Corralling Our Monsters: The Power of Grace

Charisse Tierney recalls how grace carried her through a crisis, defeating the monster of worry and anxiety that threatened to steal her peace.

“She has a collapsed lung.”

I nodded my head calmly as if someone had just commented on the weather or informed me of what was on the lunch menu for that day. I looked at my four-month-old daughter lying in the hospital bed and watched as doctors gathered around her, preparing for the necessary procedure.

“You might want to leave. A lot of parents don’t like to watch something like this.”

But I chose to stay. I’m the mom who gets nauseous when one of my children gets a deep flesh wound, but I wanted to be with my daughter as they inserted a tube into her side and began to repair her tiny lung.

I heard her whimper as the doctors did their work, and I clutched my Rosary beads, praying all would go well.

And suddenly, they were done. I felt fine. I felt strong. I was able to be next to her as soon as they finished and hear them say the procedure went as planned.

I had the grace I needed for that moment.

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Worries and anxieties about potential future events can take on a life of their own. When they are outside of the moment in which the dreaded event actually happens, they grow into monsters that eat away at our peace.

But when something we’ve been worried about happens, grace takes over and corrals the monster. The steps to work through a difficulty become clear, solutions present themselves, and the monster contained within the bounds of grace doesn’t seem quite so scary after all.

We’re given the grace we need, when we need it. I was given the grace I needed when faced with a complication after my baby daughter’s open-heart surgery. I will be given the grace I need with the many other challenges I am sure to face in the future.