Category Archives: Life

Who Killed the Liberal Arts?

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Recently I came across this article in the Weekly Standard by Joseph Epstein called “Who Killed the Liberal Arts? And why we should care.”

In it he traces a history of how the Liberal Arts education in today’s universities has been degraded, from what was once intended to train free people how to think into a mess of lightweight exercises in political correctness and shallow group think. From a study of Western literature, philosophy and history to a crazy amalgam of gender studies, the worship of multiculturalism, and lightweight popular culture subjects.

It’s somewhat long, but worth the time. It’s the first time I’ve ever really read a description of what Liberal Arts was meant to teach, and the reasons and he gives a thoughtful analysis of how it all works together in our culture today in a sort of weird apprenticeship racket. All you need to know to be a journalist you could learn in the newsroom in a matter of months, he says, yet people spend four years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to learn pretty much the same thing in a college atmosphere.

Anyway, I pulled a quote from the article that I found particularly interesting in light of his discussion of learning how to think:

Only years later did I realize that quickness of response —on which 95 percent of education is based—is beside the point, and is required only of politicians, emergency-room physicians, lawyers in courtrooms, and salesmen. Serious intellectual effort requires slow, usually painstaking thought, often with wrong roads taken along the way to the right destination, if one is lucky enough to arrive there. One of the hallmarks of the modern educational system, which is essentially an examination system, is that so much of it is based on quick response solely. Give 6 reasons for the decline of Athens, 8 for the emergence of the Renaissance, 12 for the importance of the French Revolution. You have 20 minutes in which to do so.

The idea behind the curriculum at the College of the University of Chicago was the Arnoldian one, abbreviated to undergraduate years, of introducing students to the best that was thought and said in the Western world. Mastery wasn’t in the picture. At least, I never felt that I had mastered any subject, or even book, in any of my courses there. What the school did give me was the confidence that I could read serious books, and with it the assurance that I needed to return to them, in some cases over and over, to claim anything like a genuine understanding of them.

I’m finding myself that I like to spend time thinking. That things don’t come quickly, especially if you don’t have the opportunity to reflect and simmer. Yet, as he points out we, as a culture, have filled up our lives with so many things, there’s rarely time for that. And if there is, one feels almost guilty indulging in just thinking…  The fast response is desired and praised, the slow one, well, not so much.

The Plague of Busy-ness

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Recently I’ve been going through old computer files and came across the following article which I wrote in August 2002 for the newsletter I was putting out then. This was about three months after Arena’s release, during which time I was busy making  trepidatious trips into local bookstores (“Who did you say you were? And why are you here, exactly?”), designing and ordering bookmarks, mailing out postcard announcements, putting together press kits and having a book signing.

In addition to a family related vacation to the east coast that summer, followed by a trip to the west coast for the 2002 CBA conference in LA, I also finished up the final touches on The Light of Eidon before turning it in to Bethany House, then began the rewrite of The Shadow Within to bring it into line with changes I’d made in Eidon.  All this in addition to updating my website, and writing the newsletter in which the following appeared.  Hence the reference to “activity and folderol.” The ideas expressed seem as applicable to me today as ten years ago, so I thought I’d share it again, this time in a different venue.

***

“Let your occupations be few if you would lead a tranquil life.” ~ Democritus

THE PLAGUE OF BUSY-NESS

With all this activity and folderol, I’ve seen how easy it is to lose one’s focus on the things that really matter — that is, the things above, rather than the things on earth. In fact, in some research I was doing recently I learned that one of the techniques used by cults to suck in their new recruits is to keep them busy all the time, to tire them out and to never let them be alone.

If they are constantly occupied with some task or engaged with some person, they’ll have no opportunity to stop and think about what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, and what they’re coming to accept as truth simply by default.

I believe this plague of busy-ness is one of the main assaults Satan’s world system is deploying upon Christians today, particularly in the United States with all of its prosperity and corresponding options.

Daily we are bombarded with things to do and be and have. With people to listen to and do things with (and for). It can get overwhelming, to the point we’re just like the newly-snagged pre-cultist. Run ragged by all the demands, opportunities and perceived obligations, by all the people who come into our lives (have you ever stopped to count how many?) we can end up losing track of who we are and what we really want.

Worse, we end up losing track of the One who’s put us here and for whose glory we’ve been created. We sell ourselves out for the “stuff” of the world.

