I'm no Robin Williams, but ...

Los Angeles Times

Some people think I'm pretty funny. Much of the time, I am one of those people.

Maybe that's why Robin Williams' suicide has hit me so hard.

Many of my friends and even members of my own family probably don't know this, but I have suffered from depression, at times severe, since I was about 12 years old. It wasn't diagnosed until I was 32. Before and since then, it has caused upheaval in my life, skewing my thinking and hampering my ability to make good decisions. If My Lovely Wife were not a superhero, it would have killed our marriage long ago.

It has come close to killing me more than once. I've never attempted suicide, but during the blackest, foggiest passages of the abyss I have contemplated and even planned it. The irony is that the depression robbed me of the initiative to go through with it.

It pisses me off because at various times I have thought I was free of this depression, but it always comes back.

About three years ago I tumbled into one of the deepest, darkest emotional pits I've ever known. I could barely function; somehow, by the grace of God, I managed not to get fired from my job during this period. I had daily panic attacks, and I couldn't hold my bladder. I thought about death, obsessively, every day for months -- usually in a positive light.

Thank God I was able to ask for help. An attentive and compassionate doctor put me on a particular medication, but it had no effect. We switched to a different drug, and almost immediately I started showing symptoms of mania.

I was freaking out, believing that I was slipping down a well-greased slope to full-on psychosis. I didn't want to be that nice, smart, funny guy who went crazy and spent the rest of his life as a friendless, homeless lunatic bothering people on the train. As my irrational mind reasoned it out, it seemed better to me to go to my eternal rest than to spend my remaining years as an object of pity and horror.

That's when the miracle happened. Miracle, thy name is Prozac.

I know Prozac (fluoxetine) has gotten a fair amount of bad press over the years, but I can tell you in no uncertain terms: Prozac saved my life. Now I take a fairly hefty dose of it every morning, paired with timed doses of Buspar (buspirone) that help keep me on an even keel throughout the day.

I also have been seeing a therapist on a regular basis. For a while, just last year, I was placed in intensive (outpatient) therapy, where I met a number of other people who were struggling as I was, each in his or her own way. These were private battles, but we were all in it together, and somehow that was comforting.

And now, with these therapies and after making some desperately needed changes in my life, I am happier and healthier than I've been in a very long time. What had seemed impossible has become my daily reality. I'm me again.

When one drug or therapy or therapist doesn't work for you, it doesn't mean you're beyond help; it simply means that particular drug or therapy or therapist doesn't work for you at this time. There are plenty out there, and it's worth trying out as many as necessary to find one that helps you start feeling normal again.

And that's a key understanding: These are not "happy pills" that artificially raise your mood and turn you into a grinning idiot; they are chemotherapy that kills the cancer of depression that makes you feel abnormally bad. They pull you back to normal.

I had forgotten what normal was. Although I was still quick with a comeback or a one-liner or a wry Facebook comment, I had forgotten what joy and peace felt like. I thought -- I really believed -- they were lost to me forever.

That's the lie that depression tells you, over and over again like the relentless beat of house music: It's never going to get better; things will always be the way they are right now, or worse; there is no hope.

But that's a lie straight out of the pits of hell. ("He [the devil] was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks in character, because he is a liar and the father of lies." John 8:44b)

There is hope, even if you can't see it right now. Fight for your life. As the poet Charles Bukowski wrote, "Your life is your life. Don't let it be clubbed into dank submission. Be on the watch: There are ways out. There is light somewhere."

If you feel profoundly sad, or hopeless, or angry, or listless, or confused, or forgotten, or lonely, or worthless, or anxious, please, please, talk to someone. Talk to someone who will listen, someone who is willing to walk alongside you on the winding path to getting better. These feelings seem completely real, but they are not normal, they are not right, and there are ways out.

I'm testimony -- living testimony -- to that.

I am heartbroken for Robin Williams and for those who loved him. But I am grateful for the many gifts he gave us, not least of which was an opening for this conversation.

Beloved, seek peace and pursue it. "You are marvelous; the gods wait to delight in you."

Is there not a cause?

My brilliant pastor, Jentezen Franklin, this morning preached on the subject, "You need to get free of 'What's in it for me?'" He used the passage in 1 Samuel 17 where David's brothers and other men tell David what rewards would be given to the man who slays Goliath.

These guys were all focused on the prizes -- great riches, the king's daughter in marriage, and tax-free living for life. But all that talk didn't sit well with David, who said, "Is there not a cause?"

