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3-day progress report

Today is when I was originally scheduled to have lower-back surgery, before someone else cancelled and I was able to take their slot. My back surgery three days ago was specifically to address the drop foot problem. This is where my right foot would drag and trip me when trying to walk, because the muscle along my shin bone was not firing. This in turn was because of the pinched nerve in my lower back.

The surgery successfully corrected that problem, although I still have work to do to restore that movement. Yet the day after surgery I was already able to hold my toes about an inch off the floor. The second day this increased to at least 2 inches. The nerves and muscles are firing, but the muscle is still weak. Exercise will bring about more progress.

Most people who undergo this type of surgery are given physical therapy three times a week, and they struggle to leave the house, get into the car, and drive to a clinic. I get it twice a day without having to leave the house. Each day I am able to do more than the previous day, so the progress is encouraging to all of us.

I have not yet tried to navigate stairs, so I am confined to our lower-level living room. Perhaps I may try this today. My daughter is anxious for me to do this. Even if successful, it will take months to get back to “normal” strength. The nerves and muscles are all working, but they remind me of a newborn colt that is a bit wobbly on his feet.

I am also on an excellent nutritional program from Dr. Melinda Pettingill, which is speeding up the healing process. I started her regimen last Monday and had completed 2 days of it prior to the surgery.

On a more prophetic note, the day of my surgery was December 21, which has been one of my 5 major watch dates since 1981-1982. Recall that in 1981 I experienced 5 steps down into the “dungeon” (as I called it), and a year later (1982), I experienced 5 steps back up in a type of “resurrection.”

So when my surgery was rescheduled for December 21, it did not take long to put the pieces together and to see the parallel. Being under anesthesia is much like a death experience. In fact, anesthesia brings a person close to death and can be quite dangerous. The anesthetist must know what he/she is doing.

The night before my surgery, I had a call from a friend who gave me a word that I was to present myself to God as alive from the dead. That was encouraging, and I knew that I was to do so after coming out of surgery. So once again, I was seeing patterns from the past manifesting in the present on the same date—as I have so often seen. In this case it suggests a transformation in some way, most likely in terms of the ministry itself.

This also showed that this surgery was not purely a “secular” event to heal the body. God was treating it as a literal death-and-resurrection experience. In other words, it was something that I had to go through, because God had purpose in this. This may clarify further when we reach the next watch date in this cycle—December 29/30.