I realize that I have not blogged in a while. Simply because I lost interest. I had a great call to a great church. I did not feel the need to really air my hurt and disgust at the church anymore simply because I was in a place of healing and repair. It was a reciprocal process. The church needed me as I needed it. I can honestly say that if my ministry ended completely, at least I served a church that was indeed, trying to BE the church. So, to bring you up to speed. I left that call to pursue my passion of professional chaplaincy. It has been a wonderful, eye opening, and self-revealing process and experience. One that I am forever thankful and grateful for, as I feel I am being reborn all over again. It is at once, a beautiful and painful process of self-discovery in terms of knowing who the hell I am, where I come from, how I behave, what motivations are there, understanding teaming, etc. It is full of parallel process. I see patients everyday who make me think of something in my own life. This has been one of the most challenging aspects of this experience for me. No one really likes to look into a mirror to see what's really revealed. In this case, when I see others, it is at times, like looking into a mirror to see a reflection of who I am, and what I am.
Not long ago, I was paged to a Code Blue. A code blue is when a patient is all of a sudden unresponsive meaning the heart has stopped, the patient is not breathing, no pulse, etc. I arrived to the room, only to see around 18 people working as hard as they could to revive this man. I stood outside the room as I was told only medical people were allowed in the room. This was the first time I felt "out of place" by an MD. But I respected the situation and chose to be a presence on the side. When all was said and done, I accompanied the patient down to ICU with the cardiologist and RN. The patient was wheeled into a room, medical people did what they had to do to settle him into the surroundings, and I was there alone with him. This is where I looked into the mirror. The patient was a large man, pushing at least 450. He was in his mid-50's, not married, no children or family present. Here he was hooked to tubes and wires, was intubated, and all I could see was myself. I thought to myself, "If I continue to eat and not exercise the way I have been doing all these years, I will end up like this guy." This is the purest definition of parallel process as it gets. Although he really didn't have family, I felt so much compassion for this man. It is the sad part that when the MD tried to contact the one emergency contact, he could not be found.
The next day, my colleague was on call and was paged to come to ICU. The patient that I had prayed for and saw myself in, died. The heart attack was so severe that the only was he was kept alive was through machines. Once family had been contacted and brought in the patient's advanced medical directive, it was found that he did not want to be in his present state of being kept artificially alive. This man was extubated, wires and tubes removed, IV gone, and left to die a natural death where his heart would just stop. The next week, I found his obituary online and it was fairly small, no back story or family mentioned. Name, age, time of death, funeral and burial information were the only bits of information offered. I was sad to see such a few words to speak about this man who obviously had a story, but perhaps someone did not feel it was important that it be at least mentioned to celebrate his life.
Last Wednesday morning, I woke up at about 0430 with chest pains. They were severe enough to get me out of bed. I got dressed, packed the man-child and dropped him off, and went north thinking I was heading into work. Instead I took a detour into St. Mary's. By this time, my chest was hurting. When you go to the ER and say you have chest pains, it does not take long for people to surround you and get you on telemetry and take an EKG. I was also given some meds to open blood vessels and oh yeah, calm me down. They moved me into a heart observation area by the ER where I am fairly sure RNs play cards to see who will be on shift for these rooms. I still have no clue who my nurse was for the night I was there. Long story short, I took a physical stress test which did not last too long. I was then given a nuclear test (chemical test) to stress my heart that way. Let's say it was one of the worst feelings I have ever experienced. They then took pics of my heart under stress, and the plan was to keep me overnight and take pics of my heart in the AM of my heart at rest. They did both. In the morning the MD came in and I quote, "Well, the bad news is that the cardiologist thinks he may have found something on your heart. He cannot say for sure because it might be what's called an artifact (a blur) or it could be a blockage." I immediately stopped listening to what the MD said next. It was like listening to the Charlie Brown teacher. She left and I sat on the bed and cried. I was scared. My mind immediately went to, "On my God, I am going to die." I was all alone in that moment and all I could think about was my wife and kids. It was a moment I will never forget. I am going to see a cardiologist to talk about options. I might need to have an exploratory procedure done to see if there is a blockage. If there is, they can stent it. I am still scared and yet this has forced me to change my lifestyle right NOW.
