Widowmaker

It's hard to describe what we have just been through. It was scary, it was miraculous, it was quick. When Mark told me just a few days ago that he had been having some pain in his chest sort of under his left arm, and some tingling in the arm itself, my heart was heavy. I didn't want him to have heart trouble. His parents both have heart disease. I have heart disease. I was scared for him, for us and for our children. I wanted to deny it. I wanted God to make it go away. I wanted it to be nothing.
The cardiologist's office called when they had a cancellation and Mark went for a stress test. He failed it. The ekg was so scary that they sent him to the hospital to see if the cardiologist wanted to do a heart catheterization that day. The cardiologist told his staff to fit Mark in the next day. He said "This is serious. Absolutely no stress. No physical stress, no stress of any kind until we get you in here." I prayed for a false positive, for a mistaken ekg.
We were essentially walk ins for the test the next day, and the doctor had several emergencies as well as several patients ahead of us as we waited 8 1/2 hours for the test. We arrived at the hospital at 1 pm and they wheeled him out for the procedure at 9:30 pm.
As we kissed goodbye I was still praying for the false positive or something, anything besides a heart problem. What I thought could be better I don't know. Maybe some outrageously simple problem that was easily cared for was what I wanted. 20 minutes later when they came and got us out of the waiting room, telling us the doctor wanted to see us, I knew it was bad news. I said "This is bad." The nurse said, something like "It's not bad." I thought she was nuts. I knew the doctor hadn't yet spoken to the family of the patient done before Mark. I knew he couldn't want to see us for any good thing.
The nurse stood in the door of the operating room and called to the doctor. They covered his hands and he came to talk to us. Mark was on the table in the background while he said "We have found a 95 to 99% blockage in the left anterior descending artery." The nurse showed us vivid pictures of a very narrow artery. "We call this a widowmaker. It is life threatening" said the doctor, "and I want to put a stint in as our first option before open heart surgery. He has seen the pictures" he continued, "and he knows what I want to do." I said "Go for it." He hollered at Mark. "Reverend Lowe?" Mark hollered back "yeah". "Your family is here. I'm telling them what we want to do." I think Mark said "okay". I said "Go for it" again, and the doctor told us that it would be 20 to 30 minutes until they were finished, along with the usual disclaimer about the wonderful risk of heart attack and death during the procedure.
I called my kids and our ministry partners, my mother in law cried and prayed. Not long after all the calls were made, one of the nurses appeared and told us the procedure was over. Mark had not had a heart attack on the table, the stint was "beautiful", she said, and we would see him in a few minutes. We rejoiced. I started calling everyone again.
After he was wheeled to the recovery room, there were more pictures of the heart and the difference the stint had made. We were gratefully rejoicing in the timing of the tests and the success of the procedure. All other arteries look fine. Only one was blocked, and it almost completely.
When Mark had stood on the podium the Sunday before and said,"I could walk out of this building and die today. (God please not today.)" He didn't know how true a statement it was, or that God might indeed be literally protecting him from death as he did tear down at church. He could easily have had a heart attack and died.
We came home today. Mark is tired but otherwise fine. I have been reminded that a husband is a wonderful thing. The widowmaker has been thwarted by the hand of God in the form of an excellent surgeon and wonderfully timed discovery and treatment.