One day last week I noticed there was a sore place on the bottom of my left foot, and I wondered how it got there. I had broken the top of a crystal box recently, and the glass shards scattered across my floor in front of my dresser. I thought I had gotten them all up with the broom and dustpan but maybe not. My bedroom floor is wooden and I sometimes get splinters in my feet from the floor. I cannot bear to wear shoes inside my own bedroom, though.
Yesterday, I could feel the lump on the bottom of my left foot, near the outside, but I couldn’t twist myself around enough to see it. I asked Mom to look at the bottom of my foot and figure out what was causing the pain. I held up my foot and Mom scooted her chair over to the bed so I could put my foot in her lap. She could feel the lump.
She said “It looks like there’s something under there, and the skin has grown around it.”
“See if you can poke it out,” I suggested.
Mother has incredibly tough fingernails. She keeps polish on them. Her body holds on to calcium, which is good, but potassium seems to slip away too easily, which is why she has leg cramps so often.
She dug around in my foot with her nails and I tried not to scream.
Mother has a cataract in her right eye and can see almost nothing out of it at the moment. Hopefully the August 15 surgery will remedy that.
“I think I got it,” Mom said, after a short time. I breathed a sigh of relief.
My foot is still a bit sore from Mother’s prodding of it.
I was thinking yesterday how my sore foot is a metaphor.
In life, we often absorb foreign objects [hurts] into ourselves, and even surround them with protective layers, burying them deep. Shouts, insults, angry words, abuse – all those type of hurts are like foreign objects, wounding us. We try to ignore them. Yet, the pain lingers, of course, because it shouldn’t be there.
Ignoring the pain doesn’t make it go away.
No, someone with the ability to dig out the foreign object is the solution. It’s better if it’s someone who loves us, but it can also just be someone who likes us. A friend, parent, sibling, a colleague, a professional therapist – they are diggers. Sometimes we can dig things out on our own but it's much harder to do.
Digging hurts. Looking at the pain-causer in the harsh light can be sickening. The wound left behind will hurt for a while. The alternative, though, never results in healing. Ignoring pain is not the same as healing it.
Once the foreign object is actually out, though there’s still some pain and soreness for a while, eventually a blessing occurs. One day the hurt is truly and completely healed.
There will be a scar, but scars can be ignored, or even worn as badges of honor.
I respect scars. Scars indicate suffering, but also healing.
I have a lot of scars. Most of them are the result of someone I love accidentally hurting me, but the scars also show healing has taken place.
My wish is that everyone I love will dig the foreign objects out and toss them away, so true healing can take place. Then we can all concentrate on happy pursuits instead of expending our energy ignoring pain.
