Something I Wrote Fifteen Years Ago

 

I found this document that I wrote in 2007.  It is still just as appropriate today as it was then, so I will share it here. 

          A little over three and a half years ago, I began a journey I never asked for.  During what was meant to be a fairly routine Dr. visit, events were put into motion that changed my life forever.  Within two weeks, I was given a diagnosis with a long convoluted name that basically means I have cancer.  Because of the location and number of tumors, it is inoperable and incurable.  This is not to say I have no hope—I can live with this for many years.  But it has changed my life.

 

          During the week between hearing the words, “you have a mass,” and having the biopsy, there was a great deal of fear—because there was too much I didn't know.  One night I awoke in the middle of the night and was unable to go back to sleep.  While I lay there, I heard the words, “I will keep in perfect peace whose mind is staid on me” whisper through my mind over and over again until I was lulled back into sleep.  When I awoke the next morning, I grabbed my Strong's Exhausting Concordance and found these words in Isaiah 26:3:  “You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast on You, because he trusts in You.” To say that my fear was gone would be an overstatement, but it was tempered with the peace of knowing whose hands held the control.

 

          This has changed my life in so many ways—beyond the impact on my family and my daily routine.  This has given me a chance to grow.  It is an opportunity that cannot be wasted.

 

          In 1 Thessalonians 5:18 it says to be thankful in all things.  I have been able to be thankful IN my circumstances.  I am able to see things daily to be thankful for.  My heart is more readily burdened to pray.  I've been given opportunities to reach out in my own meager way and to be reached.  I've been granted time to learn and to grow.

 

          Through my learning, I came across something that has made a huge difference in my thinking.  “When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives, don't resent them as intruders, but welcome them as friends!  Realize that they come tom test your faith and to produce in you the quality of endurance.  But let the process go on until that endurance is fully developed and you will find you have become a person of mature character.”  (James 1:2-5 Phillips)

 

          This is a conscious choice I make so that I can say:

1. It is sent from the Lord
2. It is necessary for my spiritual growth.

 

          Finding this particular wording and these specific thoughts became an “Ah-Ha!” moment for me.  The lights came on, the elevator rose all the way to the top, all my cards were in my deck, and my bricks were a full load.

 

          I UNDERSTOOD!  There probably isn't a person here who hasn't at least heard Jeremiah 29:11:  “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.”  And I knew that.  And I am not trying to say I understand having cancer—beyond the fact that this is a fallen world, there is no real explanation for cancer or a whole host of other diseases.  I am not saying that I understand why God allows things to happen to His people—it is not for me to say.  But what I do understand is that God will use this for my good:

1. to perfect my faith
2. to give me spiritual maturity
3. to allow me to minister to someone else with the same or similar debilitations
4. for other benefits beyond my fathom, because I am still peering through a mirror darkly.

I've been able to thank God for many things since I began this journey, but now with this new understanding, I can finally say, “Thank you, God, I have cancer.  I don't understand it and I don't have to.  It can and will do me good—if I let it.  So I ask that you continue to work in my heart so that I am open for whatever You plan for me.  In all this I have come to the settled resolve that everything I believe about You is true.”  Amen.

 Heavenly Father, you are the sovereign Lord of all things, and you are the Lord of my life.  I praise You because You are God and I am not.  Here and now I confess my total dependence on You for all things.  Thank you for the gift of free grace in Jesus Christ.  All that You demand and all that I need I find in Him.  Grant me a grateful heart and a generous spirit toward others.  Teach me to seek first Your Kingdom above all things.  Help me to believe so that I might obey even when I do not see all things clearly.  Thank you for giving meaning and purpose in the darkest moments of life.  I believe that weeping endures for the night, but joy comes in the morning.  Teach me to rejoice while I wait for the fulfillment of all You have promised.  You have not brought me here to leave me alone now.  It is only by Your grace that I have come this far; by Your grace I will go forward.  Equip me now to do Your will.  Bring me to a settled resolve that everything I have believed about God is true.   In the strong name of Jesus, I pray these things. Amen  (from He's God and We're Not by Ray Pritchard)

Why Me? Not in My Vocabulary

 

So what is the first reaction a person has when a devastating diagnosis is leveed upon him or her?  "Why me?" is often the question asked.  I've had more than one relative descend into the "Why me?" conundrum and my mother always had the perfect answer.  "God's grace is enough." There is no time for "Why me?" because there is too much life to be lived between medical appointments--things to do, people to see, trips to take, experiences to be had.  I won't say this is an easy mindset or even easy to put into practice, but it's the choice I make every single day when I get out of bed.  Soon after I was diagnosed, I read a book called "He's God and We're Not," that put a whole lot of things into perspective for me. This is a situation that will aid in my spiritual growth, if I allow it to.  I decided to allow it to.  

