A Quote to Start Things Off

""I'd love to go to Santa Fe at some point, Emmett said, but for the time being, I need to go to New York. The panhandler stopped laughing and adopted a more serious expression. Well. that's life in a nutshell, aint it. Lovin' to go to one place and havin' to go to another. Amor Towles in the Lincoln Highway.

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Pictures of Memories I
Snow kidding! These "kids" now range from 17 to 23

Monday, February 1, 2010

Sickness Disease

Last Wednesday night Amy as she was driving home from a Naperville hospital after visiting her Mom who was in for pneumonia felt arm and chest pains and drove herself to our local emergency room. I rushed over there and they admitted her early Thursday Morning. They ran every test you could think of EKG, Ultrasound of the heart, X-Rays, blood work, and some of these multiple times. They were able to rule out heart attack, mini strokes, basically everything. Yet for most of her visit, her arm still felt like something or someone was clamping on it. Eventually that feeling subsided and they released her with a clean bill of health. Our family doctor will check on her in a few weeks to make sure everything is okay.

This is the second time in less than 2 years that she has gone to the doctor with legitimate symptoms and they have not been able to find anything wrong with her. It is incredibly strange.
These visits both remind me of what happened with Amy when Lucy was just a few days old. We had been out of the Hospital for less than 48 hours and Amy could not find any comfortable position to lay down in and was having trouble sleeping. We called my Dad in the middle of the night and he came over to watch the older kids. I remember it was snowing pretty hard as I drove Amy and Lucy to the hospital at about 2 in the morning. We didn't know whether to keep Lucy with us or keep her at home because she was less than a week old. Once we got to the Hospital they sent me back home with Lucy while they began tests on Amy.

I got back there about an hour later. After a long battery of tests they determined that Amy's heart and kidneys were both working at about a 25% level. They admitted her to the Heart Hospital. I drove home at about 8 a.m. I was devastated, I had had no sleep the night before and I just prayed a ll the way home. 4 years prior I had donated a kidney to a family friend. I was tempted to despair as now I would be unable to donate one to Amy. I wondered how I would possibly be able to raise 3 kids on my own if anything were to happen to Amy. But mostly I was struck with how much I love Amy and how much of who I am is tied into her. I did not understand how I would make it without her in my life.

When I got home I took care of the kids and started calling people for prayer. This was on a Sunday morning. By Thursday Amy was released and both her heart and kidney were at basically 100%. We never got an adequate response as to why the levels had gone down and then gone back up.

What was really strange was that less than a year later my brother was hospitalized with about the same kidney and heart levels as Amy had experienced. Amy and I both expected that his levels would go back up to normal as hers did. Keith's diagnosis was not the aberration that Amy's had been. He died less than 3 years after the condition was found.

I have had other friends and family members pass away from cancer and other illnesses in the past few years. My experience on that ride home in December of 2005 has built an empathy for the relatives, especially spouses of sick, dying and deceased people. Even though my experience with Amy turned out to be only a false alarm, it gave me a glimpse of what others go through.

I am not sure why I am sharing all this. I have been thinking about that time and thought the need to get it out there.

Next Time: WFMW

4 comments:

jugglingpaynes said...

How scary! I know I also feel that my life would be incomplete if anything happened to my husband. I hope Amy stays well now.

Peace and Laughter,
Cristina

sweetnika said...

Dave,
my heart goes out to you... I plead to say, no alarm is false...just perhaps delayed.. something is going on... and you now, have time to dig further... It took us 20 years to figure out what was ailing me.. I have lost an organ or two.. been paralyzed, had my kidneys nearly collapse, been hospitalized countless times, nearly died ... the list.. it's to obnoxious to even detail... I will be praying that you see this time as an amazing blessing, enjoy it richly, and continue to pursue answers to the questions brother...

Just because the doctors do not have the answers, does not mean there are not answers to be had..

Continue to live, and love, hold hands, kiss often, LIVE life to the FULLEST as I read often you do :)

just... know you are loved, and count no alarm as false... all warnings come from God... to prepare us, to alert us to equip us.. for work..
you and yours are LOVED!!!!!!!!!!!!! XXXXX

Chick Hatchers said...

This is very unsettling, I'm sure. Your family is in my prayers. One thing that strikes me, and I will share it with you, is that I have known several people who have had what seems obviously like a heart-attack or close to it. After being admitted and having many, many, many tests and several night in the hospital, they are discharged with a clean bill of health. This would seem disturbing on the surface, but not when assessed further. You see, one thing each of these people had in common is that they were Christians. Not the ones who just say they are, but the ones who really live their faith - the way it seems through your blog that your family does. My perspective on this is that there are no accidents and God is an amazing orchestrator. All things work for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose, right? So, He uses situations like these for people liek you and your wife to really deomstrate that faith and talk to those you meet in the hospital. It's amazing how many nurses, doctors, and technicians one will meet. There is opportunity here that is not to be overlooked.

Gotta cut it short now because my 4-yo just yelled HELP.

mychildsview.blogspot.com

Dave Roller said...

This is Amy. Thanks for all of your concern :) It turns out, the arm pain and chest pain was only from GERD. I have GERD and I drink too much tea...which exacerbates the situation...can't seem to knock off the tea, and there you go. So I need to work on this!

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