Do you remember the TV show called "Six Million Dollars"? The 1970 show was dedicated to an astronaut who had bioimplants that made him superhuman! Little did I realize that one day my husband would receive computerized implants!
In April 2004, I bought my bionic man's home!
My husband was diagnosed with a severe spinal cord injury with a spinal tear, and was told to sit and rest for 1-2 years. Given the weight limit of 5 pounds and the lack of hope for recovery, doctors loaded it with Oxycontin, Percocet, Morphine and several other painkillers - all at the levels usually reserved for the terminally ill, and wished us good luck.
His final operation during the year was an experiment to implant an electronic neurostimulator from the upper back and up to his thigh. We were told that neurostimulators began to spread in those days, but no one had yet managed to introduce the device into the region of the thoracic spinal cord.
The theory is that you shoot controlled electrical currents in the spinal cord to turn off the pain. Theoretically, cauterizing the local nerves also helped eliminate pain. The computerized battery has been designed to control the current on both sides of the spine and can be dialed up or down by the patient.
The neurostimulator was supposed to be another unsuccessful experiment that will forever affect our lives.
Making my way from Bakersfield to California in 401, my husband went to outpatient surgery (yes, outpatient!) To open his back, and the wires implanted along his spine, from top to bottom. In the middle, near the source of the injury, a junction box was installed, which served to supply electricity to the wires. His hip was implanted with a computerized battery, which was controlled by a control unit with all kinds of trendy buttons.
Arriving at the recovery room, the doctor handed me a box and told me to read the instructions, and the nurse handed me a yellow sheet of paper with standard surgical repair procedures, and then told me to bring my pickup to the front door.
It was the ninth surgical procedure, so I just did what I was told.
With the help of a nurse, I pulled my husband out of the wheelchair and framed him in the passenger seat, very empty of the anesthetic. I hit 401, and we returned to Bakersfield.
At home, I opened a box and a curious inspection of a gray control panel with a lot of buttons ... similar to a PlayStation controller. What in the world? I asked my very reassuring husband: “Has anyone shown you how to use this thing?” Blurred eyes, he said that he didn’t remember anything.
Well ... if all else fails, read the instructions. Needless to say, it was all Greek for me. So we played with him. By controlling the levels of electricity, he would have feelings of electricity, alternatively shaking his legs and legs ... or his hands ... or even certain personal parts.
It was a bit strange since I found that I can make my husband jump, skip and dance!
Finally, we returned to the specialist, where a company representative came to teach us how to use the control unit. Raising Randy to his computer, he began to program the control panel correctly. Using my computer mouse to determine suitable places for firing electricity, my husband acted as a puppet for a technician. Click the mouse and my husband's hand jumped. Click the mouse again and his legs respond. Click the mouse again, and my husband shouts: “You are forcing me to wet my pants!”
There were times when so much electricity shot at his feet that it was as if he was dancing in a disco. It was fun for a few months, but then body fluids filled the battery and shorted the whole system! Determined to beat the system, we chose for more surgery. This time they straightened the junction box, dug out the battery from the rear of his thigh, dried it, and then put it back in the front part of the abdomen. Unclear from the operation, the technician tested the electronics and, pleased with Randy's responses, returned to Colorado!
I put my pick-up truck to the hospital, grabbed my stunned husband, and we went home ... not realizing that something was wrong. They forgot to turn on the computer! A week later, they returned the equipment, and she turned on the power. Finally, we left California and returned home to the mountains of Northwest Montana.
Randy still used a wheelchair, but on a rocky surface, he didn't work very well. I will see his empty wheelchair, and then rushing to find him, hoping that he has not fallen too far anywhere to pull him out. I ordered him two canes, and he began to drag around the farm for short distances. But it was like watching a 200 pound kid!
Randy could not sit more than a few minutes. Once I lost his tracks to discover that he was limping out of the forest, sweat-filled with sweat of pure horror! In blinded by drugs, he wandered too far and met fresh traces of a grizzly bear and the sounds of a very large animal in his hand. One cane broke in half, and the other was severely bent in shape. It's amazing that he just got out of the forest in time!