By that David meant there was a better reason than personal rewards to go after Goliath. This thug was insulting their God and everyone who believed in him. What more incentive did they need?

My pastor then lit into preachers who do things not for the glory of God and furtherance of his kingdom, but for self-aggrandizement and income opportunities. Then he turned it onto the rest of us, saying the cause of God's kingdom should be enough motivation to get us to serve others; we shouldn't need any other incentives, such as payment, recognition or fame. Amen and amen.

He kept repeating the line, "You need to get free of 'What's in it for me?'" And it got me thinking about the health-care town hall screamers and the current crop of conservatives in general. (By the way, Franklin himself is clearly pretty conservative, so this message surprised me a little, but he didn't take it where I'm about to.)

This very morning on the way to church I had been saying to My Lovely Wife that the theme of these protests makes me sick. I saw on TV a woman with a look of disgust say of President Obama's proposed plan, "It takes away from those who have been paying for health care for years [and] reduces our health care so that everyone else can have it."

Yes, and isn't that horrible? I mean, I got mine, so SCREW everybody else! Am I my brother's keeper? Why should I be expected to give up a tiny fraction of the abundance that I have so that my neighbor who has nothing might have something?

I've never really been able to put my finger on what it is about conservatives that nettles me so much, but this is it exactly: They go on and on about how great America is, America love it or leave it, God bless America, but they're not willing to give anything up to help their fellow Americans. Anyone who suggests Americans pool their resources to help out the least of these is decried as a SOCIALIST!

I wonder if any of them have ever read the last four verses of the second chapter of Acts. The first Christians were total pinkos.

I voted for Obama in the primary election, but I liked Hillary Clinton's health-care reform plan better. So I'm not suggesting everyone should just go for Obama's plan; it definitely needs work. What I am saying is that it appalls me that people think it's OK to let their fellow Americans -- even children -- go without health care.

Believe it or not, I actually liked George W. Bush for a minute when he was running for president in 2000. That line about ushering in an era of "compassionate conservatism" got my attention. But those words turned out to be not only a lie, but an oxymoron. In today's American politics, conservatism is by definition the opposite of compassionate. It is service only to oneself, regardless of the cost to others.

What's in it for me? How about a better night's sleep knowing some child won't die because her parents' insurance company didn't want to pay for a liver transplant? How about fewer people hitting you up for money while you're walking downtown because medical bills will no longer drive anyone into homelessness? How about the avoidance of a rebuke at the Judgment Seat of Christ when he says, "Inasmuch as you did it not to one of the least of these, you did it not to me."

The wheel of life

On this, the 90th anniversary of my mother's birth, I present a newspaper guest column I wrote 20 years ago. I believe this was my first published work after college. It ran on the front of the Metro section of the Fort Wayne (Indiana) News-Sentinel, where I was a copy editor.

Wheel of life takes emotions on a wild ride
August 16, 1989

This summer has been a matter of life and death for my family.

The season has always consisted of languorous days spent staying out of the sun and muggy evenings spent sipping iced tea on the front porch. Baseball games on the radio and the smell of ribs on the neighbors’ grill.

Come to think of it, all that stuff has been going on as usual, but other events have marked this summer, and I’m not at all comfortable with the theme.

The cycle started, like summer, on Memorial Day weekend, when my wife and I were driving on U.S. 30 to visit her brother in Chicago. It was fairly early that beautiful Saturday morning, and there was very little traffic. We were sharing cinnamon rolls we had bought at T.J. Cinnamon’s on what was supposed to be its last day in business (it has since been resurrected), getting sticky fingers and having a good time.

We both were looking out the side window at a farm where the cattle were standing near the road. We were searching the herd for calves.

When I looked to the road again, I saw in front of us a wall of steel in the form of a stopped livestock truck. Instinctively, I swerved left onto the median, missing the huge truck by little more than a few inches. After I got my pickup back on the highway, still going about 50 mph, my wife put her hand on my arm. It felt like the hand of God.

Neither of us said a word for five minutes. Later we prayed and she cried.

Apparently even as that brush with death was happening, the pathetic stray cat we had taken in on Mother’s Day was giving birth back home to five kittens.

Kittens are wonderful. They can entertain without trying, delight without cloying. We’ve tried not to get too attached to them, because we know we have to give them all away, but they’re hard to resist.

It has been a joy to watch them grow, explore, learn and play. They make you feel wonderful about life.

