Merciful God

 

So tonight it's just me alone in the hotel room. I have been wanting to write some things for a long time but the struggle has been too personal, too close to the bone to share. I am more aware than ever that life isn't just about me, but everything I do affects someone else. Since the struggles have mostly concerned the Mr., and I know how he feels about his privacy, I have been keeping it all to myself.                          The last ten years have been a teeter totter of struggle and victory. Win and lose. Up and down. But I have noticed something. When it first began, when we lived in Salinas for awhile, the fear was out of sight. Paralyzing. The emotions were like the sickest roller coaster you could ever imagine being on. My personality didn't help. If you know me you know I'm not the calmest of people. As the years have gone on, though, I notice that with each trial the fear grows less. Fear of job loss, fear of losing our home, fear of what may happen to the family. Fear of death. And each trial builds on the last one. Meaning what I have gone through is a building block for what I am going through. And with each trial the trust in God grows greater and greater. He has proved Himself over and over and over.  The fear just melts away.

We didn't know how really sick the Mr. was when he went to the doctor last Spring. I suspected it was serious, since he was as yellow as a banana, and almost 300 pounds of Edema. I was worried. I thought the doctor would give him some medicine and presto he would be all right. But they took him by Ambulance straight from the doctor's office to the hospital. I didn't know it then, but he told me later that they were asking him if he wanted a chaplain to meet him at the hospital. And the doctor we met that night told us that he was lucky to still be alive. I certainly know luck had nothing to do with it. I was really frightened that first night, last March, as I sat by his bedside staring into the dark and listening to the click of the clock in the quiet room and thinking about our lives. I held his hand as he slept and considered things. Liver failure. This was certainly more than I knew how to handle. I knew a test of faith was coming. Was here, in fact. Could I roll even this off onto the Lord? And let Him carry it for me? I knew this would be the biggest trial of my life so far. I knew the possibility of death was very, very real. I could be a widow tomorrow. Or next week. We were literally walking through the valley of the shadow of death. No idea what was coming next. Or how it would end. But could we trust Him with it? The answer was of course, yes. Over the course of the year minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, He met our every single need. Even up to this very minute we have been cared for in such a tender way by our Heavenly Father that it boggles the mind. 

Over the course of the year I would say the Mr. was hospitalized at least thirty times. Our lives now revolved around medication, doctor's appointments, hospitals, ambulances and transplant lists. I became full time caregiver, doling out meds, rubbing feet, changing sheets, cooking, carrying trays, and praying, always, always praying. I spent a lot of time driving, as the Mr. couldn't drive anymore. A lot of time filling out paperwork, and keeping a sharp eye on him for changes in behavior and demeanor. God began teaching me about how to be a servant. And how not to complain when asked to do something, to just do it, and keep my mouth shut. That.is.difficult. Especially for me, who always has to have the last word. I'm still working on that. And always we were waiting for the day he would be eligible to get on the transplant list. We had a doctor at the local hospital who would drill it into our heads. You MUST get on the list, he said, or it will be too late!  But the VA rule was six months. And without the VA the cost of a new liver was more than a half a million dollars. Just for the liver. Not including all that goes with that. So we waited. And he got sicker and sicker. Meanwhile it became obvious that he couldn't work anymore, although he tried valiantly. He would take his computer to work and have meetings in his hospital room, with the doctors and nurses buzzing around him trying to keep him alive. Finally he had to take a very long leave of absence. We thought eventually he would go back to work, but it became apparent that this was not going to happen, either. We applied for Social Security for him, and for disability through the VA for his military service. And then we waited for that, too. Meanwhile we got behind on our mortgage by three months. I still did not worry about that. I knew, as I said, from past experiences that God would see us through. He always had. Either the money would come or they would figure out a plan of repayment by the required pay date in November. I had a little money, and I planned to use it for that purpose, however, just when I was ready to take care of that, we had a series of house disasters that took all the money. The AC overflowed into the ceiling of the office and the hall. 250 dollars. Big lump to swallow. They told us that it wasn't actually an AC problem, we would have to have a plumber. Boom. Another 250 dollars. We had to replace the fireplace in our living room for heat this winter, another couple of hundred bucks. It went fast. I told my best friend she was about to witness a real live miracle, because I no longer had the money for the back mortgage, although all the other bills were up to date. We hadn't had a paycheck since May. We had made it to September without a problem, with some disability he had received from his job and some savings. Then we heard from Social Security that we would be getting something starting in December. That seemed a long, long time away. Fortunately, at that time, we had some help from someone very close to us, who offered to get us through until Social Security kicked in. We were not to proud to accept, with great thanks and humility, humility being something I was learning about daily...especially the day they came to put in the wheelchair ramp in the back yard. It was so big and shiny I think you could see it from outer space. I had big ideas about how I wanted my house to look from the outside and this was not it. But, like a lot of other things, my big ideas had to be put aside for the greater good. At least for awhile. I comforted myself with the thought that it wouldn't be forever. Someday I would be able to reclaim my back yard. Meanwhile it was definitely handy being able to roll things down the ramp and into the car, rather than down the deck steps. That thought didn't help me much, though, when I fell down the steps, while sidestepping the ramp, in the middle of night, and scraped my knees on the concrete. I might have cursed that ramp, there, laying in the dark. But then I got up and went on my way, vowing to be more careful from then on.  But I digress.

