Have you ever found yourself in a place where you were trapped?  Or have you found yourself in a place where you needed delivery, but no matter which way you looked their was no good way out?

When I was in labor with my second daughter I could not believe how wonderfully it was going.  I had wanted a home birth,  but my husband felt too scared to go that route.  So there was no home birth for me.  Despite the fact that I was laboring in the hospital, the labor actually went pretty well.  I listened to praise music, I worshipped God, and the LORD flooded my body with the painkilling endorphins that made me feel wonderful. Everything was going great! I trusted God, I knew he was with me, and I had full confidence in Him to deliver a beautiful baby.  My oldest daughter was there, along with a friend of mine who told me that I made labor look like fun.  And that labor was fun, right up until the point where it wasn’t.

At some point the doctor became concerned because she couldn’t hear my baby’s heartbeat.  Many efforts were made to see how the baby was doing, and suddenly the scene drastically shifted into a fear culture.  Hospital staff flooded my room.  They explained to my husband that if they didn’t perform an emergency c-section, that both the baby and I could die.  I will never forget the horror in his eyes as he told them to do whatever they had to do.

I willingly signed a consent form, in order to be butchered that day.  I cried as they rolled me into the operating room.  This wasn’t the plan.  A c-section had never been on my radar. Yet there I was with my arms being strapped down to boards stretched out on both sides of the operating table.  Did you know they strap a woman’s arms down for a c-section? With my arms strapped and stretched out to the sides, I felt like I was being crucified.  As I laid there crying, I just kept saying over and over, “I trust God! I trust God! I trust God!”

I don’t know why God delivered my daughter via c-section that day, He had delivered my first two kids normally. There is nothing normal about a c-section. The surgery decimated my body, and I never would have chosen to have that written into the script of my life.  Yet that was the delivery I was given that day.  God is sovereign, and nothing happens without God’s permission.

I had what I thought was a near perfect body before I got pregnant, and I wanted nothing more than to give birth and get back to a place where I could draw my husband’s eye.  Instead of a natural delivery, I was given a perfect baby, and my perfect abs were destroyed.  Deliveries can be traumatic and still have beautiful results.

Today, I am remembering how God delivered both me and my baby girl.   I’m not God, so I can’t say why he let the story unfold the way it did.  But I do know that He delivered more than a baby that day.  He delivered me from using my body to get attention from men, including my husband.

At the time of the c-section, six years had passed since I had worked as an exotic dancer.  I had made the decision to work as a dancer out of desperation, and when I got out of the industry I had no desire to ever go back to that life.  Trust me, no one wants to endure the abuse you end up experiencing in the clubs.  Even though I wasn’t a stripper anymore, God used the c-section to reveal that my marriage was not built on Christ alone.  Among other things, both my husband and I bowed down to my body.

Today I am experiencing a new level of refinement and I am again faced with the need for delivery.  Not long after getting out of the dancing industry, I met my husband.  I told him that I was planning to get breast implants.  I was really fit back then, and after breast feeding two babies, there really wasn’t much tissue left except for some stretched out flappy skin.

It’s unfortunate that I thought I needed to improve on God’s perfect work. My self image was wrapped up in my outward appearance, and my future husband’s favor.   I believed the doctor when he called the surgery a breast enhancement.  It was a bigger is better mentality, and totally false. I was deceived, and today I am suffering the consequences of that decision.

When I first started getting sick we didn’t know what the problem was.  As things got worse and my symptoms became more intense, I started to suspect my implants were causing the problems.  When I approached my husband about it, he dismissed the idea.  I don’t think either of us wanted to believe the implants were the issue.  Seven years ago, I was very healthy, and no one would have been able to convince me that today I would be as sick as I am.

I have become very ill with breast implant illness.  I need to have surgery to remove these toxic twenty year old implants that are making me sick.  For years now, I have been in pain every single day.  My body is struggling to fight the toxic overload, and my immune system has been unable to keep up.  I have congestion in my chest all the time.  I have trouble breathing, especially out of my right lung.  No matter how much rest I get, I’m always exhausted.  I have had a sore throat on my right side for years now. It gets worse if I eat sugar, and better if I exercise, eat sprouts, juice living foods, and get good sleep.  My lymphatic system is really backed up, especially on the right side.  So my right arm, and foot swell up.  When this happens, I will get a shooting headache only on the right side of my head in two specific spots.  This happens if I sneeze, cough, or strain myself.  I have developed arthritis, and connective tissue issues that have made it difficult for me to walk, move, and exercise.  I have pressure on my chest, and feel short of breath.  All of it makes me feel anxious.  If I didn’t have the Lord, I would be over the edge.  He has given me so much comfort, and has counseled me through all of this horrible ordeal.

The surgery I need is expensive and is not covered by Christian Healthcare Ministries.  Christian Healthcare Ministries is what we use instead of health insurance, and they refuse to cover anything that has to do with breast implants.  It doesn’t matter to them that I am sick, or that this will most likely eventually turn into lymphoma, if it hasn’t already.

I’m trapped, and there is no good way that I can see to get out of this.  God is my deliverer. Jesus is my savior, and he saves me every time.  I don’t know how he is going to get me out of this one, but I know He will. This has been crushing for me, and I have had trouble finding the right words to express myself.  Sometimes there is no good way of getting something off your chest. Pun intended.

While cleaning out my garage I found this stencil which says, “To everything, there is a season.”  How precious that LORD looked down from heaven and comforted me with his word.

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,” Ecclesiastes 3:1-2 NIV

“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”” Lamentations 3:22-24 NIV

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