{"id":1761,"date":"2015-08-08T19:36:58","date_gmt":"2015-08-08T19:36:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/?p=1761"},"modified":"2015-08-02T19:49:16","modified_gmt":"2015-08-02T19:49:16","slug":"counting-our-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2015\/08\/counting-our-days.html","title":{"rendered":"Counting Our Days"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Image<\/a>
Image courtesy of photoexplorer\/FreeDigitalPhotos.net<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

More than once, I’ve heard of people to whom doctors have delivered a dire prognosis – “You have 6 months to live.” \u00a0“You have, maybe, a year.” “You have, at most, three years – the last of which will be terrible.”<\/p>\n

And, know what? I’ve also heard of people who have lived far beyond these guesstimates, defying the best of medical opinions!<\/p>\n

Not everyone will overshoot the timeline set forth by oncologists, surgeons, and others. But there are enough examples to encourage us to think in a different way about the time we have left. Do we sit back and count the days carefully, calculating our lives into mathematical equations?<\/p>\n

Or, do we approach each day as a gift and unwrap it eagerly, like we did as children, arising ready for whatever wonder and awesome-ness God will reveal to us in that day, that\u00a0now?<\/em><\/p>\n

And we don’t have to have a terminal illness to do this. For anyone planning a grand life event (wedding, vacation, graduation, new job), often we get caught up in counting the days between then and now there, too, forgetting that there’s a whole lot of life to be lived in between. Or, perhaps we count the days relating to someone else’s life – a child’s reaching the age of 18, a toddler finally able to get dressed on his or her own – and we gloss over the “in between” when true wonder, even miracles, can happen so quickly that we’ll miss them if we’re not tuned into the\u00a0now<\/em>\u00a0instead of the\u00a0then.<\/em><\/p>\n

As long as we are alive, we are living – not in a cliched sense, but in a very physical, emotional, and spiritual way.<\/p>\n

If we spend that life counting our days until something, we’ll really miss out on so much in the meantime! But if we slow down, refocus, and seek what God is offering us now, well, talk about a pile of presents just waiting to be opened!<\/p>\n

Joy,<\/p>\n

Maureen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

More than once, I’ve heard of people to whom doctors have delivered a dire prognosis – “You have 6 months to live.” \u00a0“You have, maybe, a year.” “You have, at most, three years – the last of which will be terrible.” And, know what? I’ve also heard of people who have lived far beyond these…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":548,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,43,1242,1047,578,1420,1245,1247,1246],"tags":[1848,1845,1849,731,1847,1850,1846],"class_list":["post-1761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronic-pain-and-illness","category-encouragement-in-life","category-food-for-thought","category-good","category-goodness","category-pain-2","category-positive","category-rising-above-tragedy","category-uplifting","tag-bad-prognosis","tag-chronic-illness-and-the-future","tag-dying","tag-living","tag-living-today","tag-living-well","tag-terminal-illness"],"yoast_head":"\nCounting Our Days - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2015\/08\/counting-our-days.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Counting Our Days - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"More than once, I’ve heard of people to whom doctors have delivered a dire prognosis – “You have 6 months to live.” \u00a0“You have, maybe, a year.” “You have, at most, three years – the last of which will be terrible.” And, know what? 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She expected to be writing scripts. God had other plans. A few years after her graduation, Maureen was diagnosed with a life-threatening case of organ-involved lupus. Her life turned upside down as she grappled with the effects of the illness and other health conditions that ensued. She was no stranger to serious health challenges; even as a child, Maureen had survived numerous bouts of pneumonia, flu, and other infections. But lupus made her take a fresh look at her life goals - and took herlifelong, strong Catholic Christian faith and writing in a direction she'd never imagined. Today, Maureen writes and speaks about walking with the Lord while living with chronic pain and illness. Her most recent book is \"Don't Panic!: How to Keep Going When the Going Gets Tough (Franciscan Media). She is also the author of, \"Peace in the Storm: Meditations on Chronic Pain & Illness\" (Image Books\/Randomhouse), \"Beyond Pain: Job, Jesus, and Joy\" (Twenty-Third Publications), \"The First Year: Hypothyroidism, Second Edition\" (Perseus) and \"Taking Charge of Lupus: How to Manage the Disease and Make the Most of Your LIfe.\" She writes the syndicated column, \"Living Well,\" for Catholic News Service, and has also written for Saint Anthony Messenger Magazine, Journey for Women Magazine, The Upper Room Magazine, LupusNow, and Arthritis Today. Maureen's health continues to be a challenge, however she feels honored to be able to bring her perspective, from experience and knowledge, to others. \"Good Days...Bad Days with Maureen Pratt\" is a new way for Maureen to reach people who carry the burden of illness and pain in their lives, or who care for someone who does. Through the blog, she hopes to bring issues of health, wellness, and spirit into focus and, especially, inspire others that, no matter what health challenges, illness, or hardships they endure, each person can find a good way to realize the wonderful potential God has placed within each heart and soul.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.maureenpratt.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/author\/mpratt"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/548"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1761"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1761\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1762,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1761\/revisions\/1762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}