Posts Tagged husband
One year ago…
Posted by crusaderjennblog in adoption, Babies, Bible, debateable, Faith, Faith in the Midst of Illness, family, Football, fun, Grace, health, Inspiration, invisible disease, Jesus, life, lifestyle, Living with Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Living with MS, Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Maintaining Faith, marriage, Marriage Encouragement, MS, MS Fight Club, Multiple Sclerosis, Nervous System, Neurological Conditions, news, prayer, Relapsing Remitting, Relapsing Remitting MS, Stress and MS, toddlers, trends to consider, Uncategorized, Women with MS on November 7, 2021
My PCP diagnosed me with anemia. A few months later, I received the hypercalcaemia diagnosis from my endocrinologist, quickly followed by an Osteoporosis diagnosis and put on a drug that might cause me to lose a tooth or two. I want to be off that drug ASAP. Despite all the cumulative crap I’ve been dealing with since ‘17, I finally have a sliver of good news to share.
My endocrinologist at my July appointment basically threw-up his hands and said he’s sending me to an ENT because my symptoms don’t match my numbers, but he believes there’s something indicitive of a tumor, although the thyroid and parathyroid ultrasounds and nuclear medicine tests revealed nothing. My downward spiral of symptoms going from a pretty healthy patient (minus the MS) to going straight down a toilet as my gait in just a few months became that of a 90-year-old trying to be purposeful with each labored step.
Last weekend at church, as I walked to my vehicle and I heard someone behind me and glanced back to see who it was. The older gentleman has always reminded me of my late grandfather and I stopped so he could catch-up to me. He said he had never seen me walk so slow. I laughed and asked if it was really that noticable. Then he went on to explain how he’d always seen me actively chasing the little ones all over and then said he was keeping me in prayer. I tend to be guarded about sharing anything specific, but last Sunday morning, I was confident that the Holy Spirit put it on my heart to share with a few people at church that I was scheduled for surgery December 15 for a pararthyroidectomy.
My endocrinologist did send me to an ENT, who after viewing all the pictures, labs and radiology reports, sent me to another ENT. Well that ENT sent me to his ENT, who is head of the ENT department at the university in town and his MA was able to schedule me for an appointment to see him a week later. I told B I was tempted to cancel the appointment because I was tired of wasting my time and being referred and referred to another doctor, and another doctor, etc. B asked me to keep the appointment and if I still walked away after the appointment feeling dislcouraged and like I wasted my time, then we would seek other treatment. Funny how I get so frustrated that I might have some extreme tendencies to for example, jump off cliffs because it just makes more sense to me to do something drastic , ya know) and then B has this level of discernment that can reel me in and produce peace with a few words.
Well that ENT, about 60 seconds into the appointment, said he had viewed and studied the pictures of my parathyroid and explained he believed at least one part, potentially two of the four-part parathyroid had tumors. I asked him how long he had specialized in ENT studies. 30 years. Only 30 years!! Then he said, “ I’ve seen this before, these symptoms and pictures . I’m confident if we do the 15 minute surgery to take out the parathyroid, that you should start feeling better almost immediately in the recovery room.” And with those few words, those tear ducts started filling up. You might remember that this girl does not cry…. her eyes sweat.
Share this:
Ongoing Variables
Posted by crusaderjennblog in adoption, Bible, Faith, Faith in the Midst of Illness, family, Grace, health, Inspiration, invisible disease, Jesus, life, lifestyle, Living with Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Living with MS, Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Maintaining Faith, marriage, Marriage Encouragement, MS, MS Fight Club, Multiple Sclerosis, Nervous System, Neurological Conditions, prayer, Relapsing Remitting, Relapsing Remitting MS, Stress and MS, Uncategorized, Women with MS on April 6, 2021
Prior to the five day Lemtrada treatment in ’16, a team of lab consultants and vampires phlebotemists took eight vials of blood along with the contents of my bladder to establish my base-lines for what my normal numbers were. My thyroid, and red and white blood cells were all completely within a normal range in that analysis two weeks prior to the Lemtrada commencement. Even with Multiple Sclerosis, all these were very much within the range labeled “normal.” I’m explaining this because the following will be somewhat of a brief meaning of the physiological changes that occurred following treatment. We knew of the potential side effects that could happen and from reading the disclosures, there were definitely adverse side effect occurances. With the information that MS could be eliminated through the treatment, I saw the treatment as a calculated risk.