Now we learn one of them has a heart murmur, and we have to decide whether to “put it to sleep” (to use the prevalent euphemism for killing something beloved), give it away to someone willing to take a chance, or keep it and hope for the best.

A few weeks ago, our next-door neighbors brought forth a beautiful baby girl. We were – and still are – thrilled for them.

But then another neighbor – four doors down – was stabbed to death, and a curtain of fear and sorrow hangs over the neighborhood.

The wheel of life keeps turning as it always has, but this summer it seems to be spinning so fast that the spokes have become invisible. I’ve been up and down on it so many times already that I don’t know how to take each new scene that flashes past my eyes.

For example, several weeks ago my 10 siblings and I threw a party for my mother on her 70th birthday. It was an event to celebrate this wonderful, funny woman’s long and worthwhile life and her full recovery from a heart attack four years ago.

Nine of her 11 children were there, along with a few other relatives and cherished friends and uncounted grandchildren. It was a beautiful day, full of laughter and love and a kind of closeness with some of my siblings that I cannot remember ever feeling before.

With the kind of summer it’s been, however, I couldn’t help but think about how many more birthdays my parents might have.

The macabre mood of this summer has even managed to take a turn toward the comic.

The aforementioned stray cat has made herself very much at home in our house, turning every inch of it into her personal hunting ground.

We used to have a pet zebra finch named Jenny. She was 6 years old – that’s 120 to you and me. I admired her for her longevity.

Rikki the cat admired her for her white meat.

We came home one day to find the bird cage shattered on the floor, a small pile of feathers in the kitchen and a satisfied look on Rikki’s face.

I guess everybody faces issues of life and death; it’s part of living. But having to do it nearly every day is a bit much. Take me out to the ballgame.

Kingdom Coaches

I saw a tour bus today with the name Kingdom Coach emblazoned on the sides and back. I like that name -- not necessarily for a bus company, but as a title for a person, a spiritual guide.

Two of my kingdom coaches are hurting right now. C.David, an inexhaustible font of encouragement and optimism, is mending rapidly from extensive surgery to remove a tumor in his belly; now he's learned he's going to need two chemotherapy treatments a week for six months. Sister Dorothy, who seems to have committed the entire Bible to memory and always calls up the perfect verse to address any concern, is in severe pain from a vascular problem in her feet.

God, please bless both of these my coaches, as well as all the others. They've helped you make me into the player I am today.

Things are looking up

Another visit to the hematologist, another dose of good news.

After four months of good eating and right living, my white-cell count is about the same, but my platelets have crawled into the normal range. I guess I can thank my daily vitamin D supplement and weekly serving of red meat for that.

And here's a shocker: My weight was 154.3, a personal record. That's 22 pounds higher than the low I hit in 2007 that sent me to the doctor in the first place.

All is well!

Claim and proclaim

You may remember a series of posts I wrote in February and March about healing. The focus then was mainly on physical healing, but the principles apply to all kinds of healing, including emotional and relational.

The second part of the series was based on the passage in the Gospel of Luke about the woman with "an issue of blood" and how she received healing by pushing through the crowd to get to the source of healing, Jesus. And he so overflows with healing that all it took for her was to touch the edge of the back of his garment.

I love the last part of the story, as told by Luke:

Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”

This passage is so loaded with messages, I'll have to go a phrase at a time. Pay attention now; this is for you.

Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed,

This woman had tried to disappear into the crowd, but Jesus easily singled her out as the one among the many. She had been shunned by the crowd because of her problem, but now she was trying to blend in.

How many times have you found yourself alone in the midst of a crowd, surrounded by dozens or even thousands of people, not one of whom knows you or understands your pain? One place where it happens to a lot of people is in church. You show up on Sunday, dressed in your finest clothes and burdened with your darkest secrets, and just hope no one notices you or discovers your uncleanness. Most of the crowd won't take any note of you because they're too busy worrying that someone will notice them and discover their uncleanness. Or they're just there to find a mate or to see the spectacle or to kill a couple of hours on a slow weekend.

But Jesus notices us. We can't avoid him or evade him. He sees that monkey on your back, that baggage in your hand, that cloud over your head. And he knows why you're really there.

... came trembling and fell at his feet.

This woman had spent years in forced isolation, totally shunned by society – particularly by the rigid religious types. The society and the sanctimonious had no sympathy for her, only revulsion and rejection and condemnation. But now at last she had found someone who had compassion for her, and who had already healed her.

So she did the only two things she could do: She surrendered and she worshipped.

