"It's a Christmas Miracle!"

This photo from the post about my mother's nativity scene seemed like the best one to use today.

And I'll keep this post short.

I've had wildly fluctuating blood pressure for decades for some known and also unknown reasons.

This typically prompts great anxiety whenever I walk into a room with a blood pressure cuff.

So you can imagine the anxiety when I am actually getting my blood pressure taken.

A couple of weeks ago, I visited my primary for a follow-up on one day and a follow-up with my endocrinologist on the next day.

Both times, to my wonderment and delight, the readings were extremely normal.

My endocrinologist was equally delighted and exclaimed, "It's a Christmas miracle!"

At first glance, such sentiments seem silly and trite.

But they really are not, if you think about it.

My family is still on a several-year chaotic stretch of one emergency after another. We have a lot of turbulence in the background we cannot control, and that turbulence is teaching us (very slowly) how to walk more deeply in faith.

Whether or not you consider the first Christmas story to be fact or fiction, the details are the same.

During an especially volatile time in the world, a savior was born in the midst of it, very quietly, very humbly, and without much fanfare or notice from most people.

If your life today is smooth and without struggles, rejoice! That is a huge blessing indeed. Revel in that while you can.

If your life today is difficult and challenging, also rejoice!

For tucked away in all of that turmoil are little miracles just waiting for you to see them, recognize them, and embrace them.

That is the Christmas miracle waiting for you. 

For Those With Anxiety

Breathe.

Not as in hyperventilation.

But as if you're floating on a wave under sunny sky on a warm day.

Unless, of course, water makes you anxious. If so, feel free to substitute the imagery with one more to your liking.

As a family, we are an anxious group, and we do have some back stories that led to it.

But I've discovered anxiety is quite common, and many people I know suffer from it.

You doubt that? Post a Bible verse or meme about anxiety and see how many "likes" you get. And I've received those "likes" from people I wouldn't have dreamed have an anxious bone in their bodies.

Certainly this past year has given many cause for anxiety.

Pandemic craziness aside, why do people experience so much anxiety? Why is it so prevalent?

Rebekah has a theory that anxious people are more "aware" than people who are not. This awareness makes us less able to live our lives in denial. We know what could happen - and so we fear.

But that is part of anxiety's like. Just because it could happen doesn't mean it will. And even if it does, it probably won't happen the way our overactive imagination paints it.

This morning, some of us are anxious about Midnight. Seemingly out of nowhere, she developed a soft mass on her back, which prompted an early physical.

"Most likely a cyst," the vet said after he examined it. "But let's keep an eye on it."

Then last Saturday, right after our Calkins Day celebration, Midnight's temperature shot up. Except for curing her tapeworms and ear mites when she came to us as a sixteen-week-old kitten (she was found abandoned with her siblings), she's never been sick.

I do mean "never." No fevers, not antibiotics, no infections.

But the animal hospital did a fine needle biopsy on the cyst. And some of it came back suspicious but inconclusive.

So fourteen-year-old Midnight is having the mass removed today for a proper biopsy. And that's one reason why a few of us are anxious this morning.

But just one reason. We can list off half a dozen more on any given day. Seriously. Just ask us.

Being anxious won't help Midnight. And it certainly won't make us feel better or change any outcomes.

It's good to be aware, of course. Being aware helps us make better decisions, I think - at least up to a point.

Yet anxiety can cause level-headedness to fly out the window, too. It can throw chaos into sound thinking and the decisions we made with a calmer mind.

One terrible part of anxiety is that it makes people feel alone in their fears. And that's why I'm writing this post today.

Because "feeling alone" is also part of anxiety's lie. The Anxiety Club is actually quite large. And somedays, our family feels like we hold all the officer, alumni, and emeritus positions.

None of this will make you feel less anxious today if anxiety is already ruling your Monday.

But, hopefully, you are smiling a little and feeling slightly less alone.

Breathe.