The neurostimulator was too delicate for such antics, and shortly thereafter an explosion occurred. By that time, we were out of cobra insurance, and for the next two years we had no medical intervention other than prescriptions from a local doctor, a passionate doctor, who said that he could do nothing for Randy except prescribe drugs.
It seemed that there was no end to the pain and suffering in sight!
Without a neurostimulator, the level of pain Randy climbed to the moon, and we again experienced tortured nights of screams and groans. Sleep deprivation, constant crises and knowing that besides a miracle our life will never recover, like a dark cloud that envelops us day after day.
Living with a "bionic person" was so appropriate, because all Randy treated his employers as a car, not a car ... so much so that my husband began to believe in it and act like that! His significance and originality come directly from his work and how well he can supplant most other people. But as you know, someone who lives with a drug addict, especially a drug addict with ADHD, a former rider, a bull fighter and a Motocross racer, a wildlife firefighter, an assistant fire chief, a lumberjack, a rodeo clown, is on the edge for an emotional disaster. !
Unfortunately, when life becomes so difficult, we often blame loved ones for our closest relationships.
The film "8 Seconds" is one of the best stories about this dynamic, especially in the life of the bull rider I have ever seen. This is a great story and really helps me understand my husband!
Many marriages cannot withstand the stress of chronic pain without any medical and psychological intervention.
Randy and I lost everything, and our grief has not yet been handled. When you live on adrenaline for many years, how do you stop and relax? When you lost your health insurance, how can you afford medical or psychological intervention? When all you know is work, how do you change?
Even in the church there were few solutions.
People loved us and cared for us, but they just did not understand! Randy was returning home from back surgery, such as implantation of a neurostimulator with dozens of braces up and down his writing, and the same church leaders who prayed for him during the operation approached and struck his back, welcoming him to the church this week! It was crazy. I felt I should be his bodyguard, but I so often trusted people. what happens when, in fact, many people hide from things that they cannot understand or control ... it scares them.
If you know someone in your family, or if you suffer from severe chronic pain or illness, you probably understand the need for people around you to be normal. and if you enjoy Randy, you probably suck on him and wear a mask as much as you can. Then, when you return home, you tear off the mask and release all the pain ... and if I like you, you are probably the closest shock absorber.
Without resting and not caring for God, how can you turn to tremendous grief and the pain of loss?
The best we could do, and what turned out to be the best solution for everyone, was to find every bit of Beauty, Truth, Humor and Joy that we could have every day.
We continued to dream and pursue BIG dreams. I learned to unleash my creativity and spend time for ME. Walking through the desert was a great way for me to penetrate the world of God. Behind our house was a steep mountain road that climbed the mountains on a fairly good slope. I would carry my heavy load of anxiety and trouble with me, beating my pain with a quick clip along a mountain path. Near the summit there were slight dips on the road, where a very careful middle-aged woman could sit down and rest for a moment. Then I would stand high on this ridge overlooking our house, as well as the whole valley ... a place where you could see the eyes, like an eagle, for many kilometers.
It was a sacred space - a place where I went only with a very serious type of prayer.
Shouting out loud, crying, and by grace asking all heavens to be my witness, I made promises and vows to God that I would never give up. In fact, I prayed to more dangerous prayers and asked God to send us to the sickest, to the most broken ... to our life, who he wanted.
Then, putting my heavy load, I missed and descended from the mountain and earned my work again. Many times before I got to the end of the road, I would give a clear idea of the next step. On one of these days, I immediately entered the house and found my ideal business. I joined a team of like-minded people, and in the company of these great people I began to flourish. Personal development was at the forefront of our learning curve, while at the same time we were honing our business skills.
I entered into a personal coaching with Dani Johnson, “Call to Freedom,” “Int,” and after a year my sales pipeline went pretty well. For the first time in a long time, I could distract from constant crises and pain and concentrate in a positive direction.
My soul healed, and the numbness that I used to protect my heart from all the pain and the constant crisis began to melt.
