By: Dr. Jacquelyn Simmons
Scripture: And even to your old age I am he; and even to hoar
(white) hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you (Isaiah 46:4).
My Dear Friends,
As you know, we have periodically stopped along the trail which will end where, and explain how, this child of God was selected to become a columnist for the Monroe Free Press. Right now, his instructions to me are to pause a while longer and share with you some of the distresses one may experience as one’s so-called “golden age” slowly evolves into days and nightmares. The title, “golden age”, may sound glorious to those persons who are relatively young, but as one advances in age, “Uncle Arthur” (medically called arthritis), begins to become more dominant in our lives.
The expression, “once an adult and twice a child”, becomes a stark reality in some instances. Some of us have been blessed with caring, kind and patient loved ones, while others suffer the indignities of treatment nightmares due to gross neglect in many necessary areas of life. I think I read many years ago about elephants consigning their none or poor functioning elderly to certain reserved, unpopulated grounds on which they are to remain until death claimed them. Does this mean that America is joining the elephants in the mistreatment of its elderly? If so, shame on you America!!!
This child of the living God was reminded by a certain healthcare facility to appear for my annual mammogram. As I exited the laboratory, one of the technicians accompanied by several co-workers, told me, “Congratulations, you have graduated and don’t need to return”. Well, of course, had it been possible, I would have leapt from my wheelchair and danced a “jig”. Why? I almost began to bask uncontrollably with joy at the thoughts of “not ever” having to experience again the ravages of chemotherapy such as baldheadedness, nausea, extreme tiredness, avoidance of contacts with babies, uncooked vegetables, and other gross discomfitures, associated with breast cancer treatments including radiology. I also suffered undue pain because of an overdose of radium which landed me in CCU. I was mis-prescribed over three hundred sixty five dosages of a certain cancer treatment drug, also.
Well, my friends, that’s not what they meant. She and her co-workers were tactfully trying to warn me in case of a relapse that cancer treatments would no longer be an option. I had lived too long for my frail, elderly body to endure another battery of treatments. It would be wise to accept being made as comfortable as possible until my eminent demise. What a shock, my friends, to be tactfully told another mammogram would be useless. By the way, my mailed results from that same facility noted, “return in one year, you are fine.”
Thank God!!! We don’t know what our future holds, but by the grace of God, we do know who holds our future. Pray for me and I’m praying for you.
Love,
Jacquelyn Simmoms
P.S. My friends, do you know that whoever mistreats or treats kindly God’s people, they are persecuting or treating kindly, his son, Jesus Christ? He feels it just as we do (Matthew 25: 35-40). Pray for Jesus’ persecutors . God is moved with the feelings of our infirmities, also (Hebrew 4:15). Remember, Jesus loves you this I know.