Well, I became the Lemtrada anomaly. My neurologist received reports following those monthly labs to show how my body continued to respond to the treatment. About five months post Lemtrada my thyroid started showing things were changing so off I went to an endocrinologist who put me on medication to control the overcompensating hyperthyroid and a few months later, it became hypothyroidism for my underactive thryoid. Apparently my thyroid couldn’t make up its mind.
In the middle of all this the endocrin diagnosed me with Hashimotos, with vague instructions to stay away from gluten. I thought for a second that that was going to be easy to stay away! How silly was I? Once I researched gluten and found that it was in bread – I love baking bread – and that gluten is in so many of my favorite things {read as nearly everything} many candies I enjoy that include red licorice. But then once I became intentional to stay away from gluten for a month, which began in February 2019, things changed. Those chronic gut aches finally ceased. Over time, gluten-free has become more of a staple in grocery stores as gluten-free snack options are more available. While all these changes started in me and I needed to create my new normal , I was delighted to discover gluten-free snacks in stock with Amazon Prime. Did I mention Gluten-free chocolate covered pretzels?!?! Yum! Simply delightful.
Then a couple months later, the medication changed back to control my hyperthyroid’s overactive antics, but that didn’t go well but after all the nonsense, my numbers finally leveled-off. Then, of all the obscure causes why I didn’t respond well to the prescription, my endocrin said I was allergic to the dye in the prescription pills, so she wrote the Rx in such a way so my pharmacy filled the Rx with non-dyed pills. But then my encodcrinologist moved to Sweden and I was not responding well to the medication anyway so I opted to elimininate the idea of finding another endocrinologist. I didn’t really like her. My first appointment with her was weird. She asked many questions about when and how the MS was diagnosed and in that I explained that auto-immune was in my genes so it was definitely in my genetic make up to rear it’s ugly head. The doc’s take-away was telling me that I missed my calling to go to medical school and figure out why my MS was affecting me and why auto-immune put a target on my family or why Lemtrada screwed up my physiology. Apparently her playbook for me was to discover why I should’ve become a world-reknowned doctor who discovered a cure for MS. I’m not kidding or exagerating about one iota of this.
I would love to say I fired that doc, but timing was such that when I decided to not see this endocrin any longer, she went MIA over-seas. I took the opportunity to be in control, which I should’ve done at the beginning of all this nonsense and researched thyroid supplements and those most highly rated on Amazon. I read many reviews and ordered one supplement. I took for a couple months, but then after I decided that chronic diarhea, even as a temporary side-effect really sucked, I ordered a different highly rated supplement. And “Behold! No chronic diarhea? We had a winner!” Said Jenn after taking it for a month with no unwelcome side-effects. So with the supplement, I felt decent and have continued taking it for a few years now.
Then last September, my (now remember I had to agree to monthly labs for five years following Lemtrada.). Things started changing again with my physiology and my neurologist called and asked me to take a copy of my labs with me to see my PCP. What’s changed this time? I started feeling sick in mid-September ’20. Those labs said I was anemic. Apparently, as of February I’m no longer anemic, but if that’s true why am I still experiencing heart palpitations? Coincidentally, I just felt lousy. This coming December, it will have been five years since Lemtrada ended, but changes were still happening. My internal system has allegedly flushed the toxic chemical cocktail from my body, but things are going awry. For a couple years I put reading my Bible on hold while I was working through my anger at God for allowing our first foster placement after two years with us from birth, be sent to an unknown distant family member in St. Louis.
Perhaps the stress from that situation was another culprit for making my health go sideways. Whatever is going on, I feel like I’m in a fight for my life right now. My new Endocrin tested me for a list of about 25 things in December. A few of those things included conditions related to osteoporosis because with my initial intake appointment with him, he looked at my prior bloodwork and saw that in my urine, there is a high level of calcium, which isn’t normal. My body is leaking calcium. I’m too young to have osteoporosis. Which means I will need surgery to put a stop to this and have my parathyroid removed. I sought a second opinion and that doctor was in agreement that the parathyroid is indeed the problem child. I have an appointment for a bone density scan which should confirm the need for surgery and with the parathyroid removed, it should put a stop to the “calcium leak.”
https://youtube.com/watch?v=X1eMZWiOJ0a0&feature=share
Last June I began reading my Bible again and it’s timely that I am reading Job in the middle of my own health nightmare. God is faithful. I’ve seen and experienced healing in myself and others in years passed. But I’ve doubted him so much and prayed for my own end in order to to be rid of what I know will likely be temporary pain and discomfort. The pain and chronic discomfort that I’ve felt in the last six months is like nothing I’ve experienced before. God healed my MS in 2005. He healed my Dad’s cancer and continues to keep it away. So how dare I doubt his goodness?!?! One of B’s clients has a mom who is also a believer and she told my husband she had a dream about me and that she received a word that I would be healed. But like the Isrealites and their chronic complaining through the desert for 40 years for an 11 day journey, I have to keep my faith and remind myself that like Danny Gokey’s song, I “Just Haven’t Seen It Yet.” The light at the end of the tunnel has become faint, but I have to have faith that my struggles have not been in vain.
