Wanted: A Voice

As you know if you have been around me this week it seems very probable that I have a ruptured blood vessel in my vocal cords. My communication has been mostly by light whispering and typing on my pocket computer. It sure complicates things. I have not had the time to get a scope of my vocal cords so I don't have absolute proof of the diagnosis, but the fact that I went from a full voice to no voice in the period of minutes while singing makes it a pretty sure thing. I have never lost my voice for so long, and if I ever recover my full voice no one knows at this point if I will be able to sing again. All this since singing on praise team last Sunday. This, of course, could end up being a short hyphen in my life story, but the fact that I may lose the voice I know has really shaken me.
Now for funny stuff.
The first assumption when people hear me speak is that I am sick with respiratory virus. I have been asked to step back, and even asked to leave the room during surgery. The next thing I hear quite often is "That will be especially hard for you, Josh." My mother-in-law has been the sweetest about it- "Will you still be able to explain things?" She knows that I love to teach, and wanted me to know that she valued that. One of my co-workers has made it point to thank God that I still can't talk every time he hears me whispering. It seems that I needed to give the world a break from my voice anyway.
I hope to get some voice back next week. In the meantime I hope to learn how to listen better and talk less.