Hello all! I guess it’s about time for an update.
As most of you know I got sick in Nigeria and had to be sent
home. Here’s how the story unfolds…
What I remember:
We were staying in a little village called Iwo, Nigeria. I
don’t have much to say about the place except the power went out about every 15
minutes and it was h-o-t HOT there. My
roommate and friend Courtney had just come down with typhoid, and I had been
taking care of her for about 2 days. I was beginning to feel very tired and
drained, and emotionally it was really difficult to see my good friend so sick.
My other teammates rotated off with me and I moved into the other room so they
could help take care of her for a while, and I could get some sleep. I noticed
that I was starting to have this weird feeling – the feeling I get when I’m
about to get a fever – and we were laughing/crying in a ball of pent up emotion
because it just seemed that I had stressed myself out to the point of being
sick about it. I really figured I was just sick because of stress and our lack
of good nutrition for that month…
I remember sleeping for about 2 days, just not feeling like
I could get out of bed. Then I
began to really start feeling sick – my fever spiked and we decided to have the
doctor come visit me. They took some tests, hooked me up to an IV drip, and
came back an hour later to tell me I had tested positive for malaria. Great,
is all I could think. Now half
our team is sick!! After that is all a blur
– that night my fever spiked again insanely high and I remember having
delusions and nightmares about Gilmore Girls all night – haha. Who has delusions about that!!? Only me. Not so sure I can ever watch that show again… anyways, I just closed my eyes and
tried to drown out all the noise in my head…
… when I opened my eyes I had no idea where I was. As my
vision focused I saw Bill’s smiling face and all I could say was “Where am I?”
and he brightly replied: “You have malaria and you are at the hospital”. I was on a cot in the middle of a big
room, and there was a fan blowing on me and an IV drip going into my hand. I’ll
never forget the taste or the smell… I had the taste of the meds in my mouth,
and the medicine was just sweating out of my pores. I hope I never have to
smell and taste those things again. From that point on it was a blurry series
of memories – being poked with several needles, being sponged down, finding out
my squad-mates donated blood so I could have a transfusion, waking up at random
hours of the night feeling as if I hadn’t drank water in months, and best of
all, waking up to find I was never ever alone at any point. My brothers and
sisters were by my side 24-7, and although I didn’t have the strength to voice
it at the time, it was the most comforting feeling to wake up in that cold, creepy
place and see that I wasn’t alone. Not even at 4 in the morning.
I ended up being life flighted to Paris where I received
more treatment and 2 more blood transfusions, and the next thing I know I was
on a plane with my father headed back to Ohio. I had an appointment here at the
Cleveland Clinic and it wasn’t until I reviewed my charts and everything that
had happened that I even realized how serious the illness was and what I had
gone through. I had a strain of malaria called “Falciparum malaria” which turns
out to be the most severe form of it. My kidneys had failed, my blood count was
scarily low, and all these other things happened to me that I really had no
idea were going on at the time. But the blessing in disguise is that even
though it’s the worst strain of the virus, it’s also the only one that doesn’t
stay in your system. Once it’s out, it’s out, so you never have to worry about
a relapse. Praise God for that!
As we touched down in Detroit I was overwhelmed with
emotion: This is the end for me, and I didn’t even get to say goodbye, was all I could think. The tears started flowing and
didn’t stop for quite some time. Then it hit me… What am I thinking?
Who says this is the end? Who says I can’t recover and go back for the last
month?? So I have a goal: I am going to
Ireland for SURE for the Awakening conference, but I’m gonna shoot for even
sooner then that. I’m aiming for the month of August for the last month of
ministry with my team – ultimately it’s up to God and to the Dr.’s – and my
family might want to have a little say in it too 😉 – but God has proven to be so insanely faithful and I have learned so much the
past few weeks that I know whatever the outcome is – I will be exactly where He
wants me. And I’m ok with that, whatever it may look like.
And this may sound morbid, but I learned more through being
sick then ever before. God hears our
prayers. God listens, and He answers. It seems so simple, so infantile, but it has never
been more real and true to me. And He is always, always with us. People had always given me words about how
God has a big plan for my life… I believed it, but sort of shrugged it off. Now
I know. I have no doubt that He
kept me around for a reason – and I am so ready to take on whatever it is that is coming my way.
RAWR!!!
