I keep pinching myself and smiling, then just sink down into my couch, feeling how good it is to be home. Being quite a vagabond and living out of a suitcase the last five-plus weeks makes being home all that much better.
Even though my physical therapist scolded me for it this week, it's great to sit in front of my computer again - I am hopelessly horrible at writing on small devices. I need to see the "whole sheet of paper" in front of me before I press "send". Obviously. Those of you that have endured my poor attempts at "snippet-replies" know what I mean here.
I am swallowing food better. My doctor told me that they had "kissed" my trachea and esophagus during radiation, and that it would heal up, and it is. Faster than they thought. My toenail is growing back, and the other toenails that had threatened to leave as well, seemed to have decided to stay put for a bit longer. My skin is looking better already. Feeling better already.
My ribs on the other hand, have started a coup. Part of my rib cage, mostly the left side and back, feel like I have been kicked by a horse. Certain movements like coughing and sneezing and getting up out of a chair can kind of make me stop breathing. My deep breathing exercises that my physical therapists gave me are rather difficult all of a sudden.
I called my doctor's office and talked to the nurse practitioner who smiled at my description and said "we wondered how long it would take to hit you, Karen. This is normal, especially after five weeks of radiation." She gave it some correct terminology, and what I repeated back to her was "so,,,, you are telling me my chest muscles are cooked and my ribs and cartilage are barbecued - just so I am understanding this correctly", and she said "well, kind of, yes".
While I am smiling, and glad all over for the end of my treatment, for the ability to be *home*, for the fact that Scott and I both are feeling better than we have for a long time; even with this latest symptom arising, bringing with it fatigue - for the first time in fifteen years I can sleep at night without the help of drugs - heck I can even sleep during the day now without any prompting or help whatsoever - but despite all the little things still hanging around - we are smiling.
If we were dogs, we would be wagging our tails so much our whole bodies would be swinging.
Even so, daily, I still do a little grieving exercise that a good counselor taught me a long, long time ago.
In the front and center of my mind, I remember that I met a lot of people on this journey that aren't smiling today. Can't smile today. I know there are some still in the fight. I know there are some that are no longer in the fight and have passed on.
My first week of chemo was at the James Cancer Center main campus, four days a week for five weeks as I was in the first phase of a study drug trial. Some days I got a room to myself, other days I was in a small curtained stall waiting for drugs and blood pulls.
While waiting in those stalls, I came to a cold realization while listening to other's intake and evaluations - that some in that "Phase One" department were doing the new drugs for no other reason than to help out science. Their cancers had overtaken them, won the battle, and yet these people were doing the drug studies so the lab and doctors could see what these new drugs did to active cancer cells.
They even went a step further - Phase One is mostly about determining "the highest dose tolerable" - that's not a field of daisies you walk through in that wing of the hospital. They were basically being overdosed, then underdosed, then overdosed again to see how their liver reacted. To see how their heart reacted. To see how their digestive tract reacted.
Sometimes, it felt like you were four steps from a deep-pitted gulag - some type of torture chamber - only your cell was sterile and clean, the inmates friendly, and your caretakers cheerful and kind.
If you get cancer in the next decade, you owe a great deal of thanks to these people - they literally suffered much at the end of their lives so a doctor could know what dose to give you of their new treatment.
I had a hard time grasping their courage - cancer treatments have not changed a whole lot in some ways for decades and decades - and a lot of that is due to the fact that there just aren't as many people willing to become human guinea pigs. I would listen to these intakes and realize what they were doing, and then try to get a good look at these people when they got up to leave - I didn't know how they could choose to not take the last couple of months or weeks of their lives to relax a little, get off of chemo, and feel a little better for a bit.
Some were sicker than sick. And yet they came back day after day, week after week. I remember listening to one man give his last evaluation - you couldn't help but hear it all being just twenty four inches away with a mere piece of cloth between you. But his study drug coordinator went over his basics, they hugged and chatted, then she instructed him to keep calling her the next couple of weeks.
That was all he had.
I remember these people that I barely knew but was suddenly connected to deeply, and I grieve. I was there in that group with a different outcome, for a different reason. I was grasping at a hope for myself.
They were wanting their lives to count for others.
It's all still overwhelming when I think on it and remember them.
And also, the last two weeks, I grieve another grief as well......
***
When my children were young I was faced with some horrible information. Horrible for others concerned, so I had difficulty understanding my reaction. I knew I was angry and hurt, I knew I needed to protect and shield and help the ones involved, yet I cried in the shower every morning so others couldn't hear me. I would take long walks to scream at heaven, and cry again.
I didn't understand my reaction - I was not the one who had been horribly hurt, horribly scarred, horribly had their hearts cut. I knew I was dealing with a blatant betrayal by someone I thought loved me, but knew by far it was not the worst suffering I was witnessing.
I went to a counselor, a really good counselor, who told me what was happening - even though I was not the one who had been hurt and assaulted - I was grieving.
I told him "nobody has died, I was not the one wounded, what do you mean?"
He explained that many life events cause us to grieve and if we do not handle it properly, it rules us for the rest of our life. We misplace anger for the grieving and dump it all over others. We make it into a lot of things it should not, can not be. I instantly caught the idea, knew what he was saying was truth. Memories of folks around me that had never properly grieved their pains in their lives instantly came to mind and finally made sense.
Realizing that, I asked him how long it sits on you. How long is your soul crying while you are living your life? How long does your spirit weep when you cannot?
He said there was no time limit.
But, he gave me a tool to use, an instrument to help me walk through it.
He had me envision a door, then a room and a comfortable chair to sit down in. He told me to open that heavy, solid door. He told me to walk into that safe-room and sit down. Then he told me to weep and grieve. When my spirit and soul felt cleansed and spent, I was to get up, leave the room and close the door.
It was amazing. I asked him if it was all "fixed".
He told me no, that you do that daily. Really? How long?
Until you don't need to open that door any longer.
He gave me one more most important caveat - there was one holding the door open for me, then following me in and catching my tears. He told me that Jesus was there for every step I would take in this grieving process. What's more - the Bible said he even captured our tears.
My tears were measured and saved.
That was a little different than the information I had been given previously - good solid people don't cry. You don't grieve. It shows weakness. It shows an inability to look at life on the bright side. It shows someone just feeling sorry for themselves.
All that was debunked and thrown out. It's mostly spewed by those not knowing their Scriptures very well.
Putting perimeters around my grieving, yet forcing myself, allowing myself, maybe even gifting myself with the ability to grieve, unloaded my life. While I would think about it all during the day, now knowing that it was a big issue, and that my body, my soul, my spirit were reacting to it and needed a safe place to go to grieve, changed my life. I could put it on the shelf during the day, not because I was doing the classic "christian" thing - pretending all was well, everything was ok - but I could put it on the shelf during the day because I knew that there would be a proper time to take it off the shelf, explore it, weep over it, mourn it, then eventually put it back.
It has worked for a lot of years, for a lot of griefs. Thank you Ken Jacobs. I think because I learned to grieve when I was thirty, I was able to deal with cancer at fifty.
Because he taught me how to recognize grief, then grieve properly, I can laugh while getting punishing chemicals pumped into my body. I can enjoy life's sweet moments and not feel like I should not because all is not well. There is a time and place for my grieving, and a time and place to love, and laugh, and live as well.
***
So while we are celebrating the end of my treatment this week, we are also grieving as only mums and pops can do over their grown children.
Over three years ago, Heidi had a tumor removed from her brain. While the surgery was a success, it left her fighting a daily battle with many and sneaky auto-immune disorders. Her brain was saved from the invader, but her body could not react nor respond to that human-scalpel-invasion properly. Her body - even though she has done everything to make it get well again - has gone a little crazy. Having dealt with auto-immune disorders myself, I know the daily battle. I know the icky feeling when realizing your greatest enemy is within you. It pops out in varied and nasty forms - MS, Crone's Disease, rheumatoid arthritis, or my body's choice of options eventually - Grave's.
There are hundreds of ways your body can go auto-immune crazy and try to do you in. I talked one day with an EKG technician who had done lots of ultrasounds and body scans in his years within the medical field and he felt that "they" would find the cure to cancer, when they found the cure to auto-immune. I think he might be right.
But Heidi has dealt with this cauldron of crappy symptoms, diagnosis, issues and pain for over three years. It's a medical rabbit hole you hope to never have to go down. It's exasperating to doctors, more-so to the patient.
She called me over two weeks ago and told me that she had blurry vision in her one eye. I had to sit down. It felt so much like the phone call we had received when she called to tell us about her tumor. My blood went cold.
She went to the emergency room at OSU and waited most of the day for an MRI and lumbar punch.
I went down and sat with her - complete with my mask on - while Wes went home to tuck two scared little girls into bed.
While I waited they took her up for the MRI. Then the doctor came in at 9:45pm and said he was ready to do the lumbar punch. Since he looked all of twenty years old, I respectfully asked him if he ever did one under ultrasound, and he replied "no, don't need it"....
His first attempt ended up with Heidi's heart rate plummeting to 34, her blood pressure not registering, and her skin became so clammy her sheets were wet after they laid her back down. I asked him if she could be having a reaction to the lidocaine, and he said no, and when Heidi kept murmuring "I don't want this", he stopped and left the ER stall. He had punched the lidocaine so fast that she had a goose egg on her back.
I didn't feel good about it at all, called Wes to come back in to allow him to make the call. The head nurse came in twice and told her "she did not have to do this tonight". That kind of caught my ear but the doctor came back in close to midnight and coaxed her into doing it again - telling her she could lay on her side this time.
I stood towards the end of the bed, watching. After scrubbing her, he started, and inserted it into her spine a couple of times. Then I started counting. At the tenth punch, I wanted to yell "STOP!!" At the fifteenth punch, I had to squat down close to the floor because I was becoming queasy myself.
I know you can't punch a vein too many times, and had no idea what this was doing to a spinal cord.
He finally got spinal fluid at punch number 19. Your read that right. I counted at least nineteen punches into her spine before he found spinal fluid.
When your kids are adults, it gets no easier watching this type of procedure. I looked away so the doctor would not see me glaring at his pompous ass. I made a joke so Heidi would not get scared if she saw me angry.
But the spinal tap showed that it was not MS. Everyone in the small ER room was enormously relieved and ready to forgive a doctor that could not admit he could not do what he had done easily many times.....
The next morning I called Heidi at her specialist's office two buildings down from my treatment center and asked her if she wanted me to run her some Starbucks as she had been instructed to drink caffeine. I had not been there for more than three minutes when they were called in for the final consult with her doctor. They invited me to come along.
