Homeward Bound
First off, we are finally home... well, in a manner of speaking at least. I'm actually typing this on the way to Cincinnati, but we're not at the hospital anymore, and we were sleeping in our own beds last night, so that's good enough for me!
Long story short, we were readmitted on Saturday night with an occluded PICC line and had to wait until Monday for the PICC team to get in and fix it. The plan was to have them replace the line since none of the nurses that tried could get it to draw back or push anything through it. Saturday and Sunday came and went with visits from some good friends and Monday arrived.
Linden had been fasting since midnight Sunday night and was a grumpy girl on Monday morning. I was home with a sick boy who caught something at the hospital during one of his visits so I wasn't able to help Laura distract her. It was looking like it was going to be a long day, but then came a PICC line nurse to the rescue. She fiddled with the line for about a minute and a half and had it fixed... seriously. Praise God! This cut hours off of our waiting time on the PICC team and kept Linden from having to be sedated, PLUS she got to eat immediatly. Talk about a happy baby.
Some of our amazing friends offered to juggle kids and watch Graham while I headed to pick up Laura and Lindy Lu. Home at last.
Hands and feet
I wanted to quickly share one of the things that the Lord has been teaching me through the last few months.
I remember in November when Laura had spent weeks prepping for Grahams 3rd birthday party and had spent most of the day getting decorations ready for the evening celebration. If you know anything about Laura, you know that birthdays are a HUGE deal. Graham's party was no exception. She was SO excited to celebrate with him.
That was the first time Linden got sick post-surgery. She wasn't doing well and Laura had to leave an hour before Graham's big party to take Linden to the ER. She missed Graham's party, heartbroken, and had to spend the entire night caring for a sick baby.
I remember being frustrated and questioning where the Lord was in the situation. Of all the days to have Linden get sick, it had to fall on the day of Graham's party. I prayed a lot that night, and I remember thinking that it sure would be nice sometimes if instead of praying and trusting God to work on our behalf, he would send an angel or some magic genie or have some physical presenece in this world that would let me know He was doing something now.
That next morning I remember our good friend Marcia taking Graham super early and watching him that whole day (and almost the entire next week). Another friend Matt Knobloch offered to drive me 45 minutes to Peoria before he went to work that day since Laura had taken our car the night before. Before I left Marcia's house, she told me she would be praying for us and gave me money for lunch. When Matt picked me up, he brought a huge mug of coffee, talked to me the whole way over about Linden and how he could relate with his son Henry, then gave me money for dinner that night. While these might seem like little things, the Lord revealed clearly to my heart that day that he uses His own people in this world to be his hands and feet to His children in need.
Every time we head to the hospital to deal with another round of infections and late nights, I am again reminded of this truth the through kindness, compassion, and generosity of others. Money for gas, text messages in the middle of the night, giftcards for food, little girls selling bookmarks to raise money, friends running in Linden's honor, pastors mowing our lawn, prayers and kind facebook messages from strangers, all of these and countless other acts of unrepaid kindness teach us that while we often look for God in the large and the loud, he more often works in the silence as He whispers His will to the hearts of His children.