2010 – The Year in Review

Welcome 2011!

Wow! I totally forgot I even had this blog. My friends have blogs and I have been reading their’s over the last few days…and I thought about how much I miss this. How much I yearned for communication and interaction. How I desired to let you, the faithful (one) reader, be encouraged by something you found here…

So, I am back. My friends are challenging themselves to blog once a day during the month of January. I am going to try to blog once a week this year. For me, I believe that is more of an attainable goal.

2010 was a roller coaster of a year. I began the year spending the month of January in the hospital. I had noticed my feet and stomach had begun to swell. Never a good sign. I got home from work, wanted to take a nap, and I was going to make an appointment to see my doctor. Well, after the 5 hour nap, I woke up and my feet not only were bigger, they hurt. I decided to go to the Emergency Room and get checked out.

When I got there, I was immediately taken to a bed and a team of nurses began to work around me. One was setting up the IV, while the other was taking my vital signs, and yet another was hooking me up to a heart monitor. I felt like I was in a unbelieveable dream. It turned out my heart was beating at around 190 beats per minute. The normal resting heart is 60-80 beats per minute. I was told I was going into congestive heart failure.

Over the next several days, I would be closely monitored as doctors and nurses ordered tests and medications to get my heart rate down. Finally, after 14 days, my heart was staying at a rate of 94 beats per minute. That was quite a change! While treating my heart, they also had to treat my thyroid gland, which was over-producing and causing my heart to beat rapidly.

I was told they were transferring me to a heart hospital to get a test done to examine the effects of this rapid heart beat on the strength of my heart. When I got to the new hospital, I was met by two great men there to encourage me and see if I needed anything (this was at 11pm at night). One of these guys was my life mentor, and the other my best friend. It was calming and reassuring to see them there, and I was surprised they made the 30 minute drive to meet me…

I was told they couldn’t do the exam because of my thyroid gland. So, the doctors decided to keep me to continue to treat the over-producing gland and my heart rate (which had now increased again). A few days into the medical treatment, the doctor decided to increase one medication by one dosage. By doing this, my blood pressure dropped drastically as did my heart rate (into the 40′s). I was immediately rushed to their ICU unit. There they had to give me 4 different IV medications to reverse the effects of the medication in my system. Why was my heart doing this?

I would stay at this hospital for a few more days before the doctor was comfortable enough to send me home. January was already over. I was told I could not go back to work until 3 doctors cleared me. This was also the time that we in NJ received some MAJOR snow! So here I was, waiting to see doctors, out of work, snowed in at my house, unable to do anything like shoveling or that required too much exertion, for a month! These past two months were some of the scariest months in my life. But, my best friend sent me a text during the hospital stay that I still have saved in my phone. It read, “Yeah we’re all missing you dude. But I was blessed to see you last night. You have an entire army praying for you here.”

This is the only text message that I have ever kept in my cell phone. I remember saying – WHAT? Why am I so important that people would be praying for me? I am usually the one to say a prayer for someone. I am usually the one to be there. But through this text, and the words of a friend, I remembered that “IF WE ARE THE BODY,” then this is what we do. We are there for each other. If one of us hurts, we all hurts. I never thought such a VALUABLE lesson was needing to be learned. I am so grateful for those words, those prayers, and that encouragement.

Finally, the end of February came and I was cleared to return to work. I currently work in retail, but after a two-month forced vacation, I was ready to get back into a normal routine. My job was more than accommodating in welcoming me back.

These two months were the scariest months that I can recollect. It took a text message from my best friend to remind me that I needed to be strong in my faith. Through that faith, through prayer, through my best friend, my church family, my mentor, the MANY texts/calls/visits from 3 specific people, and the AMAZING friends and family in my life, I was able to remain strong in knowing that I was being taken care of. I was going to be OK.

This is turning out to be a longer post than expected…and there is more to tell. So check back for Part 2 over the next few days.