(written on the 28th from notes)
Well, I can only blame myself for the night sleep last night. 🙃
I ended up staying up until after 3:00 in the morning looking up stuff online related to the house-building project here because I was so concerned about everything. 🙃
Aaaaaaaaaaand then I woke up at 6ish–wide awake. 😆
I think I did some of my normal morning routine. My canker sore issues definitely seemed like they were on the mend. 🥳
I wondered around the house just sort of thinking about what we could do to get things moving a little faster. When it came time for Heather to be getting ready to go to work, I headed over to the trailer to wish her a good morning, and we chatted for a bit before she headed out.
I spent a fairly good chunk of the morning communicating back and forth with different healthcare providers. I got in touch with the surgeon’s office in Rapid City to see if I could get an appointment scheduled, and they said his next available was latter half of june, which is actually pretty darn great.
They did say they wanted me to send my medical records over first, though, so I started trying to get in touch with other medical providers to get my stuff sent over to them.
While I was in the middle of that, I got a text message from the dental office asking if I still wanted to make an appointment for today, and I was like yes!
The next good little while was spent trying to get good records from the dentist office in Washington sent over to my sister’s dentist in Rapid City.
It had been like pulling teeth. I had sent requests twice, I think, last week, and I kept trying to call and call and call, and they would never answer their phone. Since it was a dental chain, I figured maybe someone else in the chain could get the records and send them over, so I called the main number for the whole company, and gratefully, the lady who answered, after multiple attempts, was able to get high quality pictures sent over to me, which I forwarded to the new dentist.
It was much more of an ordeal than that, as there were many many back and forth exchanges because the first set of X-rays they sent were really poor resolution, and they didn’t make it over to the dentist. But after many back and forths, I had an appointment, and the dentist had all the records they needed, and we were set to go. 🎉
I chatted with Hans a bit about things that I had found with the house from yesterday and what not, and we talked a bit about plans going forward and what we might be able to do. He had an appointment in Rapid City as well, so we figured it would be great to drive together and chat about stuff while we drove, so he swung by after work and picked me up, and we headed north.
Chatted with Cory for a fair bit while we were driving, as he was still working to try and diagnose his van. There were complications. He replaced the ignition switch, and the dashboard lit up again like it should, and the everything immediately prior to actually trying to crank it over worked again, so for a split second, it seemed like everything was going to be great, but then as soon as he tried to start the van, it made a weird noise, and then everything went black again as before.
No more dash lights. Nothin’.
😕
So I walked him through some things, and I think we also chatted a bit about house building stuff and roofing stuff and whatnot. Thanks, Cory!
Hans dropped me off at the dentist and headed over to his appointment, and I walked in, apologized for being a headache of a patient prior to even being a patient 😅, filled out all my paperwork, and waited for my turn.
And that’s when the magic began. 😊
Kelli, the Dental assistant, was wonderful. She was super friendly, and we chatted for a few minutes as we waited for Dr. Lemmon to head our way, just get to know you to chat stuff. We got on the subject of traveling for whatever reason, and it came up that I had been to New Zealand, and I mentioned that that was where the Lord of the rings was filmed, and just then, the dentist walked in, and Kelli asked him the little trivia question if he knew where Lord of the rings was filmed.
Well… yes, he did. Lord of the Rings is his favorite, so not only did he know that it had been filmed in new zealand, he knew a lot more than that. 😆
We ended up chatting for maybe 5 minutes just about New Zealand and traveling and whatnot before we even got into Dental stuff. He was totally relaxed, totally laid back, totally just… cool.
And then the dental exam began. He poked and prodded. He check this. He checked that. He went from the front to the back, from the side to the side. He checked every tooth, and he was thorough.
Every time I had a question, he didn’t hesitate to pull an instrument out of my mouth if it was in there, and let me ask my question, and then he’d answer it.
Totally took his time. Not even a hint of irritation. Good-natured and happy, explaining and teaching as he went.
That root canal that the other dentist thought I might need and was sending me to an endodontist to get checked out?
He looked at the X-ray, pulled it up for me, pointed at one shadow, and said here’s where the decay is, and pointed at the other shadow, and said here’s where the route is, and pointed to the Gap in between, and he said this gap here is what we dentists like to call a big gap.
No need for a root canal.
🥳
Wahoo!!!
After a very long and thorough exam, he sat back and asked me if I had any other questions–not even a hint of hurry.
And I was stumped. I couldn’t think of a single other question I had. He’d answered every single question that I could come up with already.
I’ve had I don’t even know how many gazillions of appointments with medical professionals in my 43+ years of life. I don’t think I’ve ever had an appointment be this wonderful.
It was phenomenal.
It was so amazing that when I left after paying the bill for the day, I called my mom up to gush about the whole experience. I was simply blown away. Blown away.
