You'll Never Shout for Joy From the Peak of a Mountain You Did Not Climb

 If I'm being completely honest, I did not like the person I became sometimes while I waited for transplant.

In my defense, being told one needs a heart transplant is a fairly big deal. It's not something that can be coped with immediately. I needed every last minute of my 18-month wait to adjust. And even then--even now--it's a hard thing to wrap the mind around.

In April of 2022 I was sitting in church pondering the words I was hearing. I don't know fully if it was said over the pulpit or if it was whispered by the Spirit, but I distinctly heard the instruction to ask the Lord to know what you need to strengthen and He will tell you. And that's exactly what I did. As I sat in sacrament meeting that day, I prayed to know what I could work on and improve.

The answer: Patience and Long-suffering.

A few short weeks later those words would need to become a mantra of sorts--actually, more of a chastisement as the transplant process began.

The transplant team, while enthusiastic about organ transplantation, are very clear that transplant is NOT a cure. Instead it is trading one disease for another. At the time, I remember thinking, well, it's the only chance I've got, so let's get on with it! I caught the enthusiasm in a way and I was anxious to get the show on the road. Oh, but nothing is ever so easy. The wait would end up being longer and harder than I had hoped.

While I thought I was a patient person, this trial taught me that the Lord does in fact know us better than we know ourselves. Patience was truly something I needed to work on. And as month after month went by, I felt myself becoming less and less patient and more and more self-pitying.

In December of of 2022, while messing around with my hair in front of the bathroom mirror, I noticed a new lump in my neck. I knew it was my thyroid. I took a picture and sent it to my sister to see of she could see it or if I was being hyper vigilant. She said she could definitely see the lump. I waited no time scheduling an appointment with my GP. The only problem was, my regular doctor couldn't fit me in until the end of January. I felt this was more urgent, so I scheduled with another doctor who had an opening in early January--still, I would wait a month to get into a doctor about this lump.

To my dismay, this doctor, upon walking into the exam room, almost immediately dismissed me. When I explained to him about the lump, he looked--did not do any manual exam at all, just looked--and said the lump was small. I explained that one of the medications I was on was known to have thyroid toxicity. To which he responded, "Now why would you say that? Surely if it were toxic, you wouldn't be on it." I explained that both the prescribing physician and the pharmacist told me it was toxic to the thyroid and I should have my levels checked frequently. In the end, I had to ask him for labs and an ultrasound for my thyroid. I never returned to him again, obviously.

In early February I finally had the ultrasound. While my lab levels were normal, the US was not. It did show three nodules--one with concerning characteristics classified as a TIRADS level 5--meaning highly suggestive of malignancy. This doctor emailed me to tell me the results and suggested I follow up in a year. Do nothing and follow up in a year? Uh, no.

When the transplant team heard the results they pushed to get me in to see an endocrinologist. In March I went to the Huntsman Cancer Institute to meet with a specialist where we went over the findings. He explained that thyroid cancer is usually slow-growing and easily treated, that the suspicious nodule was still small, and left me with the choice to biopsy it or not. I explained that being on the transplant list, I knew they wouldn't do a transplant if there was a chance this was cancer, so we needed to get this treated and out of the way as soon as possible.

Right there in the office, the doctor performed a fine needle aspiration. Under ultrasound guidance, he inserted a long needle through my neck, into the thyroid nodule and took several samples for pathology, with only a shot of lidocaine for the pain. Little did I know, this was something I would need to get used to as a heart transplant patient.

A week later I received a phone call from the doctor himself. "I am so sorry to have to tell you this, but it is cancer."

My transplant listing was put on hold until the cancer was successfully treated.

I cried, not because I was scared of dying, or cancer--thyroid cancer, after all, is considered the "good kind" due to it's low mortality rate--but because I was frustrated that I was getting hit with this on top of everything else! I fell deeply down the Why Me spiral. I looked around, and from what I could see, everyone else was living life on easy mode. While they were all going on vacation and working toward goals, I was waiting for a heart transplant and, now, dealing with thyroid cancer! How unfair!

Then I was reminded of the scripture Ether 2:24 "For behold, ye shall be as a whale in the midst of the sea; for the mountain waves shall dash upon you. Nevertheless, I will bring you up again out of the depths of the sea..."

Here was another opportunity for God to strengthen me, to deliver me. Here was another chance to prove I had faith in the Savior. I would get through this. I would climb this mountain, too. After all, you will never shout for joy from the peak of a mountain you did not climb.