Sandwiches

I must confess that I've been putting off posting an update since Kaylee's colonoscopy and surprise hospital stay last week.

Frankly, I'm still sorting out my feelings about a lot of things, and I'd really much rather post about something less personal and introspective. Like sandwiches. I'd definitely be much more comfortable talking about sandwiches.

Why is that?

I think it's the same reason that I like happy shallow movies like The Wedding Planner and I absolutely will not watch deep, emotionally stirring movies like The Notebook. (Which, by the way, positively horrifies a lot of people who really love movies like The Notebook. Really. I've been practically kicked out of some female circles for that one. And I've also been the subject of an evil plot to trick me into watching it under the pretense of being given a pedicure.)

So while I think my little avoidance of emotional issues is perfectly fine for movies, I suppose that in real life it is necessary and unavoidable to deal with the yucky stuff and move forward. But I would like to officially go on record as saying I do not like it, not one bit.

(Here's where I would insert some line from Green Eggs & Ham if I could remember it...but you get the idea.)

So, in my effort to be a mature grown up, I will tell you all about what happened last Thursday...

After they wheeled Kaylee out to do the procedure, we had to go wait in a waiting room with a bunch of other people waiting for colonoscopy patients. After about an hour and a half, when she was back in the recovery room, a nurse came and got us and took us to Kaylee, whowas trying to wake up from general anesthesia. Since six-year-olds are not common in this particular recovery room, there are about 3 nurses for about 20 patients, so we were pretty much on our own with Kaylee. She was disoriented and sleepy, and we were talking to her and trying to help her wake up. About 5 or 10 minutes of this, the doctor came over.

He proceeded to tell us, in his soft-spoken and thickly accented way, that he saw a lesion and he wasn't sure what it was. He called in a few other doctors and they didn't know what it was. He tells us it was bleeding a lot after he passed the scope by it, so he ended the colonoscopy without seeing everything. He asks if Kaylee's ever had problems with bleeding. He tells us he wants to keep her overnight. He says something about a hemagioma but he's not sure. That he wants to do a lot of bloodwork and a CT scan. I ask a few questions about when's and how's and whether we can give Kaylee something to drink because her throat is sore from the breathing tube. He says a lot of "I'm not sure" and "Not yet" and then walks away.

At this point, I am starting to cry and simultaneously feeling like I am going to throw up and I can't really breathe and that the room just got 30 degrees hotter. I firmly believe that if there hadn't been a chair nearby for me to sit on and compose myself, I might have fainted, fallen over, cracked my head open, and given Jeremy a whole lot more to deal with right at that moment.

So over the course of the next few hours, we did a lot of waiting, plenty of praying, as much question asking as possible in 3 minute interviews with the doctor, and tearful explaining to a crying (and still somewhat groggy) six year old why we couldn't go home and go to McDonald's like we had promised.

After everything, it was determined that Kaylee might have a hemangioma in her colon which is the cause of the bleeding she's been having and unrelated to the polyp they removed last summer, which was also bleeding. The first set of results of the coagulation study came back fine, but some results will take several weeks. The plan for now is that we are going to give the mystery lesion several weeks to heal & wait for the full results of the coagulation study. Then Kaylee's doctor will do another colonoscopy, with a surgeon present, to try to determine exactly what is going on.

Those are the facts. Now the hard part...fessing up to my feelings on all of this.

If I am perfectly honest, I must admit that I am struggling with the fact that there are so many things in our life right now that are up in the air. We have been doing an awful lot of waiting lately, and the list of unresolved problems seems to be getting longer and not shorter. That's hard for me to accept.

I like certainty and answers, preferably easy answers.

I like minimal suspense and quick resolution.

I like happy endings.

I do not like when the people who are supposed to have answers do not have any answers.

I do not like the way my imagination begins to wander among the possibilities and create answers that scare the daylights out of me.

I do not like the way it feels to be uncertain and afraid.

I do not like crying in front of people (especially the very uncomfortable man at the hospital whose job it is to move gurneys from one place to another or the man at the Guatemalan consulate who told me he couldn't do our papers in one day).

And yet, God has us in this place. And He has reasons for it and is asking us to trust Him in it, and He promises that He will bring something good out of it.

So we walk forward, leaning on the truth of verses like these from Isaiah 43:

But now, this is what the LORD says—
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
"Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.

When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze.

For I am the LORD, your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior...

and

Do not be afraid, for I am with you;
I will bring your children from the east
and gather you from the west.

I will say to the north, 'Give them up!'
and to the south, 'Do not hold them back.'
Bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the ends of the earth-

everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made."

and

"You are my witnesses," declares the LORD,
"and my servant whom I have chosen,
so that you may know and believe me
and understand that I am he.
Before me no god was formed,
nor will there be one after me.

I, even I, am the LORD,
and apart from me there is no savior.

I have revealed and saved and proclaimed—
I, and not some foreign god among you.
You are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "that I am God."

Now I have fulfilled my responsibility to be honest and act like a grown up, and so if you don't mind, my next post is most definitely going to be about sandwiches.