Share this:
Learning Humility
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Faith, family, Grace, Inspiration, Living with Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Relapsing Remitting MS, Uncategorized on November 10, 2016
Over the course of twenty-two years with MS and its retrogression through abilities like my choice to temporarily give-up driving at the tender age of 27, only to again be able to reclaim it a few years later -albeit with some hesitance, #loveindependencebutIvalueyoursafetytoo, and then the need to self-catheterize in public restrooms #hateunsanitarybutnecessary was mandatory because when you gotta go, always go with confidence. And then there was the necessity of needing walking help with a cane or walker and dealing with the loud and ignorant judgmental heckler’s (stangers) comments, let’s call a spade a spade, #grumpyoldcodgers being bullies simply jealous I obtained the last handi-capable parking spot, or the accusations that I “faked” using various devices for good parking, but the most influential, yet one of the most difficult to accept component was accepting rides to appointments from well-meaning #friends and #family.
These were all contributors that #God used to help me absorb the much-needed lessons of being humble. #lessonoffaith Thank you, Lord for being patient with me. #godnevergivesuponus Thank you also to friends for your help and thank you, #Jesus for teaching me to learn to simply appreciate a friendly act of service. I don’t recall just who interrupted me in one of my misguided tirades about people boosting their own egos to offer to “help the cripple.” Was I that bad? I know it’s hard to believe, but yes, Jenn is #stubborn, and I was likely worse than I imagined because it was in my head that I believed most people were fake.
And I often revert to speaking about myself in third-person when I get frustrated. #oldhabitsdiehard To mentally turn each offer to help, into an ego boost for themselves. A lesson I’ve been learning is to accept things at #facevalue instead of trying to read between the lines for some (but likely not there) hidden meaning. Talk about being a mental-case. I might most definitely resemble that. Ever heard, ” When you worry about what others think of you, you’d be surprised how little they do.” Whoa. So as much as I think people want to make me feel a certain way, they don’t. I ultimately control how I feel and most people have better things to do than manipulate ways to be condescending. Again-whoa. Jenn’s learned it’s much easier to believe an offer is sincere. If it’s not, that is not my problem because I should not be required to further analyze anything.
I detested being required to depend on others to #chauffeur me to doctor appointments, and because of the increasing menu of my many worsening #relapsingremittingMS issues, there were many of those to see various specialists like a speech pathologist to assess learning to speak again, a physical therapist to help me re-learn to walk, a urologist to learn how to safely #catheterize in an emergency, just to name a few things. Because of the many basic abilities I had taken for granted, the lesson to give-up stuff and be forced to accept and later embrace a new practice in order to get what I needed was somewhat lengthy. You can imagine teaching an old dog mule-like human some new tricks.
Yes, those first couple of years being disabled before turning 30, even I was a pain. You better believe it. I was that old dog. #stubbornasamule Although it probably took longer than was necessary since I was so resistant to accepting help for so long, but once this girl got-it, it became easier and easier to just say, “Yes, I appreciate your offer to help and thank you very much. What day would be best for you?” Another challenging situation was when people offered to buy or prepare us a meal, drop it off and expect nothing in return. Because of my limp and gimpiness, I am a klutz and when I shattered my ankle seven times slipping on the driveway in ’07, several brought us meals. Again, thank you for helping in a big way. But, I very very briefly got back in the mode of analyzing people instead of just saying, “Thank you,” but then quickly realized this was a meal I could in no way prepare for B #husband #love before he came home from work. The moral of the story is accept someone’s offer to help and don’t forget to say thank you and send a thank you note. Those became my new rules. Much easier. And no further analyzing. Whew! This girl’s brain needs a rest. But today, I’m asking for grace while I’m getting the I-V full of #MS treatment as I try to coherently share my thoughts. Thank you in advance.
