Thursday, February 26, 2009

The Bug in my Head Right Now

I am not okay.

If you haven't figured it out by now, much of what I write here is just me processing, often real-time. I'm sorting my thoughts and--frightening though this may be--letting you 'listen' in. Today will be one of those days.

First, let me start by telling you that I had a doctor's appointment this morning, one that I found I was a tiny bit anxious about. Anxious isn't the exact right word, but I can't find the right word now. I was something. Much as it was last year at this time. And it was for the same reason. This appointment was a follow-up to last year's.

So, prayerful--and something--I went. And I was fine, emotionally. I even got some good news! Something I have been concerned about for more than three years was finally clarified and shown to be normal! (Ironically, this thing is the reason I went in in the first place last year, but when other issues surfaced, this took a back burner.)

I'm not sure what I was expecting from this appointment, but I can tell you it wasn't this: "I am concerned about what they found last year. You must continue to come in for this test every year to follow up on it."

Uh...okay.

The follow-up is because what they saw can sometimes be or become cancer. The big C. A life-long fear for me, as it took my grandmother before I had the chance to know her.

Now, to be fair, what I have wouldn't become that kind of cancer. "Not the kind that kills people," he said. But still...

So now, my brain is fuzzy, my mood subdued. I can tell that my mind is trying to suss it all out [suss: Southernese for to sort, to dig out, to discover]. But it's like I can't even access the process in my mind. It's just going on, without meta cognition.

I'm not unaware of God's sovereignty or His sustaining grace. In fact, I'm very aware of it right now. But my head is just running, sorting, thinking, and occasionally breaking into spontaneous prayer. And I feel like an observer to my own mind's processes.

And I'm ready for it to settle, to come to peace. I'm ready to let all this emotion out, and be done, and rest in the knowledge that between yesterday and today, between last year and this, nothing has changed. My God hasn't erased and revised the number of my days written in His book. His plan hasn't been thwarted. His throne hasn't been overthrown. I know that...I'm just waiting for it to resettle into my heart.

Wrestling toward rest,
-J

My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you. --Psalm 139:15-18, NIV

(c) 2009

7 comments:

joyce said...

Weren't all the doctors and nurses impressed with all the weight you have lost??

And I am confused by your post---you do have cancer or you don't??

you speak of good news---

but, you are bummed because...?

Aunt Joyce needs plainspeak, please

ShalomSeeker said...

Sorry for the confusion. I do NOT have cancer. I do have a condition that could one day develop into or present as cancer, so they want to monitor it each year to make sure they catch it if it does. THAT "bummed" me; it did. The good news was that another condition I was worried about is not anything to worry about. And I didn't see the same doctors/nurses as last year, so I don't think they cared about my weight loss much. It did, however, make it easier for them to view the results, so that's good.
-J

joyce said...

Breast cancer? Cervical cancer? Uterine cancer? Ovarian cancer?

I don't understand "present as cancer" That is a new one---what did the nurses and doctors say? "Oh, sorry, it looks like cancer, but we have to do these expensive tests to protect ourselves??"

And surely, they noticed the fantastic weight loss---I would have pointed it out a hundred times. But, knowing nurses and doctors, they would have tried any negative approach and questioned whether you were anorexic or diabetic. Here you have been very good about watching what you have been eating---doing what they say is healthy, and they did not give you a "good job" or gold star or high five???

For all those visits where I have gone in for a sore throat only to be told I was fat, like I had not noticed, for the recent visit where I was told the vaginal sonogram would probably not show anything because I was obese---next time, crow !!! Please!! Rub their noses in it!! Shout the victory from the rooftops! Halelujah Jesus!

Now what does "present as" mean?

joyce said...

word verification for my last comment was "tries" as in she tries to be a good aunt.

This time the word verification is:

turidest, as in she tried, but laid a turd. Oh, its tur-id, which means turgid, swollen or torrid, highly emotional.

ShalomSeeker said...

Sorry again. My understanding is that some of what they found *could* be cancer now, but that the samples they took were NOT cancer, therefore they are saying it's not cancer. Someday, however, if these things grew, they might discover they were already cancer but they just couldn't tell yet. That would be "presenting as" cancer (meaning, it didn't change into cancer; we just didn't know it was cancer until later).

The good news is that today I am considered just fine. Healthier than I've probably been in my entire adult life. And today, I'm just gonna walk in this beautiful path God has led me down.
Blessed beyond measure, :-D
-J

"So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God BLESSED them... God saw all that he had made, and it was VERY good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day." --Genesis 1:27, 28a, 31

Beth@playinwiththepaulsens! said...

l o v e this.

Rachel said...

That is great news.