We may say we haven’t, but in the measure of our hours spent, how many are devoted solely to concentrating on and communing with the One we claim to love above all others? Even one out of twenty-four hours is only 1/24th of our day.

Doesn’t seem like very much, looked at that way, does it? Especially when you consider that none of us could even live were it not for our Lord who holds the very atoms of our bodies together.

Nor when you remember that time is a drop in the bucket compared to eternity and that eventually all these things that seem so important today will be destroyed and utterly forgotten…

♦

 “If then you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.”         ~ Colossians 3:1-2

 

 

 

Good and Evil Thinking

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Recently I came across an article  entitled How to be Happy at Work by Geoffrey James on Inc.com.  I have no idea why I clicked on the link, because usually I don’t. I guess the title was a good one.

So was the article. It claimed that being unhappy is a choice and described a guy who was always miserable because everything mattered to him. The only time he was happy was when he won a million dollar account — which happened once a year. The rest of the time everything irritated him, and the reason he was always irritated was because he had all these rules. Or maybe just one rule, which was that for him to be happy everything had to go his way.

Or, put another way, if everything didn’t go his way he was bent out of shape. To be happy he had to win the million dollar account.

That resonated. That’s me. Well, minus the million dollar account. Maybe not “everything” has to go my way, but if a certain number of things don’t, I’m going to be upset. Mad, sad or bad, is the phrase I’m using.

When Quigley lags on the path, I get irritated, because my plan is to walk smoothly with no hitches, get the walk done so I can get on to the next thing. Also, he’s the dog and he should obey me and if he doesn’t I will get irritated because he’s not following the Rule. Finally, it starts to make my back hurt to have to keep pulling on him, and that makes me irritated too, because another Rule is that the dog should not make your back hurt.

Once I started looking out for this sort of thinking, I found it in way too many places. 😳

Going back to the article, another guy in the office was asked what made him miserable, and he said not much. What made him happy?

“Another day above ground is good,” he said.

What an attitude! This has such applications to doctrine. Another day of grace. Another day to bring glory to God. Another day to see Him work and get to know Him, and have opportunity to trust Him and thus bring glory to Him. It all has to do with choosing what your Rules are going to be.

So yeah, I have a million idiotic little rules I didn’t even know I had, and just now I came upon another one. Not only must things in my periphery do the right things and “go right,” but I must do the right things as well. I must follow the plan I have devised for myself, even if it doesn’t make sense. Even if conditions beyond my control have warped it enough that it can’t even be done any more.

And in this morning’s Sunday message, Pastor Farley cast a whole new light on this business with the rules: it’s thinking born of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

It’s thinking in terms of what is good and what is evil, what is right and what is wrong. You’re constantly seeking in your own power to determine what is right about your periphery, your actions, your viewpoint and what is wrong; you’re wanting a law that you can live by, and if you can just abide by the rules, everything will be wonderful.

<<<ROTFL>>>

The Happy at Work article advised us to make new rules. So when something happens — like you get to the store and realize you forgot something and will have to return home — instead of getting all upset, realize you’ve made a rule about how things are to be and change it. So what’s the big deal about returning home — in my case a 5 minute drive? Why is that worth getting all angry at myself? You just go home, get whatever you forgot and return. Why is that such an awful thing?

Well, I can’t think why that’s such an awful thing — at least in my life. And I’ve started to catch myself in this thinking, and realizing how absurd it is. It really is a matter of choice and for believers in Christ, whose lives are supposed to be in Christ, whose God has ordered our days and allowed every detail that appears in them, it makes even less sense to go about in bondage to a million silly little rules…

And then Pastor Farley, took it a step further. But that’s a post for another day…

Potential Delivery Date — Meh

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So I was going to use my progress the last week as an indicator of whether I should announce a potential delivery date for The Other Side of the Sky.

Clearly I did not announce one. The experiment was not a bust, but neither was it conclusive. I worked for 4 days. Then my hubby was off Friday and I had family things to do. On Saturday I installed an external hard drive on my computer to back up my stuff… supposed to be easy, but as with all things related to computers, it was not.

I barely had the accompanying program installed when an update announcement showed up. Unfortunately I had to somehow turn off everything that might require drive access — and I don’t even know what all that might be — and never succeeded. Not even with my antivirus program. As the hours drifted by, I finally gave it up. I didn’t have any external back up at all before. Now I have one. Maybe not optimum, but not worth the time of wading through obscure online instructions that never seem to actually represent what I’m seeing on my screen. Yes, I could call some  tech support person but…

Bleah.