Speaking of friends, there’s a generous couple from #church who have offered to provide dinner for us as I go through this #Lemtrada #MS treatment. Thank you to friends like this who “get-it.” Instead of of putting the responsibility on us to, “Just let you know if we need anything.” This couple called yesterday and asked if they could bring us dinner tonight. As a matter of fact, that is precisely how such an offer should happen. Those are the best kind. It’s humbling that people would do this for us. It might seem silly that I really cannot do much, but I cannot go anywhere or even try to exercise while the I-V is attached so here I am several hours a day getting treatment. Maybe compare it to being on a long flight, sitting several hours and also being at the doctor’s office for vitals monitoring.
💙💚💙 GO HAWKS! 💙💚💙
Share this:
Baby-Girl aka dare I say Diva, in the making?
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Babies, family, Humor, Inspiration, life, lifestyle, Living with MS, Living with Multiple Sclerosis, MS, Neurological Conditions, prayer, Uncategorized on November 2, 2016
Butter Buns must accompany me all the time, so rest assured that when I have to go anywhere for myself-doctor appointments, allergy shots, etc., she must accompany me and I put way more effort into making #sweetbaby Ms. Buns #nickname more presentable #ooohs #ahs than myself. Because baby cuteness factor supercedes everything. And she is thankful for that. Although she hasn’t said much beyond baby-babble at this point, it’s clear that she sees me as part of her #butterbunsposse, although my presence must be silent support #unnoticed. I am one of her #peeps for this potential #divainthemaking. It doesn’t matter that I am make-up free for most things because disguising #wrinkles #darkcircles doesn’t matter. But Butter Buns has standards. For herself. As most nine-month-olds do.
To have Ms. Bunn’s ensemble match and be #cuteness head to toe is more noticeable than if said #entourage member is wearing wrinkled clothes or make-up. Because people notice babies #ButterBun’sPR #me. And I don’t care that I’m wearing something so wrinkled, it appears that I just rolled out of bed wearing my clothes for a nap #tooexhaustedtoiron or looking like the early thousands called and they want their knit gym-capris back. #letpeoplejudge. Yes, it’s 2016 and I wear dated gym clothes #comfortable and probably more often in public than my more fashion-forward husband would like. I’m really not stuck in a time-warp. I just don’t care. #priorities
In my defense, I’m at the #gym 5 very early mornings each week to #workout a couple hours each day and be back home before B leaves for work #notagymrat, but I go to sweat, maintain strength and keep extra pounds from revealing themselves. #gymsarenotsocialvenues I am vain, but more than that, because MS took so much from me years ago when I physically could not work-out when I very much desired to, #motivated #5yearsinawheelchair, it’s very important that I do what I am able to do, when I’m able to do it because I will never again take for granted that ability to walk independently of a #cane or #walker or at its worst, ultimately require a #wheelchair So understandably, years ago, petty priorities like shopping for present-day active-wear or taking time to add make-up, let alone sweat-proofing game face to prevent #racooneyes was deemed superfluous.
The moral of this tangented story is don’t judge the messenger who’s not only telling you “don’t judge,” but take into consideration that for the messenger, looking ultra fab all the time is impossible, unless you’re nine-months-old. #focusattentiononButter Buns.
Share this:
Our world has been sufficiently rocked.
Posted by crusaderjennblog in adoption, Faith, family, Jesus, lifestyle, Living with MS, Maintaining Faith, marriage, prayer, Uncategorized on March 10, 2016
No, really. Two months into the new year – by the way – tangent warning, I really hate resolutions – read last new year’s entry rant why I have never made a resolution because if I want to make changes, I just do it and do not require a calendar date to keep a countdown, keep me motivated or keep me accountable, etc. What I did do was make a commitment to myself to become active again in addition to my existing regimen of weights and stationary biking. I swam competitively through high school and college, but recently determined I’d do something different and start running. Because I could. For years, I’ve been scared to try because of that whole stint in a wheelchair for five years, but got over myself and tried to run and guess what?! I did. My husband has always been my biggest and best cheerleader and talked me into being fitted for proper running shoes based on the correct support for our surrounding terrain. I did get fitted, then researched price, ordered and as an added benefit, those running shoes are even the colors of my Seahawks! Yay for me and GO HAWKS!! But the colors were never even a real consideration. So those new running shoes arrived and I initially wore them at the gym on the treadmill, assessed and was confident that I could in fact run. I mapped out my running route in the neighborhood to start the following day and then God ripped the carpet from under me and said, “Jenn, I have other plans for you” when we received an unexpected call later that evening.
