What I'm about to share might twist some of you. You may be offended that you're getting this information via this particular avenue, after the fact and not any sooner. I do apologize for that, but I hope that you will read this entire account and have a better understanding of why you're just now hearing about it. If you still choose to be offended, well, I can't do anything about your behavioral choices. As my Mama is known to say, "You got mad in those pants; you can get happy in them, too!"
Y1 had an echo cardiogram last week, on May 2nd. The echo was a follow up to an EKG that he had done April 20th. In giving an honest answer on his sports physical questionnaire, I set off a chain of events that I wasn't really expecting.
So, Tuesday came and found me subbing for one of the secretaries at our church, who needed some time off. Looking back, it was a very good thing to be there--instead of home, alone, as I might usually be on any given Tuesday. I listened to everything that Dr. B told me...trying to write it down as I was hearing it and at the same time, floating out of my body and watching all of it happen. Do you ever do that? It's the weirdest thing. "His heart is tilted and something in the EKG shows the possibility of a defect between the upper two chambers of the heart." Dr. B said their scheduling department would contact that of the pediatric cardiologist's and we'd hear from them about our appointment. No time to panic or freak...and really no inclination to do so. I think I was sort of numb. Ok. Wow. Dr. B maintained her belief that there wasn't anything to be truly concerned about, but did say we got a little more information that what she expected.
After discussing it with Mr. Snark, we decided that until we had more to tell, we would be very careful about who we told. We didn't want to sound the alarm or put Y1 in an uncomfortable position by broadcasting this info to the four corners. There was a finite group of people who needed to know this and we told them....over the course of a few days. Here's why...it was VERY hard for me to keep my grip on what I knew and not dwell on what I didn't. We told the ministerial staff at church (we LOVE them so much), our parents and a few others...but that was it. That's where we felt safe. Y1 handled it all very well. He asked questions; expressed his displeasure at having to wait until after the echo to "max" in the weight room. He wanted to know what would happen if the echo came back funky and when I said they might do a stress test, he was rather indignant when he found out he'd have to run. My response..."You're fourteen...run, Forrest, run!"
I spent the next couple of days hounding Dr. B's office for our appointment with the cardiologist. My genetic predisposition to being a nag (you can also call it perseverance or tenacity)sometimes pays off and this was one of those rare moments. The appointment was made and finding out that it was in an area of downtown Bamaham that I'd recently become quite familiar with was a BLESSING!!!! Every morning, I'd open my eyes and recite my list of what I knew...starting with the fact that God was/is sovereign and not taken surprise by this turn of events. He knew how all of this would turn out before we knew it would start. I tried not to rail against the part of me that comes with the territory of being a mother....the fixer. I couldn't fix this; it wasn't mine to fix, so I had to let it go. Some hours were better than others. Yes, hours...because there were days during the wait that it was an hourly battle. "What I know...what I know..staying with what I know...Who I know...Who knows me...Who sees me...Who hears me." This is what ran through my head, my heart and sometimes out loud from my mouth.
Echo day FINALLY arrived and so did text messages from our prayer partners. Mr. Snark and I both giggled when we got to hear Y1's heartbeat...I nearly sobbed. That sound was a precious link to my memories of his pregnancy. The cardiologist laughed and said all mothers have that reaction. Not something you get to hear once the baby is born...but it's a sound you never forget. The cardiologist couldn't explain why the EKG showed the irregularities that it did and while his heart does have a slight tilt, HIS HEART IS PERFECT AND HEALTHY AND STRONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did a little dance and didn't give a hoot that the doctor and nurse were still in the room. I danced out of the building and down the street...Y1 wasn't exactly impressed. It's downtown Bamaham...seeing someone dancing down the street is not uncommon. I was humbled by the fact that my baby...all 69.25 inches of him...had just been pronounced whole. Somewhere in that maze of exam rooms, there was a real baby who would not be getting the same diagnosis. I never set eyes on the child, but the sound of that cry...that child was an infant, small...weak...and gravely ill. I could feel that with every fiber of my being. I prayed for that child, for his/her parents and thanked God that we had been spared this particular cup.
My need to keep all of this close and relatively contained clashed with my normal way of doing business. I don't have a poker face...some of you attend church with me and have seen my reactions in the choir loft and can testify; my feelings run close to the surface; my filter doesn't always work and as often as my foot is in my mouth, it's a pure wonderment that I can say anything at all! I couldn't give in to the voice of fear...couldn't let it drown out the Voice of Truth...couldn't let it hush the beat of my heart that wants so badly to hear the beat of His heart. So, I was quiet (stop laughing...that's not nice) and in the quiet I heard so much. Remember that old hymn "For I Know Whom I Have Believed"? The chorus goes like this...For I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able, to keep that which I've committed unto Him against that day. I could hear my sweet Granny W singing that in my ear. That which I've committed. We committed Y1 to God as soon as we knew he was on his way into our lives. When he was two months old, we had a dedication ceremony at church. We promised to raise him and train him in the ways of the God. When he was eight, he made his own decision to follow Christ. He life had been committed...his life would be kept. Who better to keep his heart than the One who created it?
Now that you've read this...I have to ask...which pants are you wearing?
Y1 had an echo cardiogram last week, on May 2nd. The echo was a follow up to an EKG that he had done April 20th. In giving an honest answer on his sports physical questionnaire, I set off a chain of events that I wasn't really expecting.
