Overwhelmed by His All Sufficient Grace

Warning: this will probably be a long post (Trataré traducirlo al español luego. Perdón la tardanza.)
 
I know that so many people have been waiting for an update and wondering why I haven’t posted anything. A few people have reached out, and I hope my response hasn’t overwhelmed or offended anyone. Please know that I am so truly grateful for each one of you! Your prayers, messages, calls, blood donations, information, love—everything has blessed me in ways I can’t even describe. I know most people don’t even really know what happened and still are faithfully praying and caring. Everyone processes things differently, and I also want to be sensitive to that. Some people need for nothing wrong to ever happen (definitely not biblical), some need this to have been a simple fall or in some way COVID related, others want information or situations that they shouldn’t for personal gain or glee.
 
The simple answer to the question “Are you home from the hospital?” is “Yes.” I got released from the hospital a little after 10pm Tuesday night. We made record time getting home and were home by 11:30pm.
 
Last night I went to church, and as I was sitting at the piano figuring out how to play my previously recorded songs on my new piano, a portion of a song I haven’t sung in years kept going through my mind. I haven’t been able to go through any of my music or books today to find all the information or history behind this hymn, but I would like to share it with you.
 
His All Sufficient Grace
By H.A. Taylor
 
O’erwhelmed by His mercy, amazed by His grace;
I am cleansed from all sin, every sign every trace.
Jesus left Heaven’s portals, Himself to abase;
I’m o’erwhelmed by His mercy and His all sufficient grace.
 
I will rest in His keeping each night and each day,
For I know that He’s leading each step of the way.
Tho’ the valleys of sadness at times I must face,
Still He comforts all heartaches with His all-sufficient grace.
 
O what love God bestows upon all who believe:
He will free you from guilt when His Son you receive,
He has promised to keep you, prepare you a place,
If you’ll take of His mercy and His all sufficient grace.
 
God’s everlasting mercy, oh what tender relief,
When burdened with sorrow and laden with grief;
When I think that on Calvary Christ died in my place,
I’m o’er-whelmed by His mercy and His all-sufficient grace.
 
 
I couldn’t get passed the overwhelmed part. I may have looked stronger and healthier than I really was. I was extremely dizzy and overwhelmed. But we had a sweet service and testimony time. I think I shocked those who were there, and that wasn’t my intention either. I could write a book about everything from this last week and even before. I don’t want the attention to be on me. I want God to get the glory for everything! As I share some of the details, I pray it will cause you to see my God rather than look at me. I am no super-human or super-Christian. I am that overwhelmed sinner saved by my great God’s all sufficient grace! I want you to know that God is good! That is who he is! His goodness does not depend on me or my circumstances or how all of this ends. God still would have been good if this story had ended differently! Death is not the end. It is just the beginning. Each of us will spend an eternity somewhere. I’m thankful that I have the peace of knowing I will spend that eternity with my God, and I won’t have to worry about a broken down body or all the pain in this world. If you don’t know that, I would be more than happy to share with you how you can. So many people think that God is only good if He spares someone from death, but for God’s children, being absent from this body is being present with Him. That’s actually a good thing!
 
My intention isn’t to preach here. I want to help and encourage people if I can, but most importantly, I want you to see my God!
 
A couple of weeks ago, I began noticing big ugly bruises all over my body. They were in strange places. I hadn’t fallen or run into anything. They looked quite horrible. I wondered at the time if I should ask my doctor about it but was so busy that I decided I didn’t have time. I was on my feet all day for 3 days straight, so I thought maybe that in some way had something to do with it. I was tired and had some dizziness and arrhythmias. But anyone that knows me or knows any of my previous story, knows that is nothing unusual for me. On Thursday of that week I couldn’t sleep from the pain of all the bruises, but after eating some beef on Friday, I felt better. I remember thinking to myself that maybe my iron was low or something.
 
