Grateful to God!

A smile has finally taken over my frown. Last Friday, I wrote about being in limbo about my feelings on my reproductive condition. Although I put out my rants there for the whole cyber world to read, I never expected that people – friends and even strangers from far-away places – would actually care enough to e-mail me long encouraging letters. What’s even amazing is that I even got more responses from those people that I don’t know. Just when you think most people are engrossed with their own agonies, it’s absolutely comforting to realize that the world still has a lot of love to give.

I really needed encouragement this weekend so I would like to take this opportunity to thank those very generous people who gave a piece of their hearts to me in the past couple of days…

Thank you to my friend PJ Atienza, who gets “first prize” for responding to my SOS. Peej, even if you’re writing all the way from Virginia, you feel closer to me now than anybody else within my reach. Thank you to Abi Gonzales, who I just met once in my UP Open University class last year. I didn’t even know that she reads my blog so I was so delightfully surprised to get her loving YM messages about my post. And most especially, my heart goes to out to those people who sent their thoughtful replies anonymously. God bless you all…

I finally know how I feel about the whole thing – I AM GRATEFUL TO GOD! How God writes our stories and puts everything together in full circle is definitely beyond my grasp.

I realized yet again that more than the childhood taunting, what really PUSHED me to seek medical attention for my “height problem” was this guy named Joseph Palarca. If you still haven’t heard the story by now, this guy Joseph was my classmate in one of my college classes. We had crushes on each other. Then we sort of started casually dating that semester. Then summer break came. Just when I thought we were gonna be officially boyfriend-girlfriend that incoming semester, I found out that he was already the “official boyfriend” of this girl he had long been friends with at his church.

Devastated… Crushed to pieces… I couldn’t bear being in campus with the fear of running into them, worse when they’re “pa-sweet!” So I dropped out temporarily from school the semester after that and concentrated on finding a SOLUTION to my height problem. Why? Because the moment I saw that the new girl he was dating was tall and had an “ample womanly” body, I immediately concluded that he chose her over me due to physical reasons. I was 18. I was naïve. He was my first love. What could you expect?

So my Joseph Issue led me to my crazy mis-adventures with medical science. After more than 10 years of unresolved hormonal conditions; of unknown pituitary syndromes; and several attempts in between to finally find a man who can love me just the way I am… you know what God did? -- HE GAVE BACK JOSEPH PALARCA TO ME! Yes ladies and gentlemen, in some twist of fate that God had already pre-plotted, the guy who started this all actually became my husband. After all these years, the doctors were never able to give me solutions about my height but God was able to heal my heart.

Of course by now and ever since we started dating again in 2005, I already know very well that the reason why he went for that other girl was not based on physical preferences. He admitted that he was also too young that time and was easily chided by fellow church-mates to go after her. In short, it was a matter of proximity and peer pressure.

Anyway, I have long forgiven him for that. In fact, that’s not the issue anymore. He even said something that really struck me. If I didn’t have all these issues growing up, would I have been the achiever that I am right now? If I had been “normal” and just another mediocre face in the crowd, would I have been ME? My “shortcomings” actually brought my successes. He even added that he already liked me before because I was different. And he liked me even more when we met again in 2005 because he realized that I was more than just different – I was beautifully odd.

It just never ceases to amaze me how everything turned out after all these years. I guess God allowed these insecurities to cast their clouds over me so that I would seek his sunshine. So after realizing what a wonderful gift God has given me in the person of my husband and now giving me a “common” medical dysfunction that I can finally understand – I am beaming with gratitude for the Lord!