Who is Nat?

My name is Natalie Husk, although most people call me Nat (except my parents!). I was born and raised in Cornwall and am proud of it! I have always been involved in the church, whether going to my local village chapel in Common Moor, joining with bus loads from Cornwall at MAYC events, helping at the District Children’s Holiday or even attending Synod a few times! I am very thankful to the Cornwall District, the Liskeard & Looe Circuit and of course Common Moor chapel for being such valuable parts in my journey of faith.

Today I live in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, where I work as a youth worker for the Methodist Church. I run after school clubs, youth clubs, a youth fellowship, do outreach work and organise trips away. Not long ago I was asked by a youth group, to give them a weekly topic for reflection, an email containing something to focus them on God for the week. So every week I sit at my computer and write down my thoughts! It started quite small, with just the young people receiving them, and now lots of people of all ages find my thoughts in their email inbox!

It is a huge privilege for me to find that people enjoy and are challenged by what I have written, especially that I can now share what God has done for me with those who walked with me at the beginning of my journey. Ultimately these reflections are aimed at the young people I now work with, but if God can speak to others through them, how great is that!!

Some of the
District team

District Property Secretary

District Disability Officer & Deaf Link Person

District Ministries Panel Secretary

District Communications
Officer

Explore the
Website

Some useful Links

Helpful links

2007

9th July
Smells

2nd July
Smile

26th June
Waterlogged

11th June
Plans

6th June
Letters

21st May
Friends

May 9th
Stereotypes

May 1st
Broken

April 16th
Climbing hills

April 9th
The Three Trees

April 2nd
Small but deadly

March 28th
Toby the SuperDog

March 19th
Mountains

March 4th
Lone Daffodil

February 26th
Working hours

February 19th
Memory

February 12th
Piercings

February 5th
Patience

January 29th
Surprise

January 22nd
Wind

January 15th
Honesty

January 8th
My Car

January 3rd
Happy New Year

Piercings

I have 5 more holes in my body than I was born with. These holes are all in my ears. For years I wanted my ears pierced, but my parents made me wait until I was 16. Sixteen! That is a long time when you’ve wanted them pierced since you were 10. So great was my desperation that I went out and bought earrings in anticipation long before I could ever wear them. Then, a week before my 16^th birthday, as i was getting ready for the deed to be done, my brother arrived home from college with a hole in his ear and one in his nose too! He knew I’d waited for years for it and he upstaged my big moment – the little toe-rag!

When I went to university I decided to get the top of my ear pierced – I hasten to add this was before everyone else was doing it! As the earring goes through cartilage I had to go to a body piercing place to get it done properly (a note to all those wanting to get it done – DO NOT get it done cheaply with a gun as it will shatter your cartilage and hurt like hell – make sure they use a needle and you’ll be fine!). I loved it, apart from when my dad thought it was a clip on and tugged at it a few days after it had been done. Ouch! Next was the tragus piercing not long after I moved to Wakefield. Then last summer I decided it was time for another hole, and after considerable thought (about 5 minutes) I decided to have a rook piercing…the pictures looked good and I’d survived the other times without much pain or discomfort, so I went ahead with it.

(neither are my ears)

Tragus Piercing Rook Piercing

Oh. My. Gosh. I thought my ear was going to fall off! And that was just the ice cold spray she used to numb the ear!! It took the poor woman ages to get the needle through the cartilage and then even longer to fit the ring. My friend is wincing as she watches from the doorway, and I am trying my hardest not to scream – I was in agony. The worst of it was that I was having to pay for this experience! With my ear swollen and me unable to do anything but whimper in pain, I thought I had done the wrong thing. I didn’t feel much better about it all, when a month down the line it was still not healing and it hurt to lay on it. As the months went by and the pain continued, I was seriously worried that I had damaged my ear and was surprised at how much gunk kept coming out of the hole!

At Christmas I was idly sat fiddling with my earrings (it’s a habit I do when bored, anxious or have an itchy ear!) when I realised that my newest piercing didn’t hurt. In fact it hadn’t bothered me for a while. How could I not have noticed that the pain was gone. It had been so acute, I’d been so aware of it, how could it have just disappeared without me noticing? I can now twiddle the earring, waggle it about and I feel nothing, or at least nothing in the ouchy sense.

We all go through painful times in our lives, it’s a part of this thing called life. As REM so eloquently put it, everybody hurts, everybody cries sometimes. When we are at those times it can consume us, with every waking thought and feeling being focused on the pain. We can forget how it felt to not be hurting, and we wonder if we will ever recover from this agony. Jesus is a healer. He heals us. That’s what he does. The thing is, his healing is slow – although he does heal in speedy, miraculous ways too. But for the most of us, most of the time, he heals us day by day, often without us realising it. We don’t feel instantly better, we are not suddenly recovered from our hurt, but there can come a day when we suddenly realise we’re not in pain, our wounds aren’t so raw. We realise that we haven’t thought about our problems, our injuries for a while – what once consumed us is now an afterthought, we have continued on when we thought we could go no further. Jesus has been healing us. Slowly but surely, day by day, so gradually we hardly notice, the saviour of the world has gently placed his healing hands upon us and made us able to get up and walk.

So as I absentmindedly fiddle with my earring (one of a possible 5), I pray for all those who are in a time of pain – it sounds clichéd but things will get better and you will get through this. I pray too for those who have come through a painful experience – giving thanks for your healing and restoration. And to all, may you recognise more clearly the healing hands of Jesus amidst the hurting. Oh and warm, salty water works a treat to help heal pierced ears!