Reflections on Suffering

This Lent I decided that I would read two books, both written by people known personally to me, on their experiences of adversity and suffering. Here is a brief description of each book.

Rosella and Don Kvernen, Stroke Survivor: A Story of Hope (Minneapolis: Two Harbors Press, 2012).

This is a book about the process of rehabilitation and adjustment to life by a man and his wife after he suffers a “life-changing” and debilitating stroke at the age of forty. The stroke has left him with one side (arm and leg) permanently disabled, and inability to read, and speech and cognitive difficulties. Don had lived a full and active life, had gained a PhD in Psychology and practiced as a psychologist in his own business until his stroke in 1991.

As Don’s wife, Rosella, explains in the Introduction, the impetus to write the book came from him, but “[b]ecause Don cannot tell things exactly the way he thinks them in his mind, I have composed quotes for him with his approval and tell our story primarily from my perspective” (p. xvii). Rosella writes in a plain, straightforward manner: it is a style that is almost understated, which adds to the book’s impact. As it is a collaborative venture between Don and herself, she writes about how they both want to be transparent about the trials and frustrations that “life after stroke” has brought them.

Rosella shares honestly about her fears and pain, and also the adjustments that have been made, the learning that had to be done, and the professional help required. One has the sense that one reads the reflections of an essentially private person who nevertheless wishes to be helpful, especially to others who have suffered a stroke, or who care for one who has had one.

The book details the steps to such recovery as Don has been able to achieve. As they wish the book to be both an encouragement and a help to other survivors of stroke, the book provides quite detailed descriptions of some of the therapies undertaken to help Don, one such being the system used to help Don regain some facility with word recognition and numbers.

The book provides an insight into the struggles, the hopes and fears of someone who has suffered a stroke, and of those who care for such a one. It covers some of the mundane issues such as eating and dressing, through to issues such as concerns over finance, Rosella’s desire to help Don maintain his dignity and his embarrassment at not being able to do some things, the tensions that can arise between them, and the need each has for their own “space” and interests.

Rosella writes with honesty, but also humour. I laughed out loud at the story of Don waking one night in search of his paralyzed arm; he had been told by his therapists that he should protect it. ‘“If you lie on your arm or if it gets caught in something, you could develop serious troubles. You need to always know where your arm is and keep it safe.” One night not long after he came home from the hospital, Don suddenly woke me from a deep sleep, uttering, “Where’s my arm?!” At the same moment, I felt his left hand reach over to me, grab my left arm, and plop it on his chest. He found an arm; it just was not his’ (p. 40).

There are a host of anecdotes that give a very good insight and understanding of what it means to live with a stroke or to care for someone who has suffered a stroke. Each chapter ends with a check list of “what helps us cope and gives us hope”. These are practical and down-to-earth actions, or attitudes that build optimism and hope. Both Don and Rosella have chosen consciously not to allow the fact of Don’s stroke and what has entailed from that to make them bitter, but rather have chosen to take positive steps to address each challenge, and also to focus on other people. Moreover, while the book does not say a great deal about faith and God, they make clear that they know in this experience God’s peace, and that God loves them and will not abandon them.

Jeff Wisdom, Through the Valley: Biblical-Theological Reflections on Suffering (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2011).

This book is an honest reflection upon a time of intense spiritual, emotional and physical turmoil and difficulty. Jeff Wisdom, in July 2005, was diagnosed with a stage four cancer, Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. This entailed about six months of regular chemotherapy, a couple of bone-marrow biopsys, and a cocktail of drugs: it brought on many side-effects, some of the worst of which were pain, debilitating tiredness and weakness in his legs.

He writes about the experiences he went through, from the pain experienced in treatment, to the fears he had for his family’s future should he die, to his struggle with trust in the face of God’s seeming absence and the reasons for suffering. He also writes of the support and encouragement he received from friends, family, and especially Chris, his wife, and in some cases fellow cancer sufferers. As a record of a sufferer’s struggles, it is a rich and moving account. The book is further enriched by the inclusion, at the beginning and end of each chapter, of extracts from Chris’s journal, very personal and honest cries from the heart to God, and expressing her fears and struggles as she walks with Jeff through his valley.

Jeff writes “biblical-theological reflections on suffering” out of his experiences, and because they are not written in the abstract, they are most helpful and telling. Jeff honestly admits that he still continues to struggle with issues, and that he is less certain about some things than he once was. I found his writing about his sense of loneliness and abandonment by God at times during his illness to be very helpful. His reflections on the lament psalms are most perceptive and surprising. The fact that they provide a way of being brutally honest before God was not an unexpected insight, but a surprise was that Jeff speaks of his reticence in expressing his real feelings for fear of hurting those he loves. He wonders whether he refrains from an “honest expression of lament, because whether I admit it or not, I am afraid that this honesty would be too much to bear, even for God?” (p. 25). He affirms that God is fully able to bear our anguished articulation of pain and a sense of abandonment.

A challenging aspect of the book was Jeff’s sharing of his struggle to fully trust God, his desire to be in control of his life (though he also writes of the deep theological truth that we are not, cannot be, and that God is omniscient), and the “breaking point” when he released to God his family. He came to the point where he knew he must “simply and directly, but most importantly verbally, profess to God that I trusted him to care for my family if I were no longer here on this earth to provide for them” (p. 134).

Through his suffering, Jeff has learned to leave the “why” question with God. But he has observed many ways in which God has been at work in the experience, both in the way circumstances have come about, and in the support and encouragement received (sometimes very tangibly through financial support, or in the songs composed by a friend). He has also observed how God has worked through his experience of cancer in the lives of family and others.

Jeff writes that he would rather not have written this book. If it had been his choice, he would have rather not gone through this particular “valley”. But it has provided him with the impetus and the occasion to make a contribution to a biblical theology of suffering. He acknowledges it is not the last word. And he states that it is a personal word, refracted through his own particular experience of suffering. I think that it has the greater impact because of that.

I am grateful to these friends for writing these books. Although I feel as though I have been able to go through life with scarcely a "bump in the road" (as Rosella puts it on one occasion), the books deal with challenges that we all face: how to learn to trust God, how to cope with frustrations and set-backs, how to relate to others, especially those we love, and the challenge of being open and honest (as may be appropriate) about our fears and anxieties. These books also enable us to emphathise with those going through suffering or living with pain and disability with perhaps more understanding than might otherwise be the case.