Testimony Tuesday #5

Today I am featuring my Sister-In-Law Christy Willingham. Christy is a homemaker, mom of 3, and a preacher's wife to my brother Andrew. I hope you will enjoy and be blessed her testimony today!

Thanks Summer, for asking me to share a testimony! 😊 At first I wasn’t sure what to share because God has been so good to me and done so much for me! After thinking and praying on it, I decided I would share something physical I went through that started around this time three years ago.

This journey started when I began noticing a strange feeling in my esophagus while I ate and drank. It felt like anything I consumed would stop at the bottom of my esophagus and get lodged there. At first it happened randomly, but before long it progressed to every time I ate. I would feel like this, and begin to panic. I could feel a little bit of tightening in my chest, my face would flush and then the worst would happen... my body’s natural reaction was if it wouldn’t go down it had to come up. I would have to run to the bathroom and vomit. (I’m sorry if that’s TMI 😅)

I knew something was very wrong so I made a doctors appointment. When I told him my symptoms he was concerned. I could see the look on his face. I felt my heart sink to my stomach. What was wrong? Why did he look so worried?

Prior to my appointment I had talked to a few people who suffered from similar conditions and they told me about their simple procedures that corrected their issue. I went to the appointment thinking “ok, worst case scenario, I’ll have to have my esophagus stretched and I’ll be back to normal." Little did I know I was 1 of 200,000 who have a rare auto immune disease called Achalasia.

After months of getting sick every time I ate, no longer eating out with friends because of the fear of rushing to the bathroom, losing 40 pounds, going through what felt like 1000 different tests and doctor visits, they finally decided major surgery was needed.

I knew in my heart God wanted me to take this route. As badly as I wanted to be instantly healed I felt that my healing would be completed through this surgery. I didn’t know how or why but that’s what I knew in my heart. I would feel so alone. I literally knew no one who had suffered from this and no one, except my husband, could fully understand what I was going through. But even though I felt so far away from everyone else, it amazed me at how close to God I felt. I would read my bible and it’s like every scripture would be exactly what I needed to hear, I felt his presence in everything.

All of sudden I gained a deep compassion for people, and in a LOT of ways God humbled me! I needed more than a physical healing, I needed a spiritual healing too and if God had instantly healed me of this disease I would have never learned to love like I do now, how to trust him like I do now, how to have compassion like I do now or how to be grateful like I am now. It reminds me of the old hymn that says, “if I never had a problem, I wouldn’t know that he could solve it...”

Not only did he change me in so many wonderful ways he took care of me throughout the entire process. I prayed that God would place me in the hands of a good doctor and he not only blessed me with a good doctor, but the head of cardio thoracic’s for Piedmont Atl. 🙌🏼 There are so many little testimonies tied to this big one that I am extremely grateful for. I could share one after another 😭

I cannot thank God enough for His grace and kindness towards me then and everyday of my life. I do not believe God puts illnesses on people, but we live in an unfair world and I DO believe he can teach us so much more when we’re humble and seeking him.

I pray this testimony helps someone and one day I would love to share every amazing thing he did for me through my experience but for now, here’s a few 😉

Much love,

Christy