I went in, sat down, and looked at the MRI eye scans on his multiple screens. I tried really, really hard to not cry. I tried really, really hard to hold my emotions off of my face. I tried really, really hard to not look at anyone. I don't know a lot about eye scans, but I do know that they should look the same for both eyes. One looked like it had a clove of garlic behind it. I also had an inkling of what her prognosis might be and what that hideous looking inflammation meant.
She had lost her sight in her right eye.
Heidi held it together remarkably well. She asked all the right questions. Even thanked her specialist and his fellow.
I can be remarkably strong when my kids are involved. I went down the elevator with them and followed their lead on how the mood of the moment should go. It was light. Then we sat down to discuss lunch options, and Heidi started to cry. She realized immediately that not only had she lost half of her eyesight, but she could possibly lose the rest if this happens again.
I had wanted to ask the doctor that question, but couldn't, not knowing if they realized that or not yet.
I'm grieving over Heidi. We are grieving over Heidi. Scott will tell me it's going to be fine, then puts his head down to cover a tear on his face. We hate that she has to go through this.
Losing your sight in one eye is not so easy. Driving needs to be relearned. It causes pain and strain. It's scary.
But even worse, living with the knowledge that your body could once again turn on you, and you could lose the vision in your other eye as well, is a journey I do not wish for anyone.
Please God, not my Heidi. Please God.
I thought about all the struggles she has already walked through. All of the fear. All of the pain.
I can't, don't, want to think about her having to go through yet another difficult, tortuous life event. I can't bear to hear people say things that cut to your soul - good meaning people that say things that have been said in the church for years - but that cut to your very soul when you are the one on the receiving end of such hurtful words. Time after time.
"You'll get over it." Really? "Let go and let God." It's just not good reasoning folks - if that were true in instances such as this, you realize quickly that you just did "let God" - and look what happened.... "there's other things that are worse". Really? Why, why, why do people of God feel the need to minimize every single pain? Just for the record, Jesus never did. Blind? He healed them. He didn't tell them they should not worry because they could be blind and deaf. He didn't tell the paralytics they could be worse - they could be dead.
He never for a minute told me I could be one of the folks in that Phase One wing of the hospital that knew they had no hope, and therefore I should not grieve my own disease.
He never minimized pain nor grief. In fact, He held the people of Israel accountable for the hurt and grief they had caused the prophets sent to them.
One of the rabbis I listen to teaches that Jesus' ministry was all about the hurting, the downtrodden, the people put on the fringes by the people inside the temple by their wrong ideas and flippant responses.
And yet we still do that very thing.
I don't know what to say to her other than "I love you". "I wish this had not happened to you". "I hate this". It sucks. There is not a whole lot of good about it. I'm not going to hand her a list and tell her how her life is going to be gloriously enriched by this. It might, but that doesn't make it ever easy nor make it less painful.
I do tell her what I learned long ago - I tell her to grieve it.
If my kids say at the end of my life that they learned nothing else from me than to "be real", to be true, to live honestly and to love and trust a God in heaven that we can never fully understand, then I will feel like my life did some good on this earth.
And to the suffering, those suffering anything, I simply say "Grieve it". And as you grieve it, remember that there is One that loves to be invited into your room of grieving to experience it with you.
And never forget that for whatever reason, He captures your tears.
I don't know why, I just know that I trust the One who said it.
***
I stayed with Heidi the last week and a half of my radiation treatments. I drove Addy to school in the morning - which was such a joy - then continued on to my treatments. Millie went with me sometimes.
One day she put on her new dress that she received as a gift for Christmas that has a matching dress for her doll. If you don't know Millie-bean, know that this is most uncommon. She prefers staying in her footed pajamas all day if possible.
She told me she wanted to "be adorable" for the ladies at my treatment center. They were so incredibly kind to her. One of the volunteers took her for a walk to meet each person that worked there, and as they chatted most of them learned about the incredible and extreme care Millie puts into being a "doll-mommy".
She loved going with me, but I don't think she will understand how she affects the lives of others with her obvious love of life; her joy at being able to play and explore and learn; her absolute trust of others to listen to her and respond to her world.
I don't have a lot of answers, but I know that God gives us joy on the most difficult of journeys, and somehow that joy is so many times wrapped up with children and their sincere and simplistic view of life. And their total trust that every adult in their life has their best interest at heart, and every adult will help them and love them and care for them properly.
So in the grieving is joy, and in the joy grieving. God promised us deep and unfathomable mysteries, of which I witness more than I even knew.
I pray my eyes stay opened to heaven above, not what the worldly church teaches about heaven.
And I thank God that He sent me one to teach me some of the fundamentals of heaven - how to grieve, and how to live with joyful moments in the midst of it all.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Friday, February 8, 2013
He drove me home.
I met with my radiologist oncologist Dr. White, and her fellow Dr. W. on Wednesday morning after my treatment. I sat in her exam room and waited and thought about a lot of things. I thought this would probably be my last doctor's visit for cancer treatment. I have plenty of appointments lined up in the next few months - like just getting to these is going to be a full time job - but this was possibly going to be my last appointment with an oncologist while in treatment.
I thought about my first visit to the Stephanie Spielman Center, and what a long day of appointments it had been - I had met with two surgeons and two oncologists that day. We were there from 8am to 6:30pm. But even though it had been the most grueling of days, I remembered well how the doctors at this place could hand you the most devastating news, and yet send you out the door smiling with a string of hope on your heart.
I remembered being able to follow the doctor's information mostly and how words hit me like "metastatic"; "stage 3"; "a hopeful study drug"; "ten years ago, this diagnosis had little hope".... they all fell on me like a ton of bricks.
I thought *these days* you got breast cancer, got treatment, and lived happily ever after. I had not heard the words "triple negative" together in a sentence my whole life, and now suddenly, it was my whole life.
When doctors say the words "metastatic-triple-negative" together in a sentence, they sit on a stool directly in front of you, knee to knee, looking at you full on in the face, eye to eye. The female oncologists take hold of your hand.
They know the words that are coming out of their mouths will affect the person in front of them for the rest of their life. Their eyes do not look away as they say the painful words nor when they are done speaking. Their steadfast eyes make you trust them even when you know you were just pushed over a deep, deep treacherous ravine by their words.
I knew cancer was serious, I knew it would be hard, but I didn't know I was in for the fight of my life. I didn't know how big the odds were against me. Even if I didn't know this at the beginning of my appointment that day fourteen months ago, I know enough about the medical field to know if your first appointment with a doctor takes over two and a half hours, it's more than the common cold we are talking here.....
I thought about all of that while I waited for Dr. White and her red headed fellow.
And not for the first time in that large complex full of lots of people with a radiation wing, diagnostic scan wing, lab wing, ekg, chemo floor, surgeons offices, physical therapy wing, a half floor dedicated to mammograms and ultrasounds - within that whole complex I had wandered from room to room, wing to wing the past year hearing both bad news and good news; and when Dr. White walked in, her words once again, made my eyes swim with tears.
After the appointment I went back to the patient waiting room, changed quickly, said hurried good byes to my lady friends and barely made it to the car. I opened the car door, got in, sat down - and as I have so many times within the many nooks and crannies of the half mile vicinity of that large building - I wept.
I sobbed. And sobbed. And cried. And cried. I could not stop. Her words had been too powerful, too filled with meaning, too much poured onto me in just one phrase to allow me to keep my emotions in control.
Once again, one simple sentence changed my life.
When she walked into the exam room she simply said "you only have one more treatment!!"
And with that statement, the dam that held such deep troubled waters behind it, that had waited so long, broke. That huge body of water that had swirled and stormed and wickedly threatened to overtake me, but had recently become still and deep, that dam - broke.
I could not stop the flood of emotion and tears.
I could not stop the flood of memories that immediately jumped before my eyes - all the pain, all the tears, all the hurt and body bruising, all the times I could barely crawl out of bed during my last chemo go around, or all the times I could not sleep for days on end due to steroids with my first chemo go around; all the times I was refused treatment because my bone marrow and blood cells could not recover and I would try to get ready to go home, then be overcome with the meaning of another missed treatment and sit on the side of my bed and weep and weep because I could not control my emotions when dealing with low blood counts even if I wanted to, and suddenly within me my soul found a purity in weeping when it needed to weep for the first time in my life.
Before my eyes, I saw all the nurses who had held my hand, hugged me, comforted me, filled me with information and facts, and told me again and again how many *metastatic-cancer* patients with this aggressive triple negative cancer had missed treatments as well, and were still alive.
They didn't say how long they were alive, and I never asked. I just took it for what it was - hope.
My brain could not stop that parade of events. It all marched before me like a vision.
I remembered all the lonely times the past fourteen months I stood in my dining room on the treadmill friends had loaned us, lifted my hands before a holy God, with tears on my face - and worshiped - because there was nothing left to do, no prayer left to say, no intervention not begged.
I remembered the nights I awakened to find Scott leaning over me with his hands on me, crying, praying, begging our God for deliverance, because the doctors words had been too hard that day on our ears.
I remembered how fragmented my brain became, and how difficult it was to think. And to think and then to speak intelligently for months and months and months. I said the wrong things, laughed at the wrong things, cried over crazy things, all because they were scorching the nerve endings deep inside my cranium.
I remembered how difficult it was suddenly to walk easily with neuropathy, and how I had to plan my footfalls at times so I would not do further injury to already burning, painful nerve endings.
I remembered the painful digestive track, the "grow two sizes in two hours" bloating. The difficulty of eating. I counted calories for the first time in my life to maintain weight, not to lose it. I remembered how fragile my once strong bones and teeth felt, and how I thought one good fall could break them all.
I sat there in the midst of this flood, in the driver seat of my car, and continually said thanks to a God that had walked this journey with me. A God Who had held me and kept me and covered me with His wings. I said thanks to a God who had awakened my soul from the deep, and allowed me to see Him, His corners of His wings that bring healing. I sat there in that car, and God sat with me, helping me remember the suffering, the hurt, the pain, and over all that was His covering.
It didn't make it hurt any less, but it uncovered a part of me long ago put to sleep by harsh life events. His wings touched my soul and my soul awakened and bloomed all over within, covering pain over pain, hurt over hurt.
I remembered the first appointment, my first day shortly after 8:30am, without a complete diagnosis, having my surgeon that I would come to love and greatly respect, stand in front of me with his arms crossed and demand - after a 12 minute explanation - that I tell him my choice of options he had just presented to me. He prodded me to make a hasty decision as to what I would choose for his part in all of my meandering treatment.
I was confused, angry, scared, so scared, and I remember leaning back - almost being gently pushed back - on that cold exam table and feeling supported. There was nothing behind me on that table.
Then looking up, I saw what I immediately knew to be the wings of God over that cold lonely exam room ceiling.
The ceiling was covered with the wings of God. White, feathery, soft wings. I saw them - it was not an illusion, not a mind trick, not a departure from reality - they were placed there by a God that had heard my cry, my whimper, my desperate whisper for help - and the universe ripped apart and I saw His wings covering that room.