I texted my sister Heather to tell her the same wonderful news, knowing that she would be super happy and excited that her recommendation had turned out so wonderfully, especially with my experience with medical professionals throughout my life.
And it was also nice to get at a least preliminary confirmation that the rather concerning prompting that I got way back when was indeed from god.
I’ve often had God direct my life… in lots of different ways. It’s funny because a lot of people talk about wanting to get direction from god, and I’ve found myself getting lots of direction, but sometimes getting exasperated by it because it’s often incomplete direction.
Oftentimes in the past, God would just give me a no. And then I’ll try and do something else, and he says no. And then I’ll try and do something else, and he says no again. And then I get frustrated and exasperated because I don’t know what to do.
And then I’ve had a fair number of people tell me that God doesn’t direct lives in the ways that he does mine, that he wants us to make our own decisions, and… I agree with that in very important ways, but I also can’t deny that God does direct me in a lot of things.
And this was one of them.
And it was nice to get the preliminary confirmation today. 😊
I badly needed to see a dentist, and I went to make an appointment with my regular dentist.
No.
No?
No.
Oooookaaaay… but I need to see a dentist. My mouth has issues. Maybe I can see this other dentist in Arkansas nearby. They have good reviews.
No.
No?!
[Stephen starting to feel a little… discouraged]
Ok, if you don’t want me to see a dentist in Arkansas, then maybe Utah?
[doesn’t feel a no. Then Stephen has a conversation with his sister Heather who raves about her dentist in South Dakota, so he says, ok, good enough. How about South Dakota? Doesn’t get a no, and South Dakota seems like the most logical choice outside of Utah, given the raving, so… he proceeds, never gets a no, but on the trip starts having really bad teeth issue symptoms and feels like he got it all wrong, that he was being messed with by the other guy because clearly things are bad now, and there weren’t before when he could have had things taken care of in Arkansas. And the dentist in Washington says he might need a root canal, and given the symptoms, that seems reasonable, so it’s hard for Stephen to have faith that he was understanding correctly something from God and not just being messed with.]
So I go to South Dakota, have an absolutely incredible experience with the dentist, find out I don’t need a root canal, and find out that had I gone to my dentist in Arkansas, I would have had a tooth filled that didn’t need to be filled.
And as I write this, I am reminded of an experience years ago my heavenly father told me that discerning the voice of the Spirit will continue to be hard for me.
Aaaaaaaand… that has continued to be true. I second guess and worry and feel dumb and often have all sorts of less than peaceful feelings.
Anyway, I’m grateful. 🙏
Hans got done with his appointment early, so he picked me up a lot sooner than expected. I had thought that I’d have enough waiting time that I might as well walk to the next place we were going to go, but nope! He pulled up while I was talking to my mom, and we headed out.
We stopped at a place to try and buy a harness and anchor kit to be able to work safely on the roof, but it was beastly expensive there, so we checked a couple of other things there and headed out.
The next store was a chemical store, where Hans bought some weed killer stuff.
Then it was on to Lowe’s where we had hoped to buy some underlayment, and some tape and tar goo for fixing roof leaks. We got the tape and the target, but we weren’t able to get the underlayment. We’ll have to get that from somewhere else at some other time.
From there, we headed over to Menards, as they had a much better price for the roof safety stuff, so we bought that, stopped off at the grocery store for some sriracha? sauce, and stopped off at the gas station for some gas-station hot dogs.
Without my knowing, Hans bought my hot dogs for me 🥰, which the counter person forgot about, so I bought them again. 🙃
Fortunately, I went back in and got a refund.
On the drive back, we talked roof stuff, called a place for some info on roofing prices and suggestions.
Lots of learning.
The rest of the day… is a blur.
My sister Heather reminded me that we spent a good little while trying to take care of River (poor horse was having some pretty significant hoof issues 🥺).
Loved on River for a bit to try and help him be calm during the efforts to work on his hoof. Loved on Fiona a good bit as well.
Heather made a delicious pasta something for dinner, and we just chatted the rest of the night, I think.
I did spend more time later catching up on journal posts, but that was the day!
Gratitude:
- I’m just… still gushing over and grateful for my dentist visit and how everything turned out. 😁
- I’m grateful that God is interested in even the little things in our lives.
- I’m grateful that God is love and didn’t care that I was in a dark place. [I got that prompting about not going to an Arkansas dentist when I was still in my darker place] 🙏
- I’m grateful that the horses let me love on them. 🥰
- I’m grateful that despite my feet having switched from tingle twinges, to dagger twinges, to hurting all day long, I’m able to be positive and grateful.
Success:
- Gratitude today. I’m grateful.
Improvement:
- Though my stressing over house stuff was on behalf of another, I don’t need to stress. Work hard. Give a worthy effort. Leave the outcomes to God, and be at peace with them.
Hugses. 🤗
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 