It started with the fact that a friend’s husband had a bone infection from an accident about a year ago, and she was able to recommend the best ortho trauma doctor at KU.

Then when things got worse and I didn’t think I could wait for that appointment for five days, my competitive boss friend sent an email to her VIP KU connection and I had an appointment the next day.

The first KU doctor who saw me right away grew up an hour from our Small Town USA and took the time to walk us through and explain what I was facing. He got me an air cast boot to take away a little pain and discomfort while we waited for the main appointment with his colleague four days later.

On the big day of the appointment last Tuesday, we left at 6:30 am in a cold wind and drizzle and drove the five hours to the KU Med Center campus, anxious for answers and an end to this lower leg pain.

“Your appointment was canceled.”

Talk about a punch in the gut sick feeling. After driving five hours to be told there was no appointment? Inner Grace wanted to come out – that’s my mom, notorious for not being able to hold it in.

30 minutes later, we were in an exam room waiting to be seen by the best of the best, and I was worried that this physician would examine my leg and tell me the same thing the other ortho doctor in Central Kansas had told me one week earlier:

“Keep doing what you are doing and we will follow up.”

*****

A week earlier, we had traveled an hour and a half to that Central Kansas appointment on a very early morning, just knowing this was something kind of serious thanks to our wonderful Small Town USA physician who took my pain seriously.

We arrived on time and anxious to see the specialist.

“We don’t have an appointment for you. What is your name again and how do you spell it?”

I swear I am invisible, especially next to “personality plus” husband whom everyone loves. (Actually, the specialist had set up the appointment four days earlier as he consulted with my primary care physician, but he neglected to let his office know, so I was not in the system, not on the books…)

I tend to think every time I go to the doctor it will be nothing, that the educated and busy will think I am wasting their time. It causes me to pause more often than not, to not pick up the phone and make the call for an appointment. (Hmmm. Could it be I was the youngest of six children and grew up seeking attention any way I could get it? Could it be that when my original injury happened 40 years ago and the orthopedic surgeon told my parents my complaints about pain in my knee were just a desperate cry for attention after all the other surgeries were over and done, maybe he was right?)

So I overthink and under report. And Tuesday morning, I was worried that we had made the drive for nothing.

An hour later, we were making fast plans to check in to KU Med Center for surgery the next day.

*****

This week I have been reminded once again that God intervenes, through people all around me, and through His unrecognized miracles. When we were not satisfied with answers from an appointment with a doctor in Central Kansas, He took over through the actions of my competitive boss friend and former co-worker friend who spoke on my behalf to those in charge at KU. When the appointment was inexplicably canceled, He took over and made it happen through the kindness of a scheduler and staff on the 2nd floor of a medical office building on the campus of KU Med Center. When I thought that I was over-exaggerating my pain and questioned my motives for complaint, He took over through the kindness and concern of a orthopedic trauma surgeon at KU.

God intervened and continues to do so all along this journey. When I felt like I was a back page story and beating myself up for thinking this was a bigger deal than it should be, He intervened through new Friends in Indiana and a congregational care pastor here in KC, through Facebook messages and text messages from friends and family members. When we had to drop everything and hightail it to KC, He intervened through the kindness of our neighbors who took care of cats and house and mail and properties, being Jesus to us, being His hands and feet for us.

God let me know that I matter through the kind eyes of an infectious disease doctor and a long conversation with a nurse on a Saturday afternoon.

God reached out and touched me through a pair of pajamas that made all the difference in the world, and He let me know I was not alone in the text messages that said, “Don’t buy a shower chair or a walker. You can borrow ours.”

God made sure I was aware that not only does Sam have a circle, so does Rhonda. This journey is being taken on a paved path of prayer from Texas and Oklahoma to Florida and Indiana and all over Kansas.

God is making Himself known to me this week and He is assuring me I am not invisible and this leg does matter.

Left Legs Matter. That is as political as I get.

I am grateful God intervenes and maybe it is the overload and hallucinations of pain meds, but I recognize His hands and feet in the actions, words, and care of others around me.

And I am grateful that God will continue to intervene this next week, come what may, whether I am still in this hospital bed or back home trying to figure out how to maneuver with a walker.