Sometime later, unexpectedly, the military approved the Mr.'s request for disability. We were so, so amazed at God's timing and provision. And finally, they were getting him prepped to get on "the List" as we had started calling it for short. But we had to go to Houston to do it. So we were scheduled for the end of October for the many tests the Mr. would have to endure to make sure he was transplant worthy. 

But in October he ended up back in the hospital in Denison. I was amazed at the amount of therapy he was receiving just to keep him alive. Who knew the liver was responsible for so many bodily functions? He had three IV's. One with blood products, one with antibiotics, and the third with electrolyte stuff. His abdomen was swollen. His feet were swollen. His face was puffy. And he was so weak he couldn't get up without help. However he made a remarkable recovery and was discharged in a week. The doctors at that hospital were all in agreement, though, that he couldn't wait anymore to get on the list. They were making personal calls to the doctors in Houston to see if they could speed the process up. We were inching closer to getting on the list, but inching was taking too long. 

We made the preparations to go to Houston. They had told us they might not let us go home if he was too sick. That we might have to live there for a time. I hadn't taken that seriously. Well, I had taken it somewhat seriously. I told the kids we might not be back until he had a new liver. I bought new electric heaters for the living room. I instructed the kids, who would take care of the house how to turn on and off the gas heaters and gave repeated safety instructions.  Made sure the house would stand through the winter should we not make it back. I made endless lists and I made arrangements for the dog. She would be staying with my Dad. That was the hardest part for me. She had had a tough couple of years, with the loss of Sam, our Beagle, and the repeated trips away from home, in which she was not allowed to go. She had begun to exhibit anxiety in her old age. Other than our time in Salinas, she had never been away from us. I felt so bad for her. And me. But there was nothing I could do. I knew Dad would take good care of her. And I told myself  we would be back within a week. That was a month ago. We made it to Houston, and sure enough, as soon as they got a good look at the Mr., into the hospital he went. He was 258 pounds of edema this time. Sixteen long days and two heart caths later, they finally released him at 201 pounds. But while he was in the hospital that miracle I told my friend to expect regarding the mortgage payment came to pass. 