I want to write, not spend all my time fooling with that. So I didn’t.  (Plus my printer’s pretty much just given up the ghost so I’m going to have to deal with that very soon..)

Sunday was church and an engagement party, from which I came home exhausted. For the first time, though,  it didn’t carry over to Monday. Lately I’ve been feeling pretty normal. Walking the dog again, doing my regular stuff. Or at least working back up to it. And I did no work on Sky during the entire three days.

Blog writing has also taken a hit as is obvious to regular readers. I wonder if it’s because I’ve gotten out of the habit.

Anyway, I have more to say regarding the  potential delivery date, but I’ll save that for another post.

Ups and Downs and an Obsession

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Well, the second week of my recovery wasn’t quite as “good” as the first. Probably I was expecting too much. Or doing too much.

Anyway, I felt both better and worse.  Maybe it was the susiding of the initial pain of the incisions healing that made other… discomforts more noticeable.

In any case, I was more tired and seemed to be more bothered by my discomforts. Since, as I wrote last week, I had read about the need to rest after a major surgery, I decided to do more resting. I can’t really describe the discomforts I was having, because it wasn’t exactly pain, but sometimes was, and then it seemed like gas, or maybe something else… at one point I even thought I had developed a bladder infection.

While I was dithering around on Thursday, trying to decide if I needed to call the doctor, God arranged for the nurse from our health insurance “nurseline” to do her last follow up call. She told me to go ahead and call the doctor’s office and let them decide.

They had me come in the next day to be tested and determined that I had no infection. It was just a case of  my various abdominal organs not working the way they normally do as a result of having to adjust to their new and unfamiliar configurationas a result of the surgery.

Well, that was a relief. Oddly, the day after I learned all that, most of my discomfort eased, so I guess my organs are a little more settled with their new digs now.

On Thursday I thought that I probably needed a book to read to keep myself lying down more than I was, and as the Lord would have it, when I went to the grocery store that morning, I happened to walk down the aisle that led to the books — something I rarely do, and there was a new Dean Koontz book sitting on the shelf. Only one. For $5.  I have never seen a Koontz book in that store (though, as I said I rarely peruse the book section).  That just seemed too fortuitous to ignore. So I bought it, went home and started reading it.

It worked. I think I lay on the couch pretty much all day. Except for when I was talking on the phone to the nurses and doctor’s office receptionists.

Oh, and the “Obsession” in my title? That would be with card making. On Thursday, having tired of reading after a day of it, I decided to sign up for an online card class called Clean and Simple Cardmaking. It was originally offered as an interactive, real time sort of class, that occurred every day for two weeks. After that it became independent study, where students could go at their own pace. Once you sign up for the class you have permanent access to all the instructions, videos, forums and galleries.

I have long thought it would be fun, but didn’t want to get stuck in a real time class where I would feel like I had to attend every day, causing other things … like writing … to fall by the wayside. I thought this might be a fun way to get my toes wet.

Ahem.

So I’ve gone through the first two classes, over a period of 4 days, and have made 9 cards, with one more in progress. I’ve been obsessed. I think it’s sort of like putting together a jigsaw puzzle when you reach that point when all the pieces start going together and you just can’t stop yourself because as soon as you start to get up you see where yet another piece goes….

Only with the cards, you get another idea for something to do either on the card you’re currently working on or one of the three that you’ve set aside, or just had lying around or whatever. I guess I knew that it would be like this, because I told myself when I signed up that I would treat it like a class for the next four days but come Monday, I would have to go back to work again.

On Sky, that is. And probably the house as well… I feel recovered enough to start doing the housework again — I actually put the waterbed sheets on the bed myself today. I feel like I could probably handle Quigley on a walk, just don’t know if 3 miles would tire me out too much yet. In any case… tomorrow I get back to work. Cards will have to be for after hours or next weekend.

( Please try not to injure yourself while laughing at that last statement…)

Follow Up Appointment

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Well, today I went for my ten-day follow-up appointment after the surgery. The doctor took off my waterproof bandages and removed a stitch or two, said all was healing up nicely.

In fact, he was surprised by how well I was doing.