On Sunday I wore clothes to try to make sure all the bruises were covered and couldn’t be seen. We had a special speaker that day and were taking them to lunch after the service. The music director persistently asked me about a bruise on my arm. I told him I had no clue because I hadn’t run into anything. We had a game night at church that night, and the music director made a point to come pull me aside and tell me I needed to go get a blood test. His children are doctors, and he had talked with them about it. I was so busy, that I never went and checked into it.
 
On Wednesday, I was working on the computer trying to get reports done for our mission board and get things done for church. We have puppies that we were in the midst of selling, and I heard them crying outside. I ran to try to bring them all in the house real quick so I could get back to work and they wouldn’t disturb the neighbors. I was a clutz and tripped in my haste. I had a puppy in my hands, and fortunately he was fine. I couldn’t catch my fall (which was probably a good thing) since I was protecting the puppy. I landed on rocks—smooth, decorative ones—with one knee and the back of my left hand. It was hard to move, and I didn’t know if I had broken my fingers. If anyone plays the piano, you may understand how worried I was about my fingers and the fact I couldn’t move them. I knew I could handle a broken knee, so I wasn’t worried about that. But I was very worried about my fingers.
 
Mark had me call the doctor to make an appointment for Thursday. The doctor told me to go get x-rays, which I thought was odd only because they do x-rays at the hospital where his office is. Since I couldn’t walk and couldn’t move my fingers, I stayed home from church in bed while Mark went.
 
Our hospital/doctor’s office is anywhere from 1 ½ - 3 hours away depending on traffic and time of day. Mark and I left early on Thursday to run a couple of errands while we were in San José. Our plan was run the errands, find out if anything was broken, visit a couple of friends, and come home. When I went to check-in, the receptionist looked at me really funny and asked if I had talked to the doctor at all. I assured her I had and made the appointment because I had fallen the day before. She called him and handed me the phone. I found out that the appointment was supposed to be virtual instead of in person. Since the COVID cases had gone up again, he had gone back to virtual appointments, and no one had told me. He said I could either find a quiet corner and video call him, or he could have me see a different doctor. I’m sure it was humorous for all passing by to watch our virtual visit in the hallway of the hospital. Since I still couldn’t move my fingers, he had me go over and see an orthopedic specialist. That doctor was kind and helpful and saw there were no fractures. He immobilized my fingers and prescribed some pain meds. He told me it was probably just a build up of fluid from the trauma. While I was waiting to get my meds from the pharmacy, my doctor texted to see if I was still there and could go by the lab to get a blood test done. I had mentioned to him about the bruises during the virtual appointment and told him that I already had them before the fall.
 
So we went and got my blood drawn, which is always an event! It took 4 people to find any blood. At one point, 2 were working at the same time. (They always have a hard time finding my veins! That is nothing new or special for me.) We left the hospital and headed toward our friends’ house. When we got there, no one answered, so we called our son to see if they had sent him any messages. He said that they asked if we were still coming or just going home. It was rush hour, and we were tired. So we told him we would just go on home.
 
About halfway home, my phone rang. I almost didn’t answer it. I figured it was someone wanting info about the puppies, and I was tired. I did answer, however, and the person on the other end told me she was the doctor at the lab and that I needed to call my doctor right away. I’ve had many health challenges and crisis through the years, and I have never once had the lab call me before. I asked her if my results had been sent by email yet, and she said I should have them within 5 minutes. Since we were driving, cell reception can go in and out. So I figured it was easier to text my doctor. I didn’t get an email, so I finally looked the results up online and sent those to him as well. I’m not a medical professional. I don’t really know what lab results mean unless it has to do with thyroid. We continued home and picked up some supper. I checked my phone when we got home, and the doctor hadn’t seen my messages, so I called him. He said he would look at it and call me back.
 