I thought on the warm whiteness of those wings again while I sat there in that Chevrolet weeping, wiping my nose on my sleeves because I had run out of a mountain of stored Starbucks napkins, and there was only one person to call - I called Scott. He didn't pick up his cell phone, so I called his classroom number. He answered concerned, because I only call that number, interrupt his class, for emergencies.
I couldn't talk. He wanted to know if I was ok. I said, yes, "I -sob- am doing -sob- really -sob- good". He said "I'm coming down - what did your doctor say?"
I finally choked out the words - "She said I'm done. I'm done, Scott. It is finished. I only have one more treatment. I'm done". And then I laughed. And then I sobbed.
He didn't say anything for a moment, couldn't say anything for a moment, then said "I know, sweets, I know. You're done."
He has been my Jesus daily here on this earth. He has cared for me, comforted me, prodded me, helped me. He has used up his sick days, his health, to take care of me. He is the closest thing to mirror God that I have met on this earth.
He knew what this moment was - our journey to the end of hell and back - our journey through the valley of the shadow of death - for this moment - was finished.
***
I have wandered this journey without knowing a lot of things. I didn't know that at the end of the treatment you go out to the waiting area and ring a bell three times after your lead radiation expert reads the words:
I thought about my first visit to the Stephanie Spielman Center, and what a long day of appointments it had been - I had met with two surgeons and two oncologists that day. We were there from 8am to 6:30pm. But even though it had been the most grueling of days, I remembered well how the doctors at this place could hand you the most devastating news, and yet send you out the door smiling with a string of hope on your heart.
I remembered being able to follow the doctor's information mostly and how words hit me like "metastatic"; "stage 3"; "a hopeful study drug"; "ten years ago, this diagnosis had little hope".... they all fell on me like a ton of bricks.
I thought *these days* you got breast cancer, got treatment, and lived happily ever after. I had not heard the words "triple negative" together in a sentence my whole life, and now suddenly, it was my whole life.
When doctors say the words "metastatic-triple-negative" together in a sentence, they sit on a stool directly in front of you, knee to knee, looking at you full on in the face, eye to eye. The female oncologists take hold of your hand.
They know the words that are coming out of their mouths will affect the person in front of them for the rest of their life. Their eyes do not look away as they say the painful words nor when they are done speaking. Their steadfast eyes make you trust them even when you know you were just pushed over a deep, deep treacherous ravine by their words.
I knew cancer was serious, I knew it would be hard, but I didn't know I was in for the fight of my life. I didn't know how big the odds were against me. Even if I didn't know this at the beginning of my appointment that day fourteen months ago, I know enough about the medical field to know if your first appointment with a doctor takes over two and a half hours, it's more than the common cold we are talking here.....
I thought about all of that while I waited for Dr. White and her red headed fellow.
And not for the first time in that large complex full of lots of people with a radiation wing, diagnostic scan wing, lab wing, ekg, chemo floor, surgeons offices, physical therapy wing, a half floor dedicated to mammograms and ultrasounds - within that whole complex I had wandered from room to room, wing to wing the past year hearing both bad news and good news; and when Dr. White walked in, her words once again, made my eyes swim with tears.
After the appointment I went back to the patient waiting room, changed quickly, said hurried good byes to my lady friends and barely made it to the car. I opened the car door, got in, sat down - and as I have so many times within the many nooks and crannies of the half mile vicinity of that large building - I wept.
I sobbed. And sobbed. And cried. And cried. I could not stop. Her words had been too powerful, too filled with meaning, too much poured onto me in just one phrase to allow me to keep my emotions in control.
Once again, one simple sentence changed my life.
When she walked into the exam room she simply said "you only have one more treatment!!"
And with that statement, the dam that held such deep troubled waters behind it, that had waited so long, broke. That huge body of water that had swirled and stormed and wickedly threatened to overtake me, but had recently become still and deep, that dam - broke.
I could not stop the flood of emotion and tears.
I could not stop the flood of memories that immediately jumped before my eyes - all the pain, all the tears, all the hurt and body bruising, all the times I could barely crawl out of bed during my last chemo go around, or all the times I could not sleep for days on end due to steroids with my first chemo go around; all the times I was refused treatment because my bone marrow and blood cells could not recover and I would try to get ready to go home, then be overcome with the meaning of another missed treatment and sit on the side of my bed and weep and weep because I could not control my emotions when dealing with low blood counts even if I wanted to, and suddenly within me my soul found a purity in weeping when it needed to weep for the first time in my life.
Before my eyes, I saw all the nurses who had held my hand, hugged me, comforted me, filled me with information and facts, and told me again and again how many *metastatic-cancer* patients with this aggressive triple negative cancer had missed treatments as well, and were still alive.
They didn't say how long they were alive, and I never asked. I just took it for what it was - hope.
My brain could not stop that parade of events. It all marched before me like a vision.
I remembered all the lonely times the past fourteen months I stood in my dining room on the treadmill friends had loaned us, lifted my hands before a holy God, with tears on my face - and worshiped - because there was nothing left to do, no prayer left to say, no intervention not begged.
I remembered the nights I awakened to find Scott leaning over me with his hands on me, crying, praying, begging our God for deliverance, because the doctors words had been too hard that day on our ears.
I remembered how fragmented my brain became, and how difficult it was to think. And to think and then to speak intelligently for months and months and months. I said the wrong things, laughed at the wrong things, cried over crazy things, all because they were scorching the nerve endings deep inside my cranium.
I remembered how difficult it was suddenly to walk easily with neuropathy, and how I had to plan my footfalls at times so I would not do further injury to already burning, painful nerve endings.
I remembered the painful digestive track, the "grow two sizes in two hours" bloating. The difficulty of eating. I counted calories for the first time in my life to maintain weight, not to lose it. I remembered how fragile my once strong bones and teeth felt, and how I thought one good fall could break them all.
I sat there in the midst of this flood, in the driver seat of my car, and continually said thanks to a God that had walked this journey with me. A God Who had held me and kept me and covered me with His wings. I said thanks to a God who had awakened my soul from the deep, and allowed me to see Him, His corners of His wings that bring healing. I sat there in that car, and God sat with me, helping me remember the suffering, the hurt, the pain, and over all that was His covering.
It didn't make it hurt any less, but it uncovered a part of me long ago put to sleep by harsh life events. His wings touched my soul and my soul awakened and bloomed all over within, covering pain over pain, hurt over hurt.
I remembered the first appointment, my first day shortly after 8:30am, without a complete diagnosis, having my surgeon that I would come to love and greatly respect, stand in front of me with his arms crossed and demand - after a 12 minute explanation - that I tell him my choice of options he had just presented to me. He prodded me to make a hasty decision as to what I would choose for his part in all of my meandering treatment.
I was confused, angry, scared, so scared, and I remember leaning back - almost being gently pushed back - on that cold exam table and feeling supported. There was nothing behind me on that table.
Then looking up, I saw what I immediately knew to be the wings of God over that cold lonely exam room ceiling.
The ceiling was covered with the wings of God. White, feathery, soft wings. I saw them - it was not an illusion, not a mind trick, not a departure from reality - they were placed there by a God that had heard my cry, my whimper, my desperate whisper for help - and the universe ripped apart and I saw His wings covering that room.
I thought on the warm whiteness of those wings again while I sat there in that Chevrolet weeping, wiping my nose on my sleeves because I had run out of a mountain of stored Starbucks napkins, and there was only one person to call - I called Scott. He didn't pick up his cell phone, so I called his classroom number. He answered concerned, because I only call that number, interrupt his class, for emergencies.
I couldn't talk. He wanted to know if I was ok. I said, yes, "I -sob- am doing -sob- really -sob- good". He said "I'm coming down - what did your doctor say?"
I finally choked out the words - "She said I'm done. I'm done, Scott. It is finished. I only have one more treatment. I'm done". And then I laughed. And then I sobbed.
He didn't say anything for a moment, couldn't say anything for a moment, then said "I know, sweets, I know. You're done."
He has been my Jesus daily here on this earth. He has cared for me, comforted me, prodded me, helped me. He has used up his sick days, his health, to take care of me. He is the closest thing to mirror God that I have met on this earth.
He knew what this moment was - our journey to the end of hell and back - our journey through the valley of the shadow of death - for this moment - was finished.
***
I have wandered this journey without knowing a lot of things. I didn't know that at the end of the treatment you go out to the waiting area and ring a bell three times after your lead radiation expert reads the words:
Ring this bell
Three times well
Its toll to clearly say,
My treatment's done
This course is run
And I am on my way!
One of my new radiation friends, Joline, printed off the information and brought it to me the next day when I told her I had not heard of this tradition before. I briefly mentioned it to Scott, when I was home one weekend and told him that Joline was a little disappointed that her family could not be there for her bell ringing.
I knew he didn't have any extra sick days to take so I didn't even hint, not a hint, that he should be there. I told Heidi about it, and told her she could come if she wanted as Millie-bean has gone along with me to a few treatments, met all the good, happy, kind ladies and loved them as well.
So Heidi, her two daughters Addy and Millie-bean and I walk into the radiation wing Thursday morning. Addy had talked non-stop about missing school so she could watch Grandmum ring the bell. She packed a big lunchbox full of snacks thinking it might take most of the day. I told her a few times that she would not be waiting long, but she and Millie also packed a backpack full of dolls and outfits for entertainment.
As we walked in, I was already crying. Millie walked up to the ladies and showed them her baby in her new outfit, they were smiling and loving on her again, then behind us the doors opened again and a whole crowd of people that I love most in the world walked in - Chloe and Zoe and Scotty and Leila; Kristi, and my dear, dear Scott that had secretly planned this all with the kids.
They were all there.
And I cried some more. The relief, the love, the happiness -- all happened at once in that place of hope, that place that I had wandered in for so long. The hugs and laughter and happiness could be heard all over the building. The squeals of delight from four small girls was infectious. The other folks in the waiting room all smiled and laughed. Chloe hugged me and hugged me and yelled "Grandmum - you're treatments are all done!!" Zoe just hugged and hugged and told me she was "so happy". Addy and Millie jumped and laughed and yelled.
The two front ladies that I have come to know were pleasantly surprised at how much the young girls knew of my treatment and how cognizant they all were for this moment.
I know. I know how blessed I am to have this family. I know how blessed I am to have had all of them care for me and love me so this past year. They have all done so much to help and lesson our burden and care and love, and I am so blessed. I know that.
Then that whole blessed group waited a short time while I went in for. my. last. treatment.
In the patient waiting room I cried with Joline a little - she had waited on me to be there for my last day. I cried with my radiation people - I told them I had been "doing this place" for a long time, and that I could never, ever, repay them for the good they had done for me. I could never repay them for the encouragement, the happiness, the fun, the healing.
