surreal

Late in the night the pager buzzed a code blue.  When I arrived a medical team was already surrounding the bed of a elderly man.  A nurse was kneeling over him doing CPR.


I'm always surprised at how physical codes are.  The team take turns pumping a chest, putting their everything into it.  Codes end with a group of sweat drenched people.


This time the life saving measures went on and on.  I perched on a chair right outside the room.  On one side of the patient the vital signs monitor shows lines jumping and falling, jumping and falling.  On the other side of the patient another TV was broadcasting Jay Leno's new show.  I watched one....then the other.  It was surreal.  I could almost hear the Twilight Zone music in the background.


At first it struck me as very irreverent.  A man is dying.  Heroics are being performed.  Do we really need to hear Jay and Steve Carrell cracking up?  Was everyone on the medical team too busy and focused to notice?


But we got into the second code, the vital lines were more erratic, and flatter.  The medical team was tired and grim.  The family was on their way to receive bad news.   Jay's cheerful banter reminded me that outside this room there are people full of life, people with big plans and little annoyances - home after a busy day, curled up in bed or on the couch, having one last laugh before they fall asleep peacefully.


Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own.  Matthew 6:34

refueling

After years of oblivion, I've now become one of those people who is obsessed with gas prices.  Every morning I drive past our best gas station and note the price. (say $2.42)  Then I drive down the mountain, into South Carolina and watch the prices fall.  (say $2.19)  I time my fill ups and my routes to get those satisfying low prices.


In our Pastoral Care class we talk a lot about keeping our tanks full.  There we call it Self Care - the act of intentional awareness and care to ourselves, when most of our effort is focused on taking care of others. As we head into busier holiday months, it will be imparative that we are practiced at keeping our emotional, physical and spiritual tanks full.  One of our biggest self care advocates, our teacher, Sherry, reminds us to get plenty of sleep, step out of the hospital and breath real air, play, eat well, and be gentle with ourselves.


This week I took my first two vacation days. (2 down, 12 to go) Our family spent 4 days at Myrtle Beach refueling.  I slept in, took long walks in the sand, watched my 3 guys body surf, felt the waves pulling me out and crashing over me, cooked a little, and read......


Oh yeah, baby.  Those tanks are filling up.

I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.  John 10:10 NIV

spiritual clown

I wasn't at all sure about the pastoral image of circus clown.  There is not a lot of  mirth and hilarity on the floors. But two pages into the chapter, and it was my favorite so far.  What an out of the box way of looking at ministry.


Heije Faver writes "Charlie Chaplin..spoke to thousands because he managed to show the ability to find the genuine, the authentic on the edges of life.  The wry smile in the face of failure; the strange victory of the man who recognized his weakness, his powerlessness in failure, and accepts it as part of the scheme of things;   the little man who continues to have faith in something indestructible.


This is also the function of the clown in the circus itself; that is why he belongs to it, this place in which people perform great feats, tame wild animals and do hair raising stunts on the trapeze.  They make us feel tense and frightened, but the clown puts it back in perspective.  In a childish way he makes these stunt men look a little foolish, he makes us feel that they are, after all, only human and ordinary, and thus reestablishes a sort of spiritual balance."  Images of Pastoral Care - Robert Dykstra


postscript - On Monday while discussing this chapter, our teacher Sherry brought each of us a little colorful bag with slinkys, sour candies, pinball toys, wind up robots and monster finger puppets.  She talked about how in the midst of the heaviness and seriousness of our job, we need to be intentional about having fun.  What great homework!


Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful.  1 Cor 1:27  NLT

wounded healer

There are times when everything lines up for me.  Good family time, good exercise, a good sleep, and I come skipping into the hospital ready to take on what ever is waiting.  Love those days, few as they may be. There are plenty of days where the last thing I feel like is a spiritual expert.  There are days when I just want to crawl into a hospital bed and have random medicines IV'd into my system.  There are days when I feel proud that I got dressed and made it to Spartanburg on time.


One of our assignments for next week is to read two chapters in the Images of Pastoral Care book.  The first image is Henri Nouwen's Wounded Healer.  It was a thought provoking and hopeful chapter.  Here are a few excerpts.


He is called to be the wounded healer, the one who must look after his own wounds but at the same time be prepared to heal the wounds of others.


This is not a form of spiritual exhabitionism but a constant willingness to see one's own pain and suffering as rising from the depth of the human condition which all men share.


