{"id":2017,"date":"2013-09-08T06:31:09","date_gmt":"2013-09-08T13:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/?p=2017"},"modified":"2013-09-08T09:53:25","modified_gmt":"2013-09-08T16:53:25","slug":"lord-not-yet-not-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/lord-not-yet-not-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Lord… not yet… not now"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Jon Post<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Lord, not yet\u2026 not now.<\/em><\/p>\n

Praying out loud, then in my heart, then under my breath, then moving my lips, in English, in Portuguese\u2026<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 not yet. Be merciful\u2026 not yet.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Filomena<\/a>

Filomena Loves Holding Karasi<\/p><\/div>\n

Filomena sat in the back of my car in a sweaty panic.
\n\u201cI can\u2019t breathe, Jon. I can\u2019t breathe!\u201d
\n\u201cI know. I know. You\u2019re going to be fine. You\u2019ll be fine. Just hold on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 be merciful. Don\u2019t let her die\u2026 not yet.<\/em><\/p>\n

Our little car screeched onto the sidewalk in front of the 24 hour clinic and I wrapped my arm under Filomena and got her inside.
\n\u201cShe can\u2019t breathe! Where is a doctor?\u201d I asked, trying to communicate urgency to the man behind the desk, while communicating calm to Filomena at my side. \u201cShe can\u2019t breathe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 be merciful.<\/em><\/p>\n

In a small examination room, oxygen being piped over her nostrils and mouth, Filomena sat heaving her chest up, desperately trying to fill lungs that refused to inflate and offer her blood its critically important oxygen supply.<\/p>\n

\u201cTake it off, I can\u2019t breathe with it on.\u201d Filomena said, clutching at the oxygen mask and pulling its elastic band over her head.
\n\u201cWait, dear sister. Wait. You need this air. You need it. I know it feels horrible but trust it. Trust me. You need it. It\u2019s helping. Wait, dear sister.\u201d
\n\u201cI can\u2019t breathe, Jon. I can\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lord, not yet\u2026 not now.<\/em><\/p>\n

Filomena had been feeling fine until 9 PM last Sunday night. She had eaten dinner, watched a little TV and at 9, lain down to rest. Her problem started as a slight difficulty in drawing full breaths. She described it as a weight on her chest that she couldn\u2019t take off. She let Layne and I know when it started and we both went to her room to see how she was. She was clearly struggling to breathe so we made the cautious decision to get her to a doctor and make sure it wasn\u2019t anything serious. While I went to find my car keys and wallet, her breathing drastically worsened. When I came back, ready to drive her to see a doctor, she couldn\u2019t draw enough breath to stand up.<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 PLEASE<\/em><\/p>\n

On the examination table she sat there quietly, swaying back and forth from exhaustion but unable to lie down because the little breaths she was drawing couldn\u2019t be found when she lay down. I held her against my chest and kept praying.<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 PLEASE<\/em><\/p>\n

Layne, at home with the girls, echoed every prayer I prayed and rallied our families to join us.<\/p>\n

LORD, WAIT! NOT YET!<\/em><\/p>\n

An emergency X-ray of her chest showed her lungs were full of fluid. The doctor inserted a tube through her ribs and into her right lung. 1.8 liters of yellow fluid came crawling out.
\n1.8 liters. The average female lung capacity is 4.2 liters.
\nThat\u2019s for both lungs.<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 please\u2026 be merciful.<\/em><\/p>\n

Filomena started breathing. It wasn\u2019t perfect, her left lung was still full of fluid, still not doing its job, but she was breathing. She was breathing.
\nAnd then she started resting.
\nAt 2:30 I finally felt comfortable leaving her resting. The clinic told me they would transfer her to the central hospital\u2019s Oncology ward the next morning at 6. Come back at 5:30 they said.<\/p>\n

Lord\u2026 be merciful.<\/em><\/p>\n

A couple hours rest at home and then back to the clinic to make sure she got on the clinic\u2019s little ambulance and then back home to get two of our other patients and get them to the hospital for scheduled doctor\u2019s visits.
\nThe day blurred by as Filomena was first admitted into the Central Hospital\u2019s emergency room (as is common for clinic-hospital transfers), seen by a doctor there, had a new X-ray taken, had blood tests done, and then\u2026 finally\u2026 transferred to Oncology to be seen by her oncologist.
\nThe Lord was merciful. She is alive. She\u2019s alive. She\u2019s still very tired a week later, but she\u2019s alive and she\u2019s breathing normally.
\nHe was very merciful.
\nFilomena is still with us. She\u2019s here and God is good.<\/p>\n

Oh, Jesus. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Jon Post Lord, not yet\u2026 not now. Praying out loud, then in my heart, then under my breath, then moving my lips, in English, in Portuguese\u2026 Lord\u2026 not yet. Be merciful\u2026 not yet. Filomena sat in the back of my car in a sweaty panic. \u201cI can\u2019t breathe, Jon. I can\u2019t breathe!\u201d \u201cI know.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2017"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2017"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2023,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2017\/revisions\/2023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonandlayne.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}