Leadership Journal

He spoke with honesty. Confessing what he can no longer do, describing how his gifts have departed, admitting new fears and weaknesses, his testimony did not proclaim peace. It told of pain, of pressure, of depression.

"Why do I have to take this medicine?" he asked. "I've prayed for many others to be healed, then watched God miraculously change them. He healed them. Not me."

His name is known. His accomplishments have amazed people. Now he struggles to perform tasks that felt so simple before. Doubt and defeat appear housed nearby.

I listened. We cried.

I encouraged him to release those hurts. I have him keeping a journal to avoid denial or despair. He meets with friends who accept the new man as he is.

And he talks to me. Why? Because of my counseling degree or my gift of encouragement? No. My talents or title didn't open his heart. My sickness did. When he heard me speak about a life-changing experience, he felt I would relate.

That's the way it is now. people call me because I've lost my mind, or a least an important part of it. TV and radio hosts interview me and promote my book, Beggars Can Be Chosen. But what do they really want to know? About my br /ain damage, about how it feels to have seizures, about my MRI results, about my forgetfulness.

I'm not asked to speak about how I've maintained good relationships with my three sons or how I communicate consistently with my wife. Reporters and editors, pastors and congregations want to ask: Does it embarrass your sons to regularly remind you of their names? How does your wife feel when you pause in a conversation because you can't pronounce a simple, common phrase? What do people in the congregation think when they call and hear, "No, the pastor isn't available now; he is resting"?

Several years ago an illness changed me. I had viral encephalitis. Ten days in the hospital, months of therapy, a lifetime of tests and medicine. Now, under the category of epilepsy, the "new me" is a man I would not have chosen to be.

Now I know about aphasia: because of injuries or disease, weakness mentally to grasp or gather.

The former me had no trouble spelling. The new me thanks God for spell check. This br /ain once had no trouble remembering names or memorizing Scripture. Now? Our members remind me of their names; my three sons repeat what their father forgets; my wife works to accept her new husband who goes by the same name but isn't the man she married.

What a learning experience. New words. Illustrations. I play games to track numbers, rules, or order. The poster at my clinic gave this prophetic utterance: "An impairment of the power to use or comprehend words, usually acquired as a result of a stroke, and sometimes from head injury or br /ain tumor." They needed my picture beside it.

V.S. Ramachandran's words in "phantoms in the br /ain" mirrored my thoughts: "parts …. had forever vanished, lost in patches of permanently atrophied br /ain tissue."

Therapists evaluated, ...