You Will Be Okay: By David Bowers

Haven’t we all told someone or been told that it will all be “Okay” at some time or another? Whether it be as a toddler who has broken his toy, a teen after a breakup, or as adults when things just don’t go the way we planned, we’ve all heard those words. But what does okay mean? How do we get back to being okay when everything has changed?

I was initially told that I wouldn’t survive my injury; in those first moments, the emergency room
staff wasn’t telling me I was going to be okay. I was just being told to fight with all I had to just make it to the next day. Eventually as the days became weeks, the hospital staff became more hopeful and would start to use the old cliche of “everything will be okay.” As the person laying in the bed, this was confusing. I was unable to move and what little I could see of my body didn’t look okay. How were things ever going to be like they had been before? I held on to that hope that somehow they would be right, but it seemed like such a ridiculous thought that things would go back to normal.

As the weeks in the hospital turned to months, the confusion would stay. I would get my glasses back which helped me see things clearer. My body was healing, but it did looked different. Therapists were working with me to increase my range of motion and strength to be able to walk again and do the simple task of feeding myself. Eating with an eighteen inch fork just didn’t seem “okay.”  Taking a few steps from the bed and back again didn’t seem “okay.” I would be told that it was unlikely I would be able to do certain things again, like walk unassisted or button a shirt, but we would need to wait and see. But things had improved from those first days and I was being told that things would take time. I would continue to have that hope that things would be “okay.”After about 8 months, I was still being encouraged that things would be “okay.” I was making progress in a lot areas, walking more and more unassisted, was using a fork again and you could see where things might get back to being okay if I continued to heal and improve. I was being told that most of the range of motion I’d lost in the accident would return within 12 months after the accident, and that whatever I hadn’t gotten back I would be able to do reconstructive surgeries to get back to being okay.

As the 1 year anniversary approached my progress had plateaued, we started those conversations about reconstructive surgeries. I was desperately wanting to get more hand function back and felt that with that I would be okay. Through our conversations with the plastic surgeon (who didn’t have good bedside manners), I was trying to determine how much he would be able to help my hands. He wasn’t optimistic. The surgery he was proposing was the only option and the place to start. But depending on how the surgery went I might lose my hand or regain some partial function. This was not the “okay” I had been looking for. I was looking for the return to normal before the accident. It was a quiet drive back to our home in Nederland, when Carly pulled the truck off the road and onto the beach along the Bolivar peninsula. We sat in the truck for a while watching the waves, and looking out onto the gulf as we started the grieving process in earnest for what we had lost. The tears flowed as we talked aboutwhat being “okay” really meant. We weren’t returning to normal; there was no going back. After several surgeries, we came to terms with what my hands could do. That I would always look different, that things would always be different for our family.
As Carly and I made a return trip to Nederland last week along this same stretch of beach, I was reminded of this grieving process. At times it was a couple steps forward and at other times it was a step back. Coming to terms with the new me was a process. It started early in the hospital with glimpses of what the new life might look like. Was kicked farther down the path at times, like that night on the beach. But it was a slow process that took years to accomplish. To truly be “okay” took time and some inward reflection.

Sometimes being “okay” doesn’t mean being familiar, or going back to the normalcy you once knew. Sometimes being “okay” means adapting to a new normal, and trusting God to guide you gently through that season. If you’re facing a new normal today, know that you truly will be okay, even if you can’t see it at the moment. God cares for you and wants us to trust Him even when we’re afraid of what tomorrow holds.