Just Waiting

Waiting is becoming a very common theme in my posts. I wonder what you are waiting for? I think we are all waiting for something. Sometimes we’re waiting for big things, sometimes we’re waiting for small things.  It can be hard to be patient in the waiting. We have options. We can be irritated, grouchy, miserable, intolerant, and so many other icky feeling emotions. Sometimes it feels good to go to the icky feeling place. Sometimes it doesn’t. We can also choose to find peace and contentment in waiting. I think of it as a release of control that I don’t have anyway. It’s an action that can be hard to do, to let go, but when I do I feel so much lighter and relaxed. I can take deeper breaths. I sleep better. I am much less irritable. It’s more enjoyable to be around me, too!

Anna is getting lots of practice waiting as she is still waiting for her gently used set of lungs. She must wait for just the right set, not any lungs will do. Her body is already on to this “lungs from another body” deal. So the new lungs will have to be very different from her current set. This will help trick her body into leaving the new lungs alone and not seeing them as a threat. Our immune systems are so awesome at fighting bad intruders but they don’t know the difference between bacteria that’s bad and life-saving lungs that came from another person’s body. So Anna waits. Her wait is worse than mine for so many reasons. I spent three weeks with her and then returned home. I’ll go back in a few weeks. But she must stay in North Carolina waiting every day for a call where she will hear, “Anna, we’ve got lungs for you!”