You might recall a previous post about a year ago that I finally shared with my husband the snapshots that I’d seen for the prior twelve plus months. Remember? After I shared that little tid-bit of info, B essentially sat me at the table with a bright light shining on me to question me and determine how serious I was,then after the FBI- style interrogation, he determined I was on the up and up because that’s how completely unexpected it was for B to hear me mention, “Well maybe we’re still here because we’re supposed to adopt a child.” Eleven years ago, after the failed attempt to adopt a baby from China, when a year into the process we were declined to adopt because of my MS, the subject of children in our own home had become the topic of which we no longer spoke. So imagine how unexpected the suggestion nearly a decade later…
As Christians we seek God’s will and pray for God’s prompting for major decisions, but with my ‘epiphany’ we were even more resolved to make sure that this vision was really from the Almighty. The weeks following the ‘interrogation’ were filled with prayer and research and then in July 2015, we began the 10-week journey to become licensed for foster to adopt through the state. In addition to a plethora of info, we obtained CPR/First Aid certifications, reinstalled the pool-fencing, had two home-studies, installed the necessary magnet locks and fire-extinguishers, obtained a crib and the path was smooth-sailing, confirming yet another answer that what we were doing was indeed, God-led.
However, what had become disappointing after completing the class and list of tasks was the continued delay of getting licensed since our social worker had estimated that would happen before the new year, but we did not hear a thing for weeks later. One of our class members had set up a closed social networking group that was created for our training class only. Many of our class-members posted pictures of their newly acquired foster munchkins. I may be kind of sort of admitting that the green monster had more than likely, undeniably and most definitely bit me. Hard. I’m blessed to have a spiritually strong husband with excellent discernment. Most of the time I operate on logic, but there was nothing about this situation that ever spoke logic, so that overwhelming left-brain-ness went right impulsively emotional on me. B helped me realize that the green monster’s name was “Obama” when I had this sense of missing out on my fair share, but once again my wise husband pointed out that this entire process was about stretching our faith in God’s timing by not taking control where those control-freak tendencies might have in the past.
Back to that unexpected call… Our licensing social worker finally called in February that the center had received a baby. A baby!?! A baby. A baby was never on my radar because those visions were always of a toddler. But what then came to me was that our licensing SW said in class was that “adoption may not happen with your first placement…,” but I also thought this could be good experience for both of us. B had those same thoughts, called the case worker, we asked many questions, after which we prayed and determined we’d pick-up that baby the following morning. Talk about a world-rocking situation… Most people have nine months to prepare for a newborn. You know that whole thing of what to expect when you’re pregnant? We had 12 hours. But, here we are weeks later, very much operating as ships-passing-in-the night-zombie-mode, if that is a real condition. We are sleep-deprived starved and ‘conversations’ have become limited to Neanderthal-like grunts and groans of exhaustion. Lord, I apologize to any Neanderthals out there who read blogs, let alone have the wherewithal to take offense at my very tired sense of humor.
Next you might read about the monopoly of over-priced “Baby” targeted gear.
Share this:
True or False: A blog is a safe place to share or rant.
Posted by crusaderjennblog in debateable, Faith, lifestyle on August 25, 2015
Years ago, I was one of those who lived on the Faceplant (Facebook). See the film “The Internship” if you’re not familiar with the Faceplant reference. I spent hours lurking, liking and responding to people’s posts. Because I was sick (really I was in a wheelchair for a while) and could do nothing, but vicariously live through other’s activities. That was years ago and over the years, that time on Facebook diminished a great deal, to now, when I can barely tolerate it. I’m on there maybe once a week and primarily to see family and like/support the Seahawks feed. I might find myself feeling like I should like friend’s posts if I happen to make it to being logged-in 5 minutes 90 seconds. I set my profile on private and all my settings are also private so people really can’t see much about me like my birthday or anniversary. If I had that information available to others, than I would feel obligated to also give people the appropriate, “Happy or Congratulatory” remarks on their walls. So I rarely log-in to the social network thank goodness because who has time? When I got a new iPhone last Christmas, much to my dismay the Facebook app came pre-loaded, but I do not use the app for the reason that I am not that important. And Twitter? I have an account, but I also don’t use that. Because I’m not that important.
My husband laughs at my attitude because he thinks I sound like an elderly person. Hush, you whippersnapper. I guess I noticed last time I logged-in that people used Facebook as a means of obtaining relationship advice. A while back, I saw the marital demise of some friends based on the surplus of their disparaging Facebook posts at each other that were out there for the world to see. Don’t people tire of notifying everyone of what they’re feeling moment to moment or capturing every second of their life through taking pictures of themselves and posting another variation of their emotions or what they’re wearing? #Narcissism
Speaking of Instagram, I joined and my husband will attest to the fact that it was while borderline kicking and screaming. Social networks elicit that kind of a reaction any more because I feel like it’s, “just one more thing” that I’m required to monitor consistently. Thank you to those who hounded me on Facebook a few years ago when I didn’t respond in your timely fashion (immediately). And I closed the social network and turned to blogging.
