop. Stop like life is no longer to be cherished, to be thankful for. You stop thinking of other people -- most hurtful of all is that you stop thinking of the people you love. All you ever think about is yourself and how miserable you are. You start to despise yourself.

To despise oneself is a horrible plight. It makes you shout angry words at loved ones. Or demand entitlement. Or live in fear, paranoia . . . pain. The pain of a despicable condition, the pain of having to reflect on imminent death. It goes with you on the breakfast table, your solitude, your conversations with your children and even in your sleep. If there is one image that would best capture it is a knife stabbed on your side. You could think of discomfort, of fear, of pitiful agony, of hopelessness -- all rolled into one experience: you.

Yet many of these things, believe it or not, happen in the mind. The physical infirmity occurs in short intervals such as a horrible looking needle to be inserted on your arm or muscle pain after prolonged activity. That to me is bearable. But the thing of the mind is one that confounds me all too often. The mind is a very powerful thing. It is like a ship's rudder, directing where the ship goes. In this case the ship is your life.

There needs to be a transition that has to happen in the mind to overcome this gnawing sadness. There are many reminders that tell us to move from one emotional status to a better one. In my case, one of them reminders is Shakespeare's Sonnet 29.

This particular sonnet is a very important piece of poetry for me. Back in the 90s, I wooed my wife (who was then just a close friend) using this sonnet. We were in a bookstore and I pretended to be surprised upon seeing a book of Shakesperean sonnets in the shelf. I flipped the pages to sonnet number 29. My wife didn't know that I memorized this sonnet when I was in college. I faked fumbling reading the first lines whereupon I put the book back to the shelf while still reciting the rest of the poem, dropped myself on one knee as if proposing and finished the concluding couplet:

For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Up to this day, that we would talk about that event as the most romantic episode of our simple love life.

These days Sonnet 29 resurfaces but this time I'm dropping on both knees understanding the place of faith in all of this. Before I continue, let me just give you a very brief look at this sonnet I'm talking about.

Shakespeare and Myself Almost Despising
In Sonnet 29, Shakespeare structures this short lyrical poetry in two major sections. There is the anguish:

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

And then there is the resolution to the anguish:

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

I understand that Shakespeare addressed this sonnet to a love interest (reason for my using it to woo my wife). Yet the structure shows a certain struggle to overcome adversities, in his case a "despising" of oneself. It has a anguish-resolution transition -- an invitation for us to consider in times of difficulty.

The Challenge to Overcome
It is easier to confront situations when it is still readily reversible, such as a financial problem, a heartache, a fatty liver or high cholesterol diagnosis, or even an ordinary marital conflict -- than a situation like ESRD that would involve a lot of financial difficulty (Php. 4500/dialysis twice a week), a kidney transplant (approx Php. 1.6M expenses) and post-transplant crisis (possible kidney rejection and a whopping Php. 100k monthly on drugs and hospital stay for first three months). That puts your problem in perspective, doesn't it? LOL.

The challenge to overcome for people like me begins at 4 o'clock in the morning. It is a time to meditate and open my eyes to the beauty of life or "Haply I think of Thee, and then my state" -- or more specifically, open my eyes of faith.

At one level a man must have a resolve to fight off depression. But on a deeper level that fighting off has to be anchored in a favor. Not just of a human kind but of a God kind. Faith. A person fighting off depression at least must come to the understanding that behind his ability to FIGHT is a FAVOR from God. Faith. The idea that it is a favor from God starts with the gift of life. The life that is very meaningful. Yes I do have a sickness that can make me hate everything. But is it fair to hate everything? or to hate at all? Does my life mean hate? I have beautiful kids. Biboy is 7 months old. Eula is 4 years old. Jotham is a good-looking, lanky, smart 13-year old honor student. On top of it all is a beautiful wife who belongs to the top three kindest people I know (the other two are missionaries). If my life means hate then I understand why many people give up on life for there is nothing to cherish in hate. A hateful person is a sad person.

Then there is also the deepest level of all, the favor of God for salvation. These days I take hope in many of the promises of God. Almost always, I try to shape my mind and my life with the promises of His Word like Psalm 46:1-3

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.

It is easy to be shaped by grief, pain, resentment, etc. and apply those misgivings to other people or the difficult events in life such as "the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea."  It's easy to despise life with that but it will also shape me into the thoughts of my heart. Despicable thoughts, despicable me. The salvation that comes from Jesus Christ is a truth that can shape a person even when he is followed around by infirmity and emotional travails. The salvation coming from Jesus overcomes "my thoughts almost despising" and assures it with a lot of life-shaping truths such as love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, etc.

There is a favor called salvation and it begins with belief in the GOSPEL found in Holy Scripture.

The Bible tells of Jesus who was sent to earth by the Father to live a sinless life, suffer persecution and death by crucifixion from people to redeem His people from the sin that started with Adam and continues to this day. He rose from the dead and then ascended back to heaven. That was the perfect story of victory over sin and death. That is the GOSPEL. That is favor of the One who has the power to redeem people like you and me who sin by being bitter, resentful, scornful, liars, adulterers, thieves etc. -- despicable. One continues a path of depression if the despising of oneself arrests any form of good sanity. The salvation that comes from Christ is a salvation that overcomes that despising and moves the person to kneel before God and ask him for help. When a person believes the GOSPEL that person begins to see the overcoming power of God even against those who think there is no longer hope. There is a special favor that comes for a person who believes the GOSPEL and that is the favor of redemption and victory over sin.

Through the Gospel, God redeems a person from the "thoughts almost despising" and take that person to a realization

(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Realizing that, where do you start to think about a miracle for your life? You start with Jesus.