E.R.

I went to my primary care for a litany of complaints the other day but chief among them was aches all over like I had just finished a 90 min soccer match (trust me, I know what that feels like lol).

The doctor didn't know what to do so I left with a handful of miscellaneous scripts that I never did fill.

I get home and the pains from worse; I could barely lift my head off the pillow. I was showing many signs of Lithium toxicity. I freaked when I saw that two of the more sever side effects were going into a coma and death.

So I went to the ER at Chesapeake General and the triage nurse gave me priority over others who had been there longer.

I was actually called back with a nurse, a man too weak to walk with a facemark on, and my dad, to keep me company. But what happened next was inexplicable to my arrogant mind: I saw the "rooms" were just curtain-partitions, just like pre-op for the Whipple. I started sobbing immediately and hid behind my dad so no one would noticed. The prim-and-proper Anna immediately composed herself. And, true to form, I asked my dad to snap a picture of me to remember this whole ordeal.

I remember wearing my friend's red clay earrings that day for "good luck" (plus they're super cute; I'll put a like to her Etsy shop at the bottom of the page). The red clay reminded me of Georgia where I spent all my summers.

I told my dad to go get something to eat and that I'd be fine there while they ran a battery of tests.

Besides the aforementioned crying, I typically do really well as a patient (minus all my blow-out veins). I didn't realize how much cancer had traumatized me until I saw the curtain-partitioned "rooms," in which (at a dif hospital) I had been horrendously anesthetized.

I am a good patient (well, a little rebellious, really) but I would let them take my blood at 4am, nonetheless.

If I ever got coronation name, I would want it to be Anna the Brave, perhaps calling into existence what is not so. I remember during the time of surgery and recovery I would wax eloquent about the benevolence of God. But when push came to shove, I was just as scared and in pain as anybody else would have been. I remember my worst fear and rebellion towards God came when they would make me breathe into a tube violently to determine if I was developing pneumonia. I refused, but surgeons aren't the type of people to let themselves be refused, especially by an angsty teenager. So I did it with full resentment in my heart towards God.

I'm writing this post because, seven years later, I was scared of the cancer, the pain, the inadequacy of a nerve-block to do it's job (ahem, Portsmouth Naval).

But this is also an update. I'm to see my psychiatrist on Friday so pray for wisdom on his part, he is a fiery christian, so I know Holy Spirit will work through him, I'm in a lot of pain both physically and mentally, so prayer for fortitude would be great.

Love y'all,
Anna Jo

Below are three books about what it's like to live (and die) from cancer:

When Breath Becomes Air -Paul Kalanithi

Worth the Suffering -Jenna Henderson

The Bright Hour -Nina Riggs

Sorry this post was scattered and a tad disorienting.. I guess it's just a reflection of my life (and messy room) right now.

P.S. most of my labs (and there were a lot of them) came back fine so praise the Lord for that.

I'll leave you with a quote from Shauna Niequist:

"There's nothing small or inconsequential about our stories. There is, in fact, nothing bigger. And when we tell the truth about our lives - the broken parts, the secret parts, the beautiful parts - then the gospel comes to life, an actual story about redemption, instead of abstraction and theory and things you learn in Sunday School."

Thanks for reading about my story