A Prayer, a Pager, a Healing

A year and a half ago, Vickie Birch was facing death. But a prayer, a pager, and a little persistence changed her life.

“It’s the first time I really ever thought about dying,” Vickie said. “Of course I know that I’m going to die one day, but I just never expected it at that age.”

Vickie Birch was 46-years-old when she started having severe headaches. She tried one pill after another, none of them worked.

“It was just a constant pain so bad that I just had to get in the dark and lay down,” Vickie said. “I wanted to sleep most of the time so that I didn’t have to think about it.”

Vickie went to her family doctor, thinking she had a sinus infection. Her doctor couldn’t find anything wrong, and sent Vickie for an MRI.

The next day her doctor gave her the test results. Vickie was shocked.

“She said, ‘The main artery going up in your brain has a 95 percent blockage,’ and it was in a problem area because it was way up deep in my brain.”

Vickie was referred to a neurologist, who agreed with her doctor’s initial diagnosis - the blockage could cause a stroke, or worse – death.

She needed surgery. But that would be risky.

“I could have a stroke while they were doing it,” Vickie said. “Or my personality could change, or I could lose my body, I could get paralyzed, just all kinds of things could happen if they had to do surgery.”

The neurologist ordered an angiogram, but Vickie would have to wait for the results. Meanwhile, she did the only thing she knew how - she prayed.

“I prayed that if the Lord wanted to use the medical profession to heal my body, then please be with me because I was terrified” Vickie said, “And to keep me calm, and be with the doctors.”

”Then lastly my prayer was if you’re ready to take me in your arms, then I’m ready,” Vickie said.

Vickie asked her friends and church family to pray. They said they would, and gave her a pager. They told her that each time someone prayed for her, they would call. Then, they prayed.

People prayed for Vickie, for her healing, for the Lord to bless her – and her pager was beeping time and time again.

Soon a friend called.

“When they were praying one of the girls had a vision that my artery cleared,” Vickie said.

Then another call.

“She said she was praying one morning before she went to work and the Lord just told her I was going to be okay,” Vickie said.

Vickie went for the results of her angiogram. This time, the doctor had a different response.

“Your artery is totally normal,” the doctor said. “The only thing I can say is somewhere between the MRI and the angiogram, it cleared itself up.”

“So right then, I knew what had happened,” Vickie said, “that our prayers had been answered and that the Lord had healed me.”

“Now I just want to spend the rest of my life serving him any way I can,” Vickie said.