I hugged them all - then they gave me gifts only a radiation patient would treasure - my 'protective-scar-blob-thing' and my chin strap. We had the "ceremonially throwing away of the chin strap". It's not the favorite part of treatment, but keeps your body not moving while you get the radiation. It was kind of like throwing away that horrid maternity dress you were stuck wearing the last two months of pregnancy because it was the only thing that fit. You just were glad you had it when you needed it, but ever so glad to see it go.
We laughed one more time over some private jokes then I told them they all had to come out and "be Gerwigged" - and they gladly stood out there with us all, participated and watched, applauding loudly while I rang the bell.
My family was over the top happy. I was over the top happy. We all knew it isn't a perfect life, but sometimes you have some perfect moments, and this was one of them.
I will cherish it forever.
We went to lunch later, and celebrated over some good appetizers, good food, and good desserts.
Four little girls and I declared it "THE BEST DAY EVAH!!"
And it was.
***
Kristi had to go back to work, and the rest of us ended up back at Heidi's house. I was surprised when Scott asked our son to drive his car home for him. I thought it a bit odd and commented that the alone driver with two kids might not want to share their driving partner. Scott turned to me and told me "I drove you to your first appointment, and I am going to drive you home, sweets".
We held hands most of the way, with the radio off most of the way, and mostly just smiled. I cried a little more, then we smiled some more. Then we would talk about the funny things the girls had said that day, and laugh, then sit and be quiet and smile again.
Amidst the flood of events, God has walked us through the best and worst. We don't know what the future holds, but each day I get up and say "Blessed art thou Lord God King of the universe, that gives me another breath of life, another day to live." And live it, I plan to do.
It's not a perfect life, but there are some perfect moments.
And he drove me home.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Feeling good, feeling good.
Everyone, with deep concern, keeps asking me how radiation is going. I can't help myself with my answer - "it's all one big party!!"
Honestly. The folks at the Stephanie Spielman Center could not have set my radiation time at a better moment in time for me - I have met such wonderful women, made friends, and we laugh like hyenas over everything. Getting undressed in front of half of Columbus for however long your treatment has been? Laughter. Getting fitted for bras? Laughter. Showing each other our hair growth? Laughter. We talk about this spring and summer and what everyone plans to do. You might find it difficult to meet a roomful of women more excited about spring this year anywhere else in the continental United States.... We've exchanged names, phone numbers, email addresses, and hope to keep in contact.
We have all come through the valley of the shadow of death, and we could not be happier about it all. And even though I am starting to feel the effects of the radiation finally, the fatigue and skin sensitivity, it still all seems like I am going on a picnic at the end of a long, long, journey.
I know there are those eyeballing the whole radiation route, knowing it's in their near future, and my only advice is to not worry about choosing your time, but instead choose your waiting room mates!! I mean, really. It's been a joy. All through chemo I didn't get to talk to other fellow sufferers. The chemo setup at the Stephanie Speilman Center is that the first 40 women to show up get beds, in single rooms. It's quite nice and setup to accommodate your travel mates and all, and there is a nice feeling knowing all of your symptoms are not heard all over the chemo ward like they were at OSU-Phase One Study Drug ward when I started, but you don't see the same women each week, nor do you really have a chance to talk with them at length. And that's ok, you need to be able to discuss in depth with your chemo nurses what has happened and what will happen...... And honestly, you don't feel all that much like talking. And even more honestly, you don't feel all that much like hearing other's stories - you focus a lot on getting through your treatment, because that's about all the energy you have most days.
But there is no being apart from other "fellow-journeyers" in radiation. We sit together and talk, and laugh and plan things to do with our lives.... That seems to be all the rage in that room, after not knowing for a while if you had plans to make... And can I say, they are so dangone good at accommodating patients. Running early? No problem. Running late? Don't stress, we'll get you in. All it means, is that you meet five more women going through the same thing.
***
I do have to admit I have developed a good case of "treatment envy". Again, the last several weeks /months, I have heard the word *metastatic* used in a sentence with my name attached a few too many times. That word burns my ears every time I hear it.
While talking to these ladies I ask how long they have been in treatment - they respond with "May". "July". "September". And I have to work really hard to not have my head swing around and say "WHAT???!!!" By far, with the women I have met, I get the award for the longest time spent at OSU/JAMES CANCER/STEPHANIE SPIELMAN CENTER. That's a line I didn't want to be standing in.....
But apparently, I hold an advantage in that I don't have to work while going through this like some do. That means I don't have to wear some necessary clothing pieces that the work-world kind of demands.... Also, I can wear whatever clothes I want to wear however I want to wear them - like turning a nice soft 100% cotton long sleeve t-shirt wrong-side-out so the seams don't irritate my skin. While talking to the other ladies, as my fatigue has started, I don't have three teenagers at home demanding time, effort, and everything that goes with keeping up with children. I can go to bed at 7pm, and no one cares.
So even though I have talked with God some about the length of my treatment, and knowing it could have been shorter if I had demanded an ultrasound with my first lump, I'm ok. And maybe even have it easier with radiation than some of the ladies do that have to wear things and do things that cause a lot of skin irritation.
If the damnable word *metastatic* would just go away, I would be feeling even better.
All that to explain my next adventure: I am in a new study. This one is not the same as my last study drug - that study was a drug my own oncologist had developed, of which I was in the very first stage of testing - making us closely tied to each other for life, both wanting and needing good outcomes.
The new study drug is a world-wide, double-blind study. Meaning that neither the patient nor my doctor knows if I am getting the drug or a placebo. After meeting with my study coordinator last week, we are leaning towards the fact that I am getting the real drug, due to my side-effects.
Apparently, only God and a doctor somewhere in a faraway land, knows for sure.
I told my doctor when she was encouraging me to jump into this study in December - because it would enhance my chances of not "recurring" even more - that even though my brain has been quite uniquely on a beach in never, never land, savoring it's last few months of not having to do like actual math or problem solving or anything, I told her that I had added up all my chances I had been hearing over the past 13 months of treatment and I was now standing at 158% for non-recurrence.
I raised my eyebrow at her while she laughed and told her my brain was telling me I was in good standing suddenly. And that I was banking on those odds. Because those are nowheres near the national averages for this *disease*.
But I will take what I can get, and for now, know that I feel better than I have in a very long, long time.
And oddly, just a sidebar, this time my hair is growing in mostly black...... Last summer, it grew in almost all white. Go figure.
***
God and I talk a lot on these long drives. We talk a lot about suffering and how to stay on the journey and how to find the gold in it all. He reminds me that His people have suffered immeasurably from the beginning of time, and more so, His own son suffered a shameful death, all under His care.
We in North America, especially those sitting in pews, don't like to discuss suffering. We like to put labels on it like "complaining". Or "not trusting enough". Or the best one I have heard to date "just don't think about it". Which I found kind of difficult this last chemo blast go around. When one lies in bed for several days at a time, you find a little difficulty in ignoring it all.
And yet, God keeps pointing out to me time after time after time after time, while I listen to the Bible in big huge chunks because that's the way my brain is rolling now, that His book is full of suffering. And full of how those that suffered, dealt with it all.
I can tell you they didn't ignore it. They didn't label it. They didn't think they were not trusting God enough - in fact most times it was the opposite - never did they trust God more.
If you have time, along with the verbal Bible, this is my night time buddy this last week - the last ten minutes rip me up every time..... It might be better titled "What to Think of Suffering"....
http://www.followtherabbi.com/guide/detail/corination
***
I wrote all of this before I had a phone call yesterday. My heart is heavy with concern for one that I hold dearer than life itself. I ask you to pray.
And everyone is asking for an update on Scott - he needs healing and prayer as well. His new doctor at the Cleveland Clinic says he should have had the procedure, when his other doctor sent him home..... Plus, we are dealing with some huge bills with it all, and please just pray that God can work it all out.
But after the phone call yesterday, my heart has stopped, waiting, waiting. I know God hears. And I know God is near.
And like all those fellow-sufferers found in the Bible - I cry out "I THIRST!!" Please, God Almighty, hear my prayer, for I thirst.
Honestly. The folks at the Stephanie Spielman Center could not have set my radiation time at a better moment in time for me - I have met such wonderful women, made friends, and we laugh like hyenas over everything. Getting undressed in front of half of Columbus for however long your treatment has been? Laughter. Getting fitted for bras? Laughter. Showing each other our hair growth? Laughter. We talk about this spring and summer and what everyone plans to do. You might find it difficult to meet a roomful of women more excited about spring this year anywhere else in the continental United States.... We've exchanged names, phone numbers, email addresses, and hope to keep in contact.
We have all come through the valley of the shadow of death, and we could not be happier about it all. And even though I am starting to feel the effects of the radiation finally, the fatigue and skin sensitivity, it still all seems like I am going on a picnic at the end of a long, long, journey.
I know there are those eyeballing the whole radiation route, knowing it's in their near future, and my only advice is to not worry about choosing your time, but instead choose your waiting room mates!! I mean, really. It's been a joy. All through chemo I didn't get to talk to other fellow sufferers. The chemo setup at the Stephanie Speilman Center is that the first 40 women to show up get beds, in single rooms. It's quite nice and setup to accommodate your travel mates and all, and there is a nice feeling knowing all of your symptoms are not heard all over the chemo ward like they were at OSU-Phase One Study Drug ward when I started, but you don't see the same women each week, nor do you really have a chance to talk with them at length. And that's ok, you need to be able to discuss in depth with your chemo nurses what has happened and what will happen...... And honestly, you don't feel all that much like talking. And even more honestly, you don't feel all that much like hearing other's stories - you focus a lot on getting through your treatment, because that's about all the energy you have most days.
But there is no being apart from other "fellow-journeyers" in radiation. We sit together and talk, and laugh and plan things to do with our lives.... That seems to be all the rage in that room, after not knowing for a while if you had plans to make... And can I say, they are so dangone good at accommodating patients. Running early? No problem. Running late? Don't stress, we'll get you in. All it means, is that you meet five more women going through the same thing.
***
I do have to admit I have developed a good case of "treatment envy". Again, the last several weeks /months, I have heard the word *metastatic* used in a sentence with my name attached a few too many times. That word burns my ears every time I hear it.
While talking to these ladies I ask how long they have been in treatment - they respond with "May". "July". "September". And I have to work really hard to not have my head swing around and say "WHAT???!!!" By far, with the women I have met, I get the award for the longest time spent at OSU/JAMES CANCER/STEPHANIE SPIELMAN CENTER. That's a line I didn't want to be standing in.....
