Lesson 10: Times Like These

I am a one way motorway,

I'm the one that drives away

then follows you back home.

I am a street light shining

I'm a wild light blinding bright

burning off alone.

It's times like these you learn to live again.

It's times like these you give and give again.

It's times like these you learn to love again.

It's times like these time and time again.

I am a new day rising,

I'm a brand new sky

to hang the stars upon tonight.

I am a little divided.

Do I stay or run away

and leave it all behind.

It's times like these you learn to live again.

It's times like these you give and give again.

It's times like these you learn to love again.

It's times like these time and time again.



David Grohl of The Foo Fighters, Times Like These

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Juw-pDJPX5Y

          Wednesday, December 15th, 6AM

     After a pathetic night of little sleep, incessant mechanical sounds, and voices outside the reach of my eyes, I am glad to see the nurse come in.  She is smiling.  (I am actually more coherent now than at any point up to this moment.)  Why do they smile?  Is that a prerequisite class all nurses must complete?  Smile! Talk politely...with a bit of helium added.  Walk with a distinct purpose!  Come straight into the room. State your name.  Bring tidings of great joy - or just another heparin shot.  the nurse is nice enough.  But, it really is too early to be this chipper.  Furthermore, I don't want chipper right now.  I want some answers.  I want some information.  I want someone to tell me what is going on.  Ouch.  Forgot.  The heparin shot. Why can't they put that mess in the IV?

     She takes my vital signs and crisply turns and walks commandingly out of the room.  I am beginning to WANT to wake up.  I am beginning to see and think a little clearer.  I turn my heard to the left and Missy is laying between two chairs in position I am not sure she will want to wake up from.  I chuckle and smile.  I reach for the remote connected to the bed...not because I have had diarrhea on myself again, but rather to turn on the TV.  Local news and weather.  Ahhh.  Reality.  Normalcy. Smiling faces greet me - still to early, but I begin to smile some.  I am feeling tired.  But my mind has yet to quit racing.  If it isn't what the amoeba claims it to be, well then what could it be?  What could it be?

     Pinching the bridge of my nose with my right thumb and fore-finger I try to relieve the building pressure my mind is beginning to collect.  I try and think.  It is a hopeless cause.  Missy awakes.  She looks worse than I do.  Of course, if I had attempted her Ringling Brother's feat of sleeping where people are supposed to sit, well...it wouldn't be pretty.  My mind races back to my first church...Mt. Olivet UMC and two sisters whose names I cannot remember who stayed in the waiting room for one month...ONE MONTH...while their mother remained in at UK after surviving an aneurysm in her stomach (less than 3% survival rate if I remember correctly.  She lived).  Are family members really not allowed to rest?  How can Missy care for me if she cannot even get a half-decent rest?  Poor families shuffling aimlessly through the hallways and pouring cup after cup of terrible coffee made by those chipper nurses...  People are hugging outside my door.  Across the hallway.  They are crying helplessly.  Shoulders are bearing faces up.  Arms are protecting the crying ones as they encircle and engulf them.  Why do people in church not care like this all the time?

     "Good morning, Mr. Housewright!"  This voice was chipper as well, but with a little more relaxed feel.  Breakfast is served.  In bed - not that I want it this way.  I would rather be at home making breakfast.  I would rather be serving...not being served.  Why is that such a hard and humiliating lesson to learn - allow others to serve you.  She leaves the tray for me and is very kind.  As she turns I notice the top half of a tattoo across her neck.  Never would have guessed that.  Ignorance again.  My stomach rumbles.  Quit judging people I remind myself as I hazily recall accusations of drug abuse.  I shake my head and remove the cover to my breakfast.  A quick sniff, a millisecond glance, the top goes back on.  "Where in the h... do they get this food?"  I wonder.  I voraciously chug the two orange juices I have been afforded.  The coffee is among the worst I have ever tasted.  How much is this costing me?  Do I have to pay for this?  Where does the staff get their food because it sure isn't from here...

