An Issue of Blood
Mark 5:25-34
The Bible tells of “a certain woman,
which had an issue of blood…”
who touched Jesus’s garment and was healed.
Jesus stopped amidst the crowd
and asked, “Who touched my clothes?”
The disciples had to have looked at him
like he’d gone nuts, and I’m sure they were thinking,
“Who could tell in this crowd?”
But the woman confessed,
and Jesus told her that her faith
had healed her.
I had terrible periods
from the time I was a teenager,
well into my thirties and forties.
Near the end, I would bleed three weeks of the month
and have just seven days of rest before
the cramping and flooding would begin again.
Finally, my gynecologist recommended
uterine ablation.
But it took me a full year
to come to terms with the idea
and get past my irrational fear
that “burning the uterine lining”
would lead to smoke
escaping from my vagina.
The bleeding continued to worsen,
until I desperately longed to touch
the hem of Jesus’s garment,
and I finally consented
to have the ablation.
I have yet to regret that decision.
8 ½ years later, I have my life back,
and I can carry on my day to day
without the issue of blood.
About The Author
Jenni Clarkson is an Indiana native and graduate of the University of Indianapolis, where she studied with poet Alice Friman. Jenni has been writing poetry for many years and was most recently published in the journal, Palliative & Supportive Care. Jenni is Managing Editor of the Journal of General Internal Medicine and lives in Indianapolis with her spouse and their dog.
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