Anniversaries

We celebrate many important dates in our culture...historic, religious, and personal. Today is a different type of anniversary for me. Today signifies my "life event" as they call it. Today is the the celebration of the day that the Lord in essence said, "be still, and know that I am God".

In my last post, I eluded to the fact that my venture into blogging started 11 years ago, culminating into getting started 3 months ago while surfing for a chikin' butcherin' page. So here is a brief explanation.

11 years ago today (the date was actually June 27th, but it was a Saturday) I had to be up extra early as we were "polling" inventory in the manufacturing facility I worked at. As the production control manager, it was my duty to assign teams areas to inventory, how to inventory, and audit counts. I had not been feeling well all week, and was having alot of back pain. At about 5:00 am the first cup of coffee had done it's duty and it was time to evacuate my bowels (sorry, modesty became a thing of the past during my ordeal). As I was proceeding to the lavatory, I noticed that there was tingling in the balls of me feet, and my tongue and fingers were tingling as well. "Things happened", but there was no sensation there. I knew there was something not right going on.

I called my warehouse manager, and asked if he could fill in for me, that I wasn't feeling real well, and that I would be back as soon as I could. I went directly to the ER...I didn't feel that this was an emergency, but what would be open at 5:00 am. Plus I figured that it would be three to four hours before I would be able to audit, and I'd be back in time to resume these functions.

Fortunately the ER was not busy that day, and the doctor on call quickly checked all of my symptoms. His quick assessment indicated nothing real serious other than probably some sort of virus. He told me of his findings, and told me before I left he wanted a Neurologist to take a quick look at me. I took this as "as long as you're here, let's rack of a little more money from the insurance company, and keep this guy here longer than he wants to be to discourage him from using the emergency room again unless it's an EMERGENCY". I say this because I heard him in the hallway outside say to one of the nurses "I don't no why this guy is here, there's really nothing wrong with him. Why can't people understand that we're not a doctors office".

Dr. Sinke came in and performed her neurological tests. She seemed a little more concerned, and was pretty thorough. Her assessment was about the same as the first doctor, but she did say that there was an illness that some times presented itself as a minor complication like mine, or could be much more serious. She stressed she wasn't overly concerned, but to be on the safe side that I should go straight home and get bed rest for the rest of the day. I objected that I needed to get back to the shop, and she quite sternly indicated that if this illness fully manifested itself, if that is what it was, could put me into paralysis. That got my attention. I went straight home, with the promise to her that I would be back at 11:00 am Sunday for another evaluation, just to be cautious.

The rest of the day I just laid around as instructed, watched some TV, did some light reading, became extremely bored. I did feel a little weaker when I woke up Sunday morning, but assumed it was from laying around on Saturday.

I arrived for my evaluation as requested, and Dr. Sinke started doing her battery of testing. One of the things she had me do was walk on the balls of my feet. I had a real difficult time even getting on the balls of my feet, but then trying to walk on them, I was all over the place, like I was drunk. I also noticed that my hamstrings were extremely tight and painful and so was my lower back. She seemed a little more concerned by now, and ordered for a battery of test; CT scan, MRI, regular Xrays, and my favorite, a spinal tap. As it got later into the day, she finally came in and said that all the tests were inconclusive. However since my physical condition had deteriorated somewhat from Saturday, she wanted to keep me in the hospital overnight for observation. She again assured Terrie and I that this could just be a mild form of this illness, and if it was, I'd probably be fine within a couple of weeks.

My condition continued to deteriorate on Monday, I believe I had to walk with a walker on Tuesday, and I think it is was on Wednesday that my legs just totally gave out and I collapsed. By Wednesday night I was moved to ICU and stayed there for 5 days. My overnight "observation" period became a 2 1/2 month stay between the hospital and a physical therapy ward in a hospital 60 miles from home. This minor illness had exacerbated itself, and I was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre' Syndrome. The original doctor in ER on Saturday morning was right. It was some sort of a virus, and was it a doosy! I would become paralyzed from the neck down, could barely swallow or talk, and would be wheelchair bound for close to a year.

So today I once again celebrate the anniversary. This is a private anniversary between me and my God. This is the day for me, when it seemed like life was ending, it was actually beginning. I have learned and grown so much form this experience. While I would never want to go through this thing again, I would never ever trade it for anything.

Most importantly, this is an Ode to my wife. I will never ever forget what she has done for me. How she has remained faithful to her vows, how she has demonstrated her love to me. As much as my life changed, so did hers, and she didn't miss a beat. She is a Proverbs 31 woman. So today, as her husband, I follow the words of Proverbs 31:28-29 " Her children arise and call her blessed, her husband also, and he praises her: Many woman do noble things, but you surpass them all!"

Happy Anniversary, Terrie