For those of y’all who know me personally, you know that I’m fluent in falling down. Despite the fact that I spent the majority of my life flipping on a 4 inch wide piece of wood, walking on my own two feet has proven difficult for me time and time again. One of these times happened to be during our last week in Colombia.
I managed to step in a hole while walking literally 3 feet down the street to the other house that some of my squad mates were staying at to return a pair of chacos and ended up rolling my ankle real nice. As I sat holding my ankle on the sidewalk of a not entirely safe street at 9:30 pm trying to laugh the pain away, I was silently praying to God that nothing was broken because, man, did that hurt. Me and my stubbornness kept telling everyone “oh it’s fine, it barely hurts” as I was crawling back to my bed in hopes that no one would call our leaders because hospitals are not my thing. I went to bed that night telling myself that I just rolled it and it’d be good to go in the morning.
Boy, was I wrong.
I woke up the next morning to a foot that had doubled in size and no remnant of an actual ankle. I then reluctantly made the decision to call my squad leader who told me to meet her at the hospital after I sent pictures of my very impressive cankle. What a great way to spend my last week in Colombia, right? Wrong. I was not a happy racer.
After around 7 hours at the hospital and a very strange doctor, it was determined that my foot wasn’t broken; a severe sprain at the least and torn ligaments at the most. Because the severity of my injury couldn’t be determined, I was put in a soft cast and told to stay on crutches for 7-10 days. I was now an even unhappier racer.
Being on crutches on the World Race is probably one of the most unideal situations because our main form of transportation is, ya know um, walking. Not to mention the 2 bags with 9 months worth of living necessities we are expected to carry around pretty frequently.
Being unable to walk for the past 10 days has been a huge struggle for me. I hate feeling like a nuisance and having to depend on people to do simple things like carrying my bags or walking up the stairs. I hate not being able to play sports or hike with the squad. I hate feeling weak and I hate feeling unable. But through this time of being a cripple yet again, I got to spend a little more alone time with the Lord while my squad mates were out and about enjoying their last few days in Colombia. And I’m a pretty big extrovert, so alone time isn’t something I usually value or even desire, but my opinion on it has definitely changed.
Crutches frustrate me more than words can express. I’ve had to use them so many times in the past, yet my loathing for them seems to grow each time. Being unable to do all the things I wanted to do this past week made me a really angry and mean Emily. I hated how negative I was becoming so I decided to take all these frustrations to God and ask Him to soften my heart to what He was trying to teach me from this situation. This is what I got:
I have a really big heart and love loving people in any way that I can, but letting others love me has always been a challenge. That’s usually because I don’t feel worthy of it, but this past week, God has completely casted out this lie. Although it still makes me uncomfortable, my community has loved me so, so well over this past week. Whether it be carrying me up the stairs or to the store, getting my food for me, watching movies in bed with me instead of going out, or even just words of encouragement have meant so much. Trust isn’t an easy thing for me, yet God has showed me that I can trust my team and my squad to truly love me. That these little acts of service that often make me feel like a nuisance come from a place of love and because they really do care about my wellbeing. That I am worthy of receiving the love I show to others.
So, while the sight of crutches still conjure up some not so great emotions, I am thankful for that hole in the middle of the sidewalk in Colombia.
