My Snake Killing Hero with Very Kind Eyes.

                                                                                                                   
I shared a pot of coffee with my daughter-in-law, Courtney, this
morning. She spent the night here with my son, Sam, after attending Secret Church last night. I arrived late but sat on a front row pew with them for two hours, indulging in the teachings of David Platt. It was one of several events I've enjoyed since my biopsy was cancelled. 

 Yes, the biopsy of my spleen was cancelled. I should have mentioned it on FB before now but it's taken me a few days to digest all the information and put it out here in black and white.

Around 3:30 Wednesday afternoon, a nurse called from the hospital to go over procedure protocol. When we hung up, I was to check in at 8:30 the following morning. Within an hour, my primary care physician called, informing me that a hospital radiologist had called to say they weren't comfortable performing the biopsy due to the risk of bleeding. After much discussion she decided to order a PET scan to measure how fast the lesions were growing. But five minutes later she called again, saying an in house radiologist didn't feel a PET scan would help and encouraged a follow up MRI in six months. We opted for four, and since a month has already passed since the original scan, I'll have the MRI in July.

Medical. Chaos. I've been swirling in medical chaos.

While not knowing what the next day will bring has forced moment to moment living, I'm actually OK with the final plan. Waiting has its benefits and not being poked with a long needle is one of them. 
And not only did I get to attend Secret Church for a few hours last night, I also ate dinner at a Longhorn Steakhouse with Don and his Home Depot sales team. Their manager is leaving so the group chose to honor his departure with a family meal. Having never met most of the people in attendance, creative conversation ensued - like why I married a man fourteen years my senior.

The topic started when I mentioned a sales call Don made last week. As he began his window spiel across a table from a woman in Adairsville, she mentioned she'd worked for the sheriff's department for thirty-two years. After some quick math, Don asked, "Where were you in December of 1972? Our little football team came this way for the State Championship game that year."

"I remember that game." she replied, "I was a senior in high school that year and it was a cold, rainy mud fest of a game."

[In case you're wondering, I had just turned three and moved from Hawaii to Pennsylvania to Georgia.]

Don hesitated and the woman continued, "We lost to y'all in the final minutes of the game. We out played you, but we still lost."

Not sure if he should go on, Don finally asked, "How would you feel if I told you I was the guy who caught the winning pass?"

I'll let you imagine her response. 

After the hub bub died down Don continued, "I could be bluffing you know. I might not have caught that pass after all."

"I doubt that." she replied, " You have kind eyes." 

At this point in the story last night, I told his co-workers that I agreed with the woman since I married Don because of his kind eyes. I'd looked into several pairs of eyes during my ten years of widowhood, and Don had the kindest eyes I'd seen.

Of course it helped that he was a hometown football hero. As the geeky drum major who never mingled with athletes, I quietly entertained distant crushes on quarterbacks. I told Don that while I'd always wanted a quarterback, marrying a tight end would suffice.

And that brought to mind one more thing his work mates needed to know about my mild mannered husband. On one of our first dates, he killed a rattle snake with just a stick. The slithering pest was sunning in the street on a back road in North Georgia while a little girl road her bike near by. So Don put the car in reverse, backed up behind the snake, and left me screaming like a girl as he approached the viper.

Stick in hand, he whacked the unsuspecting creature just behind its head. Then he picked it up,careful to keep the jaw from his flesh and offered me a close up look. Still undone, I only peered through a window. After we drove off again, he realized he should skin the varmint for my children. I wasn't so sure, but the rattler and snake skin road home in the trunk that day.

So while I sort through medical chaos and unanswered ailments, I slog through it all with a snake killing hometown football hero with very kind eyes. Some days the snake killing side takes me for an uncomfortable ride. But at the end of the day, Mr. Kind Eyes sleeps by my side. And it's a good thing.



photo credit: coffee04 via photopin (license)
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Savoring the Simple with some Sugar in my Coffee

I just downed the last of today's sugar laced coffee. The surge of sweetness heightened my enjoyment since I normally refrain from the added calories. But after the last two days, I tossed aside the Food Babe's concerns and put a whopping teaspoon full of plain white sugar in my morning cup-of-Joe. 

And it was worth it. 

After days of waiting for doctor's to sort things out, I spoke with someone yesterday who scheduled a biopsy of my spleen for next Thursday, April 23rd @ 10:30 am. The short story remains I woke with severe abdominal pain in mid-March and spent hours in the ER. While all blood work was normal, a CT scan showed numerous lesions on my spleen. An ultrasound two weeks later confirmed the same. The spots can indicate several things: sarcoidosis, fungal infection, bacterial infection, or even lymphoma. 

Thus, the biopsy and two specific prayer requests. 

First, there is an added risk for internal bleeding when a biopsy of the spleen is performed (which is why I'll be in a hospital for the procedure). Second, I know of several situations where someone's first biopsy came back inconclusive, leading to a second. So will you please pray that I experience a routine biopsy (with no bleeding) that results in a concrete diagnosis?