Those are a couple of tough things for us -- any of us, but especially us Americans (and particularly us of the male persuasion) -- to do. We're so self-sufficient and self-actualized and self-reliant and self-centered and self-worshiping that we find it very difficult or indeed impossible to acknowledge a force greater than our will, much less submit to it.

But let's face it: Surrender and worship are the only appropriate responses to an encounter with Jesus. Compared to him we are nothing, and to pretend otherwise is not only blasphemous, it's downright ridiculous. Your refusal to worship at the feet of Jesus is like a little poodle yapping at a Great Dane; to anyone with any perspective it's just silly.

So quit yapping and worship the God who stands before you.

In the presence of all the people,

Not in reverent silence, not in her private prayer closet, not anonymously over the phone. In the presence of ALL the people. Yes, those people. The people who had condemned her and rejected her and recoiled from her. The people who didn't have what she had. The people whose faith and commitment were not sufficient to draw Jesus' attention. In the presence of those people,

she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed.

The sister testified. She told the story of how she got over. She said she wasn't gonna talk about it but she couldn't keep it to herself. It was like fire shut up in her bones.

When you find a good dentist or a good pediatrician or a good barber, don't you tell everyone you know about it? When you receive a healing from the Good Shepherd, should you do any less? Shouldn't you tell everybody about it, so they can get in on the action too? You're not ashamed to refer someone to your car salesman; why are you ashamed to refer them to your Healer and Redeemer?

She told why she had touched him. She acknowledged her uncleanness before all the people, and she was not ashamed. She was not ashamed, because there was a second clause in that sentence: "how she had been instantly healed." Jesus had taken away her reproach, and now there was no condemnation. She could speak freely of it because now, thanks to the healing power of Jesus, she was free of it.

Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty! I'm free at last!

Then he said to her, "Daughter, ..."

Daughter. ... My child. ... My flesh and blood. ... My baby. ... Possessor of my heritage and bearer of my future. Now you are all this. You used to be all that -- dirty, unwanted, untouchable, unclean -- but now you are all this. What a remarkable, miraculous, sudden reversal. But how?

"Your faith has healed you."

Notice that Jesus doesn't take credit for what had just happened. It happened because of her action, driven by her faith. She reached out to him because she believed. He didn't do anything but show up. He didn't wave his hand or utter a prayer or lay his hands on her. Heck, he wasn't even facing her when she reached out and grabbed the healing that was there waiting for her.

It was available to her as long as she was willing to push through that hostile, disapproving, sanctimonious, celebrity-mad, profane, faith-challenged crowd, which represents the world and the church. She said, "I don't care what they all think about me or believe about him, I'm going to reach out and claim my healing."

Are you ready to claim your healing today? Are you determined enough to fight your way through the obstructing crowd and get close enough to Jesus to receive his readily available healing? Are you prepared to surrender your ego and your pride and your failed efforts to fix things yourself? Are you ready to worship at the feet of the Great Physician and admit and declare that he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords? If you will do these simple things, then and only then will you be able to do as this woman did:

Go in peace.

Monsters among us

A friend of mine who, for obvious reasons, will remain anonymous responded to my "Godfather's Day" post from last summer; it featured Steven Curtis Chapman's song "Cinderella." I've sat on this response for several months now, but what she has to say needs to be heard. A word of warning: It's not pretty. Here, edited, is what she wrote (and gave me permission to use):

I've heard the song several times on the radio and always find it well-written and pretty tuned in as to the likely reality of a good father's perspective.

I'm regrettably a daughter who falls into the "or worse" category of father experiences. Begins with a "p" and most people go to prison for it.

Growing up I held the hope for myself that justice would be served during his time on earth - that's not gonna happen. He's a pillar of the church and his community, smart enough to know that maintaining that status will always provide him access to the young children of family and friends.

Years ago I brought his photo to the police, knowing they couldn't do anything about what he did to me but hoping someone who needed to identify him for their own child would have a way to do that. The detective I spoke with got a sad look on his face and said he would accept the photo but the reality is that people like my dad elude them forever.

I'm childless by choice - and when married, my then-husband and I agreed to remain so - but in my case the overarching reason for that is to not provide my father another victim - knowing that whatever precaution I could take to prevent that would not match his devilish, manipulative cunning. I'm sad at heart about it - even one instance of sexual abuse is soul-eviscerating, but years of it planted in me the seed of severe breakdowns for nearly two decades till I came to terms with the reality of its inception.

