For the past two months I have been on a journey. I can tell you exactly where I was and what I was doing when I learned I had cancer.
We had just completed the June Executive Committee Meeting at Lexington Medical Center. It was our first in-person meeting since the beginning of the Pandemic. COVID cases were declining. As we sat around the conference table and enjoyed a light lunch after the meeting, we were talking about how good it was for life to be returning to normal. As I walked out into the bright sunlight of a beautiful June day, I was thinking about our church and how, slowly but surely, we were welcoming people back to Sunday School and worship. That is when my phone buzzed.
It was Dr. Hemal’s office (my urologist) in Winston-Salem. His nurse asked me if I had a few minutes to talk. I walked over to the beautiful fountain in front of the hospital as I waited for Dr. Hemal to get on the line. He started the conversation by saying, “I’m afraid I don’t have good news.”
That was the beginning of a journey that many of you have traveled through the years. I have always been on the outside, looking in, but now I was the one taking the journey. As many of you know, it is not easy.
Two days after my surgery at Wake Forest Baptist Hospital, Dr. Hemal walked into my room to check on me before I was discharged. He told me that I had been blessed.
“We were blessed to find the cancer when we did,” he said. And because COVID cases are rising so rapidly he added, “And we were blessed to be able to have the surgery when we did.”
This week I received another blessing. My pathology report came back clean. The bone scan, MRI, tissue samples, and lymph nodes all came back with no trace of cancer. Dr. Hemal said, “The pathology report looks fantastic.”
The greatest blessing that I have received during this journey is the constant assurance of God’s love and grace. This has been demonstrated through the love and care of my family, through your many expressions of prayerful intercession, love, and support, and through the gifted healthcare professionals who have allowed God to use their gifts of healing.
Early on Monday morning, August 16, I felt your prayers. Then, as a compassionate nurse who has worked at Baptist Hospital for 45 years was preparing me for surgery, she took my hand and Joyce’s hand and lifted us up in a beautiful and powerful prayer for comfort and healing. I had no doubt that I would be just fine, because I was blessed!
For the past two months I have been on a journey, a journey of illness, a journey of the unknown, but most of all, a journey of blessing!
