Sometimes, life gives you some unexpected circumstances and situations. That’s where I find myself right now; and I kind of expect to be here for a while. That’s not what I had planned for 2022, but it is what I’ve experienced, and have to deal with for the moment.

On Christmas Day, I fell down our stairs and broke a bone in my foot, giving it a pretty bad sprain to go along with it.

But let me back up.

Last summer, I experienced a flare up of some lower back pain that sent me to the Emergency Room. They diagnosed it as a pinched nerve, and told me that it would gradually subside. And it did… to a degree. But it never really completely returned to normal. For a while, I walked with the help of a cane, but eventually managed to leave that behind me.

However, my leg was still mostly numb and unfeeling, and my foot had no sensation of whether it was off the floor or not, causing me to stumble frequently.

That’s what happened on Christmas Day. My foot drug, this time on the stairs, and down I went. We ended up in the Emergency Room that day, with a follow up at an orthopedic doctor the next week. A bone in my foot was broken, so I received a cast for a few weeks before moving to a walking boot. However, while in the cast, I developed a pretty significant blood clot in my leg. So now, we’re treating that as well.

In the meantime, the orthopedic doctor I saw locally recommended that see a back specialist in a nearby community. He has determined that the damaged nerve is the likely cause of the fall, as we suspected, but he isn’t so sure it’s in the lower back. So he has ordered a nerve conduction test to find out where the problem lies. That has not happened yet, but is scheduled for next month.

In the meantime, we’re monitoring my blood work a couple times a week as we try to dial in the specific levels of the blood thinner I need to address the clot, and I’m traveling between the hospital lab, three different doctor’s offices, and physical therapy. And, on top of that, we’re working with the various offices and our alternative to insurance, Samaritan Ministries, to figure out all the financial details.

That’s not at all how I envisioned ending the year and beginning a new one.

And frankly, I’m a little overwhelmed and stressed out. It’s a lot to deal with, and it feels like it.

I’m doing my best to maintain a positive attitude through it. I think I’m doing ok with that (although my wife might tell you differently). It’s ironic, though, that last October, I determined that the word phrase that I wanted to dominate my year for 2022 was to “choose joy.”

It seems I’m getting crash course in that, with this set of circumstances before me. I hope I can learn whatever lessons God is teaching me through it all, and learn to trust him more in the process.

And while I deal with this, I would appreciate your prayers for me, and for my family as we work through this.

Question: How are you learning to trust God more? You can leave a comment by clicking here.