My doctor called back and said I needed to get back to the hospital. Since it was so late already, I asked if the next morning would be fine. He made it clear that I needed to get back as soon as possible and mentioned blood transfusions. I still didn’t really know what was going on or the seriousness. I had not bled when I fell. I didn’t understand what I know now about platelets. I threw a few things in a bag and called the insurance company. Mark called our tico son to come stay with the boys since it was so late. He would go drop me off at the hospital and come back home, but that would be several hours.
 
My doctor let me know that there would be a doctor waiting for me at the ER. He wanted to know when I would be arriving. The US is different than most countries. You don’t just go to the ER for an emergency and get right in here. You have to prove that the bill will be paid before you are seen. Through the years, we have spent many hours waiting for approvals from the insurance company to arrive at the right desk so we can be seen. Last Thursday, however, the insurance company had already sent the approval before I got to the hospital, and the doctor was waiting for me.
 
Everyone kept telling me I would be getting blood transfusions and be admitted, but Instill didn’t know how serious anything was. There was a lot of frustration among medical people over why transfusions hadn’t been started. They took me by ambulance to another hospital to do a CT scan of my brain then brought me back and put me in my room. Mark said goodbye and got back home around 2:30 that morning.
 
Friday morning my doctor asked if I knew anyone that could donate blood. I assured him Mark would and that we would ask our friends and church people. I didn’t even know at that time that it took 6 donations for me to be able to get 1 transfusion. Due to limited donation hours with COVID restrictions and people working during those limited hours, many willing people weren’t able to donate. I learned that my platelets had been 7.3 Thursday afternoon and had already dropped to 6 by the time I got back to the hospital.  I know I have a lot of friends and some family members who are medical professionals. Please forgive my ignorance. I didn’t know then all the things they have explained to me now. I should have been dead. The fact that I wasn’t already dead or in a coma, the fall should have killed me. If I had hit my head or bled in any way, there would have been no way to stop it, and I would not have made it to the hospital. My brain should have been bleeding, and it wasn’t. My body should have been bleeding for no reason, and it wasn’t. God had every little detail under control. My fall had nothing to do with my critical health situation. God used my fall to allow the doctors to see my critical health situation.
 
In spite of the doctors being frustrated that I wasn’t receiving blood transfusions, God was even working through that. He protected me from any problems those transfusions could have caused, and he brought the right doctor to the situation to see what was happening and treat it. There is so much more detail to even that! Not even thinking through the potential problems of the blood transfusions, if they had gotten my platelets up, would they have found what caused them to drop in the first place? They could have gotten them up for them to immediately fall again.
 
I have an autoimmune disease. No I don’t know all the info. Yes my doctors do. Basically my own body was killing me by killing all my platelets. The oncology hematologist put me on lots of strong steroids and 2 long immunoglobulin treatments, which I’m told is like chemotherapy. After the first treatment, my numbers rose out of the critical level. After my second treatment, my numbers doubled. I haven’t had them tested since then, so I don’t know where they are at right now. I will be taking a cancer drug for the next 6 months to a year probably. I do not have cancer. I have an autoimmune disease. I don’t know what everything is going to look like or how it is going to go. I’ve been told things to watch for, and my doctors will be watching me closely. I don’t want to live in fear. It would be super easy right now to panic and be afraid to go anywhere or do anything in case I fell or got cut or ran into something or just didn’t know what my numbers were. However, the same great God that has chosen to leave me here to serve Him for a little while longer is in charge of all of those details just the same as He was last week.
 
Some people say God is good because He didn’t let me die last week. That isn’t what makes God good! God still would have been just as good if I had died!
 
So back to the song… yesterday I was doing okay. Today as I go through the effects of coming off all the steroids and medications and treatments, I’m overwhelmed. I will be honest. It was a rough day! I have mountain tops, and I have rivers of tears. I’m no super-Christian. I do have a great God, and He is very lovingly, gently holding me in the palm of His hand. He gives peace that passes all our understanding. God is good, and His grace is all sufficient!