As soon as my own healing began, something in my husband cracked, and in his own pain he began to get very angry. Years later, he apologized for those days, saying, “Sue, you have done nothing wrong.
His worst fear was that I would leave him in his broken condition, who would take care of him? With constant confidence that I was for him, not against him, the pain was breaking through, and my freedom to conduct business was verified in all respects. Nevertheless, he was very much for me ... it was just that internal battle with which he had to deal every day.
In Stephen Pressfield’s “The Art of War,” he defines resistance as something within you that will sabotage your efforts for everything related to the work you have created to achieve in this world.
We must be ruthless with such an enemy, and the best way to defeat him is to move in the opposite spirit, to do something that does not come naturally.
When we beat off resistance within us and begin to blossom and flow in our God-given identity and destiny, this automatically causes those around us to panic. For when they see that we have success fighting with our own demons, he is responsible for them in order to kill their own fears ... At this moment I need to move forward, leaving Randy behind (emotionally and spiritually). And sometimes, when a person is not ready to grow and mature, it is best to keep moving forward and up. At first glance, it looks ruthless. When in fact it is the only way to save the life of another person. We must first be healthy and strong enough!
First we have to save ourselves, and then we can show with our example the way for others to follow and help them from there.
However, our life is about to move once more in a way that will change us forever. A brochure for a healing conference arrived in the mail, and we signed it the same day! A few weeks later, they went to British Columbia for one purpose: the complete healing of Randy's spine. That was our only hope!
Randy made a vow, and he sealed it, not bringing enough painkillers to hold out over the weekend. He told me: “If God does not heal me, then you can just put me in the ground!” The first day was really great, but not healing. The second day was wonderful, but just as Randy stood up in front of the speaker, they had to close the service and empty the building to receive a prayer! The third day was discouraging, and Randy began to lose hope. It took about a dozen people to push him to the front to get a prayer. John Arnott was the speaker, and he did not care to speak as much as he wanted those who suffered from chronic pain — especially those who had been in chronic pain for many years — would come to the front.
We finally pushed and pulled Randy forward. He later admitted that he was not sure what fear was the greatest ... that he would be healed or that he would not be healed! After all, many people go to audit conferences and they do not heal. And indeed, when you see that people are falling and claiming that they have been healed, are they really connected, or is it a lot of emotion and hype, or worse? We were going to find out.
The actual moment of healing was taped and then released on a DVD titled "Miracles, the Randy MacKenzie Story." I was there watching, but my husband was so short that I could not see anything with all the people in front of me. Then, suddenly, John Arnott asked if anyone had come with Randy, and that someone had come forward. Randy stretched and flexed, doing things that usually cut the muscles and tissues on the back, with all the wires. My husband cried, and suddenly he picked me up and started spinning me!
He always told me that when God healed him, the first thing he would do was pick me up and he kept his promise!
Somewhere on the right there was a voice: “Honey, you have returned your husband!”
The whole world fell away when Randy and I just held each other until the voice spoke again and said, “Well, I think we just let them have their own personal moment here!” I looked in because I buried my head in the shoulder Randy, and John Arnott handed me a microphone. Oh my God! I just said the first thing that came to my mind, because it was the sum total of all Randy with whom I had prayed for many years.
And this is when our life has changed, irreversibly, again. Not only did God remove the pain of my husband, but when we put our hands on his back, he felt our hands, whereas before they caused so many nerves that his back was numb. As if this was not enough, Randy lacked pain, and he could not take it if he wanted ... this was literally the last chance.
He slept the first time that night - all night! And never suffered a symptom of care.
His doctor, while observing the conference, told him that he simply had to simply die from having to pass these recipes on a cold turkey!
I do not know what shocked us more: injury or healing. I think it is healing. And then, when the conference leaders sent a film crew to our home and started shooting a drama / documentary in our living room and local area. We really didn’t want to be a part of the film and didn’t know why anyone would want to film an ordinary family who lived in the desert and made almost all the mistakes a man knew. But having risen a little to the mountain, in a sacred place, where I was a witness of the heavenly hosts, some prayers invaded me: “We will go where you want us to go. The most offensive, the most broken, the most needy ... "So, we said" yes "and just trusted God.