It had been a long couple of days. The Mr. was supposed to have a heart cath on this particular day, and also a cat scan. The heart cath was not because anything was wrong, it was just to measure the pressure in his heart, to see if he could withstand the surgery. The cat scan was to check out his lungs. They came to get him for the cat. I sat in the room and waited for an hour. I heard something at the door and looked up and there he was! No gurney, no nurse, no escort of any kind. They had finished his test and parked him in the hall and told him to wait, that someone would be along to wheel him back to his room. So he waited. Meanwhile all the patients coming out after him went back to their rooms and he just sat there. So he just got up and walked all the way back to his room, passing many, many doctors and nurses who never questioned him about what he was doing walking around the hospital in his bright yellow socks. That was the day I learned about hospital socks. Hospital socks mean something! Bright yellow means fall risk. Somebody should have said something. As it turns out, he didn't even have the scan. Something went wrong with the machine. They came awhile later for the cath. The escort didn't know where to take him. The doctors didn't know why he was there. When they finally figured it out, they took a look at the arm they were going to use and put the big kabosh on it. His arms were too swollen for anything because of the repeated attempts by the nurses to get a good vein for labs. It was a miserable day of frustration. Two days later he finally had the heart cath...and he failed it. Pressures in his heart were too high. They would try again later. Meanwhile they would move him up to the ICU to get some of the fluid off. They would use an IV drip and just administer lasix around the clock. The doctors who came to tell us the plan told me I would be able to go up with him. I had just been to the store to stock up on his snacks, so I loaded up all his stuff, clothes, food, personal items, computer, and became a pack mule walking up to the fifth floor. It was so heavy, all this stuff. I looked forward to getting him settled and comfortable, and then I would go home and rest. We got up there and the nurses wouldn't let me in. Nor would they let all that stuff in. He could have his phone. That was all. I sat in the ICU waiting room and burst into tears. It  all of a sudden became too much. I realized I would have to carry all that stuff downstairs and all the way out to the parking lot, and then into our hotel room. And I realized the car keys were on the very bottom of a very tightly packed bag. I realized I was going to have to unpack all that stuff right there in the waiting room. It was going to be embarrassing, so I just went all the way with it. Go big or go home, right? I took the bag and dumped the whole thing out all over the place right there in the waiting room, with two women trying not to look at me from across the room. I was sobbing hysterically. I found the keys. Then I threw, I mean threw every single item back in that bag. I didn't care who was looking. I was far from home. Stripped of every single thing I held dear. No home, no kids, no grandkids, no family, no Mr., no money, no dog. I felt like a naked hermit crab. Exposed. Homeless. At the end of my rope. I lugged all that junk out to the car and pulled up to the hotel. Got out. And realized...the room key was in the bottom of that bag. I was going to have a repeat of the situation in the ICU waiting room. And so I did. I dumped the whole bag on the floor in front of my room and then just threw it all inside once I got the door open. I was just done. I cleaned it up and then went to bed and didn't get up until two days later. I just stayed in bed and watched tv. On Sunday, I got a call from the Mr. Look at our bank account, he said. So I got on my phone and did so. I gasped. It was so unexpected. The Mr. had gone from 50 percent disability from the military to 100 percent! There was enough to pay that mortgage! I got on the phone with the mortgage company and asked the rep when our time was up to pay it back. Tomorrow she said, is the last day. God is never late. And always on time. 

So on Tuesday of this last week, he finally got on the list! It's official! The paperwork they gave us said it could be anywhere from five hours to five years before a liver becomes available. You never know. We have been here a month, and although there is a possibility he could go back home to live, the docs are loathe to let  us go, because he is so sick. Today is Sunday. Five days since it became official. They called us today. There is a liver. He is currently in the hospital, being prepped for a liver transplant. When the nurses getting him ready heard he had only been on the list for five days they were astounded. Astonished. I am not. I am cognitive of God at work here. He has made himself known, from the smallest of things to the largest of things. From the nurse that came to pray with Tommy the day our car broke down and I was stranded at Kroger,  (THAT was amazing, the insurance had a road side service person to me in less than seven minutes, who started the car right up, and told me to go buy a new battery) to the timing of simply everything, He has made his presence known and I am thankful on this post Thanksgiving weekend.

What will be the outcome in the morning? No way of knowing. He may not even get a liver tonight. Anything could happen, and the doctors told us it is common for the liver to not be acceptable, and not to be alarmed if it didn't happen. We may have to wait longer. Or maybe not. Whatever happens we are in His more than capable hands. It is a glorious thing to be at the mercy of such a merciful God.