Melanie's Emergent Hospital Stay

As I'm creating this while sitting in the bed in my hospital room, I have the same view that you see in the cover photo. Although blurry, the card underneath the clock says:

"My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart; He is mine forever." Psalm 73:26

I've never felt those words run so deep than during these last 2 weeks. This act of courage in sharing my story has only resulted from an overwhelming gratitude for the Lord's gifts, provision and deep care for us. My heart is humbled, awestruck, and comforted by the Lord's love, mercy, and kindness toward me through His people, and I trust that the Lord will continue to provide for me as this situation evolves. If you feel so led to read, the story of the Lord's work during this period of time in my life is below. Whether you choose to assist me financially or not, I pray that the Lord would use my story to encourage your heart and refresh your soul in the midst of our fallen world that continues to be ridden with suffering, sadness, and grief. Although this feels vulnerable and scary, I’m praying that the cost is worth it for God’s glory to be more fully known and realized in the hearts of anyone who reads this.

On July 31st, with the care of my roommates, I walked into the Emergency Department at my own place of work due to an unknown and unforeseen infection that was wrecking havoc in my body and causing emergent complications of my autoimmune disease. My fear of all that could ensue and the denial of my symptoms left me feeling exhausted, alone, and afraid. Thanks to one of the ED physicians, I was soon admitted and educated on the plan that my doctors were going to begin. Despite the uncertainty and great severity of my symptoms, the plan felt orderly and structured: we attempt step after step until something works. However, as the week began to unfold – to my greatest fear - nothing was progressing as expected. I was in an unbearable amount of pain and was physically miserable. The hope that I had put in each medication and physician seemed to be failing me, and I kept receiving the news that I wasn’t progressing as my physicians expected and, if I continued to decline, would most likely need to have emergency surgery to save some of my organs. Since I received my original diagnosis several years ago, surgery had always been my absolute, greatest fear. I clung onto that fear so tight for dear life that I was willing to suffer through the pain and try literally anything to avoid it.

This is a good point in the story to explain all of the ways that this situation could have been an absolute, complete disaster. First, I’m considered an uninsured patient. I’m in the first 60 days of a new job, and, as result, not a single benefit was available to me just yet. Although I really tried to avoid a hospital stay, this situation became too emergent for me to ignore. In addition, not one of my family members was available to be with me. In fact, some were in the hospital themselves with others of my family, and my sister and brother-in-law just so happened to be out of town. Because I was an uninsured patient, my physician team was doing the best they could to be thoughtful and frugal with the procedures, labs, and tests they completed in order to keep the cost as low as possible. However, my body was becoming sicker by the day and the physicians started to be very honest about the procedures they needed to complete as my health became more and more emergent. My battle with high fevers, dehydration, critical lab values, and raging symptoms were all indications to the physicians that I appeared sick and was only getting sicker.

On Friday, I had a procedure for the physicians to discover the severity of my infection and disease. Although my labs were getting worse by the day, they also needed to look inside to know the severity. After the procedure, the physician came to tell me that the procedure they had planned for was not the procedure they had completed. Although extremely rare, they were able to complete a better procedure that gave them much more information. All the nurses and physicians said “It’s truly amazing that we were able to complete the full procedure, that never happens”. Because they completed a more well-rounded procedure, the physicians had gathered that my worst nightmare was true – that my organs were failing and they most likely needed to perform emergency surgery. The physician that completed my procedure indicated that Friday was his last day on staff, but that I was “lucky” because the new attending was a specialist in my specific autoimmune condition and, as a result, might have more ideas that he hadn’t thought of just yet. I was transported back to my room with tears flowing down my face. My nurses were compassionate, caring, and empathetic and held my hand and gave me a hug while I cried. I was so thankful for their response, but after a while, I was left alone again, stuck in what felt like my worst nightmare. In my deepest feelings of sadness, grief, and exhaustion, all I had left to do in that moment was literally cry out to the Lord. The questions in my head were so loud – “What are you doing?” and “Why is this happening to me?” and “Why have you brought me this far just to leave me?” and “Why am I alone for all of this?”. In that moment, I’m confident that the Lord met me there, encouraging my heart with feelings of “of course you’re not alone, I promised to never leave you or forsake you and I won’t stop now” and “take your comfort in me, I am your strength” and “you can still hope in me when all else feels like its failing”. The Lord was eroding away at all of the hope I had placed in a pill or a shot or a medication or a physician to be the one to heal me.

The rest of that day and night was immediately and undeniably different. Although every physician told me that my body had failed to respond to the initial medications they gave me (the initial red flag which ensued the need for surgery), my symptoms slightly reduced, my critical lab values plateaued and stopped climbing, and my physicians were a little bit more optimistic. The next morning, my internal medicine team came in to let me know that my labs had plateaued and were finally down trending. They even said “this is rare for your body to respond this late to the medications. We did not anticipate this”. Additionally, the specialist came to my room to discuss further options going forward. He was honest regarding the severity of my condition, but empowered me with education, encouragement, and options. In fact, he was able to think of additional options that the other physicians were not aware of. Other physicians had told me that there was only one additional medication option prior to surgery, and at an out-of-pocket cost, this medication was $6,000 per infusion – and I would need all 3 of them prior to the start date of my health insurance. This physician knew of a newer-on-the-market oral medication which he believed could work just as effectively while reducing my out-of-pocket cost. Although the hospital did not carry the medication on hand, he successfully provided me with free samples of the medication that would hold me over until my health insurance starts. He also personally coordinated a follow-up appointment for me at his office for 1 week after I started the medication. As the medical director of this specialist clinic, he allowed me to be seen despite my uninsured status and his incredibly, tight-booked schedule. (Just to highlight how amazing this is - I should include that I had called to similar clinics in the Dallas area when I moved here, and the wait for an appointment was 5 months out.)

