Self Talk the Gospel: The intersection of Fear and Faith

I was standing in the middle of the community garden for a “serve day” with my daughter’s second grade class when I received the phone call. I hardly remember what my husband said but I remember I stopped breathing. Results of biopsy. Melanoma in the lymph nodes. My healthy, athletic husband had cancer. At 40.

I stood there frozen, somewhere between the corn and the kale, holding a diaper bag and several water bottles for the kids on the field trip. What should I do? Text our family? Call our life group? Cry? Sink into a heap in the dirt? Scream? Pray? Leave the kids and go to my man? My head was swirling but I was stress paralyzed. Couldn’t move. The fear started to suffocate me.

In the days that followed, my mind could only imagine the worst. I spent my days weeping, imagining myself a widow raising our three daughters on my own. I envisioned my CrossFit husband in a hospital bed, writhing in pain. Every song on the radio, every commercial, every meal was a trigger for me. My mind would race to the worst-case scenarios, my worst fears somehow coming true.

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