So this week Izzy got some sorta viral infection.
I have found a pediatrician here in West Des Moines but have yet to have
all the files and records sent from VA and to actually establish care.
So when I called to ask about Izzy's fever that was 104 WITH a full dose of tylenol, they
suggested we go to Urgent Care. Well, Tricare doesn't cover Urgent Care unless
you are referred by a physician. Doesn't make much sense, but that left us with the ER.
We took her in and they checked for a UTI and gave her some stronger meds. The UTI came back negative and her fever came down, so we went home.
She seemed to be doing better until a couple days later it was 1:30 in the afternoon and she
had been asleep for 17 hours. I had gone in to take her temp and check on her, she looked
at me, didn't move and went back to sleep when I left the room.
I called the ER and they said to bring her back in.
This time they did blood work and a chest x-ray.
After the x-ray two nurses came in to do her blood work. One of the nurses had clearly been crying and was wiping tears from the corner of her eyes. Then as the other nurse started talking, the first nurse kept looking up to the ceiling. You know, that "trying to compose yourself" look.
My heart immediately sank in my chest, a knot welled up in my throat, and my heart started pounding. I asked the nurse, "Is that chest x-ray in yet?" She said, "I will check"
My head went very quickly to a very dark place as I thought that the nurses were surly hiding something from us, that the chest x-ray WAS in fact in and it didn't look good. The word "cancer" ran through my mind. I thought about how we had come to the ER thinking Izzy just had a viral infection and it was really much worse than that. I thought about having to call family AGAIN and deliver horrible news. In a split second my mind went pretty far down the road as I even thought about loosing Izzy and NEVER being able to bring myself to have more children.
I tried to snap out of it as I laid beside Izzy and held her legs, sang the ABC's and tried to comfort her while they took blood. The nurse left and I started praying!!
This was all too familiar of the nurse coming in for the ultra sound with Liam and telling us things like, "He may have flipped around." Or, "I am not sure if this cord is working." All to protect us until the doctor could come in and tell us what was really going on.
I just kept praying that an oncologist wouldn't walk through that door.
I thought of a high school friend of mine named Ryan whose daughter has been battling cancer for the last 17 months. She is 5 years old. They were up at the UofI hospital doing tests and waiting for results. I private messaged him on facebook explaining the overwhelming nerves I was feeling in that moment and I shared that message from mother's day about God not being a one man ER unit. That it's not about an earthly healing, but about a heavenly, permanent healing. I think I was telling him this to bring comfort to us both and remind myself that those things are easy to hear when things are good in life, but tough to swallow when you are in a situation like this.
The question arose in my mind that someone asked me when I was pregnant with Izzy. "Would you still be thankful for her if God took her right now?" I can answer that question with more certainty now that she is a little older. I would be very thankful for the 16 months I have been able to spend with Izzy, but of course that would make loosing her even harder. Harder because unlike wondering what Liam would have been like, I know with Izzy. I have felt her kisses, her hugs, seen her smile, heard her laugh and talk.
So many more hopes and dreams have come true with Izzy than with Liam by virtue of the time we have been blessed to spend with her. But I found myself pleading with God that I wanted to know what it was like to have her in preschool, watch her colors, have her first sleepover, dance recital.....
I thought about the times I get frustrated and short tempered with Izzy and in that moment none of that mattered. I wanted her to home to throw food on the floor, say "no", be clingy etc
My perspective came into focus once again and it didn't matter about my photography business or oils and updating blogs, making sure the house was clean, errands were ran. I wanted to sit all day and do nothing else but snuggle and play with Izzy.
I don't know what all God healed and or saved Izzy from last week. It could have been much more than a virus, but I am profoundly thankful that it wasn't. We got our healing moment.
After they told us the chest x-ray looked normal I thought to myself, "Did I really see that nurse crying?" The answer is, "Yes" and that broke my heart for a different reason. If it wasn't because of Izzy, it was someone else. Someone else s family member, son or daughter. I began to pray for whoever it was that receiving the news that day.
