A Time to Plant...To Every Thing a Season chpt. 2

July had come so quickly! All the wedding pandemonium had died down, and Sandra was back to her regular routine. She loved yard work, as was evident when you drove up to her home. Her yard was meticulously landscaped. She had all kinds of concrete statuary, plants, flowers...she really knew how to make a yard a haven. She was never gaudy or chintzy; she was "classy" all the way!

Kevin and I were going through some pretty big changes in our lives. We had put our home on the market nearly a year prior to this time. At the beginning of July, we had finally had a buyer. With a contract on our home, we moved into the basement of our church. It allowed us more time and liberty with moving our things, especially since the buyers wanted to close in only 19 days.

We had also experienced tremendous difficulty in the ministry. We had a couple of families leave the church, which absolutely broke our hearts. There were lies and deception, but there was also just plain old misunderstandings that led up to this. It was very trying, but little did I know that darker days were ahead. I can remember feeling like I would die; my heart literally hurt. I wanted to scream out to the whole world, but I was silenced by the ache of knowing that it would do no good. People will think what they will and do what they will. All I could do was pray and keep myself right with the Lord. That wasn't easy because I held so much resentment towards the ones that left. It took a long time before I could pray, I mean really pray, for those that left. The Lord has given me victory in that area, and God alone knows that I really love them. But during this time, it was devestating. And it only compounded the grief that was in store for us.

One day while living at the church, Sandra called Kevin. She had been planting flowers and was moving one of the huge planters across her patio. She had taken on more than she could handle. As she was rolling the planter on it's side, (it was much too heavy for even a man to pickup by himself) her index finger on her right hand was accidentally crushed underneath. Fortunately, her husband Jackie was home. He heard her screams and ran outside to see what in the world was wrong. He took her to the local emergency room. I'm not sure how many stitches it required, but the ER doctor told Sandra to see an orthopaedic surgeon immediately. The tissue in her finger was dead, and amputation was almost certain.

As she talked with Kevin, she sounded so frail and weak. Of course she had been in a great deal of pain, but she sounded so helpless, in need of a miracle. He promised to pray that her finger would heal. It was a long shot. Her ortho surgeon, who was a classmate and high school friend of Kevin's, said that it was doubtful and tried to prepare Sandra for the worst. The pain was so severe, she missed weeks of work. Fortunately, she had plenty of personal time to take off, but it was frustrating to Sandra to miss work over a finger. But as a county real estate appraiser, she made great use of her hands. Her time off simply couldn't be helped.

Not only did Sandra inform Kevin of her finger, she informed him that her back was bothering her. She said she had been seeing a chiropractor for the back pain, but she wasn't getting any relief. She told us that she was scheduled to see a spine specialist in Columbia, SC with the hopes that her problem would soon be resolved.

After Kevin got off the phone with his Mom, he decided that it was time to take a trip to Camden. We visited around the third week in July. Her finger was all bandaged up, still threatened with amputation. By the time we made our trip, Sandra had visited the spine specialist and was wearing a brace.

Her back was now as big of an issue as her finger. X-Rays had determined that she had a cracked vertebrae around the lumbar region. Sandra had fallen down the steps of her back porch earlier in the winter, but didn't think there was any problem as a result. The doctor believed that her fall had broken her vertebrae. He said it wasn't uncommon to not experience pain or problems until months later.

Sandra was always an encouraging person to be around. She wouldn't let you mope and think the worst. I always called her "Mrs. Silver Lining." She was superb at pointing out the things to be grateful for, even when circumstances said otherwise. But, I could tell she was very down. She had always been in good health, so dealing with pain and physical problems of her own were new to her. Her husband Jackie was a different story; he was suffering from Pulmonary Fibrosis and Emphysema. In fact, just a few weeks prior to Sandra's planting accident, Jackie had taken a fall that resulted in a cracked rib. When the hospital ran the x-rays, his lungs were so scarred, the film was completely black. His pulmonologist gave him the ultimatum: have a double lung transplant or die a very ugly death.

Needless to say, Sandra wanted to get well so that Jackie could take his much needed trip to Duke University. She tried to get better, even if it was only a mental improvement. She knew Jackie needed her to be well before he could get new lungs. That was her goal; get better so Jackie could get better. The only problem was, Jackie was worse than we knew. And so was Sandra.