I've thought a lot about what to write regarding this recent surgery. Many of you have been kept up to date on my progress and have often reminded me of your prayers. Thanks will never be enough to let you know what those prayers have meant. With that said, let me try and summarize the experience and share some thoughts about what I've been learning through this.
For those that don't know, almost 4 weeks ago, I had a lipoma (fancy name for benign tumor) removed. We had the same procedure done 5 years ago, but they must have missed some of it, because it grew back. This time we had a different doctor in the same practice and to his credit (and thankfully the radiologist's keen eye) they made two incisions and feel like they got all of it this time. However, that meant a much more lengthy recovery process for me.
The first two weeks were harder than I ever imagined! I think I have a pretty high pain tolerance, but I can't begin to describe the pain I felt during that first week. Thankfully, the pain medicine took the edge off and kept me fairly lethargic and loopy. I was given strict orders not to lift anything over 10 pounds for at least a month. That meant very limited playing with the kids, especially Dade who likes to be chased around the house and tossed in the air and across the couch. The incisions healed nicely, but some unexpected and unknown complications have kept the pain lingering around longer. I'm moving around much better, but find myself frustrated that I still can't get around like I used to. Please pray for the final follow up visit this Wed. We hope that they will be able to help us understand why the pain is still there and help us figure out where to go from here.
Despite all of this, I have seen God at work, teaching me little lessons that continue to amaze me. Within the last week, Dade has finally started feeling comfortable enough to be near me without a fear of hurting me. What a neat illustration of our relationship with God - sometimes we feel like we've hurt God with our sin. There are times we draw away because of guilt or fear of what we've done. And yet, through it all He just wants us to draw near to Him, just like all I wanted Dade to be near me.
For fear of losing many of you with the length of this post (Jill warns me about this constantly), I'll share one more thing.
As the pain failed to completely go away, I failed to share with many of you who pray faithfully for our family, all of the frustations and fears I felt. Jill had to reprimand me one night, asking why I hadn't shared these with anyone. The next day, I sent an email to many of you and tried to explain the situation and share some of what I was feeling. The reponse I got was immediate and felt!!! I realized that what I share with men about relying on each other and letting other's prayers give us strength during difficult times had fallen on my own deaf ears. It just reinforced to me what I've always known.....we can't do this alone. To walk with Christ takes a complete reliance on Him coupled with a reliance on fellow believers who will lift us up.
I used to say that I was looking forward to the day God had to quit teaching me the hard way. In hindsight, I hope He never does. It's going through the hard times that I see my relationship with Him grow deeper and stronger and more intimate.
Dade's technique was quite a bit different. He wanted to catch the fast fish so as soon as he cast out his line he would real it back in as quickly as possible. I am not lying when I say that he cast as well as any of us out there - except that he would often fail to look and nearly caught his mother on several occasions. It was hard for him to slow down enough to catch a fish, but he finally did it. He wanted to throw the fish back into the water, but he didn't want to touch it while it was on the hook. 
