All Things Were Made By Him, and Without Him Was Not Anything Made

         I saw a Pinterest quote that said, “You never know how long your words will stay in someone’s mind even long after you forgotten you spoke them.”  Whoever thought of this saying came up with profound words.  I think this quote is even more true for people who have disabilities.  A healthy person with no physical deformities has insecurities about their bodies and the way they look.  Someone battling disease not only has the normal insecurities everyone has, but they also worry about the visible deformities everyone can see.  Most of the time it’s more noticeable to those of us who have the disease than it is to others, but still, the questions plague us: What do people think of me?  Do they find my abnormalities weird?  Do people think my deformities are gross?  Will a man ever find me attractive?  Do people pity me?  The questions go on and on.  Then what adds to these questions is when people unintentionally make hurtful comments because they don’t know what else to say or how to intelligently ask you about it.  As the quote penned perfectly the words stay on our mind long after the person forgets they even spoke them.

         When my illness first came to a head when I was six years old, there was much trial and err as to what would keep my immune system stable.  The one medication that did this was prednisone— steroids.  Steroids is a “double-edged,” sword kind of drug.  It did wonders to keep my body strong and my immune stable, but it caused a host of other issues as well.  The medication caused disease in my joints called Avascular Necrosis which destroys the cartilage.  This disease would eventually lead to my getting a total knee replacement at the age of 19.  It also caused excessive weight gain to where I became unrecognizable when I was on high doses. The worst side effect from steroids I received was a tremendous number of warts.  Not just a wart here or there, but in my nail beds, on my fingers, in the bends of my arms, on all parts of my legs, on the bottoms of my feet, and worse on my lips, forehead, and underneath my eyes.  It was humiliating and embarrassing.  While my disease caused my body to be prone to the wart virus, the steroids multiplied warts.  I was always so self-conscience, trying to hide as many of them as I could.  I would get the questions, “Have you been playing with frogs?”  or “Are they contagious?” both questions were not compliments, but things people asked because they didn’t know what to ask.  I understood this, but it didn’t make me feel any less of a freak of nature.

         When I was in the fifth grade, I tried making the best of my situation and using warts to my advantage.  I decided they would be my test subject in the science fair.  I chose three over the counter wart removers and put them on my warts to see which wart remover worked best.  None of them worked well, but I did manage to get third place in my science fair.  But science fair or no science fair, when my surgeon told me he could remove my warts during my splenectomy and gall bladder removal, I was beyond thrilled.  The way he did this was by cutting and burning warts off.  He cut and burnt them so deeply so I would have a better chance of them not returning, but it also left third-degree burns on much of my body.  I was burnt so badly I had to be admitted on the burn unit after my surgery. 

My mom had to be taught how to change my dressings twice a day just like a burnt victim would have too. After some surgeries, I even resembled a mummy because my hands were wrapped, the bends of my arms were wrapped, my feet were wrapped and the bends of my legs were wrapped.

It took about six weeks to heal, which caused me to be out of commission for six weeks of doing nothing but sitting.  It was a miserable six weeks, especially since I found walking on the wounds on my feet caused excruciating pain, so between my dad and sister, I had to be carried everywhere.  When my dad went to work and my sister went to school and I needed to go to the bathroom, my mom would help me on our desk chair with wheels and wheel me down our hall way. 

My whole family and I had to work together to get me through the six weeks— there was a lot of awkwardness to have to be carried everywhere, but my dad, mom, sister, and I laughed our way through it.  In my mind, the awkwardness was totally worth it not to have warts anymore.

         And for the first month, the warts were gone and it was wonderful.  No more stares, no more questions, and I didn’t feel like I had to hide my body.  But once the month was up, warts not only began coming back, but there was extensive scarring from warts that didn’t come back.  It was such a disappointment because I truly thought the surgery would take care of warts.  I could handle the scars even though they were somewhat embarrassing, they weren’t as noticeable as warts. They became even worse every time I was put on steroids.  My disease plus the steroids was a double whammy warts couldn’t resist.  Whenever my body’s immune system became stable and the dose of the steroids was lowered, I thought this is it, I can have another wart surgery and this time it will work.  You see it wasn’t only the humiliation of having warts making my choice to have the surgery over and over, but the pain of walking on warts that returned on the bottoms of my feet made the decision for me as well.

         However, after each surgery, warts eventually came back no matter what I did.  Thankfully, most of them did stay off my face and for that I was grateful, but they came back in full force everywhere else, which only accented the scarring from the other surgeries.  It was so difficult, but I had to learn how to come to terms with the fact this would be a part of my body.  Just when I would get over the insecurities and forget the warts, someone would have a comment.  No matter how innocent it was, it still hurt deeply. 