So the song - which I do like - and the subject route to profound pain ... the most vicious element being that I've never been anything but helpless as he wrenches children from a state of fairy tale of innocence to a life of pain and distorted perceptions.

That has always been the hardest part by far - and each member of my family watches the emotional disturbance of their own children by blaming their children rather than accept the claim I have made for years about my Teflon father.

For my part, I am now a reporter in the community in which my parents live. In my Father's Day column I included his photo and name - in the subterfuged, muted hope that they might again provide the aid for anyone who would otherwise not have it. My parents relocated to [my town] about 10 years ago from where I grew up, and it has been all tabula rasa for them since.

For what it's worth, I believe most parents of young children fear for their safety from without - strangers, dangerous streets and playgrounds - and either by resolute intent or through ignorance never appreciate the hunting skill of the wolves in their own dens.

I gotta say, the woman's got guts. She permitted me to publish this letter as a service to parents, to warn them to watch for signs of abuse within the family. Be fair, but don't dismiss any possibility -- the monsters among us are counting on your trust.

I'll have more to say in another post.

Cheers

It appears I'm past due on my health updates. 

In short, all is well.

Had a visit with the hematologist a few weeks back; all the numbers were still low, but almost exactly the same as last time. Dr. Jay loves that stability. Her practitioner said, "You are the picture of perfect health."

I even got permission to start drinking alcohol again -- though I'm supposed to limit it to one drink per week. Yeah, right.

Dr. Jay somehow came under the impression that I'm a problem drinker, which has never been true. I did tell her at our initial meeting that I went through a period after my second hernia surgery when my pain medication was not working, so I was drinking more than I should in an effort to dull the pain. But I also told her I had subsequently realized that was not a good strategy and had returned to my normal moderate habits.

I know health professionals are trained to take whatever alcohol consumption a patient self-reports and double it. But even that equation wouldn't add up to much in my case. Nevertheless, in her eyes I'm a drunk and always will be. 

I'll just have to accept that and hoist a pint in her honor.

In a related note, I have regained all the weight I lost, and then some. Had to go out and buy bigger pants today. 

Must be all that beer.

All is well

In case you missed it ...

My doctors have given me a clean bill of health. Praise God! Thank you, Lord!

I already gave the news in the "James at 5:16" post below, but I realize now that the headline is a little vague and I buried the lede. Mea culpa. There's never a copy editor around when you need one.

The paint can results are in now as well, and everything came out fine there, too, so to speak.

(By the way, I'd love to see some comments on these posts. You don't have to sign in or join up to leave a comment. Just use the "Name/URL" option under Comments and write in any name you like. I'd like it best if I knew who you were, though. And while you're at it, feel free to click on any of the links you see on the site. They're risk-free, I promise.)

James at 5:16

"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of the righteous person is powerful and effective." -- James 5:16

My hematologist told me today that my bone marrow biopsy and related blood work showed no sign of cancer, no sign of myelodysplasia, no sign of developing leukemia or lymphoma. They also did a chromosomal study to see if there are any genetic precursors of cancer or other diseases, and there are none.

I got nothin'.

Give God praise for his exceeding grace and mercy, and while you're at it give yourself a pat on the back for sending up some powerful and effective prayer. I thank you from the bottom of my heart and the depths of my spirit.

For a person my age, the makeup of the bone marrow should be roughly 50 percent marrow cells of various types and 50 percent fat. Mine is more like 30-70, but Dr. Jay says that's nothing to be concerned about. The low lymphocyte numbers we've been seeing could have been caused by exposure to some unknown toxin sometime in my past, or I might simply be made that way, she said. Either way, it doesn't seem to be a problem.

The vitamin D deficiency noted in my previous post could indeed be the culprit in my weight loss, but it is not related to the white cells; it's just a coincidence that it happened at the same time, she said. Dr. Jay at first suggested I add a vitamin D supplement to my diet, but backed off that idea when she learned I have a history of kidney stones. She said she would get back to me with a plan for addressing that problem.

Just eat a healthy diet and exercise, she said. See you in three months.

Again, I thank each of you for your love and prayers and support during this worrisome time. I can now exhale and get on with my life, more determined than ever to redeem the time.

What's D problem?

My primary care doctor's office left me a message yesterday to inform me that my most recent blood test showed a vitamin D deficiency.

This could explain my weight loss; one of my sisters lost a frightening amount of weight several years ago, and it turned out to be a vitamin D issue. She's fine now, thank God.

