I'm doing obs & gynae. It's been a bit stressful but interesting. It's amazing seeing and delivering babies, bringing new birth and life to this earth. It rekindles in me the wonder of life once more, the awe that every breath we have and take is truly a gift from God. Life and family, important things that we often take for granted. I nearly wanted to faint when seeing my first delivery and seeing how bloody, brutal and painful it is. I always knew that women were the stronger gender, so there. heh.
But it's not all fun and joy and drama in O&G. Fetal abnormalities which are absolutely heartbreaking, sexual abuse, gynaecological cancers and disease, young, young patients with stage 4 disease, my own aunty died of a gynae cancer when i was young so it's very personal to me. Perhaps because women are more emotional and gynae stuff involve hormones, you see quite a few patients crying in the wards. It breaks my heart. Suffering breaks my heart. I remember thinking, and surprised by what ran through my mind, whilst gazing at the little bundle of joy whose mum laboured really hard to get him out, is it really a joyful thing to be born into this world when it is a world filled with great and incomprehensible suffering and evil?
I like what clare shared at my bday, it's so easy to grow cynical and aware of the realities of life as you grow older, to think what does it matter if i did this, what does this really do against the monolith of suffering and difficulty in this world. But i think it starts with one. it starts with entrusting our five loaves and two fish in the hands of the One who can truly help and who already provides a way to Himself.
I was back in MG this morning. The MG chapel felt so serene and peaceful. It felt like such a safe place, a safe place in an at times overwhelming world. It was nice feeling like a little child again. Feeling safe and shelthered in God's love. How easy it is when we venture further in life, as we grow older and the concerns of being an adult creep in, to forget that our Heavenly Father provides us with a refuge and hiding place (Psalm 91). How we can venture in this world, facing up to its great suffering and many incomprehensible sorrows with and through His love. No mind could ever comprehend suffering nor find comfort for it or in the midst of it. I think it can only be found in God's love.
Distracting myself by looking through our medical ethics readings for our test this thursday. Yes we have a written test on ethics. Quite interesting. Tort law, common law, looking at case suits which set precedents for things...
I'm a little bereft of emotion at this point, but I love what my friend wrote about deliveries:) sometimes you wonder, is all the pain and trouble of the Christian walk worth it, is all the struggling and grasping worth it. I just did a search on labor on gospelcom.net. heh. It's quite amusing, many many times when the Bible describes pain, they use it to parallel that of a woman in labour. I totally believe in natural delivery, no painkillers if possible. I figure that if you're able to get through that, then well other pains in life won't be able to compare isn't it. The privileges of being a woman and pregnancy. haha.
20I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. 21A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world. 22So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.
However the highlight was this particularly mum that went through 12hrs of labour and 3hrs worth of i believe 100 over grade10 painscale contractions..you could literally witness all the whole spectrum of human struggles in her, of wanting to give up in exasperation and tears, of pushing at her very best thinking its her last contraction, of screaming in anger at why her baby is still not coming out, of begging in helplessness after such a long long delivery. It was so painful to watch, i just told myself no way am i doing normal vaginal delivery in the future, i want a C section. But finally when the baby came out after 3 hrs, i was just clutching on to my friend so tightly and wanting to cry, cause looking at the baby i could witness the mothers effort paying off. i was there feeling so honoured that i saw the birth of a child thats going to go through lifes ups and downs, decisions and dilemmas, love hate and emotions for the many many decades to come, and i was there at the beginning of it! And i love it so so much!! i think i can do it a million times and not get sick of it.
After witnessing the two types of delivery, saddistically i came to the conclusion that i want a normal vaginal delivery. Somehow the whole process of going through that torturous pain for few hrs just appeals to me. heh..
Anyway if one day..it ever gets too tiring...i shall always remind myself of what ive seen and felt today."