I keep a calendar on my refrigerator where I write all my appointments down so my husband will know what's going on and when he might want to be available.  The last three months have been filled with appointments and social engagements.  It doesn't seem to be slowing down anytime soon, but that's okay.  Now, it seems my husband is filling the calendar just as much as I am.  Life is nothing but challenges, but we are going to face them head on.  

Where Do We Go From Here

For about the next five years, life managed to swim along with no major hiccups.  My daughter went off to college, graduated and got her EMT license; and my son was home working drywall or coaching baseball, eventually going back to college himself.  I was working my dream job selling used books, and I was going every four weeks to get my shots and seeing my oncologist quarterly.  

One of the side effects of my shots is that they can cause gall stones.  I am here to tell you that I have never felt worse than when my gall bladder went bad.  I went to work as normal, called my boss to tell her that I was sick and needed her as quickly as possible. When I got home, I called the doctor who was done for the day, so I got in to see her Nurse Practitioner.  Tests and pain relievers later, I am sent to the hospital where the hospitalist (an MD) comes in to tell me I have a blockage and they will have to do a gastric bypass.  I'm set up  on a pain drip that has little effect and I have a plethora of friends who are there to show their care.  The morning after my admittance, the surgeon comes in and tells me he's read my chart and he thinks it's not a blockage and he  wants to do one more test, a HIDA scan, which measures the bile in the gall bladder.  Guess what? The results come back that I have a bad gall bladder and he's going to remove it that afternoon.  

Years ago Rich Little did a sketch on celebrities in unlikely professions.  One of his impressions was John Wayne as a Brain Surgeon, "We're gonna have to yank that little bugger out!"  My only disappointment was that my surgeon didn't tell me in his best John Wayne that he was going to have to yank that little bugger out. 

The One Where We Find True Friends

 On November 3, 2003, I met my oncologist for the first time and got my first treatment.  She delineated what treatment was going to be like for me, what my prognosis was, and what my life could be going forward.  My next visit with my oncologist was on a day that snow was predicted.  Since the appointment was early in the day, I decided to head to Wenatchee the night before.  It did snow and I was glad of that foresight, but the biggest surprise was the next morning.  Someone had gone through the parking lot and cleaned all the snow off all the vehicles in the lot.  I was able to make my appointment, run my errands, and go home safely.  During my visit with the oncologist, she told me that because we were in this together, we were friends. There are times when we know our friends face to face and other times when our friends are invisible.  I am so thankful for my friends who've followed my journey, who are following my journey now, and who will continue to follow my journey.  You are my angels unawares. 

I Am A Zebra

 

Often medical students are told that when they hear hoofbeats, assume it's a horse.  In other words, look for the simplest answer first.  Zebras in the medical world are diseases and conditions that don't fit the "horse" answers, they are rare.  I'm a Zebra. 

In September 2003, I went to a conference on prayer where the moderator of the conference said, "If you don't have a consistent habit of prayer, when the events come along that turn your world upside down, you won't have the reserves to draw on."  In October 2003, I went to the doctor for a routine visit.  I complained about indigestion that she thought was just gall stones.  It wasn't.  She scheduled me for an ultrasound that started at my spleen and made its way over to my liver.  The technician hadn't even gotten to the gall bladder yet when he left his chair and got a white-coated doctor to come take a look.  The events had just happened that turned my world upside down.  They found a mass in my liver that from the looks of things had been there for a while. From that day forward, my life has been different.  

I spent a week reeling between tests, emotional highs and lows, and a few sleepless nights. My doctor called at one point and said, "It's okay to cry."  Oh, and my daughter was a senior in high school and I was ordering cap, gown, invitations, etc. during that week.  And in the meantime she had been without her voice for almost a year and was working with a speech therapist to get it back in working order. 

On one of those sleepless nights, I heard a whisper in my ear (and it wasn't my husband, Kevin.  He doesn't whisper--he snores!!!!) saying the same thing over and over again, "I will keep you in perfect peace." I finally fell asleep to that continuous whisper. When I woke up the next morning, I got out my Strong's Exhausting Concordance and looked it up.  It was there, Isaiah 26:3--You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you. That has been my mainstay for all of the years following those events. Two weeks after that fateful day when they found the mass, I had my official diagnosis:  Neuroendocrine cancer consistent with Carcinoid Syndrome. This cancer is a 1/3000 cancer diagnosis. It's one of the Zebras of the cancer world. Therefore, I am a Zebra.