Life's Detours

As I was contemplating life and all it's recent events, I was going to title this blog 'Roadblocks'. However, the more I thought about it, the more I thought that that title didn't really apply. Here is my thinking on that. When you are driving down a particular road and run into a road block, typically it steers you back where you came from. I don't want to go back where I came from, I want to learn from that and keep moving forward. Then the idea hit me! I should entitle this blog as 'Life's detours'. We are still moving forward, maybe in a different direction then we originally planned or maybe it takes us a little longer to get where we are going since we perhaps have to go around curves, valleys, hills or slow drivers in front of us, but nevertheless still heading to our destination. Hence...my title.

Yesterday morning we received a phone call from our primary care physician. They had test results. Bob was still sleeping and I didn't want to disturb him and they really wanted to talk to him about it. I thought to myself, that's a little odd since it's been a month since his surgery. Does it really take that long to get results to your doctor from the hospital? But I quickly dismissed it as they probably were just going to tell him that his liver enzymes were up which we already knew.

After Bob woke up and cleared his head, he made the call to the doctor. They told him the doctor was looking at his CT scan and found an enlarged spleen which they wanted him to get checked out right away. Ok, I thought to myself, this isn't what I was thinking. I started feeling nauseous. This is what I do when things like this come up. It's either nauseousness or a feeling of complete exhaustion overwhelming me. On this particular day, both are hitting me.

The surgeon that recently took his gall bladder out, has scheduled him for a gamut of tests which we originally thought was going to happen today but couldn't get him appointments for that until tomorrow. They also want to check out why he's still not feeling well from his previous surgery. So we will be spending the day at the hospital tomorrow, the day he was scheduled to go back work. I'm sure they, meaning his boss, is NOT going to be happy about that.

This has been a doosey of a year already and it's only April. I was sure that once we got through his mystery of a gall bladder, that things would level out but I guess life doesn't necessarily work that way which leads me back to my contemplation of life's crises'. I was thinking that one can be traveling along and BAM! you have a severed ligament in your ankle to deal with which sends you on a 'detour' or BAM! a flood hit's your home and again, detour or BAM! health issues suddenly come up...again...detour.

How do we deal with detours? Some may get mad or frustrated because we don't have control over situations that we have to deal with. Some may embrace it and get excited to see where it may lead them. Some may shake their head in disbelief. But really, how do we deal with these crazy detours because we all have them? I personally hate the emotional roller coaster I put myself on. I tend to fall apart on the 'what if's'. I wish I could maintain a level of calmness until a determination has been made. And why does all the symptoms you have usually lead back to cancer?

I am so thankful that God places special people around you to hold you up, to encourage, to do whatever God puts on their heart that will minister to you. They are reminders that God is there. He does care about what you are going through. And He gives you the strength to get through it. And He uses his people to accomplish all this. I am always awed when He calls me to be one of those people, an ordinary Mom to five beautiful children.