Loss, Pain, the Unexpected

Last Monday, June 15, I went to work with a sore lower back . . withing two hours I was in excruciating pain and unable to walk. A friend rushed me to a private hospital where morphine and other meds were administered. Since our national health coverage would not cover care at that hospital, I was taken by ambulance to North Shore Hospital. That began one of the most difficult weeks of my life. The doctors believed that I had an infection in my spine. I was sceptical that an infection could cause such horrible pain. Due to my implant (nerve stimulator in my spine) I am unable to have an MRI which would have been valuable in seeking to assess what was happening. What puzzled the doctors was that although I had this excruiciating pain in the back (literally-the morphine and other drugs could not remove the pain), I gave no other signs of infection. They took blood tests which demonstrated that my CRT (infection count) was very high (30; normal is 6-8) I seemed to feel fine. That was to change in rapid order. By Monday night, I was desperately ill--high fever, white knuckle pain--writhing in bed with the agony. Tuesday night my infection count soared to 288.

The doctors had completed X-rays, C.T. scans but shared with me that my Medtronic device very well would have to be removed. My heart just sank, I was devastated by the thought--the placement of the device had required 3 surgeries and then 6 months of significant restrictions. I argued with the medical team about this and then the lead physician stopped me in my tracks. "Mr. Wheeler, this infecion will kill you and we have to choice between your pain and your life."

Tuesday night also began the onset of a psychotic episode fuled by the wild cocktail pain medication and potent antibiotics. I had one of the "Beautiful Mind" experiences and began to see mathmatical and scientific fomulas on all the walls and floors, quotations from academic books read 20-30 years ago and stored in some corner of my brain. I didn't realize that was happening and neither did the medical personnell initially. The horrible pain continued, the raging fever and the psychosis. By Friday morning, i actually believed that some trusted individuals had come to New Zealand to bring charges  of immoral behavior, financial impropriety and abuse of power and that I didn't remember doing this things because of a tramatic childhood event. The hospital room became a place of inquisition with the bright colors of loved friends and family deeply disappointed in me and the dark shadows of those I had trusted and now were my accusers. I actually believed for about 30 hours that I was about to lose everything . . . any savings, my family, friends, job. There was an enormous shaming process where I was stripped bare for the world to see and the name of Christ was ridiculed. Friday when I first believed these things to be true, my body began to be wracked by huge spams--off the pain charts, one after another, sometimes dozens at one time in various parts of my body . . . . this continued for three days. I was shamed, condemned, physically at the bottom.

In that time, I asked myself the question, What do I fear most?  The answer: abandonment. Our minds are so extraordinary, powerful, frail, delusional. One constant through all of this was the presence of God. Saturday night, still fraught with the debliltating spasms, Naomi convinced me that none of these things I dreamed were true. Friday, the doctors began to pick up that I was having a significant drug interaction.

On this side of it, grace has won out. My life has been preserved, I am healing though I have a long road ahead: 12 weeks on antibiotics (6 weeks intraveneously and 6 weeks by tablets). My family and friends love me and God is immeasurably good--this God for whom I poor out my life and from whom I receive the grace I desperately need for this day and then the next.

I remain hospitalized, day 12 completed. My family, friends and work colleagues have been amazing. I have had to clear my schedule for the next several months including four long anticipated teaching/preaching opportunities in New Zealand and internationally.

I am reminded in times like this that there are not heroic people, simply an amazing God. His grace has prevailed through all of this when I felt that I absolutely could not continue to go on given the deep levels of pain.

Naomi in particular has been an angel of mercy and agent of grace. We continue on, seeing how God plans to use this in our own formation and in the unfolding of his plan for us here in New Zealand.

Thanks to the many of you who have prayed and given encouragement.