Together We Are Better

It’s an age-old aphorism: “Things are usually not as bad as they seem or as good as they appear.” In reality, we live most of our lives between the utterly miserable and the indescribably perfect. We get shocked and thrown into a tailspin, but then we regroup, maneuvering through the crags along life’s slippery slopes, searching for level ground. What we find may not be a lush garden surrounded by gently flowing streams, but hopefully it’s firm, navigational, and slowly, we regain our footing. 

Lori and I sat at the conference table, anxious for the surgeon and nurse to explain Lori’s health status. We knew the bad part: yes, it’s breast cancer; yes, surgery would be necessary; and yes, some treatment would follow. But they told us the good part: it’s breast cancer of the noninvasive order. And the surgery would be a lumpectomy, not the more invasive and radical mastectomy. Then, when I asked, “What stage is the cancer?” we got the best answer we could have hoped for: “zero stage.” 

Miranda, the Breast Health Nurse Navigator, guided us through our questions, making herself available to us, and in the process,  introduced us to an organization called Life Beyond Breast Cancer (LBBC). One of the ways they help those going through breast cancer treatment is to match cancer patients to someone with a similar diagnosis or experience. So, someone at a particular stage of breast cancer can contact a person diagnosed at that same stage of metastasis and even a specific type of breast cancer. 

It makes perfect sense. If I’m going through something scary, afraid of the dark unknown, I want to talk with someone who has walked along that same dark side and experienced similar fears. 

In his most autobiographical letter— Paul’s second letter to the church in Corinth—the great Apostle Paul wrote about his problems, trials, pain, and fears. He started the letter by addressing the problem of pain and the comfort his readers had in the Holy Spirit. “He comforts us in all our troubles,” Paul wrote, “so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us” (2 Corinthians 1:4). 

I had surgery not long ago. In the past, if someone had told me they were having this particular surgery, I might have responded with something like, “Oh, yeah, sorry about that. I hope you’re okay soon.” But now that I’ve experienced it, gone through it, I can talk by personal experience to someone going through the same thing. I would tell them what worked for me in my brief but inconvenient and somewhat painful recovery, what didn’t, and what they should and should not do. I would “come alongside” them to use Paul’s terminology. It’s quite different than simply waving at a distance. 

The same is true for other, more painful experiences, like the loss of a child, a spouse, a parent, the after-effects of an automobile accident, or a financial loss. 

It works like this: I have a bruise or perhaps an open wound. I see that you do, too. Maybe I can help you with yours. We share our pain, and we heal stronger together. 

“Friendship,” observed C.S. Lewis, “is born at that moment when one man says to another: What! You too? I thought that no one but myself . . .'”

We often imagine ourselves in a safer, more secure place than it is until, like an unwelcome thunderstorm that shatters the clear blue sky, bad news upends us. In a flash, we run for the cellar to hide. But then, we eventually climb out, finding our way up the stairs, wobbly step by wobbly step, held steady by those who walk alongside us.

And when the storm has passed into the distant skies, we’re ready to guide someone else up the stairs and along life’s uncertain path, comforting them as someone comforted us.

Casting away our doubts, we join hands, knowing what the other feels. And perhaps somewhere along the journey we realize deep within ourselves that together we are better.