Guest post by Lana Christian

My mother had weathered four decades of well-controlled chronic bronchiectasis before Alzheimer’s started to erode her life. Every time she was admitted to the hospital, she would get extremely disoriented (no surprise). But she’d also say something she never said in any other setting.

Every time a doctor entered her room, she’d grab his white coat and plead, “I don’t have anywhere to go. Will you take me home with you?”

This happened so consistently that I wondered what was really getting triggered inside her head.

As I prayed for discernment, God reminded me that Mom was very young when her father died suddenly. Her mother sent her away to stay with friends for a couple weeks, so Mom didn’t see her father’s wake or funeral. I can only imagine how disruptive and disorienting that must have been to a child who’d barely started grade school.

Her mother didn’t have time to grieve or help her four children with their grief. She had mouths to feed, so she picked up night shift work at the town’s psychiatric hospital.

Suddenly mom’s words and actions made perfect sense.

This isn’t a tip in how to “speak Alzheimer” as much as it is a gentle reminder that chronic complex illness makes people especially vulnerable to the enemy’s attacks. Satan is a master at using any unhealed portion of our lives to incite fear, insecurity, and discouragement. I can say that with certainty because I’ve wrestled with it in my long recovery from a near-fatal case of Lyme disease.

Chronic illness sets the stage for connecting current symptoms with old traumas. When physical symptoms flare, emotional wounds from a person’s past tend to reopen as well.

The result? People pick up lies when life puts them down.

Pain becomes a projector, running reels of past traumas as present failures and present difficulties as a fear-filled future. Self-criticism can emerge. People may berate themselves for their “weakness” in stumbling over something they may think they’ve dealt with already or guilt themselves for not being stronger in “the battle.” They may think that God doesn’t care about them or somehow they deserve to suffer. People may fear praying because they don’t want to hear from God if another shoe is going to drop.

Where the enemy plants condemnation, we need to plant confirmation.

Your ability to help with a person’s physical needs may be limited. But you can offer what a hurting person needs most: affirmation of God’s love spoken over them. It’s a balm beyond medicine. Starting-point examples:

• “God has always loved you, and He always will.” (Jeremiah 31:3)
• “God will never leave you or forsake you.” (Joshua 1:5)
• “You are a child of the King.” (Galatians 3:26)
• “God is here with you. He is fighting for you. He rejoices and sings over you because you are His beloved child.” (Zephaniah 3:17)

Practice a ministry of affirmation. Prayerfully consider what note, call, or visit you can make to lift up someone today.

The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. Jeremiah 31:3 KJV

Lana Christian has a dual writing career in medicine and ministry. She won numerous APEX awards for the former and ACFW awards for the latter. She loves secret staircases, third-story windows, jazz, and chai tea. She believes hiking can solve most problems, but God can solve every problem. Visit her on Twitter.

Tracy Crump dispenses hope in her award-winning book, Health, Healing, and Wholeness: Devotions of Hope in the Midst of Illness (CrossLink Publishing, 2021). A former intensive care nurse, she cared for her parents and her mother-in-law and understands both the burdens and joys of caregiving. Her devotions have been featured in Guideposts books, The Upper Room, and many other publications, and she has contributed 22 stories to Chicken Soup for the Soul® books. She also conducts writing workshops, freelance edits, and proofreads for Farmers’ Almanac. But her most important job is Grandma to five completely unspoiled grandchildren.