Praise Report

I would like to pick up where I left off with my story from December 31, 2015. At the end of December I wrote that I was in a place of vulnerability. A foreign place, a place I had never been, a place I didn’t want to stay, however, this place is where I learned and gained my strength. I told the story of how I was now in the hospital after my second surgery. I was being pushed to walk and become active at least three times a day. I had to push through the pain; I required help up and down from the bed and with basic everyday functions. This continued for a week, and each day I got a little stronger.

Every day my husband would push the visiting hours to stay as long as he could because I had a roommate and hospital rules prohibited someone of the opposite sex from staying overnight. He would stay until nearly midnight most nights and return again as early as 7:00 or 8:00 a.m. the next morning. We tried to get a private room so he could stay, but my name was at the bottom of the list. On Thursday, one of the nurses informed me that someone had been moved and I could now finally have my own room. I was elated! My husband could stay the night. Friends came by and it was like being “normal” again in the privacy and comfort of our own home. That night the nurses mentioned that I might possibly go home and that was the best news I had heard in a long time.

The next morning around 5:00 a.m. when the nurses came in to check on me the first question I asked was, “Has it been confirmed that I’m going home today?” After checking with my oncologist the nurse was able to confirm that I was going home. I arranged for my grandfather to pick me up from the hospital because he had a truck and I had already learned after my first surgery that a truck would be easier to crawl in and out of and to minimize the effects of speed bumps etc. My husband, on the other hand, packed up the room filled with flowers, edible arrangements and teddy bears and headed home to prepare the house for my arrival.

Upon leaving he ran into my oncologist who yelled out, “Reverend Bridges, Reverend Bridges, we have your wife’s pathology report!” My husband said this caught him off guard because this same doctor had never addressed him by anything other than Sir or Mr. Bridges even though he had been introduced by his profession and calling of, Minister Bridges. We learned that my doctor unlike us, was not a believer. He went on to say,” I have been practicing for 30 years and I’ve never seen anything like this before, it’s as if your wife never had cancer in her body. Take her home and get ready to start your family. I don’t know who or what you believe in, but I want to get to know Him!”