When that specialist left my room after seeing him for this first time, my nurse came in and told me “He is my favorite physician that I have ever worked with and he’s usually never here either! He goes above and beyond for his patients. You are so lucky!” Although “lucky” might be a word that could describe this whole 360 degree turn, I knew it could only have been the Lord’s provision, kindness, and deep care for me. It felt like the Lord was giving me a great big hug and calling me home.

The concept of any type of "healing" has always made me feel uncomfortable. Like an itching and squirming in my seat and dodging straight to the next subject kind of umcomfortable. While physical healing is never promised on this side of Eden, I have come to trust that God is capable of healing in His own ways and through the use of the gift of modern medicine, physicians, wisdom, and direction. My hope has changed from an empty "let this medication heal me" to a prayer of "Lord, please use this medicine/food/supplement to nourish me and give my body what it needs so that I may better share Your Gospel and further Your Kingdom". While we'll never know exactly why some healing comes and others doesn't, we can trust that the Lord is ultimately still using that type of suffering for His glory and our good.

I could continue to write a thousand more ways that the Lord has provided for me over the last week and throughout my life – even seemingly “small” things like actually enjoying and being nourished by hospital food (if you know, you know) when my body desperately needed food to heal. But the truth is, I had forgotten to trust in the Lord. All of the noise of my fears and anxieties were so loud and clouded what my heart knew to be true – that God is for me, loves me, sees me, comforts me, and only wants what’s best for me.

I don’t want anyone to misinterpret the wrong message here. The beauty of this story is NOT that I didn’t have to have surgery (although I am currently very, very happy about that). The honest truth is that at some point in my life, I might have to, and this unavoidable truth continues to be a huge fear of mine. Rather, the beauty of this story (and all of ours) is that God remains consistent and will always be greater than my biggest fears. My greatest fears very much could be realized during this life, and although that’s scary, I know that the Lord will be with me in the midst of them and promises to carry me out on the other side. When and if surgery comes, our God is still there and is our only lasting source of hope and peace.

So…whatever the fear is – divorce, infertility, pain, loneliness, sickness, cancer, separation, death... He’s still there and with us through it all. Does that make it easier? Not always. The hurt that we face on this side of Heaven is so real and so,so painful. But it gives us joy in the midst of sorrow, peace in the midst of uncertainty, and hope is the midst of unimaginable loss.

And this is why I share the story - to remind my own heart and those who have forgotten and those who do not yet know, that God is love and all things good. That he is for you, with you, and never leaves us alone. And we desperately need the reminder, don’t we? Our world is lost and afraid and hurting and suffering and bleeding at the seams. When these things happen, our world is the first to shout “I told you, there’s no God! A loving God wouldn’t let these things happen to His people!” But isn’t it so sweet that, instead, the opposite is true. Out of the kindness of his heart, God created and designed a perfect world void of suffering, shame, fear, anxiety, sickness, and disease. And WE failed that version of Eden – we dropped the ball, and our world was changed. And even though the God of the universe could have immediately walked away, He stepped into this imperfect world with us saying “I know this is going to be hard for you, but I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to be with you every step of the way. Let’s do this together. You will be tired and weary, but I will give you strength and rest.”

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

As it stands now, I’m healthy and at home with the wonderful support of my roommates, friends, family, and coworkers. There are still some unknowns regarding my health, but my new physician team has been fantastic and are continuing to treat my situation with urgency and wisdom. My fears and anxieties of a few weeks ago now grow pale in comparison to my refreshed hope and strength in the Lord. However, as the dust settles and my body heals, I’m unfortunately left with a bit of a hefty hospital bill. Although financial assistance for patients exists, the financial magnitude of a 2-week hospital stay is still quite large. Because I am recovering and still within the first 60 days of my new job, I will be going unpaid for a short-term medical leave of absence.

In an effort to be completely transparent before asking others for money, I want to let you know about my own efforts to contribute before asking on this platform. As a recent new grad from graduate school, I do have some savings built up after working for 6 months, but this falls short for my current bills while I will also be going unpaid from work. As a somewhat slightly embarrassing side note, my credit cards are also at the credit limit due to previous outstanding medical bills (sorry Mom and Dad). However, I will be contributing all of what I do have in savings before continuing to accumulate any other funds from this platform. I have exhausted all efforts in contacting the appropriate people for financial assistance options, emergency employee funding, and am left with one option to obtain retroactive Cobra health insurance which will drastically reduce the cost of my medical bills. As I look further into this, I already know that the retroactive premium for 2 and a half months is larger than what I can currently afford. However, as I learn more about this, I will continue to update this platform and adjust the goal amount accordingly. For full transparency, if you like, I can provide a full list of the itemized bill to inform you of how I came to this goal amount.

Should the final amount be more than I need, I will personally contact you each individually and offer a return of your funds or the option, a donation of the remainder to an organization of your choice, or whatever further decision you determine best.

Although the burden of finances feels somewhat daunting, I am continuing to trust that the Lord will provide for me.. just has He has and always will. The Lord has consistently provided for me through His community of people and I trust that this specific, large financial request is no different. Even should the financial pursuit of this effort run short and the funds on this platform raised be $0.00, my hope is that this story would heal wounds, comfort lost and hurting souls, and remind us of God’s never-ending, steadfast care and love for every single one of us.

From the absolute bottom of my heart, thank you! I can't express enough of my gratitude for your consideration to support me financially during this time.