That said, you can imagine there's a host of unusual thoughts and emotions swirling in my head. When a virus left me exhausted the last two days, it was hard not to ask, "Does this mean I'm showing signs of lymphoma? Am I about to begin a fight with cancer? Could my days really be numbered?"

While I feel perkier today, I'm still grateful I don't have to wait longer than a week for the biopsy. Waiting is never fun and I've been in a holding pattern for several months. But the questions sure bring life into focus. No matter what the biopsy report says, my days are numbered. Your days are numbered. We're essentially walking time bombs never knowing what breath might be our last.

Sound depressing? It's actually not meant to be. It's simply what it is. A reminder that today truly is a gift. That this moment is something to cherish, even if involving taxes and nail biting while I search my brain for words.

For while end of life thoughts are sometimes accompanied by a need to do more or to accomplish something big, my plans today simply include this blog post, sorting through paperwork, and starting another chapter in my book. Routine, maybe. But as I shuffled receipts into piles, I ran across a college roommate's phone number and dialed. Amelia and I don't talk much, but it sure was fun to catch up with the math enthusiast who lived on half the sleep I did in college. 

And truthfully, that's what I need most. A healthy dose of living here and now. Not for the big something I can do. But rather for the small difference I can make in the lives that are close. I've always grieved a little that I wasn't picked to be Amy Grant or Beth Moore. On the inside of me, I'm a performer and Bible teacher like them. In real life, I struggle to maintain the energy required to teach voice and piano part time while buying and preparing groceries. Forget clean toilets.

But maybe it's time I swallow who I am a little more and value the small scale difference I'm meant to make. Whether or not I have lymphoma, I've got some life to live in this body, with its limited resources and big-hearted fun. 

What about you? With your limits and personal challenges. With your ailments and daily pain. Do you get the small scale difference you were meant to make?

Don't give up. Don't give in. I'm not going to.

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Happy Half Birthday to Me


Hours before I indulged in even a drop of coffee yesterday morning, I swallowed two radioactive scrambled eggs that were cooked in a Styrofoam cup in a microwave. No joke. As preparation for a gastric emptying scan, I chewed and swallowed the eggs without medicine or caffeine to assist.

After eating the glow in the dark substance (and two pieces of bread), a technician took pictures of my stomach with a gamma camera every hour. In between scans I sat on the other side of the building waiting to receive a TB test. Since a radiologist has suggested we biopsy my spleen due to the number of lesions, my doctor wanted to rule out Tuberculosis first. 

Go figure.

Without my morning brew and mito cocktail however, my body began to shut down around noon. By one o'clock, my legs were so stiff my sister encouraged me to let her push me in a wheelchair. Exhausted, I agreed. Starbucks and a slow afternoon aided recovery. But it was not a fun morning.

Thus, when I realized my half birthday would dawn in only a matter of hours, I sent a text message at 10pm to make sure my family wouldn't forget. Nathan, my oldest, commented, "Mom, I forget my own REAL birthday sometimes."  Sam, my youngest, moaned, "Don't encourage her," when his wife said I should surely go shopping today.

But since I've spent most of spring break writing in my bed, I've decided it's important to celebrate my half birthday. Why not? There's a lot of things I can't do, so adding an extra celebration to my year seems fair.

And in reality, there's actually another reason I know it's my half birthday. I didn't always celebrate the day in earnest. But at some point in my first marriage I realized the day held significance. For on April 11, 1987, I auditioned at Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music and was accepted as a voice major with a half tuition scholarship. When I called home to tell my mom, she added, "A letter arrived in the mail for you today. Want me to read it?"

As I stood at a pay phone in the Nashville airport, I was introduced for the first time to the man who became the father of my children. Jason had watched me accompany my brother during a concert at a church a few weeks before and couldn't get the idea of an artist married to a musician out of his head.  So he called the church receptionist and got our address. Then he crafted two letters. The first held a donation for my brother. The second, addressed to "whoever played the piano for Mark" read:


“I’ve had some trouble trying to compose this letter so it won’t sound too strange. I saw you at St. Phillip’s on Sunday and wanted to speak to you—but had to leave early. I sang with the Boy Choir years ago so it was easy to help your brother out. Getting an address was so simple that I had trouble finding arguments not to write this letter however strange it may seem. I would like to talk to you. Even if I looked for a number I wouldn’t know whom to ask for—so I’ll give you mine. This really isn’t as silly or as much a generic pick up as it may sound. Please call—it’s relatively painless.”

I called. We married three years later. And I've got some pretty cool kids as a result. 

So Happy Half Birthday to me. The leaves are green and the azaleas in full bloom. Morning medicines have my legs in gear. And barbeque sounds much better than radioactive eggs. Sam and Courtney have dropped by and a bright blue covers the sky.

So Happy Half Birthday to me, indeed.


photo credit: Azaleas via photopin (license)
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