I read a blog the other day and the writer was annoyed by the self-appointed blog experts who condemn bloggers new and old, like me for ‘doing it wrong.’ I can accept that I don’t know a lot, but I write because I like to and am not in any way trying to reach a certain crowd or a certain number of followers through my writing. The only thing I fear with blogging is making a commitment for a daily or weekly post and may miss a day because for example, Music Monday is on Monday and God forbid I miss the right day and have to post it on Thursday. That’s failure to me and a very real fear. That silly idea happened months ago and I already failed to maintain Music Monday because well, I was busy staging our home to look like we actually live here and then the whole thing with adoption started taking root, so you may understand that life has become busy.
My social networking pages are about me or what I want to see. I have a right to post what I want to post or filter-out what I don’t want to see. I should be able to maintain a page without fear of another individual high-jacking MY post by inserting their hashtag to use my post as their vehicle to support what or who they support. I guess I have this mentality that because I wouldn’t be that selfish to use a hashtag on a friend’s page, others also shouldn’t be selfish. It’s already challenging enough for me to share / post anything on Facebook without having to monitor / censor friends comments that appear. I support the Hawks and with football season beginning shortly, I changed my page’s photos to reflect my support. A friend commented that they couldn’t ‘like’ the new photos because they support a different team – insert hashtag. I deleted the comment because the hashtag supported an opposing team. I posted those pictures for ME to support the Hawks so perhaps a better response to those mascot pictures might have been for my friend to roll their eyes and NOT comment with an opposing hashtag? I guess I fear this friend’s response if they were to read this, because I don’t believe they can separate the difference between me disliking (deleting) their response or disliking them as a person, which is not the issue because I like them very much.
I get that there’s a certain satisfaction / ego boost that goes with razzing friends who support opposing teams, but why the hashtag? Personally, I see the hashtag as a great way to categorize, but because of their over-abundant use anymore, I’ve grown to see the symbol as #anotsocleverfiller. I #rantneverriot
Of what social networking trends are you tired or bored? Thank you for reading.
~Jenn
Share this:
It is well with my soul
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Faith, Inspiration, Living with MS on July 22, 2015
I love the newer version of this old hymn and God has continued to use this song to keep me and my thoughts in-check because at times, and I’ll be honest, I’ve gone from zero negativity to Defcon Red in milliseconds, for which there is really no valid reason. Those reasons have been ridiculous and those worries have been entirely unfounded. The “what if?” game and I have been on again, off again roommates and I still have to work at kicking-out the unwanted guest when they attempt to argue, sit down and makes themselves at home for an extended stay as they readily rehash what’s wrong in my life, when all I must do is counter-hash everything that is right. Here is Matt Redman’s version of “It Is Well With My Soul.”
I have been so very blessed! In 2001 my MS was on a fast-track quickly retrogressing and I became dependent upon using a wheelchair full-time. 2015 marks 10 years since I regained feeling in my legs, was healed and able to again walk and not require the assistance of a wheelchair. Thank you, Lord.
My Dad was diagnosed with cancer a little over a year ago in 2014. With each quarterly exam, the cancer was confirmed with the understanding that because it was a slow-growing cancer, nothing was an emergency, but it would need to be monitored. My Dad’s quarterly cancer check-up and biopsy in June came back, “No cancer.” As in with all the many many samples they extracted, there was NO TRACE of it. Thank you, Lord.
Our oldest kitty Thor, died at end of April- just a couple of months ago. He was with us 18 years and he lived a pretty long and happy life filled with chasing string and consistent purrs. We adopted Thor shortly after B and I married. Our youngest kitty, Zephyr was diagnosed with kidney stones last winter and because of the process of going under the knife, we’ve hesitated to get him the surgery. With our loss of Thor, the Lord knew we needed some comfort and allowed Zephyr to be instrumental in providing that with lots of loves and cuddles as we mourned, but we remained worried that his condition would also take him from us too soon. Zephyr is now stone-free. Thank you, Lord.
