Rachel Recovered

I've been praying for Rachel. A LOT.

Rachel is my daughter's best friend.  They met in high school.  Rachel is 22 years old.  She's a ballerina and an honor student at UCLA.  She is bright and charming, and I love that over the years and through long separations away at college, Rachel and Jeannette have remained close even after other friends have drifted apart.

Thank you for young women with great promise.

Rachel has spent much time at our house, and we love her joyful spirit and sense of humor.  Her own family, however, is very protective of their privacy and ever more so of their only daughter.  It is bittersweet for most parents to balance between keeping your children safe and preparing them for adult life on their own.  We celebrate their achievements and independence even as we miss their needing us.    For Rachel it was clear that her natural and deserved steps toward independence were hard fought.

Thank you for strength and perseverance in adversity.

She wanted the full college experience.  Several of her friends from high school had gone away to college and taken dorms and campus apartments when she was attending local community college part time.  She studied hard and worked hard and earned her place at one of the top universities in the nation.  She worked several jobs and saved her money, and she was ready to move closer to campus with her friends.  And while this sounds like absolutely perfectly normal American success story stuff, her success wasn't something her family could easily bear.

Thank you for normal American success stories in a world where little is normal.

Rachel made a normal, co-ed life for herself in Westwood for a little while.  Two weeks ago, this vibrant, lively young woman collapsed following a boat trip with her class and suffered a seizure.  Someone dialed 911, and Rachel was whisked away.  Her roommates and friends didn't hear from her.  She didn't attend classes.  She didn't answer her phone.  So Jeannette told me she was going to drive over to Rachel's parents' house to find her.  Jeannette was confident that Rachel was okay and resting at her parents' house, and I was inclined to let her go.  But I changed my mind and decided I needed to go with her.

Thank you for changing our minds.

We met Rachel's dad that day for the first time.  Jeannette knocked at the door and identified herself.  Then out came a father who'd spent the previous days at his daughter's hospital bedside in ICU.  His heart was breaking.  We heard unconscious, breathing tubes, responding to stimulus, some movement in her feet.  He said he felt glad when the doctors said they could expect her to remain in the hospital for a couple months slowly recovering, because it meant she would still be here in a couple months.  Jeannette and I cried with him.  I promised to pray for them all.  Private still, no visitors, no calls, please.

Thank you for unexpected visits with people who need them.

I've been praying ever since.  For Rachel.  For her parents.  For Jeannette.  I've seen my good friends Lacey and Matthew have to tell their daughter one of her best friends had died in an accident.  So many broken hearts!  How could Jeannette bear it?

Thank you for prayer.

Jeannette and her friends were asked to stay away and to respect the family's privacy at this time.  It's understandable.  But the girls couldn't help but feel that Rachel would want them even if the parents didn't.  You can't keep girlfriends away, it seems.  They are a persistent bunch and a positive force with a special bond [and Facebook].  A week later, it was time to "bust a mission."  The timing was perfect.  Rachel's mother had just stepped away.  One of the girls got through and talked to Rachel.  And Rachel woke up.

Thank you for perfect timing and the voices of friends.

How typical it is for a beautiful college co-ed to sit up in bed talking to her friends on the phone.  How wonderfully, perfectly, miraculously typical!  Now that Rachel's talking, she has asked for her friends.  And no one can keep them away.  Rachel's doctors are surprised by the huge and unexpected progress she's made in such a short time.  The girls aren't surprised; they never doubted the success of their mission.  I shouldn't be surprised; I never doubted the power of prayer.

Thank you, God, for the love of friends, for your healing spirit, and for the gift of Rachel.

[Hey, so Rachel's parents are still really private, so don't tell them about his blog, okay?  Cool.]