But apparently, I hold an advantage in that I don't have to work while going through this like some do. That means I don't have to wear some necessary clothing pieces that the work-world kind of demands.... Also, I can wear whatever clothes I want to wear however I want to wear them - like turning a nice soft 100% cotton long sleeve t-shirt wrong-side-out so the seams don't irritate my skin. While talking to the other ladies, as my fatigue has started, I don't have three teenagers at home demanding time, effort, and everything that goes with keeping up with children. I can go to bed at 7pm, and no one cares.
So even though I have talked with God some about the length of my treatment, and knowing it could have been shorter if I had demanded an ultrasound with my first lump, I'm ok. And maybe even have it easier with radiation than some of the ladies do that have to wear things and do things that cause a lot of skin irritation.
If the damnable word *metastatic* would just go away, I would be feeling even better.
All that to explain my next adventure: I am in a new study. This one is not the same as my last study drug - that study was a drug my own oncologist had developed, of which I was in the very first stage of testing - making us closely tied to each other for life, both wanting and needing good outcomes.
The new study drug is a world-wide, double-blind study. Meaning that neither the patient nor my doctor knows if I am getting the drug or a placebo. After meeting with my study coordinator last week, we are leaning towards the fact that I am getting the real drug, due to my side-effects.
Apparently, only God and a doctor somewhere in a faraway land, knows for sure.
I told my doctor when she was encouraging me to jump into this study in December - because it would enhance my chances of not "recurring" even more - that even though my brain has been quite uniquely on a beach in never, never land, savoring it's last few months of not having to do like actual math or problem solving or anything, I told her that I had added up all my chances I had been hearing over the past 13 months of treatment and I was now standing at 158% for non-recurrence.
I raised my eyebrow at her while she laughed and told her my brain was telling me I was in good standing suddenly. And that I was banking on those odds. Because those are nowheres near the national averages for this *disease*.
But I will take what I can get, and for now, know that I feel better than I have in a very long, long time.
And oddly, just a sidebar, this time my hair is growing in mostly black...... Last summer, it grew in almost all white. Go figure.
***
God and I talk a lot on these long drives. We talk a lot about suffering and how to stay on the journey and how to find the gold in it all. He reminds me that His people have suffered immeasurably from the beginning of time, and more so, His own son suffered a shameful death, all under His care.
We in North America, especially those sitting in pews, don't like to discuss suffering. We like to put labels on it like "complaining". Or "not trusting enough". Or the best one I have heard to date "just don't think about it". Which I found kind of difficult this last chemo blast go around. When one lies in bed for several days at a time, you find a little difficulty in ignoring it all.
And yet, God keeps pointing out to me time after time after time after time, while I listen to the Bible in big huge chunks because that's the way my brain is rolling now, that His book is full of suffering. And full of how those that suffered, dealt with it all.
I can tell you they didn't ignore it. They didn't label it. They didn't think they were not trusting God enough - in fact most times it was the opposite - never did they trust God more.
If you have time, along with the verbal Bible, this is my night time buddy this last week - the last ten minutes rip me up every time..... It might be better titled "What to Think of Suffering"....
http://www.followtherabbi.com/guide/detail/corination
***
I wrote all of this before I had a phone call yesterday. My heart is heavy with concern for one that I hold dearer than life itself. I ask you to pray.
And everyone is asking for an update on Scott - he needs healing and prayer as well. His new doctor at the Cleveland Clinic says he should have had the procedure, when his other doctor sent him home..... Plus, we are dealing with some huge bills with it all, and please just pray that God can work it all out.
But after the phone call yesterday, my heart has stopped, waiting, waiting. I know God hears. And I know God is near.
And like all those fellow-sufferers found in the Bible - I cry out "I THIRST!!" Please, God Almighty, hear my prayer, for I thirst.
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Praying for deliverance.....
Many have commented that perhaps I have fallen off the edge of the world.
Almost.
I have not had computer keyboard access and have great difficulty typing with one finger on my smart phone used by a dumb person..... So my communication skills are being stretched.
Today, I woke up feeling like half of me was missing - Scott is in the hospital again. I had been home two hours Thursday afternoon after spending the week in Columbus for my radiation treatments, and while laying on the couch watching DVRed NCIS, Scott calls me and says he is on his way home from school and was having pretty severe chest pains again. He said it felt like his gall bladder attacks but it was his left shoulder hurting this time, along with the front of his chest feeling like it had been kicked in.
I stood up, and said loudly "CALL 911!!" I'm thinking, #1 trouble breathing, #2 chest pain, #3 left shoulder pain - WHY ARE YOU CALLING ME???!!!
He said he could get home, and he did, and I dialed the phone for him to call his surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic to see if this could be "recent-surgery-related" and his surgeon said it shouldn't be, and to get to the nearest emergency room.
In all my travails with hospitals and emergency rooms and long doctor's visits over the years, I have learned a few things - always grab your "go-bag", and always, always, grab your cell phone plug.
I didn't do either. I just pushed him to the car and called Scotty to run us out two aspirin and continued to Samaritan. I called them on the way, asking them if there was a chance we could not have to wait in the waiting room like the last time with flu germs, and they met us at the door to take him immediately back.
Long story long - they admitted him after the usual CT scans and blood work, thinking that perhaps he had a blood clot.
Scott called me the next morning telling me it was his liver enzymes. The hospitalist called me as well and talked with me, telling me that he was looking at the "most obvious" with his liver enzymes continuing to get worse - that perhaps there was a stone in the bile duct or perhaps he had some liver damage from his recent gall bladder surgery, but that at any rate, he was dealing with liver inflammation.
I would almost have rather heard them say "heart-problems". I have seen quite a few animal livers in my lifetime, most of those fatty livers, but there's all sorts of things that can go wrong with your liver, and knowing the rudimentary issues with livers and liver damage of any type, and how that is mostly irreversible - my blood kind of went a little cold.
Plus, I was given strict orders on both sides of the doctor spectrum - from my doctors as well as from the staff at Samaritan - to not be there - that they were full of the flu, as every hospital seems to be at this moment in time. My errant white blood cells that refuse to regenerate to acceptable levels would not stand a chance......
I was a little frantic knowing from much practice that every patient needs a patient advocate - someone who can listen to the information while not drugged and act accordingly. Thankfully, the doctors that he had at Samaritan called me and kept me informed and told me his options and what they wanted to pursue. At the same time, his surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic was talking with me, and he stated that what they were doing was exactly what he would be doing if Scott were there.
Relaxation does not come easy to me at times like this - I am ready for action - but God delivered a peace to me on some levels.
And I admit, by the time a friend drove me to Columbus for my radiation on Friday morning and getting back early afternoon, I was tired and actually fell asleep and napped for a while Friday afternoon. After that, the house, our home, was so lonely.
My better half wasn't here, and wasn't going to be for a few days it seemed.
I have spent most of the night waking and crying out to God on how to pray - how to pray "enough, please Lord", or how to pray "give me more strength", or how to pray "have mercy on us oh God".
I had recently moved to listening to the Acts and the letters of Paul, and again yesterday a verse stood out to me, Acts 19:11-12
11 God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick, and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.
That one portion of scripture at least, leads one to believe that there are evil spirits at times lurking about ones who are sick, and I am pondering that greatly. And wishing I knew one or ones that believed the whole word of God as well, and spent time praying for the sick.
The idea pops up often, and yet we don't seem to take it all that seriously.
***
At any rate, I am heartsick for Scott.
They did do a test late yesterday afternoon finding a stone in his bile duct, which has to be removed by a procedure that cannot be done at Samaritan.
The Cleveland Clinic is not taking any patients for a few days as they have been inundated with the flu. He is waiting to hear if Riverside in Columbus can take him.
His angst is compounded by the knowledge that he has used up almost all of his sick days with caring for me and my illness and treatments; and then his surgery in December. He knows that once his remaining three days run out, his pay will be docked, but possibly his insurance suspended, and that is causing him much anxiety with me in the midst of treatments.
He's not so worried about himself, but is frantically trying to figure out how he can get this done and get back to school asap.
It makes me cry when I hang up with him every time.
Worse, in all honesty, I was angry with him in the emergency room - he is not proactive for his own health, and after the Physicians Assistant told him he needed to stay overnight, he turned after she left and asked me what I thought.
I briskly told him he had not heeded one word of my advice since he started vomiting in October, so I wasn't sure why he was asking me now......
File that under "Things I will repent for all my days"........
***
We are weary of all things medically wrong. We are extended and tired and wish to be vigorous and healthy again. We cried together over the phone last night.
I cried out to God all night long.
There are others that have it much worse. I talk to them every day in the waiting rooms I frequent. Many found in waiting rooms have lost loved ones, lost insurance, lost homes, lost much more.
Being in this community of the unhealthy usually means you lose much that can never be recovered. It is a frightful place to be even when surrounded by loved ones that give you soft places to land.
I don't minimize our situation, but it does keep it all in perspective.
But we are weary to our bones of being unhealthy and long to be in warm sunshine again, working in the garden. Scott has gone to work sick too many days.
We wish to be at least able to crawl into our jobs. Walking in healthy and wise would be counted blessing upon blessing.
Our kids and Scott have talked me into going to a wee ones second birthday party today. It will hurt so much knowing that I can be there, but Popop cannot. We didn't make it to her first birthday party last year either - I had just started a couple of weeks of intense chemo and was in the vast wasteland of the chemically poisoned.....
***
One portion of scripture keeps playing in my mind, one portion has awakened me time and time again and I rely on that.
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And better yet, Scott just called me and said his liver levels had come back down. All I can say is Thank You Jesus, Thank You Jesus.
Friends of ours have stopped in twice to visit him. Our son has been in and out with him, making sure all is good on that end where I cannot be.
I am so thankful. So as I cry out to God, I also bless Him and thank Him.
We covet your prayers. And I am so thankful that He sends those to fill in the gap.
Almost.
I have not had computer keyboard access and have great difficulty typing with one finger on my smart phone used by a dumb person..... So my communication skills are being stretched.
Today, I woke up feeling like half of me was missing - Scott is in the hospital again. I had been home two hours Thursday afternoon after spending the week in Columbus for my radiation treatments, and while laying on the couch watching DVRed NCIS, Scott calls me and says he is on his way home from school and was having pretty severe chest pains again. He said it felt like his gall bladder attacks but it was his left shoulder hurting this time, along with the front of his chest feeling like it had been kicked in.
I stood up, and said loudly "CALL 911!!" I'm thinking, #1 trouble breathing, #2 chest pain, #3 left shoulder pain - WHY ARE YOU CALLING ME???!!!
He said he could get home, and he did, and I dialed the phone for him to call his surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic to see if this could be "recent-surgery-related" and his surgeon said it shouldn't be, and to get to the nearest emergency room.