"Has anyone in the family ever died suddenly/unexpectedly before the age of 50?"The answer is "yes." My FIL was the third of four brothers. Brother #4 died at the age of twenty-five. No one ever knew why; it was just assumed that it was a heart attack. Mr. Snark was seven or eight when that happened. Some years later, Brother #2 was diagnosed with a hereditary type of blood clotting disorder and it then the family wondered if it was a clot that took Brother #4. Still, no way of knowing. Thus my reason for answering to the affirmative. Hearing this, our pediatrician decided that an EKG would be a very good thing to have. She was adamant that she was not overly concerned about there being a problem with Y1's ticker. There's never been a problem. He's healthy...having grown three inches in a year, putting on eleven pounds in that same amount of time...active, vibrant, not showing any externally observable symptoms of a child who is heart-sick. She admitted to being over cautious but would rather be that than careless. She wrote the orders and we had the EKG done the next day. The results were faxed directly to the pediatric cardiologist and to Dr. B's office. She would be back in the office on the following Tuesday and would go over the results with us then.
So, Tuesday came and found me subbing for one of the secretaries at our church, who needed some time off. Looking back, it was a very good thing to be there--instead of home, alone, as I might usually be on any given Tuesday. I listened to everything that Dr. B told me...trying to write it down as I was hearing it and at the same time, floating out of my body and watching all of it happen. Do you ever do that? It's the weirdest thing. "His heart is tilted and something in the EKG shows the possibility of a defect between the upper two chambers of the heart." Dr. B said their scheduling department would contact that of the pediatric cardiologist's and we'd hear from them about our appointment. No time to panic or freak...and really no inclination to do so. I think I was sort of numb. Ok. Wow. Dr. B maintained her belief that there wasn't anything to be truly concerned about, but did say we got a little more information that what she expected.
After discussing it with Mr. Snark, we decided that until we had more to tell, we would be very careful about who we told. We didn't want to sound the alarm or put Y1 in an uncomfortable position by broadcasting this info to the four corners. There was a finite group of people who needed to know this and we told them....over the course of a few days. Here's why...it was VERY hard for me to keep my grip on what I knew and not dwell on what I didn't. We told the ministerial staff at church (we LOVE them so much), our parents and a few others...but that was it. That's where we felt safe. Y1 handled it all very well. He asked questions; expressed his displeasure at having to wait until after the echo to "max" in the weight room. He wanted to know what would happen if the echo came back funky and when I said they might do a stress test, he was rather indignant when he found out he'd have to run. My response..."You're fourteen...run, Forrest, run!"
I spent the next couple of days hounding Dr. B's office for our appointment with the cardiologist. My genetic predisposition to being a nag (you can also call it perseverance or tenacity)sometimes pays off and this was one of those rare moments. The appointment was made and finding out that it was in an area of downtown Bamaham that I'd recently become quite familiar with was a BLESSING!!!! Every morning, I'd open my eyes and recite my list of what I knew...starting with the fact that God was/is sovereign and not taken surprise by this turn of events. He knew how all of this would turn out before we knew it would start. I tried not to rail against the part of me that comes with the territory of being a mother....the fixer. I couldn't fix this; it wasn't mine to fix, so I had to let it go. Some hours were better than others. Yes, hours...because there were days during the wait that it was an hourly battle. "What I know...what I know..staying with what I know...Who I know...Who knows me...Who sees me...Who hears me." This is what ran through my head, my heart and sometimes out loud from my mouth.
Echo day FINALLY arrived and so did text messages from our prayer partners. Mr. Snark and I both giggled when we got to hear Y1's heartbeat...I nearly sobbed. That sound was a precious link to my memories of his pregnancy. The cardiologist laughed and said all mothers have that reaction. Not something you get to hear once the baby is born...but it's a sound you never forget. The cardiologist couldn't explain why the EKG showed the irregularities that it did and while his heart does have a slight tilt, HIS HEART IS PERFECT AND HEALTHY AND STRONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did a little dance and didn't give a hoot that the doctor and nurse were still in the room. I danced out of the building and down the street...Y1 wasn't exactly impressed. It's downtown Bamaham...seeing someone dancing down the street is not uncommon. I was humbled by the fact that my baby...all 69.25 inches of him...had just been pronounced whole. Somewhere in that maze of exam rooms, there was a real baby who would not be getting the same diagnosis. I never set eyes on the child, but the sound of that cry...that child was an infant, small...weak...and gravely ill. I could feel that with every fiber of my being. I prayed for that child, for his/her parents and thanked God that we had been spared this particular cup.
My need to keep all of this close and relatively contained clashed with my normal way of doing business. I don't have a poker face...some of you attend church with me and have seen my reactions in the choir loft and can testify; my feelings run close to the surface; my filter doesn't always work and as often as my foot is in my mouth, it's a pure wonderment that I can say anything at all! I couldn't give in to the voice of fear...couldn't let it drown out the Voice of Truth...couldn't let it hush the beat of my heart that wants so badly to hear the beat of His heart. So, I was quiet (stop laughing...that's not nice) and in the quiet I heard so much. Remember that old hymn "For I Know Whom I Have Believed"? The chorus goes like this...For I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able, to keep that which I've committed unto Him against that day. I could hear my sweet Granny W singing that in my ear. That which I've committed. We committed Y1 to God as soon as we knew he was on his way into our lives. When he was two months old, we had a dedication ceremony at church. We promised to raise him and train him in the ways of the God. When he was eight, he made his own decision to follow Christ. He life had been committed...his life would be kept. Who better to keep his heart than the One who created it?
Now that you've read this...I have to ask...which pants are you wearing?
Very touching story from a mother's heart and great writing!! So glad that heart is healthy and strong!!!!
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