My husband had a bad cough for about a year and the doctor said it was fine. It went away and then the cough started again and I kept reminding B to go to his doctor to see what was going on. They did a full exam and also ran an x-ray this time around. The x-ray was clear and everything is absolutely fine with his lungs except that the doc put him on an allergy regimen and now that painful cough is almost completely gone. Thank you, Lord.
I doubt that there are any other Christians out there who have ever been able to relate to being control-freaks or worrying excessively. What? You might resemble being controlling? You worry about stuff too? Then you can relate… I guess that somehow I believed in my very misguided perception is that if I worried needlessly about anything big or small, that things will get better or something ridiculous like that. I am thankful that God has a plan and that through my worries, He’s waited patiently for me to step-back, give him those reigns for my inner control-freak extraordinaire and just let him be God. It’s a process and I am an active work-in-progress with needing to remind myself daily that, “‘He’s got this, Jenn.” It’s very silly the amount of control that I perceive I have. I believe that the above situations served for no other purpose than to get my faith on-track. But then, it may not be all about me, so perhaps my perspective is selfish in that the listed situations were to grow my faith, when those also could have also served to grow my husband’s faith, my Dad faith, my Mom’s faith and / or my Sister’s faith…
As B and I have again felt led to pursue adoption, our faith has very much been stretched. It’s far from ideal circumstances since we’re older and have less money than the first time we attempted to adopt in ’07, but God’s bigger. We’ve been called to just be obedient to his guidance. He’s bigger than our perceived ideal circumstances and we have questions, but more than anything, we must trust in him.
Relinquishing control is not easy, but I’m confident that considering my own life is just a little blip on God’s screen, that He can see all things past, present and future and that there is a Divine purpose for him allowing you or me or any other person to go through anything. Those situations are either good or bad character building or faith building.
What are you made of? Do you struggle with doubt? What kind of situations have challenged your own faith?
Jenn
Share this:
It’s come to my attention that I’m clairvoyant
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Faith, family on July 16, 2015
And it’s not anything that I ever wanted, but I guess since it’s not in any way a career path, we’re all good. Since my left brain-ness typically only considers the literal about most things, it takes me a while to ‘get’ anything outside the box, because I’m legalistic that way. In summary of this situation, one might say, I failed to add two and two, where the most basic of addition would have lead me to recognize a simple correlation between nearby regional earthquakes and a challenging vertigo episode that often begins within a few hours to 48 hours before a quake. Perhaps it all depends on how slow or fast the tectonic plates shift or how massive the seismic activity in my geographic region? Is there a seismic expert in the house?
I only recognized this during the recent few months that with each earthquake that has occurred within my region in the last 20 years, I’ve experienced severe vertigo. By ‘severe’, I mean vertigo that has me seeing doubles/triples and everything around me spinning at an exponential speed. How’s that for fun? On the bright side, this ‘fun’ occurs without warning and gives me a sensation that I am taking full advantage of an unlimited pass to ride all the twisting and turning roller-coasters on this planet – all in a few minutes. Yay for me! Now the reality is that one of these unwelcome vertigo episodes begins with spinning and often gets worse through the first day only to climax until the earthquake occurs. Then as a final reminder to not forget that this unwelcome guest stopped-by and overstayed its welcome, it provides a sickness ‘hangover’ for at least a day after the event. When you’ve been sick with a cold or flu for example and have taken those fantastic symptom hiding over-the-counter treatments like the, “Sniffling, sneezing, head-aching, so you can rest magic,” and wake the next morning feeling a little more clear-headed, but wondering where and what barricade you hit going 55 miles per hour, that’s the medicine hangover I’m talking about, as I wouldn’t know anything about other types.
When the most recent episode occurred June 23, I posted to the social network: I said something to the effect that, “History states whenever I experience a severe case of vertigo, an earthquake occurs in my geographic region within 48 hours, but I hope for once I will be a false prophet.” So, 48 hours came and went and nothing happened. Except it did. But I’m not on the network enough to see comments or even watch the local news because I might at times resemble living under a rock when said vertigo occurs. Watching TV and reading the paper is impossible when I see doubles and triples of everything. So, a friend saw my post and watched our regional news closely and notified me that a quake occurred on our fault line. In Alaska. Another quake occurred May 22 – same situation in me having vertigo a couple days ahead. We also had a quake earlier in the year and like clock-work, vertigo set in a couple days in advance. So wherever we’ve lived, vertigo is indicative of an earthquake within 48 hours. I believe there’s a correlation between how much of he human body is water (60-75%) depending on which expert and just like the changing tides and the closer a full moon gets to earth, there is something that sets off my balance and the liquid in my inner-ear that goes wonky with seismic activity.
