Asa Jay's weblog

Yea, I don’t post much here huh. Seems like most folks are moving to Facebook and exposing way too much of their personal lives. Some folks have managed to get themselves fired from a job or have ruined chances at getting a new job due to, shall we say, intimate details found on social networking sites. Rather than spend time in a long dissertation of the pros and cons of other social networking sites, I’ll just say I’m content with controlling all my own content, for the most part on my own domains. Occasionally something in life changes and it creates emotions, physical difficulties or other problems or concerns in life that at some point friends, neighbors and even strangers should be made aware of. That kind of change came to my family recently.

For those who have followed this blog and not died of starvation, will recall my son Samuel was born with a condition called Hirschsprungs disease. To recap, he had two surgeries to correct a problem in his colon. Well, a new problem possibly related (or not) to this disease came up recently. Sam had been admitted to Hospital twice in the past few years for a distended abdomen. Basically his guts blew up like a balloon and he couldn’t get the gas out. Not being constipation we were confused as were the doctors. This last few weeks however have changed all that and resulted in another surgery.

Sam was again admitted recently, twice in two weeks. His original surgeon as well as a new Pediatric GI specialist both agreed, his colon was not working as expected. It had to come out. This was real shock to Mom, but I have to admit, I was nearly expecting it. With that kind of heartbreak sitting in our minds, the surgeon called during the surgery with what turned out to be good news.

The surgeon found that under sedation, Sam’s anus was relaxed enough to properly release the built up gas and soft stool that was blowing him up. This meant there might be a chance to save his colon but it was going to be a long haul. First, they would install an Ileostomy, bringing his small intestine outside his abdomen and he would now be pooping in a bag. Next, after some months of recovery, we will have to perform dilitation on his anus. Sounds lovely doesn’t it. This means we’ll have to insert increasing size rods in his anus to help the muscle expand -and- get him used to object passing through.

Next we’ll continue anal conditioning by putting him through some biofeedback session to help him understand how his back door works. Eventually, we hope to hook him back up so he functions normally, with stool coming out the anus rather than out his belly. Until then, we have a huge paradigm change.

Dealing with an Ileostomy is not easy. We now have to empty this bag hanging on his abdomen several times a day. The bag must be changed every one to four days. This means we have to buy these necessary bags, classified as medical appliances, and other supplies to support our son pooping in a different way.

It was initially a shocking and gut-wrenching experience. I’ve always tried to be a neat and clean person, so having to deal with someone else’s poop in addition to changing a bag on something that is outside the body that normally is found on the inside, was enough to freak me out for a day. Three days later we are beginning to deal with it better, but it’s still our little boy and it hurts to see him this way.

Prayers and good thoughts are appreciated. This condition is made all the more difficult because of his Autism, though Sam does seem to be coming to grips with the fact he has a bag for pooping now. We just pray the future is better, that we can successfully get his anus trained to pass poop, get his colon hooked back up, make sure it all works and he can lead a normal life. Until then, both Mom and I have a lot of work to do.

Thanks for listening,
Asa Jay

I’ve recently completed my third class at Whitworth.  This time it was “The Sociology of Middle Eastern Society.”  Our instructor was very knowledgeable and simply crammed information into our heads on a non-stop basis for the entire course.  The tests were comprehensive and depending on how much a person studied, could be found to be difficult.  In my case, I felt I wasn’t doing too bad and I hoped to get a “B” when it was all over.  By the end of the course, I managed to pull an “A.”  With this one out of the way and the fall class schedule coming out, I’ve had to do some thinking about changing plans, more on that later.
With my last class out of the way, I’ve entered into my next class, or rather set of classes.  The accelerated program I am in doesn’t leave much room to be taking two classes at the same time; however, in this case I am taking one full three-credit class and another small fill in for one credit.  My primary class is “The Life and Teaching of Jesus” and my minor one credit class is “Problem Solving and Decision Making using Microsoft Excel.”

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Another six weeks down and one more class finished toward my degree. The grades were about a week late in coming, finally being posted today. Now with a final passing grade, I feel comfortable in writing about the class and moving on. I have 18 more to go, that’s two less than when I started.

I’m not a “sociology” kind of guy, I’m more technical. Social sciences and humanities courses are the types I have avoided like the plague for years, even decades. I started out finding the class very much against my better tastes; however, as I was determined to make the best of it, I found the material grew on me in a positive way. By the time the course was finished, I was happy I had endured, learned a lot and hopefully became a better person for it.

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I asked a friend at work today “Guess what I looked at last night” to which she replied using a blank stare. I said “Saturn,” and she perked up with interest and said “How many and which models?” Hehehe, I had to laugh, so I said “The one between Jupiter and. . .” I never finished my sentence as it dawned on her.

Last night was a very nice cloudless night near Spokane. I live out on the West plains. It was cold though and I had reservations about taking my new telescope out on the deck to get a look at the sky. I put on a stocking cap, a field jacket and took to the night air. The telescope went up and the notebook computer sat beside it. I don’t have a connection cable to allow the notebook computer to control the telescope, yet, so I used the provided controller already attached.

The first thing I need to do was align the scope. Since it was cold, and I as mostly dinking around anyway, I selected the “Easy” alignment method. Leveling the scope tube and pointing it North I started the procedure. The scope then automagically turned to point at Sirius. Unfortunately it was a bit off so I had to fine tune it by hand, this was part of the alignment procedure. After I got Sirius centered, I pressed [Enter] to continue and it proceeded to seek to another star. I can’t remember the name and I’m not sure I was even pointing to the right one, but I centered what looked good and continued.

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I’m painfully reminded why I’ve never taken a social science class before, it’s very non-technical and involves too much “emotion.” That’s my knee-jerk impression after attending my first night of class for the sociology of death and dying. Why in the world would I take such a course? Mostly for very good reasons, I need to fulfill a social science requirement for graduation and this class appeared to be just as good as any other in the sessions I could choose from. I just don’t think it’s the right class for me.

To start with, the class has 20 people in it, that’s almost twice as many as my last class. The room feels crowded to me, and with so many people I don’t feel the urge to participate, though a portion of our grade is going to be on class participation. My last class I participated in real well, but this one is going to be more difficult.

The second problem, as it relates to class participation, is that I probably have much different beliefs about death and the grieving process. Most folks are big on funerals, viewing the deceased in a casket, making a big deal, crying, wailing, etc. I can understand a bit of emotion tied to the loss of a loved one, it’s happened to me; however, I sometimes wonder if I am more comfortable in my faith because I look at death (of others) as a release from the burdens of this life, a victory which none of us living can truly understand. For me, a funeral is a celebration of life, not death.

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