Count Your Blessings

Today was a really tough day for me physically. I was weak, dizzy, nauseous all day, and my balance was really off. And I had a blood lab, a doctor’s appointment, and then my cleaning ladies came (and we all know you have to straighten up a bit before they come.) I was shaking so hard and my vision was blurry. I wasn’t sure I could make it through the day, but I was determined to push myself to try.

But here is the other side of things. I had a doctor’s appt at the time my home health nurse usually comes to my house. She rescheduled my home health to 7am this morning, so I got it done early, and it was done and over with way before my doctor’s appt. What a blessing!

My ride (a volunteer from the American Cancer Society’s Road to Recovery Program) showed up right on time to pick me up. He’s driven for me once before, and he is just a delightful gentleman (who has Multiple Myeloma, a type of blood cancer. He’s had it for 19 years, and does stem cell therapy to keep on keeping on.) He drives as a way of “giving back” to the cancer community. He is a great driver. He likes to have conversations while we drive to the appt. He waits in the waiting room the whole time (reading a book on his phone) and then all the way back we have nice conversations. What a wonderful blessing! We have the nicest chats, and very little of it is about cancer. It is so nice to talk about anything other than cancer!

My cleaning ladies came early today, right after I got home from my doctor’s appt. (Their boss texted and asked me if that would be okay.) I felt so sick, and all I wanted to do when I got home was crawl into bed and rest. Those wonderful cleaning ladies immediate stripped the bed and put on fresh sheets, so I could lay down in my own bed and rest! Wasn’t that thoughtful of them? I told them they could vacuum around the bed and I wouldn’t even notice, and I certainly was true to my word. I’m amazed by their kindness. I hadn’t even asked, but they just realized I wasn’t my usual upbeat self and that I didn’t feel good. What a blessing that was! Little things mean so much!

When I woke up from resting, I felt a bit better. Then we had a huge rainstorm, and I just love the sounds and sights of storms. It takes me back to when I was a small child. When there was thunder and lightning, my dad would call me over to stand next to him by the huge picture window in the front of the house. He’d always say, “Come on, Janice. Let’s watch all the pretty lights in the sky.” Because of him, I’ve never been afraid of thunderstorms. And to this day, I find myself standing at the window, looking for all the pretty lights. What a blessing that was. Somehow, my dad knew just how to take the “scary” part away, and just see the beauty in loud crashing thunder and crackling lightning.

I guess my point is, I could have grumbled all day about things that didn’t go my way, but truth be told, there were more blessings today than I could even imagine until I wrote them down and counted them.

🎼Count your blessings, name them all one by one.
Count your many blessings, see what God has done!🎶

Author: Jan Mariet

An avid writer, former teacher, and ornithological enthusiast, Jan Mariet blogs about her life journey with psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, congenital hip dysplasia, and her battle with cancer at janmariet.com.

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