really good news for a change

I never like to hear bad news.

    Hello, this is your mechanic. I have some bad news for you - it was the transmission.
    Hello, this is your tax lady.  The bad news is your refund is a lot less than last year.
    Hello, this is every health care facility in North Carolina, sorry for the bad news but we have no openings.


But in the hospital the bad news can be.....really bad.


I talked to a sweet couple last week.  After a lifetime of work and children, they both retired in April.  Finally they could travel and garden and relax.  The first of May brought bad news of his just discovered, aggressive cancer.  They are reeling.  And trying to change their dreams and plans.


I listened to a doctor, anxious about delivering bad news to young parents - that their beautiful new baby was totally blind.


I patted a woman's back as she tried to absorb the bad news.  Her husband's latest heart attack had taken him.


I left the hospital today thinking that if I am hungry for good news, there are people here who are starving for it.  It's no wonder this beautiful good news quote jumped out at me.  Read it a couple of times -


"Turn around and believe that the good news that we are loved is better than we ever dared hope, and that to believe in that good news, to live out of it and toward it, to be in love with that good news, is of all glad things in this world the gladdest thing of all."  Frederich Buechner



How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, "Your God reigns!" Isaiah 52:7

prechaplaining

I was looking out my window, enjoying the breeze through the trees.  I was aware of a car pulling out of our neighborhood and then POW!  I watched a car T right into it.


And then silence.  Another car stopped and the driver jumped out.  Two neighbors heard the crash and ran to the scene.  I could see the airbags had deployed.  Passers by were now redirecting traffic and calling on their cell phones.  In minutes a fire engine came sirening up.  Then a police car.  Then an ambulance.  The rescue workers jumped out and took charge.


Two people were pulled from the cars and carried out on stretchers.  As the ambulances were pulling out a tow truck drove up to pull the wrecked cars out of the busy street.


Then I realized that somewhere a trauma bay was being readied.  And a chaplain was being paged.


Hasten, O God, to save me; O LORD, come quickly to help me.  Psalm 70:1

how long?

There is a question I hear over and over.  In the trauma bay -"how long did he go without oxygen?  In the waiting room - "how long till we get some news?"  In Oncology -"how long do we have?  The answers are always vague and unsatisfying.


How long?  It is a question I ask too.  When my future stretches blankly before me.  When I am tired of waiting.  When I wonder how many hurdles are still awaiting me.  Just tell me!  My mom recently reminded me that I have always hated to wait, to not know. 


It helps to see my impatience and frustration mirrored in the pages of the Bible.


My soul is in anguish. How long, O LORD, how long?  Psalm 6:3


How long, O LORD ? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?  Psalm 13:1


How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?Psalm 13:2


O Lord, how long will you look on? Rescue my life from their ravages, my precious life from these lions
Psalm 35:17


How long, O LORD ? Will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire? Psalm 89:46


How long must your servant wait? When will you punish my persecutors?Psalm 119:84


How long, O LORD, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, "Violence!" but you do not save?  Habakkuk 1:2


They called out in a loud voice, "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?"  Revelation 6:10


And some hints of an answer...


"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem..., how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings! Luke 13:34


You, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.  Ephesians 3:18


"Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the LORD will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again.  Exodus 14:13
 
Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Go out to face them tomorrow, and the LORD will be with you.' "2 Chron 20


I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.  Revelation 3:11

i do

I've done some unique weddings, but this one was near the top of the list.  For starters the groom wore a green gown.  A green hospital gown that is, blue support socks and an oxygen cannula in his nose.  A crowd of around 30 nurses, dieticians, therapists, fellow patients and friends gathered in the sunlit alcove leading into 6 Heart.  This couple had been together for 15 years and an upcoming surgery had been their wake up call to stop just acting like they were married and really be married.


We started with the groom sharing how "this woman taught me that there is love at first sight." The bride shared why "this man" was worth marrying anywhere.  They confidently vowed to be faithful "for better or for worse, in sickness and in health."  Which really seems to ring truer in a hospital.  They'd already loved each other through all that.  I pronounced them husband and wife.  And then they kissed such a kiss that the nurses began heckling "check the heart monitor!"


Once again the hospital puts everything in perspective.  Priorities get so clear here.   I've been to many weddings.  Seen thousands of dollars spent on the perfect tux and the perfect gown.  Seen months of planning a myriad of details.  Seen flowers and cake flavors and songs agonized over.  And rarely have I seen the level of adoration and pleasure that this couple had in their impromptu pre-surgery hallway celebration.

Do I want this much clarity and confidence in my life?  I do!


Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  1 Corinthians 13:7 

helpless

Every day we visit people who are feeling helpless.  People waiting for surgery or treatments or a doctor's visit.  People who can't get out of bed or use the bathroom by themselves.  People at bedsides or waiting rooms who can't do anything for their loved ones.  Helplessness is an uncomfortable feeling.  It manifests itself in anger or depression or control.

Today I unwittingly embarked on an exercise in helplessness.  Maybe my empathy for helpless patients needed renewing.  Or maybe my car is just really old.