     Sometime in the morning the amoeba meanders in. The long white overcoats; silvery necklaces all hanging around their necks with some strange round amulet on one end and two places for listening on the other; charts folded and piled on top of one another; new faces - the amoeba has either grown or willfully killed one of it's own and replaced it efficiently; various dialects; no scarf this time...where did she go?
    "Good morning, Mr. Housewright!  Do you know where you are?  What day is it?  Do you know the month?  Who is the President?"
     Really!?  I have a Masters!  I know these stupid questions!  I may look like crap right now, but I am not dumb.  I hear the man next to me mumble something.  The nurses are trying to sooth him verbally and with smiles.  For the first time I am cognizant of this fact - the man next to me has had a major stroke.  He has lost the ability to speak.  He cannot move one side of his body.  Stroke.  Death of bodily members.  Long recovery.  Partial recovery.  Rehabilitation hospital.  Unable to function properly for the rest of his life.  No family in here for him.  Phone calls - alot - but no one to physically touch him and kiss him on the cheek or forehead.  The amoeba is speaking...

     "We have your results from your MRI last night and they show you have some type of brain lesion on the right front temporal lobe.  Also, your EEG showed decreased brain activity in that same area. We are not certain but that could mean one of three things:  an infection has set up in your brain; you are in the beginning stages of multiple sclerosis; or, of course, you have a tumor. We will need to perform more tests and analyze the data before we can be conclusive to what is going on."
     "What is a brain lesion?" I ask.
     "Gobble-dee-gook."
     "I'm sorry.  What does that mean in plain English?"
     "Blah, blah, blah, blah.  Blah. Blah."
     "Er, okay.  So, what is next?  What tests do you need to do?"...(I wish someone would tell me what a brain lesion is.  What about my low brain function?  What does that mean?  Some people would find it a miracle there is any brain function at all!)
    "We will need to do more blood tests.  We will possibly look at performing a lumbar puncture in order to remove spinal fluid.  That could possibly give us many answers.  Also, we will more than likely do another MRI, this time with contrast. Do you understand this?"
     I am 44 years old. Not too old (well, I suppose my teenage daughters might refute that claim) and not too young (my wife would certainly agree with the latter...).  Most information we receive goes in one orifice and out the other.  The ear hears a great deal of matter - but the heart and brain only listen to what is important to them.  This time, I am listening.  Intently.  With great interest.  Did I hear tumor?  Did I hear Multiple Sclerosis?  What the!?  I have two jobs!  I have a wife who leans upon me.  I have three children plus a foreign exchange student.  Three teenage girls and a boy who is in the first grade.  I don't have time for medical problems.  How incredibly rude is this moment!   How overwhelming. 
     It is precisely at this moment I realize Missy has been holding my hand through the entire conversation and lovingly caressing my arm.  She has been asking questions.  She is greatly concerned.  What must she be thinking...what is racing through her mind...would I be as gracious?  Would I be as caring and unselfish?  Probably not.  I am a self-centered and selfish man.  I have multiple degrees.  I work two jobs.  I am loved by people.  I am known in the community.  I. I. I. I. I.  Yes, the truth is, Missy is more of a Christian than I ever could hope to be.  She sees beyond herself.  Her needs, though many, are relegated to the "back burner."  Everybody else comes first.  Her heart and life completely describe what a Christian is to be, must be. 
     The rest of the day would pass by - slowly, but uneventfully.  I would get to see my kids and my mother-in-law. They would all hug me and assure me with encouraging and loving words.  But, it was the physical touch of their hugs that would propel me through the rest of the week.  I did not know or have any idea what I would have to deal with.  In the hospital, it is always better to not know - you are fretting and worrying enough.  Hindsight being what it is, I am extremely glad no one told me that day what Thursday night would bring.  Some things are better left unknown.  And, if you end up in the hospital for any extended period of time...where tests would cause great pain...and you are alone ...might I suggest memorizing the Word of God?  The next day would bring many Scriptures to mind and lips, but none would mean more than the words - "Yeah, though I walk through the valley of death..."
     ps- I would find out later that evening that some former members of the congregation we worship and serve with were phoning one another and stating that this was God's doing and he was somehow exacting revenge on me for things I have done. Unknowingly and without any of this information, Rev. Dr. Kevin Kinghorn, would graciously and wonderfully stand behind sacred desk for me the following Sunday.  His message?  Crisis in our lives are never brought on by God to get back at us for sin in our lives.  God is awesome...and God is always on time.

