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Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Thankful

I  have much to be thankful for this year.  I'll admit that while being sick it can often be hard to feel anything close to thankful for anything having to do with my sickness, but I'm grateful He has helped me to see the many things I should be thankful for....including my sickness.
Anyway - I'll keep it simple.

1) My family.  I could have never asked for a better little family.  In fact, way back when, I couldn't even  imagine what my little family might look like and what a blessing they have been to me....so much more than I could have imagined.  God has provided two little joys to help us laugh when we need to laugh.  I just never expected motherhood to be so fun. Yes, even though being ill, I would still say that motherhood is the funnest job I have ever had.  Not saying there have been hard moments through it, and especially being ill and being a mother has been one of the hardest things I've done, but as a whole, it's been such a joy and pleasure that I can only attribute to our good God for giving us.

And under the family subject, I've got to say once again that I am so thankful for my husband.  Yet again, I can only attribute it to the wisdom and goodness of God that He would perfectly match me with my Matt.  I couldn't have seen ahead of time what kind of care-taker Matt would have been and now with this new job thrust upon him, he has done it so well and so above and beyond what I deserve.

2) This may seem obvious, but I am thankful for modern medicine.  Though this disease has a lot of things stacked against it (mainstream medically speaking), I'm thankful for those who seek the truth and seek to heal people like me, who truly need healing from a disease that the majority of doctors in the world believe is not a "real" sickness.  These doctors and nurses (some of them putting their careers and own finances on the line) are brave and compassionate and I could not be more thankful for them, because without them and the medicine they practice and prescribe, I would not have the hope of getting well.

3) And lastly, I am thankful for prayer. So many of my friends and family (and even people I don't know personally) are praying for me and for Matt and the girls and we just so appreciate that and believe that "the effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much." (James 5:16)  I am thankful that God has allowed those of us who know Him personally to approach His throne and make requests of Him.  We have most definitely felt uplifted in prayer since this whole Lyme ordeal started.  So thank you, Lord, for giving us prayer.

Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

Monday, November 15, 2010

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Trusting


*sigh*

I just haven't wanted to write this out.  It's just so sad.  But I know that if you know, you will be faithful to pray for us this next month or so.

Matt and I had to make one of the saddest decisions of our lives thus far recently.


Background:
When I'm on the antibiotic treatment (2 weeks on, 1 week off), I am almost completely incapacitated. This is why it was such a help to have my brother and his wife and niece come, then my sister, then my mom.....all of them helping so much with the kids and the house while I literally lay on the couch in misery.

Each round of antibiotics has gotten worse for me (as far as how I feel), and the last round just really did me in and my husband and I realized I just can't do this (sick and caring for two little ones) without help.  Unfortunately we don't have the means to hire a nanny.   And with the holidays afoot, we just can't expect our church family to take on our burden of a M-F 7:30am-6pm childcare service for our family.

After lots of prayers and thinking of different scenarios, we have decided the best course of action for now is that we send our oldest two states away to be with Grandma and Grandpa until Christmas.  Thankfully she feels so comfortable with them and loves their house and Oscar the dog. And all of my siblings are nearby to come take her on play dates.  And Matt's parents are nearby to love on her too. I know she'll be happy there.

It's just she's my little girl and I know her little heart and how she misses Momma after only one night away.  It makes me sad to think about it.  But we've already planned to do Skype every night and call each day.  Even sadder is losing the constant entertainment she is and the joy she brings to our lives.  We will miss her SO much!  When we first decided upon this I cried for a couple hours I think.  And in the decision making process I cried a lot too.  But what encouraged me a lot was that Matt was very insistant that this is what would be best for our family right now.  How nice to have a strong leader as my husband!  I feel easy in trusting his judgement.

God has brought peace to our hearts about this now and we know He'll use this situation for our good.  And hopefully my body can really fight the Lyme spirochetes in a more efficient way since I will be able to rest more. (Our littlest is still little enough to sleep most of the day away and when she IS awake, she's very easy to care for).

I won't go into all our details of why we thought this was best, but just know we considered EVERYTHING else that we might be able to do to help and this truly was the best option.

It might be hard to understand -- how can someone be so sick that they can't at least "get by" during the day?  My family who was here can attest to the fact that even just walking from the couch to the bathroom took SO much out of me that I would end up tremoring on the couch afterward.  The latter end of each treatment week is the WORST for me.  Often by the time Matt gets home I need his help to walk.  I haven't really found a great way to relate how you feel when you're on this treatment.  The best I can come up with is maybe the worst flu you've ever had - weak, achy in your muscles and joints - except about 10x worse than that.  PLUS, you add horrible nausea, headaches, sensitivity to noise (there were times when my mom was here where she'd see me cringe when Georgie would come in the room to talk or when Olivia "yelled" to us to help her in a predicament.  Even the typing on a keyboard that my mom was doing for work was causing my whole body to hurt more), ZERO energy (too tired to even sit up unless I had properly rested for the occasion), balance problems, and pain...lots and lots of pain.  And that's not even all.  But it's enough to give you the idea.

It WILL be hard to care for just Baby Liv, but it will be MUCH easier to care for just her.  And I've already had some friends say they can occasionally come over and help with her or take her for a day sometimes.  So that will help us tremendously.  We'll take any help we can get.

Just goes to show you how awful this disease can be and the effects it has on the family.  Boy, we are SO thankful for supportive extended family (on both sides!!).  I know some suffering with Lyme who have family that just doesn't "believe" that you can get that sick or that Lyme is real.

So - brief timeline so you know how to pray - 
Nov. 8th - My mom is coming and graciously going to stay a whole week, helping as she did when she was here last week just so we can have an extra week with our little girl before saying goodbye for a month. Thanks, Dad for letting us have her again for a week!
Nov. 13th - They'll head down to Grandma's house together! 

Georgie is very excited about this. We don't talk about it much but we have told her in detail the plans of what is to come and she hasn't expressed any angst about it.  And she knows we'll see her again at "Christmas-time" (as much as a 3 1/2 year old can conceptually understand that timeline).

We head down to Grandma and Grandpa's for Christmas/moving-out-of-state (yes, the Army is moving us right around the holidays!) on Dec. 15th.  So it will be just about a month without our Georgie-girl with us.  I keep telling myself it's not that long and we have such technology today that we'll be able to "see" her every day.

-Please continue to pray for our family that God will continue to encourage us as we are often discouraged by how bad physically I am doing, and how sad we are to say goodbye to our little girl for a month.  
-And pray for Georgie that she will adapt well to being away from Mommy and Daddy and sister.  
-And pray for me that I can properly care for  Baby Olivia in the next few weeks.  
-And pray for Matt as he has the burden of working, preparing for a big move, and holding down the household chores and meals and such.  What a wonderful husband God gave me!  
-And pray that through this trial God would be glorified through our response to it and through our actions during it.