I left work at 5 and began my rush up the mountain.  Steve is in Maryland, so my boys were waiting for me with a friend.  While still in South Carolina I noticed my car lurch a bit.  Pretty sure that is not a good sign.  Then, just as I got the the beginning of the Saluda grade, where two highways come together, I suddenly lost all power.  There was no shoulder on the left lane and no immediate traffic to my right so I coasted across the lanes to a small V between the roads.  I got just over the yellow line and completely stopped.

AAAAHHHH.  What am I supposed to do?    I'm in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of all kinds of traffic, trucks wizzing by me. Both my husband and brother are out of town.  My boys are waiting for me.  Why couldn't this have been a day I carpooled and didn't even get in my car?  I was very clear on the physical, emotional and mental feelings of helplessness.

Then I called Steve.  Then I called a friend who is a mechanic.  He said "transmission." I don't know what a dumb transmission is, but I do know it is not something you want to break.  Then I called Barbara to see if I could borrow a car the next day.  She said she would come pick me up and was instantly on her way.  She is hereby to be referred to in all future mentions as Barbara, the angel of rescue.  Then I called Kim, who was watching the boys.  She said they were jumping on the trampoline and having a blast and she would fix them dinner.  Thank you accomodating Kim! Then I called 5 towing companies and finally found a fatherly, southern man who said a tow truck would be there in 20 minutes and would tow it to a good mechanic.  Thank you solution-oriented towing man!  Then I talked to my worried husband, my concerned in-laws, both brothers, my sister in law (all trying to figure out what they could do to help) and my mom, who had just flown across the country and landed in Charlotte.

At 8:30 I got home.  After a fun 40 minute ride with Barbara, (laughing at what lengths we would go to for a little girl time) a borrowed car, picking up my boys, and trying to take a few deep breaths.  Sometimes it really does take a village, just to get home.  I'm so very thankful for all the help given to me in my helplessness.  And yes.  My empathy is renewed.



Arise, LORD! Lift up your hand, O God. Do not forget the helpless.  Psalm 10:12

entitled

I was in a patient's room doing a stroke assessment during lunch, when I realized she hadn't eaten much of her food.  I asked her if she didn't have an appetite.  "Oh I'm hungry alright.  But this food is disgusting.  I wouldn't touch it."  This especially struck me because the last several rooms had told me how delicious their lunches were.

I got a call from the pharmacy.  "We have a patient here who you've helped financially with a perscription before.  He's demanding that you pay for this one too."

I passed two staff members during a break.  I heard one say "Well, if they don't approve those days off, I will just quit.  I'm going to the beach no matter what."

Art critic Robert Hughes wrote about American society a few years ago in The Culture of Complaint.  His thesis is that we live in a society where people perceive themselves to be entitled to having all desires fulfilled.  We take this to be part of our birthright.  We accord ourselves victim status when it doesn't happen.  We live in a culture of complaint.  It forms our minds and hearts.*

I see it in my life.  When I get caught up in the things I want but don't have.  When I look at something in my life and say "it's not fair".  When I am reminded that I am in the top 5% of wealthiest people in the world.  When I take for granted that at the end of each day I get to leave the hospital and go home.  It's so easy to complain....when I have so very much to be grateful for.

G.K. Chesterton once said, "Here ends another day during which I have had eyes, ears, hands, and the great world around me, and tomorrow begins another.  Why am I allowed two?"*

..that my heart may sing to you and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give you thanks forever. Psalms 30:12


 *from Love Beyond Reason, John Ortberg

acuity

There is a big sign on the wall in the Emergency Center's waiting room.  PATIENTS WILL BE SEEN IN ORDER OF ACUITY, NOT IN ORDER OF ARRIVAL.  I don't think I ever noticed the sign until today.  Today the waiting room was packed.  Weak people leaning on someone else.  Hurting people doubled over.  Coughing people who looked worn out.  Everyone waiting their turn.  Sometimes for hours.


I was standing at the front desk talking to the greeter.  All of a sudden three young guys came in.  Two guys helping a third.  The first thing I noticed was that he looked very unsteady and pale.  And then I saw his hand wrapped in a bloody sock.  As his friends blurted out that they thought his fingers were severed I began to feel unsteady and pale.  The greeter knew acuity when he saw it.  He jumped up and rushed the guy into a triage room where a doctor immediately came in.


As our cpe class work winds up I think about all the things waiting to be done.  Case studies, final evaluations, certification requirements, applications and resumes, on calls and final projects.  And those are just the chaplain related things! Just looking at my to do list makes me feel unsteady and pale.  Sometimes I wish for my own version of a greeter who will say "here is what is really urgent" and then wisk me away to do only that.


I once heard that in our world today people have a desperate need for quiet.  More than relief from horns honking and phones beeping.  The kind of quiet that comes inside your head when you are calm and peaceful.  When your priorities are straight.  When you have a clear sense of what really is acute and what is just waiting around to be done.  It is the kind of quiet that comes after the storm has been calmed.  It is the whisper that comes after the earthquake and the fire.


That is the triage room I want to be sitting in.

And this righteousness will bring peace.  Yes, it will bring quietness and confidence forever.  My people will live in safety, quietly at home. They will be at rest.  Isaiah 32:17,18 NLT