Four on the Fourth

We especially enjoyed celebrating the Independence Day holiday this year since it was four years to the day since Susan's emergency brain surgery. She was diagnosed with her brain tumor in late June 2007 and had been scheduled for a craniotomy two weeks later, but Susan's worsening pain and sluggishness found us driving to Long Beach Memorial on July 3rd. She had a seizure in the car on the way and had to be wheeled into ER. She was moved to ICU that night when her condition became more critical. She wouldn’t regain consciousness for another 36 hours. More brain scans followed the next day and led the neurosurgeon to recommend surgery right away. Friends and family left their July 4th parties and gathered in the hospital chapel to pray. The mood lightened when Dr. Javahery reported a successful surgery and that Susan was doing well.
 
July 5th brought Susan's new awakening into brain tumor world. She knew me, but initially didn’t remember we had kids and had to be introduced to the idea of them. She didn’t know what had happened and couldn’t understand it when I told her she’d had brain surgery. I’ll always remember death was near that morning. The best way to describe it is not that she almost died; but that death was near. She wondered who was asking her to give up her spirit. Stunned by her question, I wondered if I was going to watch my wife die in front of me. I’d already given her to the Lord for the good of his will, so I told Susan that if she needed to go, it was okay. We don’t know what sort of spiritual exchange took place as several silent minutes passed; but the threshold where she found herself slowly dissolved. Susan would live.
 
It was a memorable episode, another in what was becoming a string of extraordinary events. We pressed on into the fullness of brain tumor world – a second craniotomy; then radiation, chemotherapy, rehab, and complications that would dip us back into crisis mode again and again. There was more rehab, and more improvement. Crisis mode became chronic mode, which has become normal life. Recalling our low points makes the height of Susan's progress that much sweeter. She’s still doing about the best yet since this journey started. It feels good to refer to her as a four-year survivor of glioblastoma multiforme.
 
We enjoyed a long and relaxing Independence Day weekend at the family cabin, just the two of us. We remembered July 4th 2007 repeatedly and in prayer, giving thanks to God for how far he’s brought us. Susan had her first walk in the mountains in four years, if you don’t count ambling between car door and cabin door. We made it more than half way up our road and back, stopping frequently along the way so Susan could catch her breath while we observed our surroundings – this family’s cabin, that type of tree, the northern ridge concealing Big Bear. She was wiped out and needed a good nap when we got back; but our walk was a highlight of the weekend.
 

Lately I’ve heard the word “miracle” come up in chatting with people about Susan. “That’s a miracle” or “She’s a miracle,” they say. I wonder about that. I wonder what it would be like to wake up one morning and see my wife as she was in 2005, slender and blonde, scrambling off to the dental office in the SUV I now drive, before her breast and brain cancers. That would be a great miracle. But then I think about how I once came up with my own definition of a miracle after spending time in prayer. Ironically, I think it was in 2005. “A miracle is nothing more than God’s provision at the point of human need.” In that case, she’s a miracle. A great miracle.