Cradled in His Loving Arms
Lately, I've felt closer to God than I have in a long while. To look at my life over the past couple months, you might not think so. There hasn't been any horrible sin pattern or anything like that. Let me try to explain the various things I've been through, while hopefully communicating why I feel as I do.
The end of January 2005, I started experiencing spasms in various muscles during the night. Sometimes my arms, other times a leg or both legs. At the end of February, it became more intense, and began to take over more of my body. It started to interfere with my sleep, and finally I was not really able to sleep at all. I would recover from one episode, and then soon ,another would start. Sometimes as frequently as every half hour. During this time, I got weaker physically.
I started to seek medical attention at this point, but I probably should have done this a lot sooner. I feel the earlier episodes were God trying to get my attention to this matter, but He also knows that I tend to be stubborn when it comes to going to a doctor. I never call out from work for just a runny nose or a cough. I have to be really sick before the thought of calling out enters my mind. I've missed very few days from work . I have been blessed most of the time with pretty good health.
At the start of my full body episodes, I began to enlist the prayers of a large circle of friends, coworkers, former classmates, family members, etc. The worse things seemed to be getting physically, with no apparent answers, the more people I enlisted to pray. I know that God worked through those prayers, and continues today to do so. Even now, people are still praying for me and asking for updates on how I am doing..
My primary doctor ordered some lab work and set me up for a CT scan.He referred me to my neurologist with an appointment set for late March. It would have been approximately a month after the whole body episodes started happening before I was supposed to see the neurologist. I called the neuroloist's office on my own, and was able to get the appointment date moved up about a week. The lab work came back mostly normal with a few abnormalities. The CT scan was negative. In the meantime, my seizures ended me in the emergency room twice in 24 hours. The first time, they just watched me for an hour. They checked my electorlyte levels to make sure they were balanced and sent me home with a sleep aid prescription. It wasn't that I wasn't tired, but simply when I tried to get to a certain level of sleep, my body wouldn't let me. The sleep aid made things worse instead of better. I seized harder and more frequently than the night before.. The second visit, I actually had a small episode while in the waiting room, so they were able to observe what was going on. Still they sent me home with the same recommendations.
After my first night of full body seizures, I had moved out onto the couch in the living room to avoid falling out of bed and possibly injuring myself. After a few nights of calling out to my roommate so he could monitor me during the seizure episodes, he joined me in the living room on the love seat. He attempted to sleep there in between my episodes. Thus, both of us began to be affected by little sleep. I was having the actual episodes, and Pete was helping me get through them. Several times, he had to catch me as my episodes stopped and I collapsed in exhaustion. This pattern repeated itself over the night.
Through Pete's persistence in bugging me about it and my persistence in calling the neurologist's office, I was able to have the office visit and several tests done within the period of a week. These included an EEG, a sleep study, more lab work, and an MRI. There was a follow up visit after all the testing, In the interim, I was given a couple of prescriptions which have alleviated my symptoms for almost four weeks now. My struggle is not over, and this may even turn into a lifetime battle. I will probably be phased off one medication over the coming weeks, and the one I remain on is able to control the symptoms with occasional monitoring by my neurologist.
Through it all, I feel like God is cradling me in His arms. He's been watching over me, comforting me when I'm scared, and preparing me for how He intends to use this in my life. Some people have commented on my attitude during this. I can only attribute it back to God. I often repeated Scripture to myself during this time. I found strength in passages such as Deutronomy 33:12 and Psalm 36:7.
I also didn't try to hide my fear. I won't tell you I wasn't afraid many times because I was. I simply cried out to Him and let Him know that I was scared to death. Something He already knew was in my heart.. In all my prayers, I still affirmed my trust in Him and His plan. He knew what was happening to me and why. He also knew what was planned for my life through this.
I had many people praying for me and found great comfort in that. I felt His strength in me physically as well. There were many days after seizing all night that my natural body should have been too weak to stand up for long. Sometimes it was even difficult to stand on weakened muscles for the time required to shower. Not only did I stand, but I only missed three days of work during this time. I had shorter shifts twice to accomodate the tests. I still patiently and courteously waited on my customers. I realize now the only way I was able to do what I was doing, was Jesus Christ was physically living in me and carrying me through those times.
Over the past few weeks, I've found myself shedding tears of joy in gratitude for what He has done for me. I pray that He will show me not only how to continue to live with this condition, but to use what He's given me to bring glory to Him.
Maybe my story can inspire someone else living through difficulty. It may even prepare me in a unique way to minister to others who must deal with such things. So, I present this with a humble heart to demonstrate how God has cradled me in His loving arms.
Update: October 4, 2007. Still seizure free since March 7, 2005. I've had a couple of times where I thought I was going to have a seizure because of running out of my medication or other medication that would counter the effects of my seizure medicine. In all cases, they were fairly minor symptoms and easily controlled with another medicine I still had from back in 2005 that I had been able to stop taking with directions from my neurologist. I occasionally have momentary lapses of memory, but it's really small things such as names or things like that.