A long, long day!

Friday, October 14 meant it was time for us to travel back to Birmingham for a visit with Dr. V and his staff! Since my eyes were going to have to be dilated, I did not think it would be the best idea for me to travel alone and have to drive back by myself. James could not make the trip, so my mom was able to meet me in Calera and ride with me (thanks Mrs. Betty!) and then drive Evan and me back to their house. It was homecoming at Bibb County, so I was excited to go to the game and see old friends! The appointment started right on time and with some of the same stuff. I had to go over paperwork and do a pregnancy test (this has to be done each time to ensure that I am not since I CAN NOT be pregnant while on this medication). Once these things were done, it was time for the eye exams!

The eye exams were fine, not much had changed...not too much can change, I don't guess, when you already can't see! haha! From there, I went to do my field vision test. It was the strangest thing! She kept saying, "Only press the button if you are sure you are seeing the light." My response was, "I am only pressing the button when I see the light." Come to find out she could not find my blind spot. Now, we all know that everyone has a blind spot. I completed those tests knowing that I may have to redo them. What joy!

I moved from there to have images made of my eyes. This was pretty cool! They took me to a machine that got really close to my eyeball and had me hold my eyes open really wide. When she took the image, it was showing all of the veins and vessels in the eye. It was pretty cool to see, not to mention my eyelashes looked amazing (haha!). The tech was very sweet and very patient as she could see I was a bit anxious and tired. By this point, we had been there for a couple of hours and my eyes had been dilated 2 times.

From there, I repeated the field vision test. It was more of the same...see the flashing light, click the button and once again I was hearing, "Heather, only click if you see." By this point, my flesh was wanting to surface, so Jesus and I were having a little heart to heart! It is amazing how calming that can be! What if every time we felt our 'flesh' begin to surface we did that! How different would our responses be? What would others see in and through us? Hopefully the love of Jesus!

After the vision test, it was time for more pictures. By this point, I was DONE! Do you hear me? D.O.N.E!! It is 4:45pm and we have been at this since 12:50 pm. My sweet Evan has been so good, he has not complained and my poor mother has been dragged all over! The tech begins the test and the more she tells me to open my eyes and not blink, the more I want to blink! UGH! She kept asking if I wanted a break and I would simply answer with a "No, let's get this done!" I did not notice that she made a phone call in the middle of the test, but this will be important later in our day. This test seemed to go on forever! We finally wrapped up about 5:15 and the tech got a page. We thought we were on our way home when she looks and says, Dr. V needs to see you again.

When we got upstairs, I saw my case worker, Shareka and she had a very serious look on her face. Once in the exam room, I told my mom something was wrong. She provided comforting words, but for the first time since all of this came up, I was scared. There was Evan. My little man. My love- looking so much like his daddy, the man I had given my whole heart to. I didn't know what to do. I began to pray. Dr. V came in rather quickly and sat down in front of me, behind his equipment and told me that they had detected something in some pictures and he needed to take another look. I told him I was scared and he told me that he knew, but he needed for me to relax. For the 3rd time- my eyes were dilated! Whew! They needed a rest!

Once he finished he said that he had called in back-up from the hospital and he wanted Dr. Shaw to take a look. He came in, looked and said that he felt comfortable saying that whatever they saw in the images was not really there and that my eye (right) appeared to be ok. Dr. V said that it looked like the bottom half of my right eye was black and that would have been caused by head trauma/bleeding behind the eye. That would not have been a good thing! Since they both felt like I was ok, Dr. V told me he would keep a watch on it but I was free to go home. He did inform me that I had failed the field vision test really badly and that I needed to come back to re-take the test. So, I scheduled my appointment for the following Tuesday. I think I have learned every crack in I-65 by now!!

Once again, God shown His faithfulness to me. 1) He helped me to get through all of the testing even though I was so tired 2) He helped keep my little man peaceful and at ease while he waited 3) He made it possible for my mom to be there so I would not have to be alone 4) He sent wonderful people to work with me throughout the day to bring encouragement and 5) He was there holding my hand when possibly really bad news was to come. I felt the Lord there with me, with his arms wrapped so tightly around me. No words could ever explain how that feels. The power of God is amazing and I am so blessed to have been able to experience it firsthand! I pray that I am eager and open to share all He has done for me when He provides the opportunities!

Until next time...