Lesson Number Nine: There's Got to Be a Morning After...

Let the saints be joyful in glory: let them sing aloud upon their beds. Psalm 149:5

          Tuesday, December 14th, ?, I am moved from my room to have an MRI scan of my brain

          Tuesday, December 14th, ?, Missy tells me about my morning.  And my day. 

     I know by this time (?) I am in the stroke unit.  I have a roommate who has apparantly been here longer than I have.  No one is by his side.  He lies alone.  He doesn't talk right.  His private area is constantly exposed.  He can't pull his sheet up?  Does he know?  Does he care? 
     My nostrils are filled with the stench of multiple odors. Feces.  Urine.  Medication.  Soiled linens.  I have gone to the bathroom once - in a plastic seated toilet fixed between a walker.  That would turn out to be a minute moment of victory.  Soon, I would not get up in time.  I had to keep changing my underwear, my shorts, and the nurses would place clean sheets on my bed.  Humiliating.  Dehumanizing.  Embarrrasing.  Infantile.  "You're a man!  Can't you control yourself?"
     My ears are adjusting.  I hear only unnatural, man-made sounds.  Clanking of metal.  Squeaking of wheels.  Orders being shouted.  Someone laughing at a joke I was not priviledged to hear.  Moans from other rooms.  One man is shouting a woman's name...over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over.  "Hello, Mr. Housewright!  Feeling a little better tonight?  I have your heparin shot."  The happy nurse - what gives her the right - lifts the gown above my belly.  What?  She swabs my abdomen.  Injection.  A bee sting.  A wasp sting.  An asp bite.  "Good job!  I'll be back to get your vitals in a moment."
     My eyes are adjusting.  Missy is with me.  She is holding my hand.  I cry.  I cry more. I cannot stop.  My pillow becomes a holder of tears. My wife holds me as tight as she can.  My alarm on my venipuncture goes off for the umpteenth time.  Let go.  Flex arm open.  Alarm stops.  I wipe my wet hands on the sheets. Missy tells me about my day.
    

         Monday, April 21, 2005.  St. Joseph Hospital.  I am admitted at 5AM.  Missy and I drove over together.  It was the day after Easter.  I had purposefully postponed my back operation because I wanted to preach the resurrection.  Having been injured at a institutional facility for boys where I worked at while ministering in Indiana I had been in traumatic and crippling pain for over a year and a half.  The surgery went fantastic.  Stayed one night.  Walked without pain.  Joy.  The last few months my pain has returned - often with a vengeance in my hip and lower back.  Two bad disks and a bone spur, etc.  Nothing that Lortab, Cymbalta, 2400mg of ibuprofen, and lots of stretching can't get me through.  Though there is the two canes I have been frequently using more and more...I know now and accept the fact I will never again be able to be the man my family needs me to be.  But, I will never stop trying.

