Pam’s story

God Brings Good out of Bad

After coming out of hospital in January 2005 I was asked a couple of times, by Christian friends and non-Christian friends, “what has having cancer done to my faith?" or "how did I cope with a God that lets things like that happen?”. Well, never for a moment had I thought that God had given me cancer – cancer and all illness is a human condition – what I believe is that God used that illness to work great and wonderful changes is me……..

Let me explain:-

I have always been fat – my first memories are of being dragged reluctantly across a school hall in white vest and pants to have a medical.I was about 6 and I hated being undressed- showing others just what went on under my clothes.That poor self image and even worse self esteem rooted itself in my mind and has controlled me for the past 50 years.I come across as very confident but let me tell you that it masks fears of people rejecting me.I would walk into a room smiling, but thinking, “Oh I bet they all think – gosh just look how fat she is – she must be stupid as well.Who wants that for a friend”.Everything I did – and I mean everything, was controlled by this self destroying, undermining criticism of myself.Always wondering what people thought of me, the way I dressed, the way I spoke and deciding their thoughts must be negative ones……..

Do you know that 2 weeks before I found the lump, having a particularly miserable moment, I said to Eric “we have no friends, no-one to ring up and say lets go out for a meal” and this thought churned me up and really upset me…….Then came the cancer -well said I “the body is already shot to bits, so what’s loosing a boob”.I was undermining God’s love of me as a whole person once more…….

Now He put His plan into action – this was His time – His time to show me that I must love myself as He loved me and He used those around me to try to get rid of the destroying control I had of my life – cards began to arrive – not just with ‘Get Well’ in them, but with loving messages – people telling me what an inspiration I was to them, how cheerful I was – how strong I was.Well I thought they were mad – God must have been shaking His head wondering just what He needed to do to make me listen.

Then came the chemotherapy - everything changed - I was not at work, I was only well enough to come to church 1 Sunday out of 4. I could only do very light household jobs, some days just went past in a blur of sickness and very little in my life was as it had been. The cancer changed everything and then came the most obvious change of all – I lost my hair – all in an afternoon – seeing the reflection of a bald head in the mirror made feel that this was the last straw – how could I go out like this, what would people think.Oh, I had a wig, but to me that felt even worse – like being an easy target for people to nudge each other and say, she’s got a wig on.Again came that voice of destruction - how could I go out like this, what would people think. A voice in my head said “does that really matter?You are alive, surrounded by people who love you - go out – carry on – I love you, you need to love yourself.”

So slowly I began to be obedient to that voice, to worry less and less about what people thought – I attended the Cavendish Centre and at the first session assessment I was asked to complete a score sheet which had 3 questions about how I was feeling – one was about how I felt about the control I had in my life, I circled a 3 which showed I had lost a lot of control in my life.After 4 sessions of aromatherapy – something I was very reluctant to do because it meant exposing your body – but again God used this to wear down my inhibitions and to relax and enjoy the experience.I had another assessment and once more had to fill in a score sheet.Out of the 3 questions two had greatly improved, but the question about control I still marked as a 3.The assessor was surprised that the score remained a 3, I replied that I really didn’t want that control back in my life, control that tore down self worth, crushed self respect and criticised everything I did was not the control God wanted me to have – my thoughts of myself shut Him out of my life and allowed the destroyer in. As I continued to let go I realised that new things were opening up for me – a closer relationship with God as I begin to put myself aside and to allow Him more space in my thoughts, more room in my life.I don’t want to be the person I was – experiencing the cancer was and still is horrible, but God has brought so much good out of it.I have come through this illness a new person by God’s refining and renewing – now I have begun the journey to be the person God would have me be – Oh He’s not finished with me yet and I’m glad for that, but God has me better placed to serve Him now.

So, to answer that 1^st question “what has having cancer done to my faith?” – well, it’s increased it and renewed it to overflowing….The cancer may have destroyed a part of me, but God has renewed memories, healed wounds, given me a respect of myself, helped me to lift up my head, not proudly, but giving the glory to Him, humbly assured that as He loves me so I must love myself…………… Now I can truly say……….

Lord for ourselves; in living power remake us –

Self on the cross and Christ upon the throne,

Past put behind us, for the future take us:

Lord of our lives, to live for Christ alone.

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