In all my travails with hospitals and emergency rooms and long doctor's visits over the years, I have learned a few things - always grab your "go-bag", and always, always, grab your cell phone plug.
I didn't do either. I just pushed him to the car and called Scotty to run us out two aspirin and continued to Samaritan. I called them on the way, asking them if there was a chance we could not have to wait in the waiting room like the last time with flu germs, and they met us at the door to take him immediately back.
Long story long - they admitted him after the usual CT scans and blood work, thinking that perhaps he had a blood clot.
Scott called me the next morning telling me it was his liver enzymes. The hospitalist called me as well and talked with me, telling me that he was looking at the "most obvious" with his liver enzymes continuing to get worse - that perhaps there was a stone in the bile duct or perhaps he had some liver damage from his recent gall bladder surgery, but that at any rate, he was dealing with liver inflammation.
I would almost have rather heard them say "heart-problems". I have seen quite a few animal livers in my lifetime, most of those fatty livers, but there's all sorts of things that can go wrong with your liver, and knowing the rudimentary issues with livers and liver damage of any type, and how that is mostly irreversible - my blood kind of went a little cold.
Plus, I was given strict orders on both sides of the doctor spectrum - from my doctors as well as from the staff at Samaritan - to not be there - that they were full of the flu, as every hospital seems to be at this moment in time. My errant white blood cells that refuse to regenerate to acceptable levels would not stand a chance......
I was a little frantic knowing from much practice that every patient needs a patient advocate - someone who can listen to the information while not drugged and act accordingly. Thankfully, the doctors that he had at Samaritan called me and kept me informed and told me his options and what they wanted to pursue. At the same time, his surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic was talking with me, and he stated that what they were doing was exactly what he would be doing if Scott were there.
Relaxation does not come easy to me at times like this - I am ready for action - but God delivered a peace to me on some levels.
And I admit, by the time a friend drove me to Columbus for my radiation on Friday morning and getting back early afternoon, I was tired and actually fell asleep and napped for a while Friday afternoon. After that, the house, our home, was so lonely.
My better half wasn't here, and wasn't going to be for a few days it seemed.
I have spent most of the night waking and crying out to God on how to pray - how to pray "enough, please Lord", or how to pray "give me more strength", or how to pray "have mercy on us oh God".
I had recently moved to listening to the Acts and the letters of Paul, and again yesterday a verse stood out to me, Acts 19:11-12
11 God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick, and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.
That one portion of scripture at least, leads one to believe that there are evil spirits at times lurking about ones who are sick, and I am pondering that greatly. And wishing I knew one or ones that believed the whole word of God as well, and spent time praying for the sick.
The idea pops up often, and yet we don't seem to take it all that seriously.
***
At any rate, I am heartsick for Scott.
They did do a test late yesterday afternoon finding a stone in his bile duct, which has to be removed by a procedure that cannot be done at Samaritan.
The Cleveland Clinic is not taking any patients for a few days as they have been inundated with the flu. He is waiting to hear if Riverside in Columbus can take him.
His angst is compounded by the knowledge that he has used up almost all of his sick days with caring for me and my illness and treatments; and then his surgery in December. He knows that once his remaining three days run out, his pay will be docked, but possibly his insurance suspended, and that is causing him much anxiety with me in the midst of treatments.
He's not so worried about himself, but is frantically trying to figure out how he can get this done and get back to school asap.
It makes me cry when I hang up with him every time.
Worse, in all honesty, I was angry with him in the emergency room - he is not proactive for his own health, and after the Physicians Assistant told him he needed to stay overnight, he turned after she left and asked me what I thought.
I briskly told him he had not heeded one word of my advice since he started vomiting in October, so I wasn't sure why he was asking me now......
File that under "Things I will repent for all my days"........
***
We are weary of all things medically wrong. We are extended and tired and wish to be vigorous and healthy again. We cried together over the phone last night.
I cried out to God all night long.
There are others that have it much worse. I talk to them every day in the waiting rooms I frequent. Many found in waiting rooms have lost loved ones, lost insurance, lost homes, lost much more.
Being in this community of the unhealthy usually means you lose much that can never be recovered. It is a frightful place to be even when surrounded by loved ones that give you soft places to land.
I don't minimize our situation, but it does keep it all in perspective.
But we are weary to our bones of being unhealthy and long to be in warm sunshine again, working in the garden. Scott has gone to work sick too many days.
We wish to be at least able to crawl into our jobs. Walking in healthy and wise would be counted blessing upon blessing.
Our kids and Scott have talked me into going to a wee ones second birthday party today. It will hurt so much knowing that I can be there, but Popop cannot. We didn't make it to her first birthday party last year either - I had just started a couple of weeks of intense chemo and was in the vast wasteland of the chemically poisoned.....
***
One portion of scripture keeps playing in my mind, one portion has awakened me time and time again and I rely on that.
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And better yet, Scott just called me and said his liver levels had come back down. All I can say is Thank You Jesus, Thank You Jesus.
Friends of ours have stopped in twice to visit him. Our son has been in and out with him, making sure all is good on that end where I cannot be.
I am so thankful. So as I cry out to God, I also bless Him and thank Him.
We covet your prayers. And I am so thankful that He sends those to fill in the gap.
Monday, December 24, 2012
Gifts
I feel so smashed this morning, and it feels so good.
We have been on the road travelling to Cleveland and Columbus too much these past three weeks. We have been busy trying to get caught up a little bit here at home - Scott has done an awesome job of housekeeping this past year - but there were some things that just needed "done".
We've had poor health for so long, that these last few days of "feeling better", feel really good. And it feels good to work at something. My brain still has a lot of cobwebs - still a lot of confusion, a lot of "not-knowing" when I should know things - but it is working better.
Our son got us a shared, what I call "walkie-talkies" on steroids, and he texted his dad this morning telling him he had hid his walkie-talkie in their Christmas tree. Popop readily obliged and started talking - saying things like he was the Christmas tree talking. The twins were amazed, scared then finally knowing who was really talking - scolded him. It was all pretty hilarious.
So life seems to be full of the normal, ordinary pleasures again.
Plus, we feel as if we have just been handed another gift.
My physical therapist had instructed me a couple of months ago to massage my incision site to release scar tissue. I had been doing that - doing everything/anything to give my arm and muscles some relief when they had clamped up tight the week after my fourth chemo treatment - and while doing that massage two weeks ago, I... found... lumps... on... my... ribs.
Life slowed, then stopped again.
As I had been doing this a couple of times each day, I was pretty familiar with how everything should feel, and I knew that first lump had not been there the day before. Then there were two, then three. All on the bones. All not painful. All making me completely sick in my soul again.
At that time, I was just three weeks out from my last chemo, just barely getting back to eating and feeling better some, so the logical side of my brain said it was too close to chemo to be a bone cancer lump. The side of my brain that is not so logical, just freaked out.
I couldn't even tell Scott at first - he has been too sick with his gall bladder and trying to work to have anything more put on his plate. I didn't tell my kids at first. It's too close to that same time of year again.
I was scheduled for my radiology set-up CT scan in two days, so I called my oncologists, and we all agreed we would have a look at the scan. My radiologist-oncologist, examined the lumps, asked me if I had looked at them in a mirror - I said no - and she said she could see them easily through my skin and that they were substantial; then found another one on my sternum that she was more concerned about.
She promised me she herself would show me the CT scan when I was done and go over every little rib in my body together.
It was a long appointment - I was there for three hours. I now have four dot-tattoos, road mapping where to place the radiation when I start. After the scan, she called me into the "look" room, and showed me my bones. She told me a radiology prep CT scan is not a diagnostic scan, but that my bones looked good, and that I should tell the part of my brain that was freaking out, that the logical part of my brain was correct - and not to worry.
She showed me a few other things that were of concern, then told me to go home, breathe a big sigh of relief, and live again.
I did -- until my oncologist called and said she wanted a full body scan done asap.
The logical side of my brain knew it had looked at my bones with my very own eyes, and was satisfied, but the freaking side of my brain was full of questions, and full of dread again.
So many times this year, I've had a chance to realize that my life could be short. I've had a chance to review, and repent, and be joyful all at once realizing what blessings I've had.
I took time to mull over in my brain what my response would be if I were told I had to do more chemo. I've had nine months of chemo this year, and it has altered my brain, altered my thinking, altered my body, altered my health - and - altered who I am.
I was not sure what my response would have be if told that I needed to step into that brutal, fenced in fighting arena again.
I took time to mull over in my brain what my response would be if I was told I would be meeting God soon.
It didn't help that my scheduled whole body scan was on my "anniversary date" - the same day I had found last year that I had cancer.
Four years ago, Scott had a life threatening illness and then surgery that same day.
December has not been a traditionally good news month for us.
It was a long several days of reflection, and crying before God, and giving it over to Him time and time and time again.
And strangely, there was joy in it all. If this was "my time", I knew that even though there were a lot of things not accomplished, a lot of things left undone, a lot of things not said, a lot of things that would be missed, I also had a deep knowing that I had received more in my lifetime than I could ever be properly thankful for - I knew that God had blessed me with things that others beg Him to gift to them.
In some sense of it all - I could lose everything in a moment. In another sense of it all - I had been given everything and more.
My brain and my soul agreed on it all.
***
My sweet doctor had put in a rush on the whole body scan - so after my dye injection at OSU at 8:30am Friday morning, then my actual scan close to noon - they rushed the results to her at the Center - she had answers by our appointment time at 2pm. God bless that woman - she, as well as I, did not want to be placed once again in the "holiday-skip" - that time of year when medical staffs are cut in half with everyone taking vacation time - it's the most difficult time of the year to get in, get tests done, and the worst time to wait for and get answers.
She gave me a big hug when she walked into the exam room. She said hello to Scott, who has been notably missing the last couple of weeks as he has used up too many sick days. She then told me that my scan turned up the same thing as my first and second scans - a couple of bad discs in my lower back - and arthritis - and NO CANCER GROWTHS!
She thinks it is scar tissue. I'll take that.
My body literally shuddered with relief. It was scary, it was a time of faith stretching, it was soul searching and soul readying - it was all of those feelings, tense muscles and recoiling, afraid of the news, yet ready for whatever may come - it was all released in one sentence out of her mouth.
Scott and I smiled widely with relief.
I asked her how I should determine in the future what to be concerned about - and she answered "you don't - you come to me!" She said she didn't know until she got the scan herself.
My brain told me that God was saying the same thing - "you don't know - you come to Me!"
***
Throughout this whole dilemma, when I was finally feeling better in December, I decided it was time to renew my drivers license that had expired on my birthday in November.
I was denied.
They told me at the BMV that my Social Security name did not match my name on my expired driver's license. Therefore, I could not renew. I was told if I did drive and was to encounter a police officer for any reason, like say speeding or some such thing, I would be "taken in", and my car would be towed and impounded. No questions asked.
