LeFan tells his story of how God taught him patience through his personal trials and struggles. But this book is not a tear-jerker about personal hardships. In a nutshell, Patience, My Foot! is about learning God's patience through life's difficulties. Most of us readily give lip service to the need for patience as we rush through our lives. LeFan reminds us through a wealth of stories, Scripture, and his own personal experiences of the importance of seeking and developing real patience. There are riches here both to motivate and inspire. In showing how he came to accept his own physical limitations, LeFan shows readers how to come to grips with life’s challenges. The advice is not a collection of sweet platitudes, rather it is nitty-gritty how-to. The book was literally written with the toes of LeFan’s left foot. Patience, My Foot! was a featured selection in the College Press Book Club. This book is a faithful witness to the power of patience and the power God. Patience, My Foot! is rich with biblical truths, personal experiences, practical principles, and inspiring illustrations which can help all of us to become more patient.
"This book is a tribute to...[God’s work] in the life of a very special human being.... Virtually paralyzed, this remarkable man has overcome obstacles that few of us will ever know." Michael LeFan is a free-lance author living in Temple, Texas. Diagnosed with paralytic polio with full respiratory involvement at the age of eight, he is now a "full-time polio quad" using a respirator to breathe and a power wheelchair for mobility. With the toes of his left foot, he has written Patience, My Foot and two other books, hundreds of magazine articles, and scores of speeches, newsletters, brochures, and other assignments for clients. He earned a degree in English from the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor.
As a kid, I loved Popeye cartoons. Remember Wimpy? He was a pro at mooching hamburgers. Because he never had the money for buying a burger, Wimpy was a devotee of the soft touch. With an air of feigned haughtiness he'd promise, "I'll gladly repay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."
It wasn't that Wimpy was cheap. I've thought about this, and Wimpy's real problem was impatience. He was not willing to forego immediate gratification of his hamburger craving in favor of sustained work to earn money for hamburgers at a later time. Wimpy wanted what he wanted—right now.
In the long hot August of 1954, polio was still a summertime dread all across the U.S. The Salk vaccine wouldn't be available until 1955. Since nobody was certain about how polio was transmitted from person to person, folks lived in a sort of general fear—especially through the summers, which seemed to be the disease's favorite season. Parents kept children at home, swimming pools, movie theaters, and other public places closed, and drinking fountains were dismantled in order to curb the spread of polio. Special polio treatment centers around the nation were full of children and adults who had been infected by this virus. Many patients required iron lung machines to do their breathing for them, since polio had destroyed the nerves which control normal respiration. And in many cases, a new patient had to be placed on an iron lung waiting list--until some other patient died and no longer needed the machine.
I was eight years old and getting ready for the third grade in August of 1954 when my mother and father learned that what the doctor first diagnosed as "tonsillitis" was actually severe paralytic polio with full respiratory involvement, meningitis, and possibly encephalitis. There was no guarantee that I would live, and if I did it was certain that I'd be almost totally paralyzed. I would be able to breathe only with the aid of one of those iron lungs. Nothing could stop the inroads of the disease which was attacking me. Undoubtedly that was the worst case of "tonsillitis" in medical history. Everyone felt deep compassion for my folks, my four-year-old sister, my two-month-old brother, and for me, as our family faced this heartbreaking crisis. My dad was minister at what was then the Avenue G Church of Christ in Temple, Texas. The congregation rallied with support, allowing him time away to be with me in the Southwest Poliomyelitis Institute in Houston. Church members helped care for my brother and sister while my parents were frequently away over the following six months of my first hospitalization.
In the intervening years, I've talked about this period and the years of subsequent rehabilitation. As my dad, James, once said, "It seemed as though we had three choices. We could curse God for letting this happen to us and look for ways to vent our rage. We could grit our teeth and bear it. Or we could accept what life had brought our way."
The first choice is fruitless and self-destructive. The second is unproductive and debilitating. The third is the only reasonable way.
I don't say that in order to impress you. I've done nothing impressive. Rather, like the unprofitable servants of the Scriptures, I've done only what was required of me. I relate the fact only to let you know that I have "credentials" when it comes to speaking about patience.
Again and again, life forces each of us into situations in which we have these same choices: rage and rebellion, brute endurance, or patient acceptance—the willingness that it be so. The first two, as my father knew and as I've learned, tear us apart and eventually destroy us. The only hope—my only hope—was in patient and creative acceptance. When floods or storms damage a building, the disaster must be accepted before rebuilding can begin. Life's disasters must be dealt with the same way.
We must learn to face life's jolting experiences, accepting them patiently as a challenge—and not in supine resignation. Only when we yield to what we're powerless to change—only when we are willing that it be so—can we free ourselves from destructive anger, resentment, and (yes) impatience. It's no use pretending that the painful experience doesn't have us in its grasp. Ignoring it won't make it go away. If we are to live with any sense of purpose and well being, then there must come a time when we willingly give ourselves to the situation as it is and see what we can do about remodeling it into an inhabitable condition. It's useless to curse our fate. To merely endure it is to live in drudgery. To accept life and to reach for it is the only sensible course.