I am here & wonderfully alive

My appointment with my cardiologist yesterday was unfortunately uneventful. Meaning he cannot fix me - beyond waiting for the Cardiazem to kick in and keep my heartrate under control. I was instructed to stay in bed for the next three days while I wait. So I am trying to do that as much as possible.

The nightlight is back in the bathroom (so I can tell if my vision is darkening during the night - the sign that I am about to faint). I sit at the edge of the bed for 5 minutes before getting up to the bathroom. All so I do not break another toilet with my head. 

A few pictures of joy (making pies with my children a few short days ago) - because that is what is in me as I lie in bed. Fear swells as my heart races, and Christ calms the fear with a whisper...for every heart beat, however fast, means I have been given the gift of another hour here. I am so grateful. When my heart slows again, the fear returns, for your heart feels silent and still when it beats normally after so many quivering, flipping beats so much more thunderous to your sensation. So I close my eyes, and breathe in and out, a kind of "pinch me so I know this is real" motion that I do for myself. Yes, I am still breathing. The world is still spinning. And I am still conscious, on it, aware, wonderfully, blissfully alive another day.

Plans, plans

But every heartache will create space that I alone can fill. And I will. You will learn to wait in Hope. 'My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the LORD...Blessed are those...who have set their hearts on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baca, seasons of weeping, they make it a place of springs.' (Psalm 84:2, 5-6) ~ from 66 Love Letters by Lawrence Crabb (see sidebar to purchase book)

The verdict is in.  My oncologist plans further testing based on my tumor marker, which will be back on Thursday - probably a PET scan and a radioactive iodine scan on the same day to try to detect whatever small tumors must exist in my body, creating this thyroid storm.  And tomorrow I am scheduled to get a pacemaker.  I have fought the pacemaker idea since 1994, and feel happy that I have bought 16 years of freedom from it with faith in God's hand.  I have never had peace with the idea before.  Today I do.  Having the pacemaker implanted will allow the doctor to attempt to treat my potentially life-threatening high heart rates with a medication instead of a surgical procedure.  This is so much more preferable to me.  I had a horrible experience with my last surgical procedure for the same problem (electrophysiology study and cardiac ablation), I will forever cringe at the idea of undergoing it again.  The pacemaker seems like the most conservative route to treatment of this heart problem that has plagued me for so long.  I have high hopes that it will provide great relief, as it did for my Grandpa and several other family members with similar symptoms.

Once I find out the time for the pacemaker implantation, I will post it in hopes that you will offer up prayer for my safety and witness during that procedure.  Thanks to all of you who read here for holding hands with me on this hard, exhausting and beautiful journey.

I was reminded once again today during my devotions that it is not the doctors in whom I am putting my trust. I trust God to give them wisdom and skill and to provide for me in whatever manner He sees fit.  "Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.  When his breath departs he returns to the earth: on that very day his plans perish.  Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, who keeps faith forever." (Psalm 146:3-6)