He said that every day he sees multiple women who’ve had this same surgery — and I am way ahead of the curve in terms of recovery.  He was concerned though, that feeling as good as I do, I might easily overdo, and warned me to move slowly. Still… when I asked him what vacuuming might do to me (I slipped up and did it this morning… just couldn’t stand the crumbles of dog biscuit on the living room floor any more) he said I wouldn’t be doing any internal damage to the surgery healing, just that I might hurt my back.

Really? Hmm. I’ve had to watch out for my back for years, so maybe I can do a little more vacuuming after all.

So, clearly that is good news, as is the fact that the final pathology report showed no cancer. I just had the “complex hyperplasia with atypia” which is the fancy way of saying “pre-cancerous. Yay!  More answered prayers, so thank you all for lifting me up before our Father. 🙂

The main thing I’ve been noticing is that I seem to get REALLY tired… Of course, I’ve had a lot going in the last week: friends over for an afternoon, a day of driving across town to have lunch with my editor — a magical wonderful day, but when I got home I was totally blitzed. Even fell asleep in the middle of Bible Class which I almost never do.

Friday we attended a friends’ defense of her Master’s Thesis, and out to dinner afterward. Another amazing day… and when I got home… completely wiped out.

So today, with the doctor’s admonitions ringing in my ears, I wondered if this exceptional tiredness might be because of the surgery. So I just now looked it up and bingo!  From eHow’s “ What to Expect After a Hysterectomy“:

“You should expect to have a lower level of energy than you normally have. You may feel this way for up to two weeks.”

Well, I’ve got one week down, so maybe only one to go. We’ve been watching a lot of The Mentalist. 🙂

So that’s my first follow-up appointment report. I’m hoping to get back to work on Sky tomorrow.

A Dire Event Turns Into a Fun Weekend

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Well, I’m probably overstating the “direness” of my event last weekend, but nevertheless, it seems generally that whenever the potential of having cancer is mentioned people take it as dire. Major surgery is, I suppose, regarded by most as dire, as well. Maybe I was just in denial but I don’t think so.  I’ve known for some time that God had complete control over the matter and I had none. Zip. Zero. Oddly, that realization is the one that most often gives me peace.

So, how did this “dire” event become a fun weekend? Well, the Lord just had a bunch of little and big blessings stacked in waiting to unfold.

It started with my son and daughter-in-law arriving with little Lily Thursday night. I kind of protested them making the rather large effort it is to pack all the paraphernalia that one must bring when traveling with a baby and spend about 8 hours driving over here after a full day of work… after all I was going to be in the hospital most of the time they would be here and what were they going to do? But they wanted to come, so I didn’t protest too much, because any chance to see them I am happy for.  In retrospect, I am so glad they came.

In the morning, they slept in, since I would be sequestered in the bowels of the hospital without visitation from about 5:30 when we arrived until about 10 when my surgery, slated to begin at 7:30, was to end. They planned to come sometime after 7:30 to be there at that time.

At 5:15am  I walked out of the house in the still dark wee hours of the morning and the first thing I saw was a huge full moon hanging low over the western horizon. Very cool.

When we arrived I was the first person to be escorted back to the preparation area — and into Rm #3. I have this game that I think God sometimes plays with me using the numbers —  3 is the number of God… so that was to me, a cool reassurance.

Overall, I was totally relaxed. I always seem to like my nurses and techs, and this time was no exception. Eventually they brought me into pre-op where the anesthesiologist introduced himself and told me all about what was to happen. Then we waited for the doctors to arrive. Mine was late, but at one point some random nurse, not the one caring for me, came by and told me I was really lucky, that my doctor was really good. “He’s a surgeon’s surgeon,” she said. I counted that another unexpected reassurance from the Lord.

Finally the doctor arrived, we talked a bit and then it was time. The anesthesiologist told me he was going to give me a light sedative before we left pre-op during which I’d still be awake so I could follow different commands to move from the gurney to the operating table, etc.  Well, awake or not, his words were the last thing I remember.

Next thing I knew I was waking up and being wheeled through the a hall, through a familiar double door to a familiar waiting room which was filled with people that I knew — my husband, son, daughter in law, grand-daughter and one of my closest friends. I got a room right by the nurses station with a view of the mountains. Room 1411.  Hmm. Three ones and a four. Four refers to God’s creation, the natural world – and by implication His power over it. And 3 and 4 make seven, the number of perfection. (Yes, I know, I’m weird. Really — it’s just a fun little game and keeps me amused in times like these.)

