A Very. Very. Beautiful. Thing.
Here’s the thing about being sick and then being well…
Here is a part of my story that not everyone knows, but I have been sick for a long long time. It’s maybe not a conventional illness that I have had, but for me, it’s been comparable to what I imagine having cancer would be like. (Note: I did not have cancer, and I am not saying I get that disease. Just saying it’s been bad for me. Very, very. Bad). I have struggled with an outwardly invisible disease for what has seemed like all my life. It maybe started when I was 7 years old, maybe even 3 years old, maybe even younger - and has gone through better and worse phases, but has been there consistently: through all of school as a child, through my brief experience with college and then into getting married and having children, into attempts at careers and trying to find my purpose, through hospitalizations and attempts to be well, be self-sufficient, be productive. Through relationships and attempts at human connection.
Metaphorically I was in a ditch, one I could not get out of alone. Last year, I was offered the hand out I needed to move towards getting out of said “ditch”. It came in the form that was pretty “chill,” seemingly, at first. No bright light or sudden thunder clap. It was something only I would notice. But, it was a tiny grain of sand that would start to roll down a symbolic hill and become a boulder. It took about 9 months of consistent rolling with my new (growing) piece of sand, when I was to experience another sandstorm. It was a bigger miracle. The right person came into my life at the right time and offered me a massive cure for my disease. Because of the growth from my previous 9 months, I was able to say yes to this cure. I would have never been able to do that before. There was something about my disease that I guess I loved. It was all I knew. But now, finally, one month until my 42nd birthday, I didn’t know it at the time, but everything was about to change. I was about to know first hand the feeling in the heart of the woman at the well. I was about to get a glimpse of the mind of the healed leper. I was about to not only catch a glimpse of a dream of the person I was created to be, I was about to get to become her. What? Wow. Wow. Wow. I, Brook Huffman, even at my age, was finally going to get a hero story of my very own. Yes, even I, after everything I have been through, was finally going to feel “normal” (whatever that is for me).
It has been 4 months since I experienced my miracle, since the boulder was tossed into my arms. It’s ironic that the item I have chosen to depict my imagery is usually one that is heavy, because the experience since has been quite the opposite. The last 4 months have been light. It’s been more like I realize that I have been carrying a boulder all these years, and that I could then put it down. Once I did, everything started to change. And fast. It’s been a beautiful thing. It’s been something that I can’t wait to tell people about. It’s been something that has opened my ears to hear the world in a brand new way. It has opened my eyes to see things differently. It has increased all of the circulation throughout my whole mind and body and all my senses are heightened in the best best best ways. Maybe I don’t look any differently , maybe my routines are even slightly different, but just like the invisible disease, the miracle is constantly, although, invisible just there.
Here’s the thing about being sick, and then being well —
My own personal cancer is in remission, and I can be and do all the things I have always said I was going to do in life. If you know, you know. But if you don’t, you just have to have had a similar experience to understand. It’s simply a beautiful thing. A very, very. Beautiful. Thing.
This post is intentionally a little vague in order to protect privacy, but please do message or comment below if you have any comments or questions.
XOXO,
Brooklyn
