Sunday, January 6, 2008

PRAISE, PRAISE, PRAISE!

I forgot in my eagerness to tell you about the storm and my desire to put Sue's condition at present before you, to yet Praise God for how he continues to bless this family.

As I read Kent's blog a few minutes ago when he talked about our coming year and the great challenges, blessings and heartaches (paraphrased) we can all look forward to in the coming year, I'm still reminded of the lyrics:

His Grace still amazes me...

and that's what I see happening when I think: 'how can Sue continue to have her big smile when she is so challenged to do just a little bit of life'; how can Dana keep up with his schedule and yet so patiently and lovingly serve Sue and the kids; how can the kids remain joyful and cheerful when there is/could be so much stress within their home...and it all comes back to

HIS GRACE

It is working mightily here. Please pray that it continues to and pray especially for Sue that she will do two things that the doctors can't do for her: discipline herself to get more rest (earlier to bed) which helps both her and Dana and work at keeping herself hydrated.

Bye,

Maxine
A NOTE FROM STORMY CALIFORNIA...

Yes, we've had some severe storms, in fact, for those of you who prayed about our trip to Escondido for a wedding...we didn't go. I had to make a decision about the drive and high winds, flash floods and heavy rains were predicted for our exact route down therefore I didn't feel the responsible thing to do was expose the family to those conditions for a 6 hr drive; particularly since Sue has been feeling extremely fatigued since Christmas with no reserves for that kind of a trip.

I felt bad saying no but someone had to make the call...the kids were great. Once the initial disappointment was over they turned it around and decided to 'go camping' in the living room.

Karis wanted to know if we had a tent and I said 'no, but remember when you were little all you needed were chairs and blankets to drape over them.' So the tent has been up for two days; Friday we added 5 high school boys and had a 'full house'. They roasted hot dogs in the fireplace, played cards and other board games and had a great day while it stormed like crazy outside.

We had some blood work drawn for Sue Sat. Dana thinks she's anemic although it may just be post Christmas fatigue. We all push hard during the season and Sue has no reserve to push from but she pushes anyway. She felt much better yesterday with an extra day's rest so hopefully she's on the road to some better days.

Still lots of testing, watching, trying new combinations of meds to work on the Lyme and Bartinella diseases. A friend's physician brother told here over the holidays that the infectious disease partner in their group automatically refers all Lyme cases someplace else because 'it takes such a long time to track and treat it and we just don't have/want to take the time out of our practice to do it.'

Bittersweet because it is an admission that there is lots of it around but also validates the point (made on most Lyme websites) that it isn't fast or easy to treat.

Dana did make it to the wedding so the family was represented; they were sad we couldn't come as we were but I feel it was the right thing to do. Sue said she had bathed it in prayer too and felt relieved when she heard my decision.

I've just dropped the kids off at Sunday School and come back for Sue so we can go to church. One service is what she manages best these days.

She remains active on their Missions Committee and she and Karis worked last evening to creates something special for table decorations for their conference in March; she'll share it at their meeting tomorrow evening.

Thanks for listening and God Bless You.

Maxine