     Missy begins by telling me that the night before I was complaining of a headache.  My back was hurting, too.  No new news.  The headache, though, unusual for me.  I sat up on our futon as I often do on struggling nights and read to my son, Ryan - he is in the first grade - and I went to sleep sitting up and he laying down with his legs across mine.  
     "Really?  I don't remember any of that?  I had a headache?"
    Missy continues...she wakes up at 8:40AM - Why haven't I woke her up?!  She finds me still asleep on the futon.  She awakens me and we have to rush.  We have five minutes to get ready and drive to work!  It takes me a few minutes to get my pants buttoned.  
     We get in the van.  She looks at me and asks, "Why didn't you turn the heat on?!  Why didn't you defrost the windows?!"
     "I didn't start the van."
     She begins to worry...
     We get to work and she asks our lead pharmacists and manager to watch out for me.  She thinks I may have accidentally taken too many pills.  I just didn't seem right. She walks away from the pharmacy and goes next door to the foot store she manages for the pharmacy.
     I go back to make coffee for everybody.  I spill coffee everywhere.  My pants are still unzipped.  They walk me over to Missy's.  I sit in a chair and sleep more.  Missy calls our Doctor.  She somehows manages to get me to the van and we head to the emergency room.  In triage I am asked questions and my speech is slurred.  I can't focus.  When asked to sign some form my hand can't rightly hold the pen and I basically make a wavy line.  They immediately take me to the back.
     The attending physician is in there immediately.  He believes I have had some sort of stroke.  Something neurological is wrong.  No, it wouldn't be his medications he takes.  Those would have all wore off by now.  He's worried.  Missy's worried.
     They call the ambulance and I am taken to University of Kentucky Hospital.  There I am immediately placed in a small, but very nice room, according to Missy.  It is an ER room.  Clean.  Well lit.  Warm colors.  
     And, now?  Here we are.  One day missing.  And noone is sure what is going on.  As I looked at Missy I could see that she was very worried.  Scared?  Yes.  Frustrated?  Yes.  But, she was there.  And was that all that mattered?  Yes.
     The MRI would come late at night.  From my mobile bed we rolled through hallways, past wandering eyes, stares, glances...some turning away not to be caught looking.  Others, not even caring or noticing.  We go through an elevator and I am transfered to another cart.  Then I am moved into the room and transferred to the MRI table itself.
     MRI's.  Tubes.  Loud.  Clostraphobic beyond words.  Banging.  Eery.  Space.  White.  Univiting.  Sterile.  Technological.  Mechanical.  Uncomfortable - especially if your back and hip are in constant pain.  
     I am returned to my room.  Missy and I watch some TV.  She goes over the story for me again.  Why can't I remember?  What do you think happened?  Do the kids know?  Are they okay?  Thirty six inches to my left the window allows me to see how brilliantly white the world is with snow, ice and 20 degrees keeping it all in check.  The moon shines so magnificently on the world I feel I could sit on top of one of the buildings and read a book.  But, it's thirty six inches.  It's been twenty-four hours.  I am a prisoner of cords, needles, patches, an oxygen tube, guard-rails on my bed, and a nasty habit of uncontrollable diarhea.  I start to laugh as I raise my right hand to my head and run through my hair - now beyond control due to the EEG.  Missy asks what's funny.  I say, I remember a song from that old 70's movie "The Poseidon Adventure."  "There's got to be a morning after."  We both laugh.  There would be a morning after.  
     That night, I drifted continually in a dream-state.  I never truly fell asleep.  Truthfully, I never slept more than fours hours on any given day/night for the rest of the week.  The morning after brought another heparin shot.  The morning after brought the amoeba back.  The morning after brought accusations that I must have surely overdosed.  I had taken too many pills.  "We have many programs to assist you...if you have a problem, of course."  No, I kept repeating, I had not abused any drugs.  I take what is prescribed - and yes, for some it might be too much - but I work two jobs to provide for my family and it keeps me going. 
     I am not addicted - go without for days at times - and much to their chagrin and animosity I went the whole week at the hospital without one pill for anything but what they had to give me.  But, they kept hinting around.  Kept asking questions.  Could you have taken one too many?  Are you sure?  Kept dawdling here and being nosy there.  That is, until the MRI test came back.  They quickly forgot about their professional assessment then and began speaking in different tones.  Not accusatory.  A tad bit more empathy.  The morning after would come and so would a new assessment from the amoeba.  Missy and I - well, we probably wished they had been right in the first place.
 

Speaking of hospitals, here are three pictures of my mom, Nancy Housewright, who as a teenager spent well over a year within an iron lung as a result of polio.  She had been bitten by a tick.  She was not supposed to live very long.  She just celebrated another birthday.  One, I regretfully say, I forgot...it was my second day in the hospital...I know you understand Mom, but I still can't believe I didn't tell you Happy Birthday.  So, a week later:  HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!  We love you!!!!!!!!!!
    

Lesson Number Eight: 24 hours and 36 inches...

