It’s been exactly a month since Hannah’s surgery and what a whirlwind of a month it has been.

So lets recap, shall we?

Hannah finally had her long-awaited surgery and let me tell you, I did not know how I would’ve been addressing it after everything was said and done. Let me explain. Very few people knew or understood what was at stake with this surgery. There was a possibility that it would be completely unsuccessful, a possibility that Hannah would lose her voice, and as many other medical parents could sympathize, with everything we’ve experienced, there is always a small part of you that leaves room in case things go wrong. Something that as a believer I have become better at navigating because I don’t believe my faith and this kind of conditioned fear can co-exist. However, for the sake of being honest and transparent, I have to be truthful. That being said, I was less fearful of things going extremely wrong, but rather concerned about this not being the best decision for my child, while also being extremely triggered by all the stored-up PTSD that comes with telling a parent who lived in a hospital for about a year with there child, that they would be going back to that place, even if it wasn’t for a fraction of that time.

Whew! Even reading that back it seems like a mouthful, but quite literally that was the state of my mind just weeks before the surgery. That is, until I was reassured that we were in the falling action.

In a story, the falling action happens after the climax and before the end. The falling action is what I’ve decided to call this point in this season because that is exactly what it feels like. It’s the most crucial part of the waiting period because it is the part where you feel like you can’t take it anymore. It’s the part where it starts to feel heavy. It’s the part where the pain of it all begins to ache. It’s the part where the end feels so close you can taste it and yet at the same time not close enough.

The Lord reminded us of our falling action, when even after a 7-hour procedure, what was expected to be a 3-week hospital stay, got reduced to a week-long stay. He reminded us when on the fourth day, Hannah was up and coloring, dancing to music, and wanting to sing. He reminded us that even with the anticipation and the fear of Hannah losing her voice, she is slowly but surely regaining that strong voice we know and love.

The reminder has been made clear and known in the evidence that the trauma that we had experienced two summers ago, would not be relived. Not this time around nor the next.

Thank you, Jesus.