A minister is not a doctor whose primary task is to take away pain.  Rather, he deepens the pain to a level where it can be shared.


The main task of the minister is to prevent people from suffering for the wrong reasons.

What a picture of God.  A God who redemptively employs wounded people, who brings good out of our pain, and who truely knows what wounds feel like.

So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.   Hebrews 4:14-16 (New Living Translation)

wanderings

It had already been a busy evening on call.  Around 9:00pm I got a page asking me to meet Doctor X in the O.R.  That was it.  No heads up or explaination.  I headed quickly out of the on call room toward the elevator when I realized that I had never been to O. R.  "Oh well, I've got the basic idea where it was."

Basic idea was not good enough.  I wandered around the second floor for 5 minutes looking for a sign for  the Operating Room.  Or a door.  Or a doctor waiting for me.  Nothing.  Finally I walked into a room marked Tranfusions (terrifying) and asked them.  A nurse walked me down the hall and keyed in a code to get into an unmarked door.  Ah Ha. The mysterious O. R.


But no Doctor X.  Apparently he was too speedy for me.  I wandered around some more hunting him. A new page informed me that I was now to go to surgery waiting.  This was like a bad scavenger hunt.  I still didn't know what was going on, but I had a sinking feeling.


I walked into surgery waiting moments after Doctor X had left.  There were more than twenty people lining the walls of the big waiting room, all sobbing, weeping, crying, and hugging uncontrollably.  I guessed that someone they loved had just died unexpectantly in surgery I had no idea who.  I began to move around the family, patting backs, saying I'm sorry.  Fourth person in was a relative who was able to talk.  She explained that Mr. B's heart had stopped during surgery.  He couldn't be revived.  She pointed out his wife, his kids, his sisters, his grandchildren, his friends.  And again I wandered.  This time from person to person.


Forty minutes later, a call came from O.R.  Mr. B had been taken to the morgue.  I called O.R. back.  "The family wants to see him.  Bring him back.  We need a respectful place to say goodbye."  But they were facing the next surgery, and he was gone.


So I wandered again.  This time with twenty-five family members following me.  Over to the heart center, past MICU, meandering toward EC, jamming into the elevator and down to the basement.  I felt like Moses in the Red Sea.  We overflowed the morgue, and paid our respects.  I got my first glimpse of Mr. B.  as they took their last.  But by now I was one of them.  Part of their journey and grief.  


We all piled into the elevator again.  Then more hugs and more goodbyes.  They scattered to the parking lot and I headed back to the on call room.  Finally I knew exactly where I was headed.


Teach me to do your will, for you are my God; may your good Spirit lead me on level ground.   Psalm 143:10 (NIV)

distractions

What did patients do before there was a tv in every room?  
Did they heal faster in the peace?  Did they die of boredom?  I'm curious.  In so many rooms the tv is on twenty four hours a day.  Bonanza, The Price is Right, HGTV.  Always on in the background.  While I'm introducing myself, while I'm trying to hear about them, while we try to talk, during prayer.  It makes it almost impossible to concentrate.  And so hard to compete! If our conversation is going any where I am learning to ask if I can turn the tv down, so we can talk without as much distraction.


I was thinking about this and wondered what are the continuous distractions in my life?  What do I need to turn down in order to hear better?


An idea from Eugene Peterson.  When we are noisy, when we are hurried, we are incapable of intimacy - deep complex, personal relationships. If God is the living center of redemption, it is essential that we be in touch with and responsive to that personal will. 


I love the focus described in this verse.


Every morning I lay out the pieces of my life on your altar and watch for fire to descend.  Psalm 5:1-3 The Message

exploring

The chaplains have been exploring!  We found the secret back route from the on call room, through the deserted roc hall to the emergency room.  We unearthed an urban legend about a mysterious exercise room and then found it hidden on the 5th floor.  We trespassed into the medical resident's decked out lounge.  We discovered the beautiful pond and fountain on the other side the cancer center.  It's a definite improvement from a couple months ago when we were wandering the halls blind trying to find the heart center.  We are enlarging our territory.


All this reminds me of a couple quotes I picked up at the Celtic Spirituality workshop.  They inspire me!


We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the very first time.  TS Elliot


Follow truth wherever you find it.  Even if it takes you outside your preconceived notions of God and life.  Even if it takes you outside your own country into the most insignificant alien places like Bethleham.  Be courageous.  George McLeod, Iona Scotland.