     They all want something of me when they come to church. They all expect that I have something to give them. A pastor is a man who is beset by the expectation that he has something to give. And when they all expect that you have something to give, you finally get the idea yourself that you have something to give. Do YOU have something to give?  God help you never to grow so conscious of your ministerial office or your dignity that, as you grow older, more experienced, and mature, you come to be convinced in all "humility" that you have something to give!

     What can YOU give to old "R," who has been lying in the same bed for twenty years, paralyzed and shrunken, and yet is friendly, quiet, patient, even joyful in the Lord?  What are you going to give to the dying young "addict" whose mother has called you to come, and you find him in utter despair? What are you going to give those people in the pews who have been disciplined in suffering and patience for thirty years and more, much longer than you have? What are YOU, who are only a man, going to give to men life yourself?

     But stop your questions! Tell me, what language are you speaking?  Are you speaking the language of the poor in spirit or are you speaking the language of unbelief?  Do you really have nothing to give?  Don't you have something else to give?  Don't you bring with you that Book from the pulpit, which is God's treasure for you and people like you...Does not God have something to give?

     Woe is me.  Am I speaking the language of faith, or is it the voice of the Tempter that is whispering to me, "God's gifts are in your hand; just go ahead and use them?" Get thee behind me, Satan! I have nothing to give, but God will give to me and my brethren, as he did yesterday, and today, so tomorrow, out of the immeasurable riches of his grace.  Amen.

(Heinrich Vogel, Traugott Untreu auf der Kanzel, 1930; quoted in Kampffmeyer, op cit., pp. 89ff.)

     Monday, December 13th, 8:45AM.  Go to work.  6PM. Go home.  Play with the kids...I think...

     Tuesday, December 14th, ?.  A face appears. I am in an ambulance. The face dissappears.

     Tuesday, December 14th, ?.  A face appears.  She has a black scarf loosely draped around an

     olive and oval face.  She is gone.

     36 inches.  Three feet.  Not far.  My legs are that long.  My head is leaning toward the left. The sixteen electrode patches on my chest and sides keep me from moving around too much.  The oxygen tube itches.  My right index finger beams a strange orange/red color in the dark room.  The sounds of machinery calmly repeating - almost put me in a trance-like state.  My left arm, which has a venipuncture, keeps setting the IV machine off behind my head because I am cutting off it's constant supply to my body.  36 inches. Three feet.  Not far.  My body won't let me go there though.
     24 hours.  One day.  Not much.  Time indeed seems to "fly by" as you age.  My head is focusing forward now.  The doctors - a team of neurologists - are moving together as an amoeba would; close, mingling but not touching; not cohesive but trying to be.  Missy is on the left. She is by my side.  Why am I lying here?  Where am I?  What day is it?  What happened?  Then, the most obvious notification that things are not normal occurs.  The dreaded question.  What I have been afraid of in the few moments this amoeba has been moving toward me - "Mr. Housewright, how are you feeling?  Do you know where you are?  Do you know what day it is?  Who is the President?  What year is it?  Do you know the month?"  24 hours.  One day.  Not much.  An eternity.
     36 inches to the left of me is a wide, ice-covered window.  Through fog - or is it me - I see mulitple buildings across from my bed.  I must be several stories up.  Can't really see anything - I cannot focus for some reason.  Three feet to look outside and see if there was still a world.  Where are my children?  Are they okay?  Who knows I am here?  Okay, my pants are still on...when did I put them on?  Who are you?  A new face appears.  A sweet disposition.  She's not from here. She says something about an EEG.  Electrodes are planted all over my hair.  They aren't too sticky.  The kind woman expresses something about reading my brain waves.  What does that mean?  I look at Missy, she is still holding my left hand with the venipuncture and her eyes tell me it's okay.  It's needed.  There is a look though that is simultaneously unsettling.  Unnerving.  Drifting.  Drifting.  Gone.
     24 hours of one day of my life.  Gone.  Where?  It was as if someone used vanishing cream on Tuesday, December 14 and wiped it clean.  Erased.  Permanently. God?  God?  God!  Yes, He'll have the answer...He is the answer!  But, I am too groggy.  Too unfocused.  Too tired.  God...God...