I remember how thin I became when one of my sons was very ill. At the time, I was one of the few female students at a large evangelical/fundamentalist seminary. We female students were constantly being stared at–so very different, so many challenges to the spoken/unspoken ethos of male superiority and spiritual leadership.
As I agonized internally over this private time of family stress and illness, my weight dropped precipitously. The compliments flowed from both the male and female students, almost endlessly.
Those memories flooded me today as I read this heart-rendering story, “Suffering’s Slim Reward”. The author is a woman with twin daughters, one of whom has been receiving chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia.
The mother has pretty well given up eating, noting, “Should I eat before I get to the hospital? The smell of food makes Devon sick. Eating in front of her seems tortuous and unfair.”
And then she wrote this:
After I arrived at the hospital, a friend stopped by to visit. Before acknowledging Devon, she looked at me. With purrs of envy, she commented on how thin I looked. Again, I was at a loss for words. My daughter was not.
“My mom is not skinny because she worked at it,” Devon told our visitor. “It’s because I’m sick.”
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