You Never Know

When we returned Joel to Sister Kenny on Tuesday after a fairly successful, though overwhelming, trial run at home, his neck and throat hurt badly and they decided to keep him another day to give those muscles a chance to rest before another car trip.  Dr. O, the internal medicine doctor, informed us they would perform a "swallow evaluation" to figure out why he kept having trouble.  We visited friends to examine their accessible van and appreciated the chance to ready a few more things for Thursday's homecoming.  We continued to pray that if Joel wasn't ready to come home, the Lord would make that clear to the doctors and prevent it from happening.

On Wednesday, Joel called to tell us that they discovered a leak in his esophagus with a sac of infected fluid between it and the spine.  At about 9:30pm, he said he was scheduled to have surgery to take out the abscess - that night!  And he wouldn't be able to eat or drink for seven days while the esophagus healed itself.  I pressed the nurse to give my number to the surgeon so he could call me as soon as he was finished, and Joel and I agreed that I would come to be with him on Thursday.

At 4:30 am, Dr. D called and in a hearty voice informed me that the surgery was successful and that Dr G, the original neurosurgeon from HCMC, had come over and taken the plates and screws out of Joel's neck also.  "It's hard for infection to heal in the presence of hardware so we removed it."  Wow.

Thursday morning I called the nurse's station as I drove, and the Sister Kenny nurse explained, "Oh, he's not on our floor any more.  Just a minute, I'll get you his new room number."  What??  I called the ICU at Abbott Northwestern Heart Hospital, and his nurse, Molly reported that Joel was experiencing almost uncontrollable pain, probably from the hardware removal.   I asked how long he would be in the ICU, and whether he would return to Sister Kenny after that.  "Probably overnight, and no, up to the spine or neuro unit."  I started fretting about this and that, but had the presence of mind to turn on the Christian radio station.  As I sang praise songs, they helped soothe me and remind me of God's power and love.  Then a d.j. came on and told how he was praying for a motorcyclist in a coma at the hospital and received the inspiration to tell him who God was.  "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, Who was and is and is to come."  And the biker started jerking and the machines started beeping and the nurses came running and - he woke up!  I determined to remind Joel of who God is when I arrived.

Molly had the pain mostly under control with a morphine drip plus pump by the time I got there at 12:30pm; it was at a level 6 or 7 instead of 9 or 10 (on a scale of 1-10).  I held Joel's hands for an hour, then one hand for another hour while we listened to praise music on his iPod.   The pain had been "as bad as I've had ever in my life," but by the time I left at 7 pm, he felt fairly comfortable and much more at peace.  Remembering who the Lord is and how much He loves us solves some of our problems at the deepest level.

Dr. O stopped in and expressed his gratitude that the swallow evaluation caught the infection, and reiterated that this may have been the cause of numerous problems for Joel.  Dr. A agreed, and further explained how much easier it is to treat infections without metal nearby.  Apparently bacteria love to hide in the pits and grooves of titanium hardware.   Dr. O seemed to think that Joel could possibly return to Sister Kenny when he's a little stronger, to make sure he's still up to speed for coming home.

As I drove back home (thankful that I was on 35W South because 35W North was backed up for at least 3 miles), I reflected once more on the futility of worry.  I lacked something to give Joel when I started the day, but the Lord provided it through the radio station.  Wherever Joel goes after this, Jesus will walk with him, and with us.