How Can I Preach Without a Voice?
James L. Wilson
July 1, 1998
Slowly I surfaced to consciousness. Where was I? Lying in a strange room, hurting and struggling for breath. I tried to speak, but nothing came out. I lifted my right arm from the blanket and moved it around. Soon I felt the warmth of a stranger's hand. "You're okay, Mr. Wilson. The surgery went great. Your wife is anxious to see you."
Thirty minutes later they rolled me back to my room. My wife, Susan, was there waiting. "Was there any nerve damage?" I whispered. "What did the doctor say? Will my voice return?"
The doctor didn't know, she said. He'd know more tomorrow.
Tomorrow came, and the first doctor I saw was the anesthesiologist. She asked how I was doing. "I can't talk," I said in a raspy whisper.
"Do you mean it hurts to talk?"
"No," I croaked. "I can't talk."
She looked shocked and began to fumble with her chart, murmuring something about it maybe being temporary. Then she left the room without saying goodbye.
She knows something, I thought. What happened in that operating room?
When the surgeon appeared that evening, I found out what happened. "Hi, doctor," I whispered. He looked disappointed, but he sat on the bed and drew a diagram of what they had discovered during the surgery. A normal nerve to the vocal cord, he told us, is white and runs along the back of the thyroid gland. Mine was yellow and seemed to run through the middle. He tapped it to see if it was fatty tissue, but it would not break away. The assistant surgeon assured the doctor it was not the nerve and advised he cut it.
He asked for the instruments and got ready to sever the tissue—when something stopped him. He put the tools away, but the damage had been done. The tapping, he said, had frozen the nerve. "The function may return—or ...
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