         One memory that comes to mind from time to time was when I was in my junior high English class.  The teacher was done with her lecture so we were able to hang out until the bell rang to end the period.  I was sitting on top of the heater with my friend and a guy in our class came over to join us.  We chatted for a little bit and then he made one of the most hurtful comments ever said to me, “Whitney, you should be in the Guinness Book of World Records for having the most warts.”  I don’t know whatever possessed this guy to think saying this was okay.  He wasn’t malicious or mean person, but for some reason, he thought this would be funny or lighthearted.  My friend verbally let him have it and somehow, I managed not to burst into tears. The questions came again in full force: Does everyone think this about me? Do people find me ugly if they think I would be able to be in the Guinness Book of World Records for warts? Do people feel sorry for me?   

Once again, I had to overcome the insecurities and negative thoughts I had about myself and it took some time.  As I got older I had to realize the scarring and warts needed to be looked like a part of my story and reminders of the blessings and gifts God had given me. I did get to that point, with insecurities rising every now and then since I’m human, but I eventually learned to not let those deformities define me. 

Warts would have been enough to handle and overcome, but another battle came to head I had to suit up against the fight for and that came in the form of psoriatic arthritis. Much of my life I dealt with arthritis and the joints affected were classic symptoms for psoriatic arthritis, but I never had psoriasis.  This all changed when I turned 22 and the psoriasis patches appeared.  I had them on my hands, my legs, and my arms and there were several of them in the form of red patches.  I went full circle to wanting to cover my deformities again.  It was terrible to feel like I had to cover my arms and legs, especially in the summer.  The patches got even worse when I was sick. Now I wasn’t only dealing with warts, I was dealing with psoriasis.  I felt as if I were a walking and talking deformity.  Everyone had to notice me, not in a good way, and the following event confirmed my feeling.  I was in college and I went to the student center at Asbury where my friend worked.  We were going to have dinner together, so I decided to sit with her the last part of her shift before we went to the cafeteria.  While I was there another friend of my friend who was working came to see her as well.  As we were sitting there talking she suddenly grabbed my hand that had a patch of psoriasis on it and exclaimed, “Oh my goodness!  This looks just like the scar off of Fight Club!” I was mortified.  I didn’t even know how to respond so I just smiled awkwardly and said nothing. My friend was shocked as well that her friend would say something like that to me and smiled compassionately and apologetically at me.  Her friend, however, didn’t notice my reaction because she proceeded to humiliate me even more.  A few minutes after she made the comment to a group of her guy friends that came to talk to her.  Without asking my permission, she grabs my hand, pulls it forward so the guys could see it and asks “Hey, what’s this remind you of?”  The guys respond with, “Oh the scar from Fight Club!”  At that moment, my only wish was for there to be a trap door I could pull to disappear from the student center.  I had to fight not to fall apart in front of everyone in the student center and again managed to smile awkwardly. My gracious friend noticed this and was furious with how I was just treated.  She grabbed my hand and told everyone we were leaving.  As we walked out she put her arm around me and said, “You are wonderful,” which was so sweet of her because at the moment I didn’t feel wonderful at all. 

When I finally got to my dorm room I let the tears flow.  I was so hurt and had never felt so unattractive.  I felt like I had been an oddity put on display.  Is this what everyone had thought of me?  I had worked so hard to overcome my insecurities and negative thoughts of what people thought of me and now they were surfacing again.  In my pain, I picked up my Bible to get some comfort.  I opened it up to the first chapter of John and my eyes immediately went to the third verse which says, “All things were made by him was not anything made that was made.”  I couldn’t believe the precious and much-needed reminder God gave me at that moment.  It was as if He whispered to my broken heart to not be sad or worried because He made me and it was in His image.  In His eyes, I was a lovely and priceless treasure and those things were all that mattered.  My true friends and people who wanted to get to know me wouldn’t find my worth in my appearance or how my skin looked, but my worth would come from my character and what was in my heart and that was what would attract people to me. 

I think this is such an important concept for people with diseases to grasp.  Yes, the hurtful words people say to us may stay with us for a long time, in fact, it will probably stay with us forever, but those words can’t define us. Instead, they need to drive us. We have so much to offer and give others with the strength and the perseverance our trials build within us.  If we do this, the world won’t see our deformities, because they will have no choice but to look at the kind of person we are. Our deformities may make us feel inferior to others at times, but they must not allow us to act inferior.  Instead, we need to stand up tall with self-respect and confidence, boldly showing the world our worth comes from the One who made us.