Two years ago, I was with my sister's family at an apple orchard when I Michael called from his doctor's office: he was being rushed and admitted to the hospital for a 14 inch DVT blood clot in his right leg. He told me that he loved me, and that I needed to get there as soon as possible. I was 5 hours away.
I remember asking him what this meant. He told me that it wasn't good. My sister and brother-in-law helped get the kids in the van (Emma was 3, Elliot was 1 and Ethan was just 7 weeks old at the time), we headed back to Massanutten, packed our suitcases (we had been vacationing with Michael's parents that week), and headed home with Mom in tow to help with the kids.
I am much more emotional looking back at this than when we were going through it. Michael told me that there was a strong possibilty that he would not make it when he called me at the orchard. When I got to the hospital, the doctors asked him questions like: "Do you have family? Call them, tell them to come." "Do you have life insurance?" "Do you have a will?" "Your condition is life threatening. Do not move for any reason." They wouldn't even let Michael move from his wheelchair to the bed on his own.
Shortly after I got to the hopsital, he was wheeled away for surgery. The clot was so large, though, that the surgeon could not get through his vein to clear it. Michael was admitted to ICU with some sort of medication dripping directly to the clot area in hopes to dissolve the clot and retry the procedure in surgery the next morning. I went home to get Ethan- I was nursing him exclusively at the time- and brought him to the hospital with me. He was with me the whole time we were there. The nurses took turns watching him while I was in the ICU unit with him. He kinda stole the show, that little peanut.
I don't even remember crying through any of this. In hindsight, I was told by several nurses how miraculous it was that Michael didn't die. And when the doctors found out that he had driven stick-shift four hours through the mountains to get himeself to the doctor's office, they were shaking their heads in bewilderment. It was difficult to grasp how close Michael was to death at the time- Michael had been so sick up to this point, we were already exhausted, weary, tattered emotionally, spiritually & physically ...everything happened so fast, the nurses and doctors flowed constantly out of our room, trying to make phone calls to family, texts sent out, Ethan had to be nursed...
No fear in life, No fear in death, this is the power of Christ in me. From life's first cry to final breath, Jesus commands my destiny."
Before Michael's surgery, he told me that he loved me and that he wasn't afraid to die. He knew where he was going. He was calm, and kept apologizing to me, as if he was responsible for creating this clot.
Two nights in ICU, two surgery procedures to remove clots, strong dosages of blood thinner (which was quite risky since he was already so sick...he was now at more risk for a bleed-out), and still so so sick from the ulcerative colitis.
It's hard to express what this time was like for us. I remember snippets. My heart is overwhelmed as I look back. Many times I wondered: "why us? why Michael? why me? why so much pain? why couldn't we have a normal life? why so many complications? why is it getting worse, not better? is this what my life is going to be like til I die? i can't handle this. you picked the wrong person to handle this, God. this is weakening our marriage, not strengthening it. will our kids remember this? they don't even know their daddy. they can't even sit on his lap because he is in so much pain. what's the purpose? what do you want, God? make it stop.
Thank you, God, for NOT stopping. God knows what we need, and He loves us THAT much to pursue us until we were broken and submissive to His will.
I don't remember crying at all through that week, oddly. But the tears flow so easily now. When I think about how resistant I was to our circumstances, and how I see God's goodness through what I learned, and how he broke my heart and drew me to Himself...I am so thankful for our sufferings. A matter of fact, I REJOICE in our sufferings. Our sufferings were precious.
So many times, I hear people requesting prayer for those struggling physically. We want to escape our physical pain. We want a good, comfortable life. Michael being sick affected our whole family. It was not convenient. It was not cheap. It was not pleasant. We wanted out. I am in no means minimizing physical struggles...God is our great healer, and we know he is powerful to make us well. But it is so easy to get absorbed in your trials that your focus is on escaping them rather than clinging to the fulfillment of the cross and the contentment that comes solely from being a child of God.
It has been two years since the blood clots. This past summer was the first summer that Michael has been healthy in the past 5 years. Emma turned 5 in August. Our kids got to see their daddy well for the first time this summer, but we are now remembering our sufferings again as we approach Michael's 3rd and final surgery next week.
We don't even really know how to prepare for the valley's that are ahead of us. Pray that our minds will be strong, our hearts pure, strengthened by God's Word and dedicated in our conversations with God.
This surgery was originally scheduled for January of 2011, but, Michael had a very small hole in his intestine which took months to heal completely. Since he has been physically well for the past 8 months, he is stronger going into this surgery. We've been told that this surgery will not be as difficult as the first two, but now that Michael has been well, this will be a huge setback in many ways. Back to bed, back to figuring out what he can/can't digest properly...
So we would appreciate your prayers: Friday, October 21st at UVA Medical Center. Ironically, we will be coming from a few days of vacation with Michael's family at Massanutten- where we were when the blood clot appeared.
