The Morning Star Rising on the First Day
A CATHETER IN THE AORTA
In a series of prior postings I have communicated how a life threatening illness sent me to the emergency room where the doctors did not expect me to live through the night. Being close to death, my spirit left my body and I experienced the truth of our spiritual reality. I traveled to and swam in the Lake of Fire (also called the second death) where I experienced unimaginable horrors. I then went into Hell where I was confronted by Satan and experienced the incredible hatred that he has for me. Next I traveled to the Judgment Seat of Christ and heard the words from God that no one wants to hear, which were, “Why should you live?”
If you would like to read the details of all of this please use the following hyperlinks:
The-Intensive-Care-Unit-and-the-Initial-Prognosis
Entering-the-Spiritual-Realm-of-Death
Inside-the-Lake-of-Fire-the-Second-death
Reliving-my-sins-before-the-Judgment-Seat-of-Christ
Opening-the-Books-on-Judgment-Day
Repentance-Brings-Salvation-Even-on-Judgment-Day
But I made a promise to God that I would be better if He would work with me. The next thing that I knew was that I woke up in the intensive care center. I had lived through the night but what was about to become clear was that the battle for my life was not over. My problem was an exploding pancreas was filling my body with digestive enzymes that are used to decompose meat. So in effect, my body was disintegrating from the inside out. To slow down enzyme production I was placed on a strict fast until such time as a more definitive direction could be made. Then suddenly my vocal cords became swollen and choked off my air supply and an emergency operation was performed that saved my life.
But now the emerging problem was how to get adequate levels of nutrition into my system. The doctors had tried several times to reintroduce me to food but each time they did my digestive enzyme levels shot up, causing damage to my internal organs. In addition the nurses were having an increasingly difficult time finding a usable vein each time they had to connect me to IV nutrition. Since the larger veins had already broken down, only the smaller veins were available. Of course, using smaller veins reduced the amount of nutrition that could be pumped into my system each day. Since I was already getting IV solutions almost twenty hours a day, this was a critical situation. After a lot of agonizing my doctors finally decided to risk placing a semi-permanent catheter into my aorta.
That’s correct, right through the middle of my chest and very close to my heart. They were hesitant to perform this procedure because a single slip during the procedure could cause permanent heart damage.
But there were several advantages to having it done. First of all my veins would get a needed rest and the problem of nutritional volume would be solved. Once the catheter was in place, all I needed to do was attach it to an IV for just four hours a day to get all the nutrition that I needed. Things would became much easier and totally pain free. An added benefit would be that I would be able to get up and move around more often since I would not need to be permanently connected to an IV.
They performed the procedure in my hospital room and I was conscious during the entire operation so that the doctors could talk with me. They opened a small hole in my chest by going between two of my ribs. Once this was done they had enough room to insert the catheter. As fate would have it, the doctor had a great deal of difficulty getting the catheter to penetrate my very strong aorta wall. The doctor made several unsuccessful attempts to force the catheter into the artery. Each attempt was accompanied with additional force and before the procedure was completed, the doctor was using all of his strength and much of his body weight to get the catheter inserted. At the time that all of this happened I was very concerned. It seemed that all I could think about was their warnings of the risk of heart damage from an inadvertent slippage. But there was no slip as the catheter finally punctured the aorta wall, making a sound like the crushing of a giant beetle’s shell as it entered. The good news was that the operation was a success. There were no slips, thank God. I was very happy and relieved that this entire ordeal was over.
Keep in mind that a permanent solution to my condition had not been devised and that the spiritual attacks on me were far from over. For now I was content but at the same time I felt a need to find God. Look to the next posting to find out what God does in reaction to my feeble attempt to find Him.
SEEKING JESUS 