Is this Hell…?

My memories of returning home are spotty at best.  I remember arriving at the house on a cold February evening.  Some dear friends, Tommy and Dylan had driven us home from the airport in Nashville.  It was so good to see some familiar faces and after a month or so away it was good to be back in Union City.  I slid out of the car into a wheelchair in my driveway as we called for Emma and Abbi to come to the door.  When Emma came out the door and saw me she exclaimed, “It was just what I wanted!”  It warmed my heart in ways that I can’t even describe as the girls through tears wrapped their arms around Jodi and I. We had missed them so much.  The guys got me into the house where I half-walked-half-stumbled on to the couch.  I had been growing weaker daily. Within moments my girls were at my side.

I would barely move from that spot for days.

As my time at home progressed I became weaker and weaker.  My appetite began suffering and it was clear that I was becoming dehydrated.  As my family went to go celebrate Emma’s birthday, I was forced to stay at home as I was too weak to go anywhere. Someone had to stay with me at all times, and I needed help getting up or going anywhere around my house. I remember where I was when my legs stopped working.

I remember where I was when my legs stopped working.

There were two steps that led from my living room to the rest of the house.  One evening while being helped up those steps to go to our bedroom I found that I could no longer put any weight on my feet.  They just wouldn’t hold me up anymore.  My physical body was giving out and my mental cognition was beginning to suffer greatly.  I wasn’t making sense when talking and I was seeing things that weren’t there, but I clearly remember asking, “Why aren’t my legs working?”

The day after Emma’s birthday, my condition had deteriorated to the point that I was on my way to the emergency room at the Baptist Hospital in Union City.  After three liters of fluid I was more coherent, but it was clear I needed to get back to the NIH as quickly as possible, as things were getting worse by the hour.  Our support team sprang into action taking care of Jodi and the girls while the medical professionals and my wife tended to me.  

But I would not be going to Maryland right away.  That evening the ER staff loaded me in an ambulance and transported me back to Vanderbilt.  I needed medical treatment, and I needed it right now.

I arrived at Vanderbilt in kidney failure.  They continued to hydrate me and work on a plan to get me back to Bethesda, and although my mental capacities were improving, I was far from being ready to travel.  I remember a doctor coming into my room and leveling with me.  We need to do surgery, and we need to do it as soon as possible.  The weakness in my extremities was being caused by the infectious lesions in my spine putting pressure on my spinal cord.  The reason I was getting weaker was because the nerves in my body simply weren’t responding any more to the signals that my brain was trying to send.  The surgery would be very difficult and would require two surgeons, but if something wasn’t done now, the pressure on my spine would continue to increase and possibly lead to irreversible damage.  Preparations would begin immediately.

The next day Jodi found herself again in a waiting room watching a monitor for updates on my status.  Guilt began flooding her mind (unnecessarily) about coming home rather than just staying at the NIH and beginning the transplant process.  It was not until a conversation that she had with the medical staff that she realized how God had orchestrated the entire event.  My doctors from the NIH explained to Jodi, that although the neurosurgery team in Maryland was gifted, they were not experts in the type of surgery that I needed, and Vanderbilt was one of the best places to have that done.  Additionally, because the infection had progressed so slowly, the deterioration of my condition wasn’t noticed by the NIH because they had been following me daily, but Vandy was able to notice immediately how much worse the infection was because they hadn’t seen me for over a month. Praise God for his providence as I likely wouldn’t have gotten the care that I needed if we had stayed in Maryland. It was at this point that it was explained to Jodi that we were in a very delicate place right now and that although the surgery was absolutely necessary, it was both extremely complicated and dangerous. 

When it was over, I was left with a metal cage in my neck and some of the worst pain that I had ever felt in my life.

Is this Hell…?

I can remember crying out in the darkness of what I now know was an ICU room following the surgery.  After what felt like hours, but was likely only minutes, in desperation I cried out, “Is anyone out there?” To which the voice of my nurse replied, “yes, I’m in here with you.”  I then asked her, “Is this Hell?” 

It was the only way that I could rationalize the severity of the unending pain that I was feeling all over my body.  She actually chuckled and told me, “No, this is not Hell,” to which I asked, “Then why won’t anyone help me!?”  But they were trying, and eventually found the right cocktail to ease my pain and cause me to drift off to sleep.

I had made it through the surgery, and now the goal was stabilizing me so that I could get on an Angel Flight jet and head back to Maryland.  A bone marrow donor had been found, and praise God, he was a perfect match, but the timing of my transplant was up in the air, as I would have to be stable enough to be released from the hospital and strong enough to travel. Physical therapy would begin immediately.

My fate for the foreseeable future was settled. 

The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”

John 5:7

In the healing of the man at the pool of Bethesda, the paralyzed man lamented to Jesus, that he had no one to help him down into the waters so that he could be healed.  I was so blessed.  I had a whole team of people, medical professionals, family, friends, and more who were at work for my healing.  Only they weren’t taking me down into the waters of the pool of Bethesda, they were keeping my kids safe, holding down the fort at church, raising money, cooking meals, taking care of my house, arranging for my flight back to the NIH, holding my hand, and most importantly carrying me to Jesus.