Whether this could account for my missing white cells remains to be seen Monday, when I return to the hematologist for the results of my bone-marrow excavation.

Canned

Another possible explanation for my weight loss, albeit remote, is celiac disease, a disorder of the small intestine.

At my brother-in-law's behest, I asked my family doctor about it the other day when I was in for a regular checkup. Although dubious, she went ahead and ordered (yet another) blood test, as well as something called a fecal fat test. The blood could be done in the office, but for the other thing I had to go to a lab and get a take-home kit.

The lab worker started to bring the kit out to me, but when she saw there were other people in the waiting room she had me come with her behind a closed door. I figured the kit would be like one of those smear tests you do to screen for colon cancer. Instead, what I got is what you see here:





I laughed. "A paint can??" I said. "Basically ... yes," said the woman, trying to keep a straight face but not really succeeding. She admonished me to follow the instructions carefully, make sure nothing gets on the outside of the container and bring the Pail o' Poop back to the lab when it's ready.

"Boy, I hope I don't get confused and accidentally paint my dining room with the contents of that can," I said.

"Yeah," she said. "That's a brown you don't want."

So off I went with my bilge bucket to my lovely wife, who was waiting for me in the truck. "Why are you laughing?" she demanded. "I gotta poop into a paint can!" said I. We sat there and laughed hysterically for several minutes while she read the instructions aloud:

PATIENT PREPARATION FOR COLLECTING STOOL FOR FECAL FAT

Adult patients should be on a standard diet containing 50-150g of fat per day for at least 3 days before test is started and during the 72-hour collection. ... The patient should not have had mineral oil as a laxative prior to specimen collection. Refrigerate specimen during collection and store at 2-8 degrees C.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR SUBMITTING STOOL FOR FECAL FAT

1. Can must contain fecal matter only (i.e., NO urine, toilet paper, diapers, plastic bags, cups, etc.). IF OBJECTS OTHER THAN FECAL MATTER ARE PLACED IN CONTAINER, SAMPLE WILL BE REJECTED.

2. Seal can by hammering lid down securely.

3. Place white plastic ARMLOK ring around can lid and press down with thumbs to "snap" seal.
CANS CANNOT BE SUBMITTED WITHOUT WHITE PLASTIC ARMLOK RING.

4. Do not punch holes in lid.

5. Indicate below collection time:
__ 72 hour collection
__ 48 hour collection
__ 24 hour collection
__ other __ hour collection

6. DO NOT FILL CAN OVER 2/3 FULL. Use additional cans, if necessary, and indicate this information here: CAN #__ of ___ cans collected. (ex.: can #2 of 3 cans)

7. Place can in leak-proof bag containing absorbent sheet and seal bag.











Brings a whole new meaning to "going to the can."

Well, that sucked

On Wednesday I had my bone-marrow biopsy. Do not try this at home. When I showed up at Dr. Jaye's office, the nurse, Pamela, who took my blood asked me if I had someone to drive me home. I did not, as no one had told us what a mess I would be at the conclusion of the procedure. "I don't know if you'll need a sedative or not," Pamela said. "I've never had a bone marrow, so I don't know how painful it is." Oh well, no worries, said I. I'll just tough it out and it will be fine. Ha.

I was told to lie prone on a table and informed that

I "have a good butt for bone marrow."

Why thank you! You really know how to make a guy feel special.

A woman named Maria came in and made small talk for a while before shooting my lower back and left gluteus full of numbing agent. "I'm putting lidocaine in here just like your dentist uses," she told me. "My dentist never works down there," I told her.

The procedure progressed pretty well, with just a couple of painful jolts like a Taser being applied to my pelvis. See, the problem with lidocaine is that the practitioner can't see where it's working and where it isn't, so she just has to start poking and hope for the best. Eventually everything was comfortably numb and Maria inserted the big needle (reportedly the size of a ten-penny nail, which I never saw -- intentionally on their part, I'm sure). She had to puncture the top of the pelvis bone and go into its spongy marrow. "This is going to be a very unusual feeling," she warned me before beginning the next phase, wherein she wiggled the needle around for a while to dislodge some marrow so she could extract it. "'Unusual,'" I said. "Good word. I must admit that is an 'unusual' feeling for me." Maria, a rather tall woman, was standing on a stool next to the table and leaning over me for added leverage, literally reaming me a new hole. I could feel the pressure all the way through to the front.

