2017 has been a very hard year for me.
Back in February, I was serving my mission in Sacramento, California. And I received the news that one of my very close friends had passed away from cancer. I knew that his cancer was back, but I had no idea how advanced it was or that he had been placed on hospice. Getting that news was pretty difficult to deal with, especially being on a mission and not being able to take the time I needed to cope and heal. Luckily I had a wonderful companion that helped me work through it. That was strike one.
About a month and a half later, in late March, we were playing capture the flag as a zone on p-day when strike two happened. I was running to stop a Sister on the other team from stealing my team’s flag when I fell and twisted my right knee. I heard a popping noise and felt a whole lot of pain and I was down. We drove to the mission home where the mission doctor diagnosed a knee sprain and put me on crutches for 3-4 days. A week later, I was still on crutches and unable to put weight on my right leg. I went to see a family doctor, who agreed with the mission doc and decided my sprain was just slightly more severe than they initially thought. He told me to keep icing it and taking ibuprofen but ordered an MRI just to be sure that there wasn’t anything else going on. I was still not weight-bearing when I went into the hospital for the MRI and I was getting worried. I got the results of the MRI a few days later and it sucked. I had a tear in the ACL of my right knee. I was still hoping for a miracle, but when I met with the surgeon in California a couple of days later, he told me that I had completely blown out the ACL and I would require surgery. That was Wednesday. On Thursday I met with my mission president and on Friday he put me on a plane. It was that fast. I was excited to see my family, but not to be home. That was awful. There was a lot of pity and a lot of patting on the back. I hated it, but I did my best to push through.
I had surgery (strike two and a half) to reconstruct my ACL using a piece of my hamstring in May and recovery was not easy. I started physical therapy two days after surgery and it was one of the most painful things that I have ever done in my life. Not only was the surgery physically taxing, but it put a strain on me mentally, emotionally, and spiritually as well. I slipped back into depression and even if I could have physically gotten off the couch, I couldn’t have done it mentally. Emotionally, I was depressed and sad all of the time. I cried every single day and hated my life. And spiritually, I was dying. I wasn’t praying or reading my scriptures and I hadn’t done those things since coming home. I was so angry at God. And what made it worse to me was that I knew that He was there. I knew He existed. I had just come to believe that He didn’t care about me at all. Because A loving God and Father wouldn’t do this to His daughter. Or if He did, He wouldn’t leave her feeling as alone as I felt.
The summer continued and my best friend came home from his mission. We quickly reconnected and spend most of the summer texting, snapchatting, and spending time with each other. He was so good for me. We went on a couple of dates and I was pretty happy. Or at least a lot happier than I was before he came home. We went off to different colleges a couple hours from each other and with neither of us having cars we knew that we wouldn’t see each other much.
At school, I expected to find the happiness that I had had my first year. I was wrong. Within a few weeks, I found that my classes were overwhelming, my depression was back in full force, I was struggling to have the income I needed, and I had no energy or desire for a social life. I was drowning. My best friend and I were still talking fairly often, but I missed him. I was struggling to hold on.
Slightly over a month into school, I got a text from my best friend when I was home for the weekend. He said that he needed distance and as far as I knew, we were done talking. Within 24 hours of receiving that text, I was in a freak car accident where I rolled my parent’s car down a mountainside. I was extremely lucky and I was able to climb back up to the road and get help, but I’m honestly still reeling from that. The friend and I started talking a little bit but it was very strained. Two days ago our friendship ended and I don’t know if I will ever talk to him or see him again. This is especially hard because my growing relationship with him was the only good thing I could see that had come out of my early-release from my mission. I feel like this combination gets me to strike three. So if he isn’t it…then what is the reason that I am here?
What is God doing with my life? Why is it in so many pieces?
I don’t know the answer to that question. And I am in a lot of pain right now, with no light at the end of the tunnel. But I have hope that there is a light somewhere. My hope may be minuscule and very weak, but it is all that I have. That, and a knowledge that people have pulled through much worse. And if they can do it, then maybe I can too. All I can do is give it my best and trust that God is there.
