When a girl of sixteen I had an attack of spinal meningitis that laid the foundation for years of invalidism, although I never gave up completely to it until after I was married.
The sudden death of my mother, who had been all the world to me, followed by the birth of my little daughter, seemed the beginning of seven long years of suffering, physical and mental. The latter was caused by a constantly growing rebellion against a God who could take my mother from me, and could permit such suffering— which finally ended in my refusing to believe in the existence of a God.
For weeks I would be compelled to lie in a hammock, for I could neither sit in a chair nor lie in bed without intense pain from sciatica. Meanwhile my spinal trouble continued to grow worse, in spite of the suffering caused by physicians applying constant irritants, and with the general breaking down came troubles too numerous to mention.
I spent six months in Battle Creek Sanitarium, returning home much worse than when I went there.
After spending eighteen months in bed, attended by different local physicians, my husband decided to send me to Dr. Weir Mitchell of Philadelphia. I shall never forget the agony of leaving my little daughter of four, and for six more long months I remained away from home and friends. Freezing the spine, and then burning it, were resorted to and finally an operation was advised and undergone, but it was all of no avail, for on my return home, I found myself facing the same old conditions and torturing pain.
During all this time, every few weeks, I suffered with headaches that baffled materia medica, until out of pure sympathy, my physician would come and administer chloroform to me.
Finally I was persuaded to try mind cure and received temporary relief from a few minor troubles, only to be thrown back at the end of a year into a "worse state than the first." Another claim made its appearance and, although I had three operations by eminent surgeons, none were successful, "owing to the impoverished state of my blood," so said the physicians. I was ordered to Europe for six months, after which I was to have another operation; but it was then I was led to try Christian Science. When I found that God not only did not permit all the evil and suffering in the world but He did not know it, I knew that I, at last, had found a God I could believe in.
My reason rebelled against the teachings of mind cure, as it taught that God's man had fallen, and it could not satisfy my desire, as to the origin of evil.
But when I learned in Science that God is All, I quickly saw that we can never find the origin of nothing and my doubts vanished. In a few short weeks the last claim was healed, but it was many months before I could call myself free of the spinal pain; and the sciatica remained a "thorn in my flesh" for eighteen months. This, also, finally gave way to the healing power of Truth and I could then say truly I was "every whit whole."
Before I was healed I went through a class with our beloved Leader and Teacher, Mrs. Eddy. My gratitude is very deep that such has been my privilege, and my daily prayer is that I may be counted worthy to be her student.