My husband and friend came in and I got the news — the surgery, ten minutes late to start had finished ten minutes early and “everything had gone exactly as it should go.” Plus, as I mentioned yesterday, they found no sign of cancer.

As my friend was leaving my son and his family came in and turns out they spent pretty much the whole day there, except for when they went out for lunch and dinner. And they brought Lily. I had not expected that, I guess because I had this idea that people just didn’t bring babies to hospitals if they didn’t have to. Plus I’d found out that my daughter-in-law’s mother and brother were in town that same weekend, so I figured she’d spend the day with them.

Thinking I probably wasn’t going to get to see much of her, I’d prayed in a random sort of way that “sometime” (like in the more distant future) I’d get some one on one time with her to just visit and get to know her better. But no way did I expect the Lord to answer that prayer the very next day. Yet that’s what He did. It was cool to sit there and realize He had done it, too. What a gift. She’s a very busy young woman, and doing a great job mothering Lily, too.

So, overall, a fun day of visiting, and watching Lily, who’s crawling now, and squeals like a dinosaur and just seems to be a generally cheerful child with lots of smiles and grins for everyone. Her two little teeth are sooo cute!

That night my son suggested we do a “Good Friday Service” wherein we all read aloud in turn a sequence of passages my d-i-l had assembled narrating Peter’s denials and Jesus’s death on the cross.

Saturday was a long process of the nurses making sure all my plumbing was working correctly and that I could eat without nausea. My biggest problem was the CO2 gas they pump into your abdomen to make the organs easier to see and deal with during surgery. They try to press some of it out but there’s still a lot left, which takes the body a few days to absorb and eliminate, through excretion or exhalation. It hurts, and moves around, and pushes on nerves that for some reason register pain in your neck and shoulders, even though there’s no gas there. And it makes it difficult to eat since you feel like there’s no room in your stomach for anything.

Eventually though, I was discharged and wheeled out to the hospital’s front entrance and the car (we laughed because for two days they’d been urging me to walk — which I’d been doing — to help mitigate the effects of the surgical gas, and now that I was leaving insisted I ride in the wheel chair.)

That night we watched my new favorite TV show, The Mentalist. My son had determined this that same morning by asking me about the shows I watched while he watched the monitor showing my pulse  and blood pressure. The Mentalist elicited the greatest increase in pulse, ergo it must be my favorite.

Then Sunday we all went to church together, which I don’t think has ever happened. That day, too, was a reunion of sorts for the members of the Sunday School class I taught for 14 years. Kids who started as toddlers, now grown, some of them engaged or married, and with kids of their own were there. One of them told me we had the largest number of them together since the class had disbanded some 10+ years ago. So that was pretty cool, too.

Afterward my husband took us out for Easter dinner, and then my d-i-l changed the sheets on our waterbed (which I’m not allowed to do since I’m not to lift more than 10 lbs for 4 weeks, nor strain my abdominal muscles) and my son vacuumed (another forbidden activity).  (I also can’t walk Quigley since he would definitely strain my abdominal muscles)

After that they left to drive back to southern California and I was just basking in the pleasure of it all. What a blessing it had all been. (So, if you’re reading, guys, thanks for coming out and providing such great support. It was greatly appreciated and enjoyed.)

Who would ever have thought the weekend of surgery would turn into such a wonderful set of memories?

Short Update

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Hi everyone!  Thanks for your prayers and well wishes. The surgery went “exactly as it was supposed to go” (except faster) and I came home Saturday. No sign of cancer, only the pre-cancer stuff they’d already found.  We’re still waiting for the full pathology report, but I’ll take good news in whatever increments the Lord decides to present it. 

I’ll try to write a more detailed update tomorrow. Somehow the Lord took what most would consider a “dire” event and made it into a fun weekend…

Catching Up

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So, where have I been the last seven-plus days? Well, after the last post about my trip to the zoo, I actually got down to business and worked on Sky for three hours every day for the next three days. Then came Saturday, which was filled with many things that did not concern writing. Sunday was our first of the month pot luck at church and the transfer of a telescope from my carport to my car to the car of the friend who will be taking it home to keep and enjoy.  I came home and crashed, exhausted.

Monday I went to the hospital to do the check-in and pre testing for my surgery, set for this Friday. That took a couple of hours. No writing on that day, either. Tuesday I focused on catching up on housework and preparing for visitors. Today, Wednesday I continued the catch up and preparations, plus I have a standing lunch date with friends that lasts the afternoon. 

