Health Update--Mystery Solved!

It's been a while since I wrote about this and much has happened. As I said in my last health update, which is now several months ago, I had been continuing to get very out of breath after doing just about anything. This included things like walking up stairs, but also things like loading clothes in the washing machine, turning the wheel of the car, etc. Early last fall, the cardiologists looked over my test results again and said it wasn't my heart, and that my pacemaker was just fine, so they sent me over to pulmonology across the lobby.

It took a while to get in to see the pulmonologist, but once I started with him, he put me through a bunch of tests, one even necessitating being checked into the hospital. Everything revealed that my lungs were just fine, too. Finally, last Monday, the pulmonologist discovered that when I was exercising, my heart rate never increased. So he walked me then and there back across the lobby to cardiology, and had them adjust my pacemaker settings. Bam! I was immediately better. I could walk fast, go up stairs, do whatever, without getting out of breath and turning all white like I had the past several months. My colleagues at work noticed it right away later that day.

We are very happy that, aside from discovering that there is yet another function that my heart is unable to perform on its own (speeding up), I don't have some awful disease (cancer, etc., is eliminated). We wish the cardiologists had thoguht of this several months ago, but at least I'm back to normal!

Thanks are due to God that I have no dread disease, that there are such things as pacemakers (which keep me and many others alive), and for making the pulmonologist smart enough to ferret this out!

Loss and Love

Our dog, Hana, died right after Christmas. She had been part of our family for almost 13 years, ever since she was a year old. This photo, taken by my daughter Mary, shows her with Mary a few days before her death.

I have found that I have been grieving quite a bit, almost as much as if she had been a human family member. She was a good companion over the years, especially when my husband was gone on the many trips he must take for his work.

One night when I was praying, I thanked God for giving me Hana in my life. She had brought me much love and friendship. I feel sure that God has made dogs (and cats) especially for people, to give them love and many other benefits. But while I was thinking about it, I asked God why dogs' lives are so short. Why do we have them to love and cherish, only to lose them a relatively few short years later?

It seemed to me that an answer came while I was praying. I'm not sure if it was God speaking to me, or directing my thoughts, or if it was just something that I thought of. But this is a possibility that occurred to me.

Perhaps the reason we love our animal friends, and then lose them after their short lifespan, is so that we can better understand what God feels about us. It is very painful to me that I now have just an urn of ashes instead of my dear dog Hana. I don't want to be separated from her forever. And, similarly, God doesn't want to be separated from us forever. I feel grief at my loss of Hana, yet my grief is only a small likeness of the grief that God feels at the possibility of losing us. That's why he sent Jesus--who is really himself--to die instead of us, so that we wouldn't die and be lost to him, if only we will respond to that loving sacrifice.

I wouldn't die for Hana. I don't love her that much. Yet God died for me. His love and grief over losing me is so much greater than the love and grief that I feel about losing Hana. What I feel now, hard as it is, is only a shadow and an echo of the love that God feels for me.