Just as Maria was finishing up that part and the procedure as a whole, I started to get dizzy and told her so. She leaned over to look at my face and saw that I was turning bright red. She told someone to go get a cold, wet towel and put it on my neck while Maria pulled out the needle and applied a bandage to the wound.

The towel didn't help. I felt close to passing out, so they rolled me over and put another towel over my whole head. My blood pressure clocked in at 148 over 110, which is sky-high for Mr. Mellow with the 90 over 64 baseline. They gave me a sip of apple juice, which I choked on.
Then it got really interesting when my abdominal and throat muscles started convulsing. A nurse named Connie tried to call my lovely wife (MLW) but had trouble figuring out how to use the speed-dial function on my cell, and I couldn't help much because my vocal cords were seizing. When she did figure it out, she couldn't get an answer because it was the one day MLW chose to sleep in.

Maria had the nurses give me IV fluids and left me alone in the room as the convulsions continued. I was pretty scared at this point and was praying, "O God, I don't want to die the way my father did.

"I don't mind coming home to you, but please, Lord, not like this."

Then I just started thanking him over and over again and telling him how much I love him. A peace came over me and the convulsions eased, thanks to the Holy Spirit and saline solution.
My phone rang on the stand next to my table, and I answered it. It was MLW. She thought I had been calling earlier just to say I was done, but realized from my strained voice that something was wrong. I told her I needed her to find a way to get to the hospital and drive me home. She caught our next-door neighbor Marg just as she was leaving for work. By the time MLW got to the hospital, I had been moved to the chemo room and was pretty much back to normal. (Insert wisecrack here.)

We ran into Pamela, the blood-drawing nurse, on the way out. "By the way," I told her, "the next time you have a patient come in for a bone marrow, give the sedative, and make sure they have a ride home. It hurts -- a lot -- and bad things happen."

Blood simple

During 2007 my white blood-cell count kept falling inexplicably. I was sent to a highly regarded hematologist, who didn't want to jump to any conclusions but cautiously told me there was a possibility of some pretty serious conditions, including lymphoma.

Dr. Jaye (that's her first initial; her last name is Srinivashia, but she's universally known as Dr. Jaye and is even paged that way at the hospital) chose a wait-and-see approach. She suggested adding a vitamin B-6 supplement to my diet because it plays a role in bone marrow development. She also suggested an iron supplement to boost my production of platelets, which were also marginally low.

My lovely and I had already changed our diet to eliminate almost all processed foods and junk food, as well as red meat. Dr. Jaye recommended eating red meat once a week or so, to get vitamin B-1, whcih simply isn't available from any other source. So we relented on the red meat but have stuck pretty well to the rest of the diet.

After my October visit, Dr. Jaye told me to come back in three months. That would give the diet and lifestyle changes time to have an effect on the bone marrow and blood counts. It would also allow her to observe any changes in the two spots on my liver that appeared on a CT scan.

Fast-forward three months to January 28, 2008.

(You can read my last previous post if it helps fill the gap.) I'm feeling physically well and emotionally confident.

They send in the warm-up act first, a very nice Nigerian PA (physician's assistant) who shows me the report on my most recent CT: The liver spots have become almost invisible and are harmless -- probably cysts.

(The report notes that "the stomach is completely empty," which isn't surprising since I was in the midst of a four-day total fast for spiritual purposes. Our church, Free Chapel, engages in a 21-day fast every January; it starts with a three-day total fast, then becomes a Daniel fast consisting of fruits and vegetables only. Our pastor, Jentezen Franklin, has just released a new book on the spiritual discipline of fasting.)

The PA also notes that my platelet count has gone from 108 in October to 109 now. That's a bit below normal range (140-440), but it's stable and therefore nothing to get worked up about, she says.

So now I'm feeling really confident that all this nonsense is about over with.

Then Dr. Jaye comes in.

My overall white-cell count came in at a low, low 2.9 per deciliter; the normal range is 4.8 to 10.8. That's not good.

During my very first visit with Dr. Jaye, she mentioned doing a bone-marrow biopsy, but didn't want to do it because it's invasive and painful. However, now she was stumped and out of options, so she said the biopsy was needed to find an answer.

The specific condition she's looking to identify or rule out is myelodysplasia, which she described as underdeveloped bone marrow. Untreated, it eventually can lead to leukemia, lymphoma or multiple myeloma, all of which are forms of cancer.