Then they dropped the big bomb - I had to go to the nearest Social Security office and get my name straightened out.
In my brain there are some things in life I deem more pleasurable - like poking an ice pick in your eye, or pulling off fingernails. I had tried several times after our house fire in 1995 to correct this problem and it was not *correctable* for a lot of years...... I had just given up and my recent tax returns reflect that - my name is hyphenated with my maiden name to get them accepted.
It's difficult to reflect God in such times.
Soooooo........ last week, Scott was finally able to pretend like he was driving me, and off we went to our nearest SS office more than 45 minutes away, early one morning.
Upon walking in the door, Scott was immediately told by the security officer to either dump his coffee - or take it back out to the car - there was no food or drink allowed in the building. And according to their tv announcements - no cell phone use as well.
We dutifully took our number, sat down, and waited. Scott complained a little too loudly about his coffee, as it was his first coffee since his surgery and he had intended on enjoying it if nothing else that day..... all the while, my intellect was telling me that we were stepping down into the abyss once more, and the pointers all seem to be pointing to the fact that I might never drive legally again.
Then we were called up and surprises of surprises, encountered a most pleasant young man. And helpful. And kind. This was NOT the same Social Security office that we had navigated trying to get five new identity cards seventeen years ago. They were helpful. He gave me a piece of paper to enable me to get my license.
He sent me to the Richland County BMV. We went in, took a number and sat down. They smiled and said their computers had just gone down and they had no idea how long it would be. While I re-positioned myself for the long haul, half of the room cleared out. Then, miracles of miracles, the computers were back up again.
I was out of there with a drivers license in less than 30 minutes. We went back to SS to show them my new drivers license so they could correct the name error (I know - crazy, huh?) and it went incredibly smooth. Incredibly well. Incredibly, we were out of there all said and done between the two agencies within three hours.
That is unheard of. I'm still in shock over it all. I have literally spent hours and hours and hours and days and days trying to correct this problem over the years. I have notes attached to our marriage license. It appears according to those notes that I was close to being suicidal after a "talk" in 2004. So, I am extra relieved to note that even though I was there the day of our wedding, now Social Security admits it as well......
***
We are not anyways near ready for our feasting and family tomorrow. But, I've decided we have done what we could, they are all helping and bringing something and cooking and baking, so we can just cozy down and wrap some presents tonight. And maybe actually put some lights on the tree that Scott put up before his surgery.
I didn't get any Christmas cards out, even though we have greatly enjoyed getting them and hearing from a lot of folks we don't get to see very often.
My shopping has not even happened this year. I couldn't even get out to the grocery store the first week Scott was home - I had a few appointments, he wasn't feeling well, so we just continued eating tomato soup and canned tuna, which is what kept him alive the previous six weeks, and I had subsisted on it quite a bit this year, so it was all good.
Friends of ours brought us out a meal, and it tasted so good. My taste buds are awakening again, Scott was feeling some better, so it was just the perfect low-fat food, at the perfect time. We ate and enjoyed it immensely.
Everything has been put under a microscope in matters of importance. Some things just aren't so important any longer. Clean bathrooms rank high in our house, this past year especially, and other than that, the rest is all ok.
I don't even have a wreath on our door. I don't know where they were put last year in the garage.
But we are overwhelmed with God's grace and mercy washing over us. We are resting in His grace and peace. He has given us so much - we have each other, kindnesses, goodness, the taste of good food being introduced into both of our diets again, and the greatest gift of all - His presence.
And, I sincerely hope I would be saying that even if my test results came back differently.
We don't know what the future holds, but for now, we are resting in His care. In a little over a week, I start radiation and the drives to Columbus daily or staying over, so we hope to savor this time together, both recovering together.
We plan to have a Merry Christmas tomorrow with everyone. We plan to let them all spoil us. We plan to just not worry. We plan to remember how good it is to have loved ones to help and support and care.
We plan to listen to five little girls screaming with delight, playing, crying, playing some more - and we can't wait.
Scott's folks are excited to give the girls their gifts - each year they get them all incredibly cute dresses. We are excited to give our gifts in the spirit of love like never before. (thank you Amazon.com and free delivery!!) The girls are so excited about giving to one another. There have been so many "secrets" and planning on how to give, what to give, and card making, and lavished love over it all.
Scott and I are so very tired, but so very happy at the prospect of being all together and being happy. Money is a side issue on those days. Snowy roads don't matter so much. Laying on yet another narrow table being radiated once again is just a short-term dim memory. Life is now, today, and there will be plenty of time when it's all over to be too tired to enjoy it all.
It will be the most extraordinary, simplest of holidays ever.
And we think it all so great to be here joyfully enjoying it all.
Thursday, December 13, 2012
Scott news
Just a short note to let folks know that Scott is !!**home**!! His gall bladder surgery went well today, despite his surgeons original misgivings about the scar tissue build up that he has from his previous two surgeries. He was able to go in a different "route" - just a few inches east of his 18 inch long scar - and still remove it laproscopically, and then as a bonus, also cut two lesions from his scar tissue that had attached to his intestines, possibly causing some problems as well.
It was all good.
I cannot tell you how happy I am to have him home tonight and how blessed I feel. Scott, not so much right now, but maybe by the weekend he will be feeling better.
And, I know a lot of you were concerned about me possibly driving today, and I feel doubly blessed to say our good friend, and house pastor, Jim, drove us. It was a pleasure to have him there today to just sit with - someone else who loves Scott as well. We left pretty early this morning - he was here just after 5am - and said he didn't mind at all. (And the only thanks he got was that I bought him a long awaited coffee....)
Blessed art thou, Lord God our King, who breathes life into the sick.
It was all good.
I cannot tell you how happy I am to have him home tonight and how blessed I feel. Scott, not so much right now, but maybe by the weekend he will be feeling better.
And, I know a lot of you were concerned about me possibly driving today, and I feel doubly blessed to say our good friend, and house pastor, Jim, drove us. It was a pleasure to have him there today to just sit with - someone else who loves Scott as well. We left pretty early this morning - he was here just after 5am - and said he didn't mind at all. (And the only thanks he got was that I bought him a long awaited coffee....)
Blessed art thou, Lord God our King, who breathes life into the sick.
Monday, December 10, 2012
Bone piles
Beth Shemesh.
I have listened to one particular teaching for almost two weeks. I should have it memorized by now, but my brain's not rolling that way at this point in my life.
After wandering for forty years in the desert, Moses - who knew he was not stepping one toe into the Promised Land - once again implored the people with a long speech that some say took 39 days, to obey God and do what He told them to do. The people agreed and said "We will do what God commands!"
When the tribe of Dan went into the Promised Land, their area of tribal inheritance was next to the coastal plains, which was full of Philistines. A whole land full of Philistines about, oh, three miles away. They were in a constant battle with their close proximity neighbors and were basically holding the door, being the "gateway" to the rest of Israel.
The "battle" seemed to take on two fronts - one was of course physical and that included full front on battles or if you were travelling with a small group of people and were suddenly caught by the raiding parties of the Philistines, you might have wished to be turned over to the Shawnees in North America.
But the battle had another front as well - it was the clash of cultures. The Israelites had been wandering for over a generation of people in a wilderness and the tribe of Dan were especially set up for a close and in depth study of what looked to be a very sophisticated culture just next door. The Philistines in my mind never got past the cave-man-looking-Goliath idea - and yet archaeology says they were at that point more sophisticated than the Hebrews. They used iron. Their paganism allotted them a lot more fun. They just had better "stuff".
How could good God fearing folks keep looking away when - wow - there was a lot of "stuff" going on right down the road - you could look and just see it all - it was that close. Some pagan temples had Amsterdam "freedoms" beat by miles and miles.
They were stuck between the coastal plain three short miles away and the Judah mountains right behind them. On the coastal plain were the powerful Philistines. Dan could not retreat, and constantly faced the pressure of the Philistines.
It got to be too much. After a bit of time the tribe of Dan decided "OIY! we cannot continue to do this", so they sent out spies to another city in the mountains, which is where a lot of the Israelites had fled for protection from their not-too-happy new neighbors.
The spies landed upon a city north to Mount Herman, Laish, and the whole tribe picked up everything, slaughtered the residents of Laish and moved in - leaving their tribal inheritance.
Dan moved from being the cozy neighbors of the Philistines, which they thought wholly too much to bear, to being the first city upon entering Israel on the Via Maris, the major trade route of the day basically connecting much of the then world. And northern armies marching along to invade anyone they took a fancy to take....
Kind of like moving from Cinnamon Lake to Polaris Parkway. Or moving from Polaris Parkway to downtown Jerusalem.
I don't know what they were thinking. To leave their God-given inheritance - the one thing that God gave them - thinking they couldn't take the campfire heat, to an iron furnace stoked and red hot.
But this is the part that I love and cannot get past without pausing it and playing it over and over: "The point that the Jewish Rabbis make on this bit of history, is if you don't work and struggle where God places you, no matter how good it looks somewhere else you always move into a worse situation. You are better off with struggle and pain where God wants you, than to try and go where it is wonderful where you are not called to be.
Dan has always attested to what happens to a people who will not persist and intensely follow God under pressure and stress and pain, and instead try and go somewhere else. You've got to be where God calls even if the struggle is there." (Ray Vanderlaan)
Looking up the history of the city of Dan, it might have been better for them to just cozy up to the Philistine border and stand firm.
I cannot get past this, because that seems to be where God has placed me. And I cannot describe it better. I've got to "be" where God calls, even if the struggle is "there".
I want to retreat to the mountains. I want to go where it looks "more wonderful". But, that's not where God placed me. And this is something I just can't escape and walk away from.
***
The reason the teaching was titled "Beth Shemesh" was - and forgive my brief paraphrase here - was because as archaeologists have dug up this city, they found the local garbage dump and layers of bones. Hebrews don't eat pigs. So the idea was to find out how much the local Hebrews had influenced their world for God by the amount of pig bones they found. (the tribe of Dan and it's inheritance was just a side-bar reference in this teaching)
During the time of Sampson - who was set up to be something really big for God, but ended up poorly with his eyes gouged out by the Philistines and chained between two pillars, he didn't make the best choices in life - but at the time of Sampson the amount of pig bones found in the leftover food places was 25%. At the time of Solomon, much less. At the time of King Hezekiah - none.
No matter what you think about the idea of eating pigs, or such, I kind of wondered what would be the measuring rod today of my influence on my society for God.
I can measure other's influence especially this year - because of what they have done for no other reason than to help those that are sick.
Our yard was mowed at least once a week since spring by a lawn service. Paid for by a former employer, who was in a lot of ways closer than family to me. He has four kids that need money put into college funds - but he still did it.