You know, this whole experience of being in a clinical residency where I get to be a student of the soul is both revealing and affirming who God is making me to be. There are moments of revelation that are not pleasant because then I have to confront my growth areas. These are the moments that as painful as they are, I am thankful for them. It means that I am changing, I am evolving, and I am transforming into a better man of God. I work in a place that reminds me that life is a gift. Life is precious. Death can occur at any moment of our lives. If there is a reminder I see at the hospital weekly, is that there is a fine line between life and death. People who continue to smoke, eat anything and everything they want, remain addicted to substances, or continue to ignore the MD's orders to simply take their medications; these are ones who ride that fine line. I want to expand that line from life to death as far as I can because I am worth it. My friends are worth it. My family is worth it. I have more life I want to live. And by God, I am going to be conscious of being a healthy person who takes care of himself because from here, new life is possible.
Not long ago, I was paged to a Code Blue. A code blue is when a patient is all of a sudden unresponsive meaning the heart has stopped, the patient is not breathing, no pulse, etc. I arrived to the room, only to see around 18 people working as hard as they could to revive this man. I stood outside the room as I was told only medical people were allowed in the room. This was the first time I felt "out of place" by an MD. But I respected the situation and chose to be a presence on the side. When all was said and done, I accompanied the patient down to ICU with the cardiologist and RN. The patient was wheeled into a room, medical people did what they had to do to settle him into the surroundings, and I was there alone with him. This is where I looked into the mirror. The patient was a large man, pushing at least 450. He was in his mid-50's, not married, no children or family present. Here he was hooked to tubes and wires, was intubated, and all I could see was myself. I thought to myself, "If I continue to eat and not exercise the way I have been doing all these years, I will end up like this guy." This is the purest definition of parallel process as it gets. Although he really didn't have family, I felt so much compassion for this man. It is the sad part that when the MD tried to contact the one emergency contact, he could not be found.
The next day, my colleague was on call and was paged to come to ICU. The patient that I had prayed for and saw myself in, died. The heart attack was so severe that the only was he was kept alive was through machines. Once family had been contacted and brought in the patient's advanced medical directive, it was found that he did not want to be in his present state of being kept artificially alive. This man was extubated, wires and tubes removed, IV gone, and left to die a natural death where his heart would just stop. The next week, I found his obituary online and it was fairly small, no back story or family mentioned. Name, age, time of death, funeral and burial information were the only bits of information offered. I was sad to see such a few words to speak about this man who obviously had a story, but perhaps someone did not feel it was important that it be at least mentioned to celebrate his life.
Last Wednesday morning, I woke up at about 0430 with chest pains. They were severe enough to get me out of bed. I got dressed, packed the man-child and dropped him off, and went north thinking I was heading into work. Instead I took a detour into St. Mary's. By this time, my chest was hurting. When you go to the ER and say you have chest pains, it does not take long for people to surround you and get you on telemetry and take an EKG. I was also given some meds to open blood vessels and oh yeah, calm me down. They moved me into a heart observation area by the ER where I am fairly sure RNs play cards to see who will be on shift for these rooms. I still have no clue who my nurse was for the night I was there. Long story short, I took a physical stress test which did not last too long. I was then given a nuclear test (chemical test) to stress my heart that way. Let's say it was one of the worst feelings I have ever experienced. They then took pics of my heart under stress, and the plan was to keep me overnight and take pics of my heart in the AM of my heart at rest. They did both. In the morning the MD came in and I quote, "Well, the bad news is that the cardiologist thinks he may have found something on your heart. He cannot say for sure because it might be what's called an artifact (a blur) or it could be a blockage." I immediately stopped listening to what the MD said next. It was like listening to the Charlie Brown teacher. She left and I sat on the bed and cried. I was scared. My mind immediately went to, "On my God, I am going to die." I was all alone in that moment and all I could think about was my wife and kids. It was a moment I will never forget. I am going to see a cardiologist to talk about options. I might need to have an exploratory procedure done to see if there is a blockage. If there is, they can stent it. I am still scared and yet this has forced me to change my lifestyle right NOW.
You know, this whole experience of being in a clinical residency where I get to be a student of the soul is both revealing and affirming who God is making me to be. There are moments of revelation that are not pleasant because then I have to confront my growth areas. These are the moments that as painful as they are, I am thankful for them. It means that I am changing, I am evolving, and I am transforming into a better man of God. I work in a place that reminds me that life is a gift. Life is precious. Death can occur at any moment of our lives. If there is a reminder I see at the hospital weekly, is that there is a fine line between life and death. People who continue to smoke, eat anything and everything they want, remain addicted to substances, or continue to ignore the MD's orders to simply take their medications; these are ones who ride that fine line. I want to expand that line from life to death as far as I can because I am worth it. My friends are worth it. My family is worth it. I have more life I want to live. And by God, I am going to be conscious of being a healthy person who takes care of himself because from here, new life is possible.
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