Good Changes continued...

Continuing on with my story so I can then explain why I've titled this "Good Changes."

After I was given the TPA, which by the way, did not dissolve the clot, I was moved into the ICU.  There I lay for a couple of days being constantly monitored, taken for VQ lung scans, MRI's, X-rays and ct scans.  The big event that occurred was my mom coming to see me.  Mom was in an assisted living home a good distance from this hospital.  She felt like she wasn't being told everything by the family and somehow she managed to get a taxi to pick her up and bring her to see me.  I was shocked when she rolled into my room in her wheelchair.  She basically said she had to see me for herself to know I was okay :(  It was kind of sad, she thought I had died and no one would tell her.

Finally I was moved from ICU to a regular room.  A couple of days went by and it was a Sunday morning.  Hubby, of course, was spending all of his free time at the hospital and we were just talking when the hospital Chief of Staff came in, can't remember this doctor's name but Steve was just waiting for someone to pounce on.  He told this doc that we had not been given any real info since the night in the ER and that since they had done a ton of tests on me there must be some news.  This doc seemed surprised and said, "You have the absolute right to see and know the results of any and all tests that have been performed.  I will go round up all results and be back in about an hour."  When he returned I was on the phone with my eldest brother, Walt, who was in Mexico helping to set up churches.  I told him to hold on and laid the phone down.  I then heard again words you do not want to hear from any doctor.  The doc said, "Well, we have looked at all of the films and scans and it is not good news.  There is a mass in your chest unrelated to the blood clot and from the way it presents we are pretty sure it is cancer.  I have scheduled you for a bronchoscopy first thing tomorrow and we will go down the throat and biopsy the mass."  I was in total shock.  I kept telling God I had only signed up for a minor scope of my knees and that He must have my file card in the wrong slot!

I got back on the phone with my brother and after filling him in on the turn of events, he told me he would start a worldwide prayer chain with his many contacts.  Steve got on the phone with church members and family members and did the same.  I believe that within hours hundreds of people were storming the gates of heaven on my behalf!  Next morning at 7am I was wheeled into surgery for my biopsy but when I woke up I was told that they were unable to reach the mass and they had scheduled me for a thoracoscopy at 3pm.  By then it was about 10am so Steve decided to go to the cafeteria and get some breakfast.  As I lay there alone pondering the situation I suddenly had a very strange sensation in my chest.  The best way I can describe it is an effervescence similar to Alka-Seltzer fizzing except this was inside of me.  It tickled a lot.  Out loud to myself I suddenly said, "Well, there goes their cancer!"

That afternoon they did the thoracoscopy which is the insertion of an endoscope, a narrow—diameter tube with a viewing mirror or camera attachment, through a very small incision (cut) in the chest wall. When they got to where they needed to be they found nothing there!  So they performed a thoracotomy where they cut a very large incision, spread the ribs, and collapsed the right lung only to find - NOTHING!  Now don't get me wrong, I believe it had been there but I believe God chose to heal me.  The next time I was able to speak to my pulmonary doc and the thoracic surgeon they basically said, "We don't know what to tell you, we have reviewed all of the films and it is there!  We even flew in a specialist from CA and it is there but as you know it is not there."  They also mentioned that they imagined we would want to sue.  Steve told them, "No, we are not litigious people and besides we believe without a doubt that God healed her."  They responded with, "Well, we do not have a better explanation!"

Now this was a very major surgery.  I had a tube in my side to remove air and fluid from the pleural cavity.  I had some major recovering to do and recover I did, however, I have never been the same physically since that day.  It is now 15 years later and that surgery has caused me lots of breathing problems and I have always had a spot in the middle of my chest that is very painful.  For a long time I really believed they had left an instrument inside me but later tests proved me wrong :) 

This is again a very long post and I am going to finish it up tomorrow.  Hang in there with me, I am telling it in as few words as possible!