Ashamed and Senior Year

Ashamed, not of who I am, but what I feel like inside.
Ashamed, not of where I come from, but what I deal with that I try to hide.
I'm ashamed of part, no most of my life.
There's nothing I can do to change it, believe me I tried.

Senior year of high school is probably the most memorable time for everyone.
High school football games, senior class trips, etc. Those were the days.
I spent very few times at football games that year. My senior class trip was to the doctors office.

Yes, senior year while everyone else was having fun, I was being poked, pricked, sucked of my blood till I came to hate the sight of a needle.
I was x-rayed, cat scanned, scanned with fancy equipment I didn't know existed before. I had to spend several entire weekends collecting my urine and stool specimens, refrigerating them, and mailing them off to a special lab for a diagnosis.

Yes, senior year was very memorable for me, but in another way. My mind was wrapped around my grandfather's untimely death and praying to God that wouldn't happen to me.
While everyone else prepares for their future, I just prayed I had a future.
While everyone else was finding out what colleges had accepted them, I was being told I had a rare genetic blood disease.

No, I don't regret my senior year, it was just a rough time for me. My life was falling apart.
While all around me everyone else's life was just beginning. I was stepping into the unknown.
I don't think I could have survived that year without my friends and family and most important I can never go a day in my life without my God.

I tried to hide my disease for years. Because I was ashamed of being sick. I tried to act normal around other people, and not let on that I was sick. But, how can I hide my life from the world? And most importantly how can I hide how much God has done for me, how many times he healed me, and spared my life? My sickness may not be fun and I may face an uncertain future, but the truth is none of use are guaranteed tomorrow, and I guess I just found that out sooner than most.

It wasn't just senior year that was rough on me, my sickness started sometime in junior high maybe even the end of elementary school. Those were the worst years of my life. Thankfully I have a God that has got me through all the rough times in my life and showed me that even though I face no certainty of tomorrow, because I have turned my life and heart over to God and have accepted him as my Lord and Saviour, I do face the certainty of seeing him in glory.