As Christian Science has been my liberator from sickness and pain, I write this testimony in the hope that it may help others. I was a sufferer from tubercular disease of the hip joint and underwent an operation, but without any healing results, as it left an open wound for seven years. I was thin and weak and walked with crutches part of the time. I was convinced that life for me was short at the best, and my greatest hope was to help mankind while I lived, at least to help alleviate physical suffering.
As this hope of helping others grew I became somewhat stronger physically and decided to take up training as a nurse. I studied many medical books, hunting for the cause and cure of the disease from which I suffered, but this only made me more restless and discouraged. After finishing the hospital course I was sent on my first case, but the patient refused to have me for fear of contagion. This was most discouraging. Just when it seemed that all my training had come to nothing and that I must give up and go home, a relative of the patient visited her. This lady asked me to go home with her and take charge of her two small children, adding that she had no fear of contagion. Her freedom from fear was so marked that I realized I had never before known any one so free from it. I went to her home and soon learned that she was studying Christian Science.
In the church nearby I attended my first testimony meeting, and can never forget how wonderful the testimonies seemed, especially two which told of the healing of tubercular trouble. On the way home I asked if they could really be true, and the lady said she knew one of them was true and that was the reason she herself was taking up the study of Christian Science. When we reached home she lent me a copy of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" and I read two or three hours. When I awoke next morning the wound on the hip joint was completely healed, although for seven years it had discharged and had been dressed daily. This was in 1904, and I never had severe pain in the hip after that. Although that leg was somewhat shorter than the other, making it difficult to walk, this condition gradually disappeared. The leg was elongated and my step became even and correct. Within a year I grew fully an inch taller and gained greatly in weight.
