The following day at about 10AM, I received a call on my cell phone from the urologist stating that I had a large kidney stone in my bladder that needed to be removed quickly and several smaller ones in my left kidney. It was Thursday morning and I was jumping on another plane on Monday afternoon for a speaking engagement in San Jose. I could either have the surgery on Friday and risk not recovering well enough for my flight on Monday or put-off the surgery for a few weeks and hope that I didn’t have any more mobile rolling stones while traveling for the next two weeks. Isn’t there a third option?
I made the decision while on the phone with the urologist to have the large stone removed the following morning at 11:30AM. Although the doctor wanted me to have the surgery, he was very concerned about my ability to be ready to fly 74 hours after surgery. I was counting on the fact that my healthy body and mind would allow me to recover much quicker than the patients that he was accustomed to treating. I was hoping and praying that the years of daily exercise, clean eating, positive thinking and a lifetime of faith would pay dividends at this time.
Going in for surgery is a religious experience for at least two reasons: The first reason is that you have to fast (no food, no water, no nothing!) from midnight the night before the surgery and the second is that times of sickness or fear cause us to reach out to God for help. When things in our lives are going well, we may not always spend a lot of time in prayer, thanks or conversation with God. When sickness, or loss-of-job or some other catastrophe causes us to slow down, we somehow end up filling some of that time with prayer.
I had planned on a little reading and some additional prayer during the two-hour span between my arrival at the hospital and the surgery. I ended-up sharing a room with a wonderful man named Bill who was having surgery that morning to make sure that his cancer surgery two months prior had removed all of the cancerous cells. Bill wanted to talk. I’m glad that he did. Usually when our plans are altered by an outside influence, the new event is much better for our souls than the originally planned activity.
More to come!
