Over Achieving at Resting

Dec 2020

For the past 20 days, I’ve rested like I’ve never rested before. Forget not going out, I barely left my bed. I wasn’t too sick, but I didn’t want to risk lower oxygen and long-term damage to something. Besides, I wasn’t motivated – I could achieve nothing for days and I didn’t even care. I connected with people on short phone calls, but I was ready to cut them off after a few minutes and go back to sleep. For a while I was afraid that I would lose my drive long-term, that essence of who I was that related and achieved. Well, I think that might have been an unbased fear. Looking back, I think I was just over-achieving at resting and trying to get better. There were little things that might have been a hint – meticulous participation in my daily tea subscription club and reading entire books in a day or two. Now that I am feeling completely healed, I am starting to re-emerge into the world. Actually, it might be coming at me so fast that it is a little overwhelming.

For the past 4 nights, I’ve dreamed that I am having full conversations with people with my eyes closed. This morning I actually woke myself up reaching up and pulling my eyelids open so that I didn’t offend that dream-person. I take longer than usual to fall asleep because I am thinking about all the things to do in upcoming days. I literally had nothing to do for weeks. Now I have 2 talks, 3 grants, a 40th anniversary for my parents and a trip to see my in-laws planned. There are also opportunities to help with things in Malawi from a distance: a friend with a sick child, a website to advise expats for stay-at-home health, an Nkhoma Disaster Preparedness Committee surging back to life with this new wave of COVID. I’m glad that it looks like I am ready to rise to the occasion. But I think now I just need to make sure that I am intentional about transitioning gently back into a vibrant, social and productive life. Apparently attempts at going from a vegetative state to full-speed ahead seems incompatible with good nights of sleep.

Furlough

It’s that time again, time when we let go of our entire life in Africa and step back into an entirely different life in America. We stay connected to both worlds to some extent due to electronic communications, but the discipline of pulling away from one to the other helps remind us to step back for a bit of perspective. There were times this year that I couldn’t pull myself away from work, couldn’t say no to the tasks before me or take just a couple days off. All of that melts away when I am on a different continent. It’s a discipline that I think is healthy for us on both sides. Reiteration that things can go on without me on the one side. Reinforcement that this place is not our home, not our final resting place, on the other sides.

I have been blessed and overwhelmed by two things in particular this time that we are back. First is the amazing security that comes from roots. I can’t imagine many people are able to live in various parts of the world and still come back from time to time to the house where they grew up, a house with over 30 years of memories where not much has changed. I feel blessed beyond measure to return to the church of my childhood and see those same saints who taught me the Bible and put up with all of my awkward and irritable phases. The children I used to babysit now have children of their own, and now I have to learn first names for people who I only recognized as “Mr.” and “Mrs.” – but there is so much security in that.

So it’s been a blessing to refresh close to my roots, and to still have those roots to return to, family and friends. But beyond that, I have found a deeper blessing that is perhaps the most profound that any human could hope for. I find that I am fully known and fully loved. These past years have been hard as we struggled in a new ministry setting and strove to understand and be understood by others. Sometimes I felt like I was in a constant tightrope or caught on pins and needles so that I wouldn’t offend people. But being back home, with people who have known me for 23 or 28 years or my entire life, all of that falls away. My friends come alongside me and share my joys and forgive my faults. My family makes time for me even when they are short on time, even though I have pursued a life that puts so much distance between us.

I am blessed beyond measure, overwhelmed. I am able to heal in ways that I didn’t even know I was broken. I am able to think about moving forward because I have these roots and this safety net. Praise God for this protected and safe time.

Perspectives from Malawian Medical Students

“When someone tells us we are doing a good job, it encourages us to do better.” We sat around a table with the six medical students we have been guiding over the past month. Although this was their fourth year in medical school, the students had just told us that this was the first time they felt like valued parts of the healthcare team. Last week when I thanked one of these students for helping counsel a patient after a difficult case, she turned to me and asked why I was thanking her when she just did her job as a student. I told her I was thankful that she was able to connect with the patient in ways I could not, and I was thankful that she guided the patient through this difficult time. It had been a privilege seeing these students grow in different areas during this month. We were mostly watching for their ability to diagnose and counsel patients, but improvements in their use of evidence-based medicine and in their professionalism brought joy to my heart as well. This meal served as a time to reflect on the past month, and we as faculty were learning a lot from the students from our informal discussions.

We learned that most consultants they worked with had a punitive attitude towards students. “They want you to know that they are the consultant and you are not” one student explained. My colleagues and I who come from the background where even experts are expected to learn and adapt will need to continue balancing what is expected from us as consultants and how we feel we should behave as instructors, team leaders, and human beings.

“When we see you caring for the patients,” a student added toward the end, “it motivates us to go above and beyond in our roles.” Of course these students would feel overwhelmed by a lot of the advanced diseases they saw here in Nkhoma, especially if it was their first time being in a rural setting or a district hospital. Here, they had seen consultants who not only diagnosed the patients but rushed the patients over for tests, sat with them while their results were discovered, and sometimes even had to negotiate hospital bills on behalf of the patients. Quotes from these students will stay with me because I believe that our goals here go so far beyond teaching some doctors how to diagnose and treat disease. If we can help them balance their skills with needs in sustainable ways, without losing their hope or compassion, we will be one step closer to bringing true healing to the most difficult situations.