Tomorrow I might actually be able to get around to writing since I should be home for most of the day drinking my clear liquids and eating my jello in preparation for the big day… Friday. Of course, no writing will occur Friday, nor for the rest of the weekend since my son and his family will be arriving tomorrow night to help out, provide moral support etc. Can’t wait to see them!

And now, seeing as the news is almost over and my eyes keep wanting to shut, I’d better sign off. I’ll be back in a few days with my report of whether all this went as smoothly as it was supposed to.

The Long Story of Last Week

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Once again, I’ve been lagging in my blogging posts — and just after I’d had a breakthrough of sorts on the matter of what it means to live as if crucified in Christ. This was partly because I needed to think things through a bit more to see where the breakthrough might be going… and mostly because I’ve been having an… adventure. A situation. A test… Pastor John started teaching about waiting a week ago Sunday and sure enough, I soon got an opportunity to apply.

So here’s the long story. It actually starts back on the first Saturday of February, when I had some spotting. Since I’ve not had a period in years, one spot is enough to warrant concern, so on Monday I called my OB/GYN. I got an appointment for Thursday of that same week, but since the office happened to be in the process of transferring their records over to digital I was advised that the wait would be long.

Thursday, when I was about to leave with plenty of time, I went to bring Quigley in and found him completely covered with dust and grass so I had to wipe him off. Then I locked myself out of the house with the car keys inside. When I finally got myself in the car and on the way, it was fifteen minutes later. As I left the house I suddenly wondered if I’d turned the oven off — if the house burned down with Quigley in it, that would be awful! But I was already late, so I gave it over to the Lord and went on.

Traffic was heavy and on the way to the doctor’s office, the car ahead of the car ahead of me ran into the car ahead of it… So everyone stopped. The two drivers got out — it was only a fender bender, if that, but here we were stopped in the inside lane and I”m thinking, “What IS this, Lord?”

Suddenly the lane beside me opened and I pulled out and was on my way. I arrived, found out it was going to be at least an hour’s wait to see the doc, so I asked if I could go home and turn off the oven. Sure. I went a different way home, but when I arrived the oven was off and there was a message from the doctor’s office: Dr. S had stepped out to do a C-sxn and we would all have to reschedule. They tried to reschedule me for almost three weeks later, but I persuaded them to give me a slot the following Monday. That appointment went as planned, and I left with orders to get an ultrasound. I made the appointment  for the following week and then scheduled another appointment over the phone to see the GYN the week after that.

The ultrasound showed some fibroids and a thickened uterine lining, so it was decided I should get an endometrial biopsy. I’ve already had several of those over the years. The day I was supposed to get it, I came in two hours later than I was supposed to because over the phone I thought the woman had said 2:40 when she’d said 12:40. Or maybe she said 2:40 when she meant 12:40. In any case another reschedule, this time for Thursday — and that one actually happened. Dr. S said they’d call when they got the results of the biopsy.

The following Monday, which was a week ago Monday, at 5:30pm the nurse practitioner called to say that the biopsy showed “complex hyperplasia with suspicious cells” that might be cancer and that I was looking at a hysterectomy. That was okay, because I had already decided if the biopsy came back anything but normal I was going to do the hysterectomy anyway. All those organs are useless now and good only to grow cancer in, so better to get them out. The only thing was, my doc was referring me to another doc whose name sounded familiar. I asked if he was an oncologist and the NP said yes. As it turns out, his office is in the same place where I had gone with my mother for the last three years, just across the hall from where she had seen her doctor and gotten her infusions of chemotherapy. Which was kind of unnerving.

The NP was quite exercised on the phone about how I had to get in ASAP, that “tomorrow” (a week ago Tuesday) the other doc’s office would call to schedule the appointment and “we’re talking days here not weeks,” she said. If I didn’t have an appointment by the end of Tuesday, I was to call her on Wednesday morning and she even gave me her special number.

So Tuesday I didn’t talk to anyone on the phone, not wanting to tie up the line, nor did I leave the house for fear of missing the call. Of course no one from the doctor’s office called.

 Wednesday I started calling the special number to tell  the NP I had no appt. No one answered. I tried the “Site Operator.” She transferred me to “Lydia” but I only got her voice mail and left a message. No one called me back. I tried the special number again, but no one answered. I called the site operator again and got a different person who said she’d go down to talk to Lydia and have her call me back. No one called me back.

