Monday, February 25, 2008

How to Predict the Future.

A neighbor once gave my family a little lesson on how we could predict the future. His theory was that the more information you have regarding a particular thing the better you could predict what will happen. You may be thinking, well duh. Yes, his theory is nothing more than common sense, but unfortunately, there seems to be a lack of that in the world.

A certain incident happened over the weekend that followed this pattern. I found out Friday night that my dad might have had a heart attack. I was not surprised. That is not to say that I didn't care or that I wasn't worried. I was. But I wasn't surprised. And this is why. Two years or so ago (more or less, I lose track of time) my uncle had a stroke and after some tests found out that he needed some major heart surgery. Originally the doctors had planned on quintuple bypass surgery but ended up combining two by passes, making it 'just' quadruple bypass. Then about a year ago, my other uncle (brothers) was having some dizzy spells. His son took him to the hospital, and the doctors treated him immediately and put in a pace maker. My grandfather (my dad's dad) also had heart problems. Fact 1: Heart problems run in the family.

About two months ago, my dad was doing his regular exercises in the park and put his legs over his head. He felt some chest pain that never really went away. He thought it was just a pulled muscle. (Yeah...his heart muscle.) He didn't tell anyone this until after all this came about. Fact 2: He has chest pain.

One night when we were all in St. George, we got on the subject of my uncle's heart beat. Supposedly the mechanical pump made a different noise than a normal heart would. My cousin listened to it but couldn't really tell a difference, so he listened to my dad's heart to compare. He said that my dad's heart was beating twice as fast. My aunt then decided to bring out the blood pressure taker and we all took a turn. The machine did in fact indicate that my dad's heart rate was twice as fast as it should have been. I was 150. No one really knew what to think of it. I thought it might be the stress that he was feeling at the time. Fact 3: He has an abnormal heart beat.

Given those fact, you would think that my dad would have been a little more concerned. According to my neighbor's theory, we could assume ('predict') that he would have a heart attack. Because of the information we had, anything serious was prevented/ Because as fortune had it, my uncle went down to Arizona for a doctor's appointment just two days after we were there. At the appointment, he happened to mention my dad's heart rate. The doctor told him to tell my dad to get to the hospital right away. My dad did, and his heart problems were verified. They put in a balloon pump to give his heart a rest and to regulate it. They also did an angioplasty and put in a stent (something he would have to have done three more times, for each artery).

A cardiogram revealed that my dad did not have a heart attack, but that the vessels had narrowed. I can only imagine that he would have had major heart failure had he not taken care of it when he had. His heart was beating twice as fast for so long that it was just exhausted. After a while, I am sure it would have overworked itself to the point of stopping.

I know there was some divine intervention. Had the topic not come up, it probably would never have been a concern. God works through ordinary means sometimes.

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