Unsolved Mystery

”The secret things belong to the Lord our God...” Deuteronomy 29:29a

Well the mystery continues. God has given man such brilliant minds, enabling us to learn & gain such an abundance of knowledge & understanding about the amazingly complex human body and the entirety of the universe that He created with a word! We can shoot men in rockets into outer space to land on the moon, we know that the burning ball of fire (aka the sun) is almost 94 million miles from our earth (placed perfectly by the Creator to give us light & warmth but not freeze or burn us), we can study distant planets with telescopes and the inside of a single cell with a microscope, we can cut people open to repair or replace vital organs, remove brain tumors, deliver babies, and fix broken bones, we can inject contrast into the circulatory system and “see” inside through magnetic resonance imaging (& other high tech means) to diagnose illness....but they can’t figure out why I'm experiencing this intermittent pain in my right upper chest, nowhere near the surgical site where the portacath hub was implanted and also not where the catheter feeds into the vein. My sweet & smart oncologist called with the results, “Good news! No pulmonary embolism seen on CT!” All the chest CT angiogram showed was some soft tissue swelling in the area of the sternum which may account for my sore throat (a regular sore throat but also it feels like something is choking me when I lean forward ...?!).  He encouraged anti inflammatory analegics (aka Motrin) for the swelling and pain.  I hadn’t been taking anything for pain (except Tylenol a couple days post-op) as I didn’t want to mask the pain & I could tolerate it. I wanted to monitor the intensity and nature of it. When the two most serious potential culprits were ruled out (pneumothorax & pulmonary embolism), I figured I’d take some Motrin to help with the pain & swelling. Ah, I feel great! Surprise surprise 🤗. I think the infamous “chemo brain” kicked in already- when many of you reached out to ask how I was feeling, I said “My chest feels so much better! Maybe the iodine contrast cleared me out!”...totally forgetting I felt better bc I had meds on board...masking the symptoms. I was awakened in the middle of the night, the pesky pain returned for a visit so I got up to send him away again with Motrin & return to dreamland instead...pain eventually left but sleep didn’t come. Instead, I was writing all kinds of blogs in my head (hopefully I can get it all from my brain to the blog one of these days). So the saga continues...discomfort persists, controllable, and still a mystery. 

Choosing to “trust in the Lord with all (my) heart, not leaning on my own (or my brilliant doctors') understanding. In all my ways, Lord, I acknowledge You, knowing You will make straight my paths.

Proverbs 3:5-6

Knowing “my thoughts are not Your thoughts, neither are Your ways my ways,” as You declare, oh Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are Your ways higher than my ways and Your thoughts than my thoughts.”

Isaiah 55:8-9

“Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure.” Psalm 147:5

I know You know the number of hairs on my head, every cell in my body, & the cause of this mysterious pain...and I know You & trust the unknown to You. (Drop the mic)

 I wrote this days ago but had trouble posting it so my apologies for the delayed response to my prayer request a few days ago.  The symptoms aren't completely gone but I'd say there's some improvement everyday.  The pain is definitely tolerable and knowing we've ruled out the two most critical possibilities, I can rest easy knowing and tolerating it ok.