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Teddy bears
comfort children. What could they do for a grown woman?
Body & Soul
by Anne F. Clement
Mesa, Arizona
All was well in my world
for a long time. I believed God was with me, and I had a loving husband at my
side. Richard and I met in high school, and in 2001 we looked forward to
celebrating our thirty-sixth wedding anniversary, with many more to come. Then
one morning I noticed blood coming from the nipple of my left breast.
Richard came with me to the gynecologist, and to every test the doctor ordered.
Nothing was conclusive. Then my GP discovered a lump in the same breast, and he
scheduled a biopsy.
Unfortunately Richard
had to teach his foreign language class at the college and couldn’t go with me
to my appointment. I’d be okay on my own, we decided. No one expected anything
serious, not even the surgeon who did the biopsy. But afterward, the
pathologist’s report was clear. I had breast cancer. Richard wasn’t with me to
hear the diagnosis. I was so alone and unsure. I left dizzy, as if the world I’d
known had spun out of my control.
Somehow I managed to
drive myself home. Richard was waiting for me. One glance at him and I could
tell he knew. “It’s cancer,” I said anyway. He took me in his arms. I looked at
him, my eyes swimming with questions. “God is with you, Anne,” he said. “I know
it.”
“I don’t know that for
sure,” I whispered. “Not anymore. And I’m ashamed I feel this way.” My faith was
strong, but it was purely intellectual. I accepted God in my mind, in my soul. I
believed he was real. But now all I could think of was the cancer that had
invaded my body. What did it matter what I knew for sure in my mind? I ached to
feel God with me. I longed for his embrace.
I got through the next
days by keeping busy. I pulled out my sewing basket and worked on the quilt I’d
neglected. Whenever I could, I visited my grandchildren. Richard and I took
evening walks. All the while the chemotherapy and other procedures pushed me
deeper into despair. I lay on the couch one day after treatment, unable to move.
God, I need your strength to fight this. I need to feel your presence. Was I
asking too much?
A friend at church asked
me to head a service project for the girls’ camp. Something else to fill my
time. I said yes quickly. The girls and I were charged with making stuffed bears
for the police and fire departments to give to children in disaster situations.
The girls talked about
their first teddy bears. “I still sleep with mine,” a 10-year-old admitted. We
collected scraps of fabric, buttons and ribbon, and sewed hundreds of bears. “I
love him!” one girl said to me, kissing her handiwork on the snout. “He loves me
too.”
It was easy to imagine
the effect bears would have on children who were hurting. A child trusts the
simplest feelings. What could be simpler than being comforted by something soft
and cuddly? I wished it could be as simple for me.
Nothing brought me
consolation, not even Richard with his constant love and attention. My
girlfriends rallied round, dropping off gifts of encouragement. Bears were a
running theme: a bear with wings hugging a vase of roses, another holding a fat
red heart. When I got the third one in a week, I balked. “You give bears to
kids, not fifty-seven-year-olds!” I stormed. “What’s with these sentimental
women?”
“Sentimental?” asked my
husband, the language professor. “Sentiment means feeling. What’s wrong with
that—at any age?” I could only stare at him. Nothing more was said about bears.
Then we paid a visit to Helen, an elderly friend in a nursing home. In one of
the two chairs in her room sat a sizable teddy, a gift from her family. “Just
put him on the floor,” Helen said as my husband approached the chair. “He won’t
mind.”
“I’ll hold him,” I said.
Richard sat the bear
next to me. I put my arm around his shoulder. As I listened to the story Richard
was telling Helen, I settled in. I leaned into the bear. He was silky soft and
stuffed enough to be cuddly. I picked him up and looked into his furry face. I
surprised myself and sat him on my lap. Richard did a double-take when he
noticed I’d turned the bear toward me. The bear’s tummy pressed into my chest,
warming me where the cancer was. I embraced him with both arms. You are sweet,
you funny bear.
I looked sheepishly at
Richard as we got into the car after our visit. “I have a confession to make,” I
said. “Hugging that bear felt really good.”
“Then we’ll go shopping
after my class tomorrow,” Richard said. “A grown woman should have her own
bear.”
True to his word,
Richard kept our date at the mall. We poked into a gift shop, a collectibles
shop and some children’s stores, but without success. There were no huggable
bears. “Maybe this isn’t for me,” I said. Then we came to a big toy store. The
window was filled with bears. Bears in every shape and size. I grabbed Richard’s
hand, and we went inside.
I immediately picked up
a medium-sized brown bear and pulled it to my chest. Richard reached for a blue
one. “This bear’s too small, Goldilocks,” Richard said. “And this one is too
scratchy,” I said. Passers-by glanced our way as we unashamedly hugged every
bear in the window.
Then I picked up the
largest bear of the bunch—almost three feet from ear to toe with floppy arms and
a big pot belly. His close-set eyes tugged at my heartstrings. His snout melted
into my shoulder. With a sense of great satisfaction, I looked at Richard: “I
think I found him.”
I held the bear close.
His soft arms wrapped around my neck. God holds me just as dearly, I thought.
This is his touch I feel. I knew I was safe in his arms, body and soul. “Call me
sentimental,” I told Richard, “but there really is nothing like hugging a teddy
bear.” Any child could understand it. Finally I did too.
These days doctors say
the prognosis for my future looks good. In a new and unexpected way I believe
God’s presence is real. As real as a bear hug. It’s that simple.
The above article originally
appeared in the November/December 2003
issue of Angels
On Earth. To subscribe to Angels On Earth click
here.
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