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I wrote a book called In Medias Res. The title is a literary term for “In the middle.” We’re always in the middle of life, and I talk a lot about how so many people have joined in the middle of my story as we wait God’s full healing to show up in my body. But there’s also some massive plot points in our stories that have a middle that keep life interesting.

Right now I’m in the middle of a move. In a couple of senses, actually. I’m drafting this while people pack around me the last of my belongings at my big beautiful accessible house that has been my home the past two years. I’ve had a lot of mental space filled up the past three months searching for a suitable alternative once my landlord told me she was selling the home. Unfortunately, I still don’t have that answer. There’s another middle as I wait for the resolution of where my long term living home will be.

For now, I’ll move to another neighbourhood where I’ve found a small home which can fit like 75% of my stuff and has a safe bathroom for me to shower in. It’s significantly cheaper which is helpful because I’ll have to taxi everywhere since the bus stop is completely inaccessible for a wheelchair user due to massive long term construction on the major road nearby. That part sucks. It also sucks that I have to move at all when so many details of my last place were exact answers to my prayers in Germany for a long term home. I’d hoped to stay here forever.

Yet here I am watching all my stuff load into boxes that I’ll have to unpack into a cramped space that is a temporary stopgap as I wait to find out where God will put me. I talk a big game about God coming through, and here’s he deal, I still believe he will. Even as I settle and seemingly compromise for this six month season, I trust that there will be a better solution on the other side.

I’m just one week away from the 12 year mark of my spinal cord injury, and I trust that God has another side of this story for me. I believe that I will be healed. I have faith in the character of God who has parted the Red Sea, led the Israelites through the wilderness, worked physical healing through the ages, and most significantly told me my sins are forgiven. I get there are lots of people who think I’m spinning a wild narrative to twist things to a happy ending that may never come, but I don’t see it that way. This is how faith works, certainty in what I hope for. Because from the middle, I don’t know how we get to the happy ending.

Right now, it really sucks.

Last night I spent a while on a call with one of my precious TCKs who was dealing with a trigger and talking through some pretty heavy self-harm temptations. She’s been wrestling with severe depression and SI since August, and she wants it to be over. I get that, but it’s harder for her in the middle. She also believes in her core that my living situation is going to be resolved with an incredible gift from God. I get that, but it’s harder for me in the middle. She lost a pretty important contract for her job yesterday, and I’m losing my house today. We both have pretty yucky things to deal with, and yet I know that it was a holy moment as we made a couple of morbid jokes and referenced anthropologists, literary theorists, and theologians and grappled with the decisions and impact of hope all over the course of ninety minutes.

I’ve promised to send her a picture of the creek running through my new back yard when I get settled this afternoon. I’ll still be in the middle of this interim housing situation, and realistically in the middle of unpacking, but I’ll be finished with the red door. I’ll still be in the middle of grieving that loss.

Lots of people have been checking in on me through this process, and I’ve been pretty stable as I carry on because there’s not really another option. I have to leave. It sucks. There were no better options than this little house. I have to pay for the ramp installation. I chose to go with it over staying with a couple of different friends who offered a spare room because this at least gives me my own space and can store a good portion of my furniture and gives the search and planning mental load a break until after Easter Camp. Yeah, I signed a six month lease specifically with Easter Camp in mind.

Huge, huge thank you to those who’ve donated to my moving costs – because of a miscalculation, the ramp installation nearly doubled in price, but I had the money in my TeachBeyond account to fix it, and it’ll get resolved this afternoon. I also had the money for some of the other moving expenses incurred already, and I’ll be set for a good portion of the next move already. Thank you, thank you, thank you! Not having to stress about money on top of the stress of moving makes a massive difference!