Father, I just feel like praying. My heart is so heavy for my extended family. So heavy Lord. Father, I love them very much. I love them. In some ways Father, I don't really know them very well. I could know them so much better, but I love them very much because they are my family. I was looking at photos in our living room, when i was 5, when i was 17, when HY got married. Father, how family members have passed on and others added. Lord, thank You for families. Thank You for my family. For the 5 sons and 3 sisters on my dad's side. Father, I love my grandma so much, I love her so much. She's so dear. Lord, it brings me great joy seeing her glow at weddings, seeing her happy. Lord, her life hasn't been easy, but I thank You for sustaining her all her 82 years of life. But Father, more than earthly happiness, more than the happiness of having a large intact family is the happiness of knowing You that I desire for all of them. Father, I want to pray for my 4th uncle and his family. Father, they came to know You randomly one day when You moved in their hearts to just step into church and receive Jesus. Father, I believe they received You into their hearts. But Father, for reasons I do not know they have fallen slightly off the path. Oh Lord, won't You in Your mercy draw them back to You. Father, would the still small voice which prompted them to receive You in the first place speak to them yet again and draw them back to You. Father, I pray that You would send Christian brothers and sisters around them, be it in their neighbourhood or their workplaces or schools, or us, their extended family, to bring them back to You. Father, may what they saw at SM wedding remind them of Your love and faithfulness, may they be moved to seek You back again. Father, You are the One who ultimately draws souls to You, Father, please, do it for Your Son's Name, that the Name of Jesus may be lifted high in their lives and in our extended family.
Father, I want to pray for SM. I thank You for her wonderful wedding which we all greatly enjoyed and were blessed by. I thank You for her faith all these years, I thank You for moving in her heart when she was 15 to pop by church and to receive You as her Saviour. I thank You that despite being the only believer in her family she has chosen to soldier on and stand on You. I thank You for bringing SY into her life. I thank You that they both waited patiently on You and that truly You have made all things beautiful in Your time. I thank You that they have both chosen to consecrate their marriage to You. Father, would You bless them richly, mightily. Father, would Your covenantly love to the church be manifested in their marriage. Would their marriage draw others to You. Father, You know that marriages are not easy. Father, when they both are without strength, when the going gets tough, when they wonder why they walked down the aisle in the first place, Father, would Your love above all sustain them. Would You see them true and I thank You that the confidence of marriage to last the road lay not in ourselves but in You, in Your unfailing love and goodness, in Your faithfulness. Thank You Father.
Father, I pray that You would show me how You are working in my extended family and what You would have me do to share the love of Christ with them. Father, I thank You for the opportunities to konw my cousin's a bit better over the years. Father, give me courage to get out of my comfort zone, to show care and love, to share the love of Christ with boldness. Father, help me for I cannot do it on my own. Father, above all help me to know that I am dearly loved by You and hence all that I do is not to win or merit Your love, but is merely out of the overflow of Your love in my heart and life. Father, remind me that above all You are the Good Shepherd. As You have shown me time and time again in my life, it's really not what i do. You don't need me to witness to people, You can do it directly Yourself. But thank You that You delight to use Your people out of Your mercy and goodness. Father, thank You. Father, help me to be a good testimony in my own immediate family in the first place. Father, help me to honour my parents, not because they are always deserving, but simply because this honours You. Father, help us to bear with one another in Your love. Father, You know how as family members it's so easy to step on each other's toes. Father, I thank You for family, that reminds us how human we are, how much in need of grace we are, how really we are no good apart from You and Your grace. Father, help me to extend grace to those around me not because i am good or Christianly, but because I am in need of grace myself and because You give me grace freely and abundantly. Father, when my heart is angry or impatient, still my heart with Your love. Father when I am anxious, help me to be still and know that You are God. Father, when I see things that don't agree with my conscience or values or Your Word, Father, help me to be slow to anger and to speak, but to abound with love because Father, that is how You are towards us. Father, help me to hold out You love and mercy in every circumstance, to every person. I know You will enable us to.
Father there is much upon my heart and there are needs which are crying out for Your love and Your presence and touch. Father, sometimes I feel so overwhelmed going through life like that because I feel so utterly helpless and useless. And I feel like condemning myself when I can't seem to do anything about it or I seem unwilling or deficient. But Father, teach me to cry out to You for such things when I see them because there can be no better or higher or greater or more effective thing than to cry out to the One who can truly help such situations. Teach and convict me that it is truly prayer which changes things, not my boldness in action, though we must arise when called, not my words or loving touch, whatever that means, though these things are important, the best thing we can do is to cry out to You. Father, thank You for prayer. I would die without it though often I tarry before coming before You. Teach me to tarry less and run to You faster and in everything. Thank You for the peace that comes when I offload my concerns and worries to You and leave it at the foot of the Cross. Lord, there is much suffering, erm sometimes I complain that I suffer too. But really, what is our suffering compared to what Christ has gone through. Father, help us to stand the trials and test of life by relying on Your grace and grace alone. Not our faithfulness or righteousness or holiness or hunger or whatever because these will all fail and be found wanting. Father, show me that truly I stand on no other but the rock of Christ. I stand on the Mighty Rock of Christ and hence great is my hope and great is my joy in this life and world that is full of sorrow and imperfection. Father, my joy is in You and You alone. Thank You.
