The Heart Monster

A few months back my heart went back into Atrial Fibrillation and I had to have it rebooted again, as I like to call it (where they temporarily stop the heart with the hopes that it will restart in the correct rhythm). Remember the movies in which they put the paddles on the person’s chest and yell “clear.” Same thing only they don’t have the decency to let me die first.

All they do is make me forget. It is called conscious sedation. It disturbs me because it reminds me of all those villains that use the mind ray to wipe away the evidence of their dastardly crime. (These are the things a writer thinks about at a time like this)

One time the nurse admitted that when they shocked me, I said, “Ow. That really hurt.” But I don’t remember that. So now you understand the insidiousness of what they are doing. Maybe there was more to the story. I might have been heroic, facing the torture, fearlessly looking the doctor in the eye as he presses the button (no doubt he was snickering wildly, saying things like “I can see you’re strong, but no one withstands the machine.”) But now I’ll never know. They snatched the victory from me by erasing it from my memory.

At least I can dream – “Ha! You call that pain. Give me another shock. But there is something I have to tell you. You have the paddles on the wrong side. I am not left hearted. Take that you nave, and that and…”

Rebekah says I need to get to the point, and that is not the point.

My doctor must have gotten his electric bill because he says he doesn’t want to keep shocking me. (See. I probably put up quite a fight last time.) So, he wants me to have another heart ablation.

You may recall a number of years back I had one of those. That’s where the knife comes in. They call it a scalpel. They are going to use it to cut the artery in my leg (they don’t go for the throat because they want your doom to come slower). Then they bring in a bundle of wires that look like they are going to install cable TV in my chest and run those up my leg until they get to my heart. The wires have a camera and an electrode similar to an arc welder that they use to etch lines into the tissue of the old blood pumper – talk about extreme heart burn.

The goal is to create scars on my heart because the erratic electrical signals that cause my Afib cannot cross scar tissue so they will have to stay in step and go where they are supposed to – taking all the fun out of their little electrical lives. Remember when you were a kid and laid a water hose at the top of a hill and used your mom’s garden hoe to carve channels in the dirt for the stream to follow. If I only knew back then what I don’t know now, I could have been a heart surgeon. At least that’s what I could have told my mom and I might have gotten in a lot less trouble.

This doctor is making a lot bigger deal out of all this than the last one. They want to intubate me (in other words they want to put a garden hose down my neck at the same time they are putting the cable TV wire up my leg). I am guessing it is kind of like skewering a chicken so it will stay put on the rotisserie. They’re worried I might get the better of them again.

They are also separating me from my trusty sidekick – Rebekah. I must stay in the hospital for three days and they won’t allow her to be there. They say it is because of COVID-19 but I know better. You know how wives are when a doctor is burning your heart. They want to look over his shoulder and say, “You missed a spot.”

My trusty side kick says to trust her that if I don’t stop messing around, she is going to kick my side. She wants me to ask you all to pray for me. Oh, and that I should tell you the timetable of events.

Originally, the operation was scheduled for August 13, but they have moved it up (trying to put me at a disadvantage by giving me less time to practice my sword play, no doubt). I had my COVID test yesterday and they will have the results back before my procedure (that alone would have killed me, but I have built up an immunity to COVID poisoning). Now I am on strict isolation at home to avoid any possible exposure. The COVID spies are everywhere.

On Tuesday at daybreak (that’s 6:30 AM for you non-adventurers), I will go into the Walker Heart Hospital in Fayetteville, never to be seen again until sometime Thursday, when I hope to emerge scarred but triumphant once again. While inside the bowels of that dark edifice: I will cross swords with the dreaded nuclear CAT scan (obviously a creature spawned when a feline was caught in an atomic blast). Then I will battle the diabolical transesophageal echo cardiogram (a malformed dinosaur like abomination that likes to tear off the heads of its victims just to shout down their esophagus to hear its own voice).

But vanquishing those opponents will be child’s play compared to what I will face on Wednesday. Midmorning (11AM), drugged and lashed to a steel table, I will come face to face with “THE DOCTOR” and his hideous burning machine. He will try to psychologically intimidate me with his gaggle of attending nurses and technicians, but he doesn’t know that I face them every day. They will stab me with needles and inject me with chemicals. If that doesn’t work, they will gas me and attach me to lines and pump me full of their deadly serums. When I laugh in their faces, they will seek to take over the very air in my lungs with the intubation device, but unbeknownst to them I had contests when I was a kid to see who could hold their breath the longest. I am confident I will prevail.

For the sake of the children, I will not even mention the rest of the torture I will endure. When they discover they cannot break me, they will “discharge” me. Little do they know that my sidekick will have a get away vehicle waiting in the parking lot and when they are not looking I plan to escape and rendezvous with her so she can take me to my secret hideaway and nurse me back to health to fight another day.

But wait. I have forgotten the deadliest adversary of them all. My own monster heart. The Bible tells us that the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9). Before I can vanquish any foe, I must first master the enemy inside myself but how is that possible if it is such a mystery. In 1 Kings 8:39, Scripture answers it’s own question when it says of God, “You alone know the hearts of all the sons of men.” Ephesians 4 tells us that confusion comes when people close their minds and hardened their hearts against God.

We are living in confusing times. Bizarre things are happening. Will our country survive? Is it the end of the world? This little heart issue I have seems like such a small thing when compared to all that. But that shows how we can become so confused about the things that are really important. What if I do not emerge from the dark tower. What if I die on the operating table or in an accident on my way to the hospital for that matter. None of this will matter to me anymore. The only thing that will matter then is where my heart is with God. When we think about that, our priorities become a lot clearer.

Every heart needs a reboot. Every day we need to ask God as the writer of Psalms 139:23-24: “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Then we will be prepared to face all the “little” battles the day has to offer.

So, now you know how the story goes. Oh, Rebekah says I forgot to tell you the doctor informs us that a second ablation is usually much more effective at stopping Afib. If everything goes as planned, and the Lord wills, I might not go out of rhythm anymore.

If I emerge from this fray, Rebekah and I will be working hard on our next novel during the time the doctor wants me to take off of work. Our next book addresses the very things that are happening on the streets of our nation. Please pray that we can address this tough topic well in the next exciting story of our Special Heroes series. If you have not done so already, we would appreciate you checking out the first two books in the series and Rebekah’s new creative art Bible study journal.

Love you guys and pray that we will see you on the next adventure – either here, or THERE.

Here are the links.