Lord, I am still in your hands. This is my confidence. I am a child of God. This is my confidence. Lord, you know how I need you. This is my confidence. [...]

I’d hoped Lee might be posting this round but the hospital discharge process took a bit longer than expected this afternoon and the ride home was pretty painful after all of her IV medicines have worn off, so she’s tucked safely in to bed to get some rest.  We’d appreciate your continued prayers for successfully managing the pain.  Lee is looking forward to giving you a personal update in the next day or two, so stay tuned!  [...]

The tube-placement procedure went according to plan and Lee is settled in a room for the night!  Her surgical medications are wearing off so she’s got a fair amount of discomfort but the hospitalist who will be overseeing her care through the night was just in and is working with Lee’s nurse to get her pain under control.  She is anxious to share personally with you so I’ll hold off on any further details for now except to say thank you once again for checking in on us and for your continued prayers and support.[...]

Just wanted to let everyone know that Lee’s procedure got underway about an hour ago (1:15 PST)  and was expected to take a couple of hours to complete.  Lee will have much to share about all the great experiences we had with the nursing and physician staff in pre-op, so I won’t steal that opportunity from her but suffice it to say that the impact of your prayers on her behalf were evident and she is in excellent hands for the procedure!  She will be staying overnight in the hospital just to make certain everything is going according to plan so I will update once she makes it to a room and gets settled.  [...]

We just wanted to put the word out for prayer today. I am having surgery in a couple of hours to place a gastrostomy tube through my abdomen and into my stomach in hopes of being able to remove the nasogastric tube that has been running up my nose, down my throat, and into my stomach for almost 3 months. “Nose hoses” (as only my beloved husband and Fire Chief would name it!) aren’t designed to stay in place a long time and mine is overdue to come out. It has been allowing my stomach and intestines to “vent” which has greatly decreased the painful abdominal distention from trapped gasses being caused by Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO). My Ehlers-Danlos disease allows the Connective tissue of the abdomen to stretch to unbelievable sizes. We are hoping the gastrostomy tube will provide the same relief and be a better option than my current nose hose. We are praying this surgery will go smoothly and that wound healing will be optimal. Steve will update here on Post Hope as the day progresses.[...]

Hello from a finally “rested up and coherent” Mayo Marathoner. As I mentioned in my last post, we finished 18 appointments, 1 phone consultation, and an ER visit that led to hospitalization. Only by God’s grace and strength was this accomplished in 7 days. In a quick summary, in contrast to last year’s 6 week stay where we seemed to learn challenging news at every turn, this trip contained a lot of good news![...]

Just a quick note to say we are home. As you can see from the picture (this is what my patient portal says) we started with 16 appointments and had 2 more added for a grand total of 18 appointments and 1 phone consultation in 5 days. The patient portal declares we finished this marathon! We got home at 3am so got a couple hours of sleep before Steve headed to work at 7:30am and I headed off to the wound care center, lunch with a great friend, and then an appt at the Infusion Center. I will post an update on results from the Mayo Marathon as soon as my exhaustion led brain fog clears enough to write intelligently! I am excited to share good news with you! Thank you for more care, love, and prayers than we can actually comprehend.[...]

Thank you, thank you, thank you for your prayers. I was discharged from the hospital late yesterday and came back to the apartment and fell into bed exhausted. We are on track for all of our appointments today and tomorrow. We will post all of the results from these appointments tomorrow probably from the airport. We fly back to WA late tomorrow night.[...]

I was going to wait and just post tomorrow but we could really use your prayers and encouragement today. We had a wonderful morning yesterday, driving the convertible of our dear friends, Kimball and Elizabeth. All of you said relax and enjoy the weekend, so we visited the nearby town of Carefree. Really. (See picture of Steve). We also knew we had to make a hard decision when we got back to the apartment. My right arm was starting to form blisters like the ones that led to my hospitalization in Olympia. Yes, the had continued to grow while we were out. We decided it would be best to go to Mayo’s Emergency Room. My last experience in Olympia of waiting 8 hours in the lobby and after four days had still not moved to a regular room, left me somewhat anxious about a return trip to an ER. We decided to give it a try anyway. Much prayer and 15 minutes later, we were checking in. Within 2 hours, we had been checked in, triaged, and seen by the doctor, and moved to a room that was more like an upscale suite. Every provider from the doctors to the nurses had read my history and doctor notes in the patient portal. I didn’t have to answer any questions except regarding current medications. What a blessing![...]

So . . . I wasn’t going to post today but I had the sweetest interaction in the radiology waiting room this morning as I was waiting to be called back for my MRI Angiogram of my chest. I was sitting diagonal from a lady who looked exhausted as she tried to keep her frail mother, probably late 80s in age, seated in the lobby chair. I was silently praying for them and felt led to ask if I could help out in anyway, The daughter said she was exhausted and that her mom suffered from severe Alzheimer’s. She said her dad usually comes with them and her mom, Wilma, is soothed when her dad prays quietly to her. I asked the daughter if she had tried that and she replied she doesn’t pray. I asked her if she thought it would help if I prayed. She said she was “up for anything.” [...]