He doesn't go to any church. He doesn't spout off 'Christianize', or worthless Christian cliches. Yet he is one of the most "do-the-right-thing" people I know. I watched him make a lot of hard decisions as a new business owner that were really hard, and I watched him always try to do the right thing with each decision.
I never had to lie for him when I worked for him.
We have received a weekly gift card in the mail for either gas or groceries. Anonymously. At first it drove me crazy trying to figure out who it was. But now I just pray blessings over them daily. Better than the gift card, wrapped around it are phrases of encouragement sent on simple white sheets of paper telling me to stay in the fight, to not give up.
I cannot tell you how many times that has made us smile on the most difficult of days.
My brother-in-law in Oregon forwards me emails - sometimes it's a "funny"; sometimes it's beautiful pictures of places that are eye-candy to the soul; sometimes it has a political bent; but it always reminds me that someone believes that I am still alive and open emails.
Well, not always immediately but eventually.
***
So I wonder what we will be measured by when we all stand before the throne? What will be our "pig bones"?
I was talking to my friend Morven the other day, and it seems that sometimes people are so wrapped up in "church" and their major beliefs that are taught to them, that they have little time for the actual Scriptures and the living out of the teachings therein.
It's easy to be so busy with work and church and our "ministries" - to be too busy to actually live out what God intended us to do - to face our struggles, and do good to others.
I'm afraid I have a whole backyard of pig bones to be dug up. I have a lot of restructuring to do in my own life. (and pig farmers, just an FYI - Ray Vanderlaan has millions of videos all over the world about the ancient Hebrews and the Torah and how important it all is to us today -- all because his grandparents sold their pig farm and gave him money to go to school in Israel.... isn't life full of irony at times??)
***
I do know we all have differing levels of what is good. I spent some time with my two favorite five year olds and ended up helping them clean up their rooms some. We ended up digging things out from under their beds and at one point I said "what the heck??!!" when encountering some items, like spoons and 'Gogurts' wrappers and such.
In fact, I think sweet Zoe would love to be a burrowing animal - she might be able to live under her bed if the shadows she sees at night, that she so earnestly and honestly tells me about, do indeed become real.
But I was immediately, and almost sternly, corrected. "You don't say "heck", Grandmumsy!"
And here I thought I was being good by redirecting a word.......
But I know in the land of the sick, the kindest things are the things others have to "do".
And I am most miserable at it myself, so I cannot tell you how much that makes me appreciate it all the more.
But it was great to help them clean up a little - it helped me get back involved in their lives. They come visit me, but I don't realize until I spend time in their rooms what is really important in their lives. I don't know what stuffed animal is most dear to them and gets top billing on top of their beds. I don't know what toys they are tired of, and what ones they desire. I don't know how creative they are until I see things they have made or designs they like, or the nests they make under their beds for "safety's" sake.
I don't know their little hurts at school until they work beside me for an hour and talk. I don't know their horrors of tree branches that make bad shadows at night. I don't remember how much they need to be hugged and told how special God made each of them and how much I love them.
So I was kind of digging in their own "bone pile", and I really, really hope I helped them and that somehow I reflect goodness and kindness and God to them in ways they can grasp.
And I won't say "heck" around them anymore......
I have listened to one particular teaching for almost two weeks. I should have it memorized by now, but my brain's not rolling that way at this point in my life.
After wandering for forty years in the desert, Moses - who knew he was not stepping one toe into the Promised Land - once again implored the people with a long speech that some say took 39 days, to obey God and do what He told them to do. The people agreed and said "We will do what God commands!"
When the tribe of Dan went into the Promised Land, their area of tribal inheritance was next to the coastal plains, which was full of Philistines. A whole land full of Philistines about, oh, three miles away. They were in a constant battle with their close proximity neighbors and were basically holding the door, being the "gateway" to the rest of Israel.
The "battle" seemed to take on two fronts - one was of course physical and that included full front on battles or if you were travelling with a small group of people and were suddenly caught by the raiding parties of the Philistines, you might have wished to be turned over to the Shawnees in North America.
But the battle had another front as well - it was the clash of cultures. The Israelites had been wandering for over a generation of people in a wilderness and the tribe of Dan were especially set up for a close and in depth study of what looked to be a very sophisticated culture just next door. The Philistines in my mind never got past the cave-man-looking-Goliath idea - and yet archaeology says they were at that point more sophisticated than the Hebrews. They used iron. Their paganism allotted them a lot more fun. They just had better "stuff".
How could good God fearing folks keep looking away when - wow - there was a lot of "stuff" going on right down the road - you could look and just see it all - it was that close. Some pagan temples had Amsterdam "freedoms" beat by miles and miles.
They were stuck between the coastal plain three short miles away and the Judah mountains right behind them. On the coastal plain were the powerful Philistines. Dan could not retreat, and constantly faced the pressure of the Philistines.
It got to be too much. After a bit of time the tribe of Dan decided "OIY! we cannot continue to do this", so they sent out spies to another city in the mountains, which is where a lot of the Israelites had fled for protection from their not-too-happy new neighbors.
The spies landed upon a city north to Mount Herman, Laish, and the whole tribe picked up everything, slaughtered the residents of Laish and moved in - leaving their tribal inheritance.
Dan moved from being the cozy neighbors of the Philistines, which they thought wholly too much to bear, to being the first city upon entering Israel on the Via Maris, the major trade route of the day basically connecting much of the then world. And northern armies marching along to invade anyone they took a fancy to take....
Kind of like moving from Cinnamon Lake to Polaris Parkway. Or moving from Polaris Parkway to downtown Jerusalem.
I don't know what they were thinking. To leave their God-given inheritance - the one thing that God gave them - thinking they couldn't take the campfire heat, to an iron furnace stoked and red hot.
But this is the part that I love and cannot get past without pausing it and playing it over and over: "The point that the Jewish Rabbis make on this bit of history, is if you don't work and struggle where God places you, no matter how good it looks somewhere else you always move into a worse situation. You are better off with struggle and pain where God wants you, than to try and go where it is wonderful where you are not called to be.
Dan has always attested to what happens to a people who will not persist and intensely follow God under pressure and stress and pain, and instead try and go somewhere else. You've got to be where God calls even if the struggle is there." (Ray Vanderlaan)
Looking up the history of the city of Dan, it might have been better for them to just cozy up to the Philistine border and stand firm.
I cannot get past this, because that seems to be where God has placed me. And I cannot describe it better. I've got to "be" where God calls, even if the struggle is "there".
I want to retreat to the mountains. I want to go where it looks "more wonderful". But, that's not where God placed me. And this is something I just can't escape and walk away from.
***
The reason the teaching was titled "Beth Shemesh" was - and forgive my brief paraphrase here - was because as archaeologists have dug up this city, they found the local garbage dump and layers of bones. Hebrews don't eat pigs. So the idea was to find out how much the local Hebrews had influenced their world for God by the amount of pig bones they found. (the tribe of Dan and it's inheritance was just a side-bar reference in this teaching)
During the time of Sampson - who was set up to be something really big for God, but ended up poorly with his eyes gouged out by the Philistines and chained between two pillars, he didn't make the best choices in life - but at the time of Sampson the amount of pig bones found in the leftover food places was 25%. At the time of Solomon, much less. At the time of King Hezekiah - none.
No matter what you think about the idea of eating pigs, or such, I kind of wondered what would be the measuring rod today of my influence on my society for God.
I can measure other's influence especially this year - because of what they have done for no other reason than to help those that are sick.
Our yard was mowed at least once a week since spring by a lawn service. Paid for by a former employer, who was in a lot of ways closer than family to me. He has four kids that need money put into college funds - but he still did it.
He doesn't go to any church. He doesn't spout off 'Christianize', or worthless Christian cliches. Yet he is one of the most "do-the-right-thing" people I know. I watched him make a lot of hard decisions as a new business owner that were really hard, and I watched him always try to do the right thing with each decision.
I never had to lie for him when I worked for him.
We have received a weekly gift card in the mail for either gas or groceries. Anonymously. At first it drove me crazy trying to figure out who it was. But now I just pray blessings over them daily. Better than the gift card, wrapped around it are phrases of encouragement sent on simple white sheets of paper telling me to stay in the fight, to not give up.
I cannot tell you how many times that has made us smile on the most difficult of days.
My brother-in-law in Oregon forwards me emails - sometimes it's a "funny"; sometimes it's beautiful pictures of places that are eye-candy to the soul; sometimes it has a political bent; but it always reminds me that someone believes that I am still alive and open emails.
Well, not always immediately but eventually.
***
So I wonder what we will be measured by when we all stand before the throne? What will be our "pig bones"?
I was talking to my friend Morven the other day, and it seems that sometimes people are so wrapped up in "church" and their major beliefs that are taught to them, that they have little time for the actual Scriptures and the living out of the teachings therein.
It's easy to be so busy with work and church and our "ministries" - to be too busy to actually live out what God intended us to do - to face our struggles, and do good to others.
I'm afraid I have a whole backyard of pig bones to be dug up. I have a lot of restructuring to do in my own life. (and pig farmers, just an FYI - Ray Vanderlaan has millions of videos all over the world about the ancient Hebrews and the Torah and how important it all is to us today -- all because his grandparents sold their pig farm and gave him money to go to school in Israel.... isn't life full of irony at times??)
***
I do know we all have differing levels of what is good. I spent some time with my two favorite five year olds and ended up helping them clean up their rooms some. We ended up digging things out from under their beds and at one point I said "what the heck??!!" when encountering some items, like spoons and 'Gogurts' wrappers and such.
In fact, I think sweet Zoe would love to be a burrowing animal - she might be able to live under her bed if the shadows she sees at night, that she so earnestly and honestly tells me about, do indeed become real.
But I was immediately, and almost sternly, corrected. "You don't say "heck", Grandmumsy!"
And here I thought I was being good by redirecting a word.......
But I know in the land of the sick, the kindest things are the things others have to "do".
And I am most miserable at it myself, so I cannot tell you how much that makes me appreciate it all the more.
But it was great to help them clean up a little - it helped me get back involved in their lives. They come visit me, but I don't realize until I spend time in their rooms what is really important in their lives. I don't know what stuffed animal is most dear to them and gets top billing on top of their beds. I don't know what toys they are tired of, and what ones they desire. I don't know how creative they are until I see things they have made or designs they like, or the nests they make under their beds for "safety's" sake.
I don't know their little hurts at school until they work beside me for an hour and talk. I don't know their horrors of tree branches that make bad shadows at night. I don't remember how much they need to be hugged and told how special God made each of them and how much I love them.
So I was kind of digging in their own "bone pile", and I really, really hope I helped them and that somehow I reflect goodness and kindness and God to them in ways they can grasp.
And I won't say "heck" around them anymore......
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