Where Do You Find Strength?

A high-stakes medical drama leads one man to the wellsprings of vigor

Photo by Mandy Henry on Unsplash

In mid-July 2022, when my wife, Dot, and I both came down with Covid-19, we immediately started taking the prescribed meds. Within a week, we seemed to be back to normal. So, we proceeded with a planned family vacation in St. Augustine. Growing up on the Gulf Coast, I regularly need the surf and salty breeze.

Our coastal trips typically involve long walks on the beach searching for shark’s teeth and seashells. Besides scavenging, we also enjoy body surfing and building elaborate sandcastles.

But on that trip, even walking from the beach up to our guest house left me exhausted. So, I mostly just watched the family frolic in the waves from the deck. When our son, Daniel, proposed to his Dana, a great wind of joy returned energy to me. So, being at the beach with everyone was good and gave some fine memories. But we wrapped up a little early to return home.

What Happened to Me?

Back home in Morgantown, West Virginia, still experiencing shortness of breath, I got tested for Covid. Unable to find that, the nurse practitioner ordered a chest x-ray. Soon as she saw it, she sent me to the hospital. There, a pulmonologist announced I had Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF). “Your lungs are completely scarred, and the scarring is irreversible.” She said the only treatment would be a lung transplant. Without one, I had only a few months to live.

What? I felt like I was hit in the head with a hammer. Wait a minute; stop this thing. What’s going on? Lung transplant? What? Is that even possible? How did I get to this? What did I do? Why?

Then, I did what anyone in my place would do; I Googled “Double Lung Transplant.” I learned that lung transplants were performed regularly at several hospitals within 200 miles of our home, and that 50% of double lung transplant patients lived 1-5 years.

Facing my mortality in a way that I had never done before, my thoughts naturally turned to Dot. How would she be cared for? Would she be okay without me? Where would she live?

Then, with no exits, no other reasonable options, I realized I was strapped atop the elephant. I would go where the elephant went.

Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

Moving Into the Matrix

I immediately started looking for a transplant doctor and a hospital that did a lot of lung transplants. I was in luck; University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), less than 85 miles from our home, is one of the highest rated lung transplant hospitals in the world.

In late October, my children gathered to celebrate my 70^th—and what could be my last—birthday. We laughed. We cried. We said the things you should say but don’t. A few days after my birthday, I could no longer stand or walk. Our local hospital, unable to do no more than increase my oxygen, transferred me to UPMC.

On November 3, 2022, I was approved for a transplant.

The first thing the UPMC team asked was, “Would you accept lungs from a donor that is ‘at risk?’” You only get new lungs once. If you need more after that, you have to settle for ones that have been used and even abused. I told them I would not be picky. On November 5^th, they announced they had located a set of lungs, and that they were “perfect.” Miraculously, I was on the wait list for just two days… for “perfect” lungs. I was immediately prepped for surgery.

The surgery was a total blur. I can almost, but not quite, recall someone saying, “Need to go now.” No time for good wishes or last-minute hand squeezing. My only real memory of the surgery was while I was under full anesthesia (which is “impossible”). I was aware I died. And I did later learn my heart was stopped, and my circulatory system was disconnected from my body and hooked to a machine. During those moments, I had an “out of body” or NDE (near-death experience).

Awakening

Photo by Explore with Joshua on Unsplash

When I woke up from the surgery, I saw the world through new eyes. A reset button got pushed. I felt things differently and deeper than ever. My priorities had shifted. Suddenly, my blissful independence was gone. I could do nothing on my own. I was humbled. One night laying in my hospital bed, when I realized someone died so I could have a new life, I broke. I still weep when I think of that family and their loss.

Through it all, those who love me stood close by and encouraged me. Recovery was the hardest physical thing I’ve ever faced. Two days after surgery, four nurses and aides tried to get me up. But I couldn’t; I couldn’t support my own weight. Over the next two weeks, I progressed from taking one step to four. Slow healing. My primary care nurse in the ICU, Paul, made me get up. No lying in bed. “Get up,” he barked at me one day, “You may not like me right now, but I hope that one day you will walk back down here and shake my hand.”

I realized I needed help, but I also knew I had to ask for it. I couldn’t walk by myself, so I had to ask, beg, shame, whatever it took to get the nurses, techs, or aides to walk with me in the hall. Through most of five month hospitalization, I had to make myself do things I did not feel like doing. But it paid off; in early March 2023, I was released to go home.

Gratitude

About a year after my surgery, while back at the hospital for a checkup, I found my nurse, Paul, extended my hand and choked out, ‘Thank you.’ Paul beamed as he asked if he could bring some of the other nurses who helped care for me. Five of the many angels that had cared for me came down. We hugged and cried. Then one of them said, “No one ever comes back to say thank you.”

No one? How could that be?  

I live in deep gratitude for new lungs that allow me to do almost anything I want. I am getting better every day. Out of it all, I’ve gained a new sense of our connectedness, and of the precious treasure of the mundane. As much and as long as I can, I will take nothing for granted.

I am a blessed man. So many family members, friends, medical personnel, and church members have done so much for me. But Dot kept me alive and stood with me when I needed it most. Almost 50 years ago, we spoke, “For better or worse, in sickness and in health...” Those words are now engraved on my heart.   

Finally, more than ever, I also understand the Apostle Paul’s words, “...I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.”

Think of it: where do you find strength? Wealth, power, health, fame, physical attraction? Keep looking. Oh, I see; it’s down there… wrapped in weakness.

John Sommers lives in Morgantown, WV where he pastors Cheat Lake Community Church.