I was recently telling someone one of my favorite stories and I realized I’d never shared it with the world… And I think the world needs to hear it.
When Dax was about a month and a half old, living very precariously still in the NICU, he began slowly easing his way into kidney failure. His urine output slowly decreased until one Monday his primary nurse sat me down and told me the doctor had officially diagnosed him with complete renal failure. I looked her in the eyes and asked her if I should be worried. With tears in her own eyes, she shook her head yes.
We talked a while about what it meant. Realistically speaking, there was nothing they could do.
The doctor came through a few minutes later and she explained to me there were no dialysis machines for babies that small. They had stopped all meds that might have renal side effects, but still, he was having absolutely no urine output. His swelling was worsening every day. All we could do was pray. If Dax’s kidneys didn’t begin working soon, we were looking at him dying within a few days.
We were obviously devastated.
So we prayed for pee. A whole lot of people prayed for pee.
Nothing.
That Thursday I was sitting vigil at his bedside when my mom walked in and surprised me. She lives about six hours away and I hadn’t known she was coming. She sat down with me and said, “I have a confession to make.”
(smile)
She went on to tell me she’d held it all together all this time. For over two months she’d dealt with us losing Aubrie, me being hospitalized, my father being in ICU, a very sick Daxton, and now Dax’s apparently impending death. She’d held it all together beautifully up until she was driving north on Highway 45 and got stuck in road construction. That, it appeared, was the last straw.
“I turned off the radio, I rolled up the windows, and I let God have it.”
She said she’d fussed and cussed and told Him under no specific terms He was NOT taking her grandbaby; that we’d been through enough and He needed to cool His jets and go pick on someone else for a while. She smiled after she told me. I could tell she’d made some peace that day.
We left the hospital at shift change and went home to eat supper. I called the hospital at nine, like I always did, to check his weight for the day and see how the shift was starting. Nurse Debbie answered the phone that night, and in her typical nonchalant fashion she said, “I came in and they were all fussing about renal failure this and renal failure that. I don’t know what all the fuss is about; that kid’s peed 150ccs since I got here.”
My mom just smiled.
“It’s proof God’s a man. You have to bitch at Him before He listens.”
