Monday, February 23, 2009

Guidance from Friends and Family.

I just posted something to the blog that I share with Francie. Check it out and please respond with guidance and thoughts as to what we should do.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Time heals all wounds....????

Well it's been a little while since we found out about the event that has caused our family so much grief and anguish. And while they say time heals all wounds, the short amount of time that has transpired hasn't been long enough. We still hurt, ache, and grief over the event and the cause of the event. While I don't know many details, I have a feeling that this is the start of a very long hard road.

Even though we are no where near to being over this event, it is amazing to me just how God has a way of making things work for His Glory. While we haven't seen exactly how He is working in this situation, I know that God is in control and His Will will be done in ALL things. In knowing this, there are a few things that I have seen, witnessed, heard of, or been a part of that I see God's Will working in. In this post I would like to share just a few of those things.

One thing that has come of this is that the family so far has grown closer together. Francie has talked to various family members on a nearly daily basis. We also have been in contact with other family members much more frequently than we have in the past.

Another factor that has been a positive from this event is that we have seen the love from the congregation that we attend. This event has the potential to tear apart the church we attend, however I have been glad to see the support (both publicly and privately) that has come from the congregation. If any of you happen to read this blog I want to again publicly thank you for everything and ask you to please keep up what you are doing.

While I will never post on here the situation that has arisen, it is public knowledge. For those that I personally know that are dying inside to know what is going on you may contact me or my parents. If you just happen upon this blog and would like to know, I'm sorry but this is a private matter and one that I wish not to let you know about. However I do ask for everyone who reads this to please continue to pray for the family. Pray that healing will occur, pray that patience will abound, pray that those affected will turn to God for guidance and strength, pray that the community is understanding, and finally (as Francie pointed out in our other blog), pray that the Spirit helps us in our weakness, that the Spirit will intercede our groans of anguish to our Lord for us since we do not have the words to express just how we feel (Romans 8:26).

Like I said before, it's probably going to be a long process, however with God's help we will be able to pull through this. Again…..thank you SO much for everything that you are doing. Words will never express how truly gracious we are for your support.

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Prayer Request

Other than SafetyDude, I don't know of anyone who checks this blog. However for SafetyDude and anyone else who stumbles upon this blog I wanted to let you know about a couple of things....


1. I am sorry for not blogging much lately. I have been so busy at work that I never seem to have time.

2. We have had a family member do something very bad recently. Bad enough that this person was arrested for these bad things that he did. This was a very large shock to us and we are having a very hard time dealing with the whole situation. Please pray for us, our realitive, and the whole family. It's just the beginning of a very, very long road and something that has the potential to rip the family apart. Please pray that this does not happen.


I hope that each of you are having a good week and that it's much better than ours has been.


Finally, if you do come across this blog please let me know. Selfishly, it would be nice to have to know someone is out there reading this blog.

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Happy New Year

Well 2009 is nearly here. To say that my posting has slacked off is an understatement. I hope to do better next year in my prayer requests. However I will give a quick prayer request here on this blog....

As my last (Lord willing) prayer request for 2008 is that may God continue to bless us as He so richly has this past year. Even though parts of 2008 has been very hard, there have been other parts that have been filled with joyful events. The fact that we have our health, jobs, a roof over heads, family, and other blessings - we are so blessed to have what we do and I'm very thankful to our Heavenly Father for those blessings.

Love to all.....

Jack

Thursday, December 25, 2008

Merry Christmas!

I'm going to try to get this in before midnight my time....

Merry Christmas!!

Jack

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Update on my grandmother

Sorry that this has taken so long for me to update everyone on the status of my grandmother. To say that it's been a busy week with my grandmother being in the hospital, Thanksgiving, catching up at work, and taking care of other personal things would be an understatement.

The long and the short of it is that my grandmother does NOT have cancer. She instead has pneumonia.

To help explain this drastic change of events below is a timeline of last week, I've included a description of each day and the events that transpired. Please note that this is from my perspective and does not include things said both verbally and non-verbally to others in the family.

Sunday - Granny falls (again) and burst open a cut on her knee (for the 3rd time). While there and getting everything figured out, the medical staff learns her white blood cell count is over 33,000. Normal is 4,500-10,000 (according to www.nlm.nih.gov). Word is that they think that she has pneumonia.

Monday - An x-ray of her chest shows a "spot" the size of a baseball on her lungs. If memory serves me correct, the doctor said "I've never seen a spot this big that wasn't cancer" and "you need to be looking for a nursing home with hospice and she will never leave the state of ". Mom & dad leave to go where my grandmother is. A CT scan is done to get a better look at the spot on the lung.

Tuesday - Things are a little clearer, and I find out that she might not have cancer. A biopsy is taken to see if the spot is cancer. Doctor (not same one as on Monday) who took the biopsy says that symptoms of pneumonia are not present (green junk in lungs, fever, cough, etc); however the x-ray report says it is a mass and the CT radiologist calls the place an infusion. So, we are told she either has pneumonia or cancer. We are also told the results of biopsy will not be back until Friday (normally would be Thursday but since Thursday is Thanksgiving it will be Friday).

Wednesday - First doctor tells us that the white blood count has gone down to 8,000 (within the normal range). Because of this the doctor is now thinking that she has pneumonia instead of cancer. However won’t say for sure until the results come back from the biopsy.

Thursday – Thanksgiving …….no news.

Friday – We leave home to travel to where Granny D is. Results come back from the biopsy and my grandmother does NOT have cancer! A BIG sigh of relief is experienced throughout the family.

So that’s the timeline of events. Writing it down makes it not seem as big of a deal, but when you are dealing with the “c” word, in real time people get worried really fast. Since Friday she has been dismissed from the hospital, staying at my cousin's house for the time being, and hopes to come back home next weekend.

I apologize for the last post and making the outlook look so bleak, however hopefully by reading this post you will understand why the post was worded the way it was. I also hope that this helps clear up some of your confusion. My family and I really do appreciate all of the prayers, comments, and concerns expressed by several of you throughout the past week. I can’t explain how much they touched all of us.

Monday, November 24, 2008

Pray

Please pray for my Grandmother. Dad's mom. We just found out that she likely has advanced lung cancer that is very advanced. Tests are still being ran to confirm the diagnosis and more details to come later, however please pray for me and my family. What would I like for you to pray for? I don't know. I really don't know. But please just pray for God to work His Will in this matter.