Research I later did on the Internet indicated myelodysplasia can be treated with medication, and if that doesn't work, a bone-marrow transplant is a treatment option. The preferred donor pool for transplants is siblings, since they are the only candidates with whom the patient shares both parents, which increases the odds of a tissue match. Should it come to that (and let's pray it doesn't), I am blessed with an unusually large pool of potential donors -- six sisters and four brothers, several of whom have already expressed their willingness to become donors. Thanks, you guys.

The adventure that was 2007

The year 2007 started with a bang. That was the sound of my abdominal wall bursting open with a hernia the size of my hand. I had just had one repaired on my left side in August of 2006, but this time I opted for the larger, roomier model on the right side. Never settle.

Meanwhile, I was struggling a bit in the new job under the thumb of a certain supervisor. His constant badgering and efforts at public humiliation inspired nervousness in me that led to even more mistakes, and I actually had a panic attack at work one January night in anticipation of screwing up an important task. I truly feared I wasn't going to make it in this job, but a couple of key friends back home were praying for me and helped me get through. They convinced me that the Lord didn't bring me this far to drop me now.

Anyway, the body shop patched me up in mid-February, but

I soon noticed that I was rapidly losing weight -- 14 pounds in six weeks.

The surgeon said people don't typically lose weight with hernia surgery, so I should see my primary care physician. So I had a complete physical and blood work, which indicated my white-cell count was a little low. The doc had it redone to make sure it wasn't a glitch, and it came out even lower, so she sent me to a gastroenterologist, Dr. Harris (I had also complained of getting full after a couple of bites), and a hematologist, Dr. Jaye.

Over the next few months I had an abdominal CT scan, a colonoscopy, an esophagogastroduodenoscopy (aka upper endoscopy or EGD), a pelvic X-ray, a capsule endoscopy (for which I swallowed a tiny camera and walked around all day with electronic equipment harnessed to my torso) and a gastric emptying study (for which I ate radioactive oatmeal and lay on a table while a sensor determined how quickly it moved through my system).

All of which led to exactly nothing in the way of diagnosis. Granted, I did learn that all those systems are in fine working order. But the question of my low white-cell count remained unanswered.

My first meeting with Dr. Jaye went well until she used the word "lymphoma." That got my attention, let me tell you.

After a difficult and disappointing search, we found and joined an excellent church with a terrific preacher. Free Chapel, led by the Rev. Jentezen ("Jensen") Franklin, is 45 miles away in Gainesville, Georgia, but it makes for a nice Sunday morning drive. The Spirit is present there and the teaching is Rock-solid. The music rocks, too.

During the summer, I read the book "What Would Jesus Eat" by Don Colbert. As a result, my lovely wife and I practically eliminated processed food from our diet, started living on whole grains and fresh fruits and vegetables and cut way back on the alcohol. We have stuck with that regimen, and guess what? Food tastes better and we feel better.

However, she has not lost much weight and I have not gained back much, and my white-cell count continues to drop and puzzle everyone. More on that in another post.

Just after my return to work in March after my surgery, God gave me the best birthday present ever: I learned that the evil boss, who is from another country known for bad teeth, was effectively being fired as the company had declined to renew his work visa. He would have to leave the country in late fall. Hallelujah! Thank you, Jesus!

Thou, O Lord, art a shield for me; my Glory, you lift my head!

In August I got away from him even sooner than expected when I grabbed an opportunity to move to the morning shift after 16 years of working nights. He managed to avoid deportation and got his work visa renewed after all, but he's been removed from his supervisory position and our paths almost never cross anymore.

The year ended well as my lovely and I took 10 days around Thanksgiving to visit friends and family in Ohio, Illinois and Michigan. Then my 6-year-old goddaughter and her family moved in December from Florida to Marietta, Georgia, a scant 25 miles from our home. They went to church with us on the Sunday before Christmas and then came to our house, where we baked a birthday cake for Jesus.

All in all, I can't believe how blessed I am. Thank you, Lord.

Allow me to introduce myself

Hello and welcome. I've been meaning to start a blog for more than a year now, ever since I moved to Georgia, and now I've finally hauled off and done it.

I'm not using my real name for now because I'm not sure what I might say about certain things and people. I work for a high-profile company that might look askance at certain things, so I'm erring on the side of caution. If you're looking for a certain person's blog and are not sure you've found it, check my profile; anyone who knows me well will recognize me in the details.

My plans for the blog are to tell about my adventure in pulling up stakes and moving to the South from Ohio; to document a health challenge I'm going through right now; and to share my thoughts about faith and other subjects.

I hope you enjoy it.