Finally just before 5pm I called the site operator again and somehow got connected to Lydia. She said she’d talked to the oncologist’s office that afternoon and they said they were just getting ready to call me. But no one had called while I was home and no one had left a message while I was walking Quigley. She called the oncologist’s office again then called me back to say they’d called and left a message — apparently on someone else’s answering machine. She said they’d call me first thing in the morning.

Finally, on Thursday, they called and my appointment was scheduled for Tuesday the following week (which was yesterday at 3pm). Once I had the appointment settled, it was amazing. I just crashed. I didn’t think I was that anxious about it, but there was definitely a thread of tension. Plus, the conversation with the NP was hurried and she was kinda freaked, so later I wondered… was it more dire than it seemed? Why refer me to an oncologist? Did I have cancer? If so, why wasn’t the oncologist’s office calling?

Well, had to put all that in the Lord’s hands and really believe those promises, which mostly I did. But once I got the appointment, as I said I crashed, suddenly very tired and about an hour later, noticed that Quigley’s ears were all thick and hot and heavy with blood. He was getting allergies from the wind we were having, and shaking his ears, which was making them fill up with blood. Bear had the same problems  and one time ended up with a huge blood pocket in his ear flap that required surgery to “quilt” the skin of his ear back together — followed by extended recovery time. One vet even suggested we cut off his ear flap… but we have hounds for a reason — we love those floppy ears.

So here I was facing potentially the same thing with Quigley, in the middle of everything else. Well, put that in the Lord’s hands as well. Certainly I have no control over any of it. Thankfully, over the next few days following our  vet’s counsel over the phone,  that eventually resolved with Wal-itin and some steroid cream for the rash… Finally all was quiet.

Then, this last Monday night, the night before my appointment with the gynecologic oncologist, I suddenly had the thought that maybe I shouldn’t be so relaxed about it all. That maybe it was far worse than I imagined and I really was going to have to have chemo and my hair fall out and feel awful and all that… I surely didn’t want to go in there thinking it would be nothing when I actually had this huge cancer and was going to need chemo, etc. So I Googled endometrial biopsies and endometrial cancer and scared myself silly with all the descriptions of where the cancer could spread from the uterus. To egg me on, I got an email to a Caring Bridge entry from a friend who is going through chemo right now — the other entries have been largely upbeat or just informational. This one was about how it was his worst week ever for chemo treatments… No coincidence on that timing.

Thus, by my own idiocy, I ended up having something of a battle that night during Carnal Hour — the time between 3 and 5 am when I wake up to go the bathroom and suddenly any scary or worrisome things in my life seem incredibly real and imminent and the power of God weak and faint; sometimes the next morning when I wake up and think back on it all, it seems like I went temporarily insane because the things I was concerned about don’t even make any sense.

Anyway, day before yesterday was the appointment. My hubby met me at the office and we were there almost three hours. I really like the doctor. He was very thorough, very knowledgeable and experienced, gave us lots of time to get all our questions answered and was very accommodating as far as the hospital I want to have the surgery done at, which is not his usual one.

 He doesn’t think that my situation is “ominous” but the complex hyperplasia is definitely pre-cancerous, and the suspicious cells are, I guess, basically cancer cells (sometimes he referred to them as such, but other times as cells that were becoming cancer cells). He thought I was at the beginning of a process that would definitely lead to cancer and so we have to remove the whole thing — uterus, cervix and ovaries.

He’ll do the surgery laparoscopically, which is minimally invasive, and he’ll remove the uterus intact through the vagina so as not to spread the cancer around in the abdomen. They’ll send it off to pathology while I’m still on the table, get it examined to see if there is any sort of invasive growth they didn’t anticipate, in which case the doc can take a lymph node sample while he’s in there.

This type of procedure  usually has a recovery time of a day, but requires I stay in the hospital overnight. After that my main source of debilitation will be the muzzy-headedness from the pain meds.

I’m waiting now for them to call me with the surgery date, which hopefully will be next week. He’s going to try to coordinate with my regular GYN, but if that ends up too difficult I told him I’d be fine with just him doing it, as long as I can go to my hospital of choice. All the experiences with my mother have made me quite particular about which hospitals I like and which ones I don’t.

In any case… I’m still waiting… 🙂