Health Update: Surgery Pending

I have been told that I need to have surgery, and that I may not safely delay. I have lost the ability to eat most foods, because my gallbladder needs to be removed. Surgery is scheduled for May 6th, and I would appreciate your prayers for its success and a rapid recovery.

My lack of food options at the moment (fruit and crackers only) has resulted in fatigue that is difficult to overcome (though I do try). As a result, please be patient if I release fewer essays (and videos) than we would all desire. Until the surgery has taken place, I cannot be sure what recovery will look like, but I hope a fountain pen can be found in my hand. I am told that for most people, most of the time, recovery is reasonably fast. Until I have gone under the knife, we cannot know where I will fall among the statistics.

If any of you have gone through this before, I would welcome any practical wisdom or thoughts as I prepare for this experience. I have only had surgery once before, after I broke both of my arms in 2022 and one of them required metal reinforcement to be useful again. A few articles rose from that circumstance. Perhaps this will be similar.

Illness is always humbling. It has a way of breaking through the illusion of control, for which we fight in our daily lives. But just as stillness can create space for the sacred, so too can weakness clarify what truly matters. I'm grateful for those who will be helping to ease this time of uncertainty, and I carry hope that even this saga might yield its own quiet fruit.