Keeping the Faith

I have always been the type of person that believed that everything happens for a reason. I do stand by that. A lot of people do not get behind that, but I do.  You can probably now ask yourself, what reason can we give for disasters, sickness, pain, heartache and on and on. I can't answer that question but what I can say is that for every situation, good or bad that we are faced with, we come away with some lesson learned or some realization of what we could have done differently to effect the story.  So again, I wonder what reason is it that I should have kidney disease and CML and have to be on dialysis and need a life saving surgery.  Well, honestly I don't know that yet, but I do know that is my faith in goodness and my faith in my family, friends, my G-d and myself that keeps me going each and every day.

Keeping the faith isn't just a catchy song lyric, it's a test and a trial each day. When I get up in the morning and I realize I have to go to dialysis again, I say this sucks, why should I do this shit, but I dig a little deeper and a pray very hard to have the strength to get me through this day.  And when I am tired and aggravated sitting in the chair watching the clock and the machines and the blood pressure monitor I grab onto my faith a little harder and watch another episode of Mad Men on Netflix.  (On a side note, I don't know how people ever survived any kind of long term medical treatment without a  tablet with Netflix and Amazon Prime , just sayin!)  It is faith that keeps me sitting in that chair and it is faith that I will be better one day and faith that I am strong enough to deal with this.

As I mentioned before I believe things happen for a reason, well here is an example of this: And I will tell you, this JUST HAPPENED YESTERDAY!!! Here goes:

My favorite Aunt and Uncle and Cousins rented a vacation home out in the Hamptons and invited the rest of the family for a BBQ. We had a great afternoon, schmoozing, eating, drinking, relaxing, kids in the pool.  Later on in the day 3 women stopped by, one of which was a colleague of my uncle's.  They joined us for a drink and we were all chatting. One of the women was talking to my brother and mentioned something in a fleeting conversation about someone needing a Kidney. Well naturally I had to get in this conversation, I said, "I need a kidney, I am dialysis". She said her father recently had a transplant at the same hospital that I am going to have my eventual transplant at. OK no big deal, right? Well, she continued to tell me that she works at the transplant hospital in the POST transplant department, so that after my surgery and discharge I return to the hospital quite often and I am followed for 3 years by this team. She is one of the doctors that I am to see.  In addition, my transplant coordinator is her boss.  THIS MEETING WAS NOT A COINCIDENCE!. I believe that we were supposed to meet. I am still reeling from this "chance" encounter.  Honestly, what are the odds that this random person, who has no connection to anyone but a colleague of my uncles' and came along for the ride meets me, someone who will now be connected to her for at least 3 years.   It's hard to comprehend .  

Is it my faith and strength that brought this to light? I am not sure, but what I do know is that I will continue to keep my faith and belief that I will be ok, because it is working so far.