Heart Hope by Olga

If a hospital is supposed to be a place of healing, health and restoration why do they disturb you day and night? It's hard to understand why it is so very important that they check your temperature, your blood oxygen level and blood pressure in the middle of the night.  After one of those nights filled with numerous interruptions, my husband had enough. When they arrived in his room at 4:30 AM to draw blood, he clearly told the nurse no. He demanded that she return at a decent hour. She reluctantly said she would return in an hour after completing the draws from the rest of the floor. (Personally I wanted to get it over with so that we didn't have to wake up again so soon.) Although I know the tests and checks are an important part of the healing process and are necessary to make sure there are no complications that arise undetected, at the time they seem to be nuisances. However if something had been wrong, we would have been thankful for the monitoring c...

While visiting eleven year old Marilyn in the hospital recently, memories from my teenage years flooded to mind. Upon entering her room, beautiful Marilyn was reclining in the bed, using a breathing machine for her pneumonia. She was surrounded by family and had declared that she was bored and wanted to go home. Going back over 40 years, I could place myself in a hospital bed where I laid for a month. My circumstances where different in that I had been in a car accident during the summer, just weeks before entering high school. My head hit the windshield and was cut up pretty bad…my forehead, my eye and even my chin all required many stitches by a plastic surgeon, but the major issues were the internal injuries sustained--holes made in my inside throat from hitting the dashboard. Like Marilyn, I also had to use one of those breathing machines to rid my lungs of the congestion that had collected in them from the accident. And I too can recall the doctor in the doorway entering my r...

My son-in-law’s grandmother died about this time last year. She had been sick for a time and had even expressed that she was ready for Jesus to take her home. Then she had a sudden turn for the worse and had to be air lifted to a hospital some distance from her home. While in the hospital, she was non-responsive for days, but at one particular time she seemed agitated and her daughters and a nurse on duty were trying to determine what might help calm her down when they saw her rosary beads on the bedside table. One of her daughters put them into her hands and immediately she began caressing the beads and they knew that she was saying the rosary. Once she had gone through each of the beads, she held the cross in her hand and kissed it. Amazing—isn’t it!   We do not know what happens in the mind of people when they are suspended between this earth and the next life, but to me this story shows that what is most important to you when you are alive is what can bring you the most com...

My friend Ikie had her hip replaced less than a week ago. After having several experiences with hospitals and surgeries in recent months, I thought I would give her sometime to recover and get over all of the pain, drugs, and lack of sleep, so I was quite surprised when she called me today and sounded better than ever. She reported that her recovery had been a breeze and that she had even been “entertaining” friends. Ikie also informed me that she had learned some things from this experience that I thought were worth passing along. First of all, the people in her church had stepped up to the plate and had showered her with gourmet meals and cards of encouragement. I think the thing that astonished her most was getting meals from people that she hardly knew and cards from people she had never met. The impact that this had made her realize the importance of doing the same for others when they are suffering in some way. Since Ikie has been such an active and independent person, using the...