Thursday, May 23, 2019

Optimized


A bit of an update: According to my primary care doctor, I am now “optimized for surgery.”

I have never heard that term before, but I like it! I have been bragging to all my friends…and now I’m telling whoever happens across this blog: “Yo, everybody! I am optimized for surgery.”

Image result for danny zuko greased lightningWhen I read the term, in my head I could almost hear John Travolta say, “Why, this boy is automatic! (whump!) He’s systematic! (whumpuh!) He’s hy-dromatic! (Shoonk!) He’s…optimized! (Throw off your leather jacket, Zuko!) He’s greased lightning!”
Everyone starts dancing.
In short, I’m ready for take-off. The board reads green. We’re a go for the knife. Go!  

But when?
Which is why this post is only a bit of an update. I do not yet (as of Thursday afternoon, 5/23/29) know the date of my surgery… I am guessing it will be around the middle of July. You know, now that I am optimized.
Image result for cars in greaseWhat that means is that I have passed all my tests, though a few of them with C’s, as it were. My blood tests have revealed a few things to address after surgery (diminished protein, slightly elevated sugar, nagging anemia). My x-rays reveal compression fractures in my thoracic vertebrae with “resulting loss of height” (yeah, I didn’t think I was as statuesque as I used to be) …these to go with the simple compressions in my cervical vertebrae and curves in my lumbar.
For a sad truth, I look more like Kenickie’s jalopy than the dream car (or even the one they took to Thunder Road)! I hear Zuko again, “What a hunka junk!”  
Age-related some of it. OH, oh, oh… and, in a different set of tests, turns out I have “presbycusis”: age-related hearing loss, which just means that the older I get, the deafer I get. Yeah, like I needed a test or a term to describe that. My audiologist said, “You’re a Presbyterian pastor with presbycusis!” Uh, no. United Methodist…
Good news: got my hearing aids adjusted. And I am walking again, bad back and all.
AND, I’m optimized for surgery. Now, if they will just give me a date.

I have been nipping at my doctors’ heels the last couple of weeks, trying to get on the schedule. One of them wrote me and said, “Please don’t worry.” He had told me during my consultation that the kind of cancer I have is extremely slow-growing, that if I had another biopsy in four months I would be in the same clinical position as now, and there was every good reason a) not to hurry the surgery (he told me to take my two vacation weeks in June and July) and b) to believe that the margins would be good and the surgery would be the end of it for, say, 15 years or more. He took my eagerness for anxiety: that I was apprehensive, scared, whatever.
I wrote back to assure him I am not afraid at all. I have confidence in him. I have confidence in the process. I have greater, utmost confidence, in the Great Physician. I am just trying to get the summer organized, and I cannot do that—who will preach when, who will cover pastoral necessities—until I have a date from which to build.
But it is interesting: how many people imagine I am anxious or afraid or worried. How others are surprised I am not talking about it a lot—having cancer, anticipating cancer surgery—or letting it disrupt my days and nights.
One person said to a mutual friend, “Tom must really be a person of faith. He doesn’t seem to be bothered at all.”
Well, I surely hope I am a person of faith! And I am glad if people see my faith as the source of my serenity in the face of this diagnosis and process. But I would not say I am completely unbothered…in this regard: I am NOT looking forward to surgery. I have had more than my share of incisions, sticks, indignities. The phlebotomist said this last Monday, as she drew my blood, “You have a lot of scar tissue.” Yep, and not just at my inside elbows. I get terribly nauseated with anesthesia (if you come seem me the day or the day after surgery, be forewarned). I do not like the pain that rips your abdomen the first time you try to get up (two hernia surgeries taught me that. I hate, Hate, HATE IVs (I beg, “Please, not my hand!” The nurse says, “Man up!” “How about some Novocain?” I say. “Nope.” The needles starts toward my hand and I close my eyes, say the Creed, try to remember Jesus experienced far worse in his hands than needles. But I am a weenie, and I dread the IV even more than the catheter or removing the drainage tube—which Dr. Damani said would be the worst part of my hospitalization).
Surgery is no fun (I've had 9 already, ten counting my tonsils), and I am not eager for it. Only eager to have that part of it behind me.
 But beyond the surgery and the abasements of recovering from such surgery—I remember my father, after a similar surgery, once exclaiming…all but yelling… “Somebody has GOT to get me some Depends!”—I am not afraid. Or worried.  
I hope for more years of life and ministry. I hope for more years with Eleanor. I hope for more grandbabies with whom to spend time. I hope to enjoy retirement, to travel and maybe take up golf again, or renew my interest in water color and acrylics (did you know that, at one time, I planned to be an illustrator?). So much to do and see. So many sermons to preach and lessons to teach. So many days at the park to push my baby/babies in the swing.
But I know that my desire to be with my grandbabies is greater than Eleanor’s desire or need for me. Love is always stronger descending than ascending. And I’m chill with that.
I also know that death, for all of us, is inevitable. It is only a matter of time. And I do long to see Jesus.
So I am fine. More than fine… I am optimized in spirit, even more so than in body. All is well. And I believe I soon will be.
Please keep me in your prayers. For, much as Paul said to the Philippians, “I know that your prayers and the help that comes from the Spirit of Christ Jesus will keep me safe. I honestly expect and hope that I will never do anything to be ashamed of. Whether I live or die, I always want to be as brave as I am now and bring honor to Christ.  If I live, it will be for Christ, and if I die, I will gain even more.”

Either way, optimized.

UPDATE: I have heard: Monday, July 8, 2019

Fishing for the Future

takemefishing.org I was supposed to go fishing this afternoon.  Didn’t happen, though. Bummer. I love to fish, though I do not...