When you move too many heavy boxes with your tongue

It's been a rougher and less productive week than I could wish for.


I've been pushing through heavy fatigue for weeks, packing and then unpacking, living on Advil and carryout.


I started with one Advil.  By moving day I was up to two, and my big toes went numb.


Ok, I was on my feet a lot, basically getting an intense workout.  After a few days I'll be fine.


Last week I bumped up to three, and the numbness spread to my whole feet, and my hands....and my tongue.


This is a bit less simple to explain.


Not only was I sore all over with a painful back and jaw and headache, but then I lost strength in my arms and legs.  It became difficult to lift my arms or balance on one foot.  And the numbness wasn't going away, despite me not unpacking or doing any heavy lifting since last Thursday.


By Monday I was desperately praying for a same-day appointment with a doctor, which I got, but it was immensely discouraging with no good solution.  Tuesday I found another doctor who would see me for a second opinion.


After hearing my symptoms, he said, "That's weird."


Not what you hope to hear from your doctor.


However, after an exam he did rule out the likelihood of anything serious, like multiple sclerosis, which WebMD said I have.  


He decided on a working hypothesis that I overdid it in the move and caused a bunch of muscle inflammation, which in turn is causing various pinched nerves, resulting in sensations of numbness and weakness.  He offered a steroid prescription which I practically snatched out of his hand, in the hope that it will bring down the inflammation and the rest will resolve itself.


So it hasn't been the blissfully creative week of decorating my new home that it might have been, had I not been so busy writhing and panicking.


I drove to the doctor on Monday with stiff back and numb hands, weeping at the wheel, wondering what I've done to myself.


It struck me that--aside from the legitimate reasons like wanting a well-ordered home--one reason I pushed myself so hard is that driving voice in my head that persistently tells me I'm not good enough.  Never good enough.  Not doing it right.  My house is a mess--I'm feeding the kids pizza again--boxes in the living room:  not good enough.  Children not marching in a line, jumping at my every direction: not good enough.  Not simultaneously cooking from scratch, maintaining spotlessness and tight discipline, and volunteering in a soup kitchen:  not good enough.


No wonder I'm neurotic.


We had an interesting discussion in a Bible study I was in some months ago on Romans, when one lady said that she never had a strong sense of guilt or personal sin, so the gospel was hard for her to appreciate.  I realized, and said, that I was thankful to have always had quite a strong sense of my guilt.  The gospel is for people like me.


As I'm driving along, thinking of how listening to that hateful voice has helped to drive me into disability, Matt Maher's song Because He Lives came on.

I was dead in the grave

I was covered in sin and shame

This is me without Christ.  Dead, in the grave.  Covered with the shame of never-good-enough.  Imprisoned by it.  Hopeless.

I heard mercy call my name

He rolled the stone away!

This is the good news for me!  He rolled away the stone keeping me in that grave.  No accusation of insufficiency, however true, had the power to hold me there when Jesus called me out.  

I'm alive, I'm alive

Because He lives

Because He lives

I can face tomorrow

Because He lives

Every fear is gone

I know He holds my life, my future in His hands

Sweet mercy.  Precious promise.  Such good, good news.  The tyranny of that voice is gone and I am free, because He lives.