I want to share what, in my opinion, is the most important lesson of this story: Stephen Pressfield, in The Art of War, chimes him in the head.
Some quotes from Stephen Pressfield:
Our job: “Our job in this life is not to form ourselves into some kind of ideal that we assume we have bought, but to find out who we already are and to become one.”
Our biggest fear is: “Fear that we will succeed ... we are afraid to discover that we are more than we think. We know that if we embrace our ideals, we must prove their worth. ”
Stephen shares an illustration showing the power of our choice over the human spirit. Когда, наш страх (или Сопротивление), мы выбираем ограничивать или уменьшать себя, в этом смысле наш человеческий дух уменьшается. Какие результаты могут принимать такие формы, как рак, аутоиммунные заболевания, склонность к несчастным случаям и ряд других заболеваний, как физических, так и психологических.
Когда человек преодолевает сопротивление и убивает людей своими личными страхами, много раз физическая или эмоциональная форма слабости переходит в ремиссию или исчезает.
Я не знаю, что случилось с Рэнди, когда боль исчезла (чудеса - это тайны), принимая с собой все пристрастия к обезболивающим препаратам, но у меня есть чувство того, что произошло, когда произошла третья и самая изнурительная травма. В течение жизни менталитета производительности, выраженного как трудоголизм, Рэнди пережил одно нарушение отношений за другим.
С разбитым сердцем он хромал жизнью, и с его большой физической силы и решимости погребенные мечты, личность и судьба были просто выражением его погребенного духа ... и смертоносных аварий (авария из нефтяного кокса только одна из трех несчастных случаев / чудес) были физическими выражениями внутренней смерти смерти в его сокровенном бытии. Я считаю, что, как защищает Стивен Прессфилд, у самого Рэнди был вызов «Просыпаться»!
Его прогулка к фасаду церкви символизировала его готовность пробудиться и встать. Человек, молящийся, Джон Арнотт, был просто инструментом, используемым любящим Небесным Отцом, чтобы помочь сломанному человеку подняться и получить добрые дары, которые отец хотел ему дать.
Боль и болезнь - это просто смерть в замедленном темпе. Несчастные случаи и травмы и попытки самоубийства являются более очевидными и быстрыми проявлениями той же болезни.
Знаете ли вы кого-то, кто болен большую часть времени, подверженного несчастным случаям или депрессии? Мы не можем давать оценки здоровья или советы, но в мире, где болезнь и болезни растут в 1-й мировой стране, такой как США, нам кажется разумным стать детективом и искать собственные сердца для любых мест, где мы имеем отказались от наших мечтаний, где мы устроились меньше, где мы надели маски и попытались угодить другим людям или где-нибудь там, где мы чувствуем себя застрявшими.
Существует генеральный план, поток, который объединяет наши жизни и объединяет нас в цельность. Мы видим нижнюю сторону, все потоки пересекают друг друга и выглядят как хаотический беспорядок. Но Бог видит верхнюю поверхность и умело и мастерски переплетает каждую нить, даже темные нити, в нашей жизни таким образом, что у каждого из нас есть потенциал и изобилие ресурсов для выполнения нашей судьбы.
Что вам больше всего нравится? Если бы вы могли сегодня что-либо сделать в мире или быть повсюду в мире, с кем бы вы ни были в мире ... с кем бы вы были, где бы вы были, и чем занимались? Если это не то место, где вы сейчас находитесь, или что вы делаете сейчас, какие шаги вы можете предпринять для исправления курса?
Мы не можем изменить себя или кого-либо еще. Мы можем принимать только одно решение за один раз, одну молитву за раз, и избавляться от всего, что будет стоять на пути или создать сопротивление. Мы не сражаемся против людей - это не наша проблема. Мы боремся против Сопротивления, наших страхов. Мне жаль, что я не могу стоять здесь и говорить, что наши битвы закончились и закончились. В некотором смысле, они только начинаются! Мы мало понимали, что наши величайшие битвы были за углом!
