Monday, July 18, 2011

Life's Tessellations

A tessellation is a kind of art.  It is used to describe when two objects slide, flip, or rotate to fit in with itself to form one larger structure with no gaps or wholes.  In other words if you have a triangle and you rotate it so that the sides line up you have used a tessellation.
My life seems to be filled with tessellations.  When I think my life is getting to a good place it gets flipped upside down and rotated around until the direction I thought I was headed in seems like a diagonal course to where I am now headed.  Take the last two days for example.  Two days ago I knew where my life was headed.  I had two good jobs, I was getting ready to go back to school, I was preparing to go on a mission for my church, and I just felt like I would be in a good place for a while.  On Sunday I was shaving and noticed a bump on my throat.  I called the doctor and we scheduled an appointment for an hour later.  I went in and she told me that she thought it was a benign cyst but she wanted me to see a specialist in the morning. 
This morning I went to the specialist and he told me he thought he’d need to cut it out, but he had to get a CT scan to make sure.  I got the CT scan and went back to the office.  He told me it was a Thyroglossal Duct Cyst.  He told me that when we’re born our Thyroid is up higher and then travels down our throats to its final resting place.  As it goes down parts sometimes get separated and then grow as separate entities.  That’s what happened to me.  This gap in my throat has been growing my whole life but recently became filled with liquid and bloated and became noticeable.
He told me he needed to remove it.  He sent me to the scheduler and she told us a spot had opened seconds earlier for surgery on Wednesday.  I booked the appointment.  To remove a thyroglossal duct cyst they make an incision a few inches across, pull the skin away, and cut out the mass.  They then have to break your hyoid bone to make sure there is no remnant of the mass that can grow back.
My life was sitting in a great place and headed in a wonderful direction, but this morning some of my dreams were broken.  I will have a scar that goes across my throat forever.  I already struggle with my looks enough, this extra abnormality is not exciting for me.  I cried for a while because my dreams of going on a mission might be in jeopardy.  I have had 4 surgeries in as many years and I might not be able to go.  I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life if I miss out on that experience.
I’ll keep you all posted on how my new plans are progressing, if I’ll get to go on a mission, and what new and beautiful lessons I learn because of this experience.  I am not bitter at God, instead I am looking to find what I need to gain from this event, why I’m being tested this way, and what I need to be focusing on.  I relish challenges because it is through pain and struggling that we grow and I want to grow to become the best man I can be.  My life is going in a new direction and I can't wait to see where this road takes me.

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