How We Got To Tulsa

Jenny and I have been thinking through the events that guided us to be where we are right now, and are so grateful for the guiding hand of the Lord.  About 8 hours after we had been informed of Ainsley's diagnosis, Dr. McDowell, Ainsley's Pediatrician, came to visit in the hospital.  He was so kind to visit and brought Ainsley a sweet note and care package from his office.  During our visit I told him how grateful I was that we ended up here in Tulsa for residency, because if we had gone with another residency opportunity that I had, we'd have been about 2 hours away from the nearest children's hospital; not to mention I wasn't sure what Pediatric Oncology would be available there. We could have been driving many hours each direction, multiple times a week for the next 2.5 years!  Not to mention the fact that the whole first week in the hospital would have had our family separated by that distance.  No chance for Ainsley to see her sisters each day like we were able to do here in Tulsa. He looked puzzled at me and said "you've already thought of that?"   

In reality, this has been a frequent thought on my mind and in our family discussion over the past number of years.  When I began the journey of obtaining a residency in Otolaryngology (ENT), Ainsley was just one month from being born.  I was preparing things to hopefully get a spot in a program in Pennsylvania and was setting up my rotations accordingly.  I still had a few more rotations to set up.  Meili (age 5 at the time) and I were driving down the road just before Ainsley was born, and she said "Daddy, next year when we move..." and stopped.  I asked her where we were moving to?  She said "Oklahoma."  At the time I didn't even know that Oklahoma was an option for residency.  I called and they had an opening for the exact times that were still left on my schedule.   One day, before the ranking lists were to be turned in, I was fasting and during the fast, I received a call that allowed me to feel confident in my ranking Tulsa as my first choice.  The rest, as they say, is history.   It all started with a 5 year old telling us where we were going to move to, before we even knew it would be an option! 

That really is a short summary, and doesn't clearly reflect the dramatic alteration of direction it was for us to not go to Pennsylvania.  It was a difficult phone call to make to let the Pennsylvania program know that I wasn't going there, but it was the right decision.  We are so grateful we followed the promptings of the Spirit that directed us here. 

Once we arrived here in Tulsa we were going through withdrawals from the wonderful friends we had in Arizona during medical school.  I was sitting in church one day just after moving here and praying that we would have friendships to help us through the 5 years of residency; because friendships had been so instrumental in getting us through medical school.  Within minutes of this prayer, an announcement was made that a new family was moving into our ward, the husband was starting residency at the same hospital I was, and they needed help unloading their truck.  They said the address and I thought, "that is 3 doors away from us!"  Then they said the name, and it was a friend of mine from highschool!  We hadn't seen each other for over 5 years and had no idea that each of us were ending up here.  We like to claim responsibility for praying Trevor and Mandy, and their beautiful family here!  Love you guys!!!  Actually, we feel personally responsible for praying a number of families to the area and are so grateful for the amazing support system we have around us.  Our prayers were answered, perhaps some of them feel like it is their worst nightmare come true ;-) (heheheh).