“The Beast” or "How are you doing?"

My favorite rollercoaster of all time is the Beast at a place called Kings Island in Cincinnati Ohio. I’ve been on plenty that were faster and higher etc. etc, but the Beast has two things going for it. It was one of the coolest rollercoasters in the world when I was a just barely tall enough to ride it, and even more importantly it is so long it has two hill that you have to be cranked up. Sure you have to wait in an obscenely long line, but at least the ride is so long you get cranked up a second hill (I think it clocks out at 4 minutes something). It’s an old wooden rollercoaster so you really feel it when you ride. (for some reason that’s supposed to be fun). It is full of twists and turns, little hills, and, of course, a bunch of giant ones.
I’m guessing that I really don’t have to unpack where I’m going with this. This whole experience is, as people have told me time and again, a rollercoaster. But it’s not just any rollercoaster, it’s “The Beast.” It isn’t the longest rollercoaster a person could go through, it’s not the “fastest”, it is not the most difficult challenge one would have to face, but I think it is safe to say it is no kiddy ride either. There are twists and turns, ups and downs, and I suspect there is another huge hill to be cranked up coming sometime in the future, but I have yet to get there so we’ll just have to wait and see. Today is a perfect example of this. There were ups and downs, twists, and turns galore, and just like riding ‘The Beast” I kind of feel like I have whip lash. Here are a few of the highlights.
Evidently this started last night at about 2 in the morning when the nurse watching our little ones called. I am told I talked to her; I have no recollection of this. After I got off the phone Mary Jane realized I was had slept my way through the entire conversation and commandeered my cell phone for the rest of the night. Again, I have no recollection of this. The first evidence I had something was amiss came a couple hours later when Mary Jane was handing me my cell phone back and telling me she was going to the hospital but that she didn’t think I had to rush there yet, but maybe I would have to, but for now plan on preaching. My intelligent response...how’d you get my phone. Like I said, I was asleep.
To speed the story up somewhat....Emma Jane started going up on her CO2 levels. Her latest blood gas came back alarmingly high. As the day unfolded we discovered that a good portion of her right lung had collapsed. I mistakenly believed this was something left over from surgery when I first heard about it, but it turns out it is much more likely this is a result of bad intubation tube placement (is there a name for the intubation tube? Probably. Do I have any idea what it is? No. Do I care 20 hours after all this started. Nope....sorry medical professionals reading this). Her lungs were also all gunky with liquid. The nurses got in there suctioned out a whole bunch of liquid and then the doctors fixed the tube and turned up her volume. If I understand this right the basic idea is that you increase the pressure and it sort of re-inflates like a balloon. If I’m 6 steps of crazy here Mary Jane will tell me tomorrow, and I will fix it then.
Where was I during all of this? Well I was at Church. We had three services this morning and I was the guy on deck for preaching, and I was determined, as long as Emma Jane was stable and in no immediate danger to stick things out and not leave my supervising pastor in a bind (I should mention he has been exceedingly accommodating and if I had needed to go he would have been the first to kick me out the door). At the end of every service, instead of walking to the back of the sanctuary where I usually go to greet people I ducked out the side, went into the vestry and called Mary Jane to get an update and find out pieces of this story as it was unfolding, as well as find out whether I was going to be running to my car or preaching the next service. (so, if you go to Salem and are reading this, and were wondering where I was...that’s where...) Every conversation this morning ended with something like “Honey”
(actually “honey isn’t the one of the cutesy names I have for Mary Jane, but I figure she doesn’t want me typing those on a blog that people seem to actually be reading, because then people at work and stuff would start calling her “honey...or whatever” to tease her, which is never any fun, but when I think about it maybe all this secrecy is just stupid because they’re pretty innocuous names and I use them in public without thinking and so most people probably already know them, and...hmmmm...this sentence got away from me)
“Do I need to get come there? Do you need me there with you?” And she would respond with something like, “No, all I’m doing is sitting here feeling like I’m going to throw up and you can just as easily do that at church while preaching.” So I stayed.
After Church I rushed over to the hospital. After a while it became apparent Emma Jane was stable. Mary Jane hadn’t slept for an incredibly long period of time, so she went home for a nap, while I stayed for a while with the girls. While there I held Parker. Parker’s day had been remarkably better than Emma Jane’s. She had her first poop without the help of a suppository (it was huge! She pooped over an ounce. An ounce!?! That is a sizeable portion of her weight). For the first time since her surgery she was completely back to her wiggly self. She thrashed and was annoying to every nurse who tried to do anything from listen to her heart to change her diaper. The girl has actually improved in her monkey like wiggling abilities. When lying on her tummy she can turn her head from the left (imagine her on her belly with the head facing to the left lying on her right ear) to the right (imagine her on her belly with the head facing to the right lying on the left ear). It was incredible to watch. She kept bouncing herself back and forth like she was some 1 year old getting comfortable and not a 29 weeks from conception year old (we should talk about the relativity of age sometime soon and how confused I am about how old they are and if we are really wanting to have fun with it, we’ll take it a step further and talk about the implications this has on “when life begins” but that will be nice and controversial...and is a longer post for another day). I just kept watching her do it and thinking...huh. Then she decided to really have some fun and ripped off her leads. I’m sitting in Emma Jane’s room talking with the nurse as she suctions Emma Jane again (or was doing something like that, I can’t recall exactly what at that point) and I notice the part of the monitor that is showing what is going on in Parker’s room has suddenly turned to question marks. So I causally said, “Jeannette is there a reason Parker doesn’t have a heart beat?” If you’re looking for sentences that get people’s attention quickly... Of course it didn’t take either of us long to realize she must have pulled off her leads. Really isn’t anything else that would do that. We go in to check on her and...sure enough, the sneaky little monkey had them on her arms. (Which is not to say she placed them there...now that would be amazing).
Later I held Parker. She looked around in amazement with her fully opened eyes as I sang little snippets of songs to her. She seemed to be trying to figure out where the sound was coming from. As I sat there, with Emma Jane struggling in the other room, and Parker (currently) doing so well, it hit me again. How am I doing? No idea. Look back at this story. I’m happy, I’m scared, I’m thankful, I’m frustrated, I’m anxious, and I’m in love with the three incredible women the Lord has blessed me with (wife and 2 daughters...in case you were confused). What’s more, I’m feeling all these emotions pretty much simultaneously. So yeah...that’s today.