You probably agree that my husband had an interesting perspective about this. B’s interpretation was that upon me discovering my ‘ability” to foresee earthquakes, I should also consider that God’s using this ability to communicate with me. Wow! That interpretation was unexpected. Decades ago at the private school, my classmate’s nickname for me, was ‘Doubting Thomas,’ which could not be more accurate than it is now. And the reason it’s relevant is because for over a year, I’ve received these ‘snapshots’ that just appear in my head. These uninspired and by uninspired, I haven’t seen a tear-jerker commercial, for example, but these snapshots have been of me or B or both of us with one or two children, but since we don’t have children, I got into the habit of quickly disregarding these ‘snapshots.’ (I’ll share with you later about B’s reaction a few months ago to my confession about the snapshots). And that’s why B’s interpretation is that just like I foresee earthquakes, God’s trying to show me that these snapshots are going to be reality. What? Whoa, Dude! No way! Is this even a reasonable possibility? Yes. Matthew 19:26. And Mark 9:24 has also become a daily reference. Dear Lord, I want to believe and I think I believe, but help me overcome my unbelief!
Are you clairvoyant or have you experienced anything like this or have you been a witness to someone experiencing this?
Share this:
I was mad at God…
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Faith, family, Maintaining Faith on June 2, 2015
I have been all over the place mentally and emotionally, therefore, my blogging has suffered severely for all you daily followers – wink, wink. A couple of months ago, I was in the middle of being angry with God. Nothing was immune from my long and increasing list of grievances toward God about… the distance from my family in WA, my husband’s health, my dad’s health as he fights cancer, my now late cat, my circumstances, well…everything. But God is merciful and lead me back to being on track with him. I am ashamed to admit that I was holding God to some very wrong and misguided performance based expectations – as in if I was being blessed, than I felt like I should spend time in prayer and reading my Bible, but there was nothing going-on in which I was thankful because I was stuck in my pit of despair. But I am out of that now. He has a plan for me and I just have to follow his lead. And for this control-freak-extraordinaire, that is the most challenging because I want to be in charge.
I have to back-up a bit, but the history is necessary so back in January, I was at our small group and our group’s new Bible study had me almost immediately feeling very convicted and I was like, “Oh-no-you-di-n’t!” all the way home by myself because B had to work late, which was a good thing as I had time to think. The next morning, the conviction hadn’t gone away though and I was like, “This is completely unacceptable.” The Holy Spirit had convicted me of being apathetic and showed me I needed to volunteer at church. At which point I joined our church’s cleaning team and also became a Sunday School Teacher. And the squirming stopped and I had peace because I was obedient to God, but then at some point, I started thinking, “Since I’m doing this and this, You need to do somethings for me,” but God does not work like that and I already know this, but I was stuck in seeing so many things around me not go according to my plan. But it’s not about and has never been about my plan.
I don’t even know where to pin-point when/how the anger started, but I do know there’s been some things following me around for a while years because I never let-go of for example our failed adoption. I heard something a while back to the effect that if I don’t let go of things that God has forgiven me for, it’s like re-crucifying Jesus again and again, which is like saying his forgiveness wasn’t good enough the first time. So like confession, I was waiting for my sovereign God to confess to me his allowing our adoption to fail. Pretty wacky, huh? I finally came to the eye-opening conclusion years ago that the failed adoption was our own fault and I’ve also been working on not chastising myself repeatedly for stuff I’ve been forgiven. In the middle of this, I began to recognize the snapshots that periodically and randomly appeared, but at the beginning of seeing those about a year ago, I quickly disregarded them and thought, “Where did that come from?” But then a few weeks ago, B and I were chatting about his job and how moving back to WA is not even on the horizon as God has kept us here for a reason and then my next comment was so unexpected as it hadn’t even been something I thought about. I said, “Maybe we’re still here to adopt a child.” WHAT?!? Even after I said that, I was confused, so I have to believe, it was God-led because after the attempted adoption seven years ago, that option was far from either of our thoughts. But then B had a lot of questions about me thinking about this because again, this was far from being an option for either of us.
So, in FBI questioning-a suspect-style, B set-up a bright-light shining in my eyes at our dining room table, where he sat on the opposite side to interrogate me. Just kidding about the light, but his rapid-fire questions combined with my own somewhat confused answers were very much making both of us pause to reassess many things, but mainly that we both recognized that the failed adoption was our own fault – it didn’t make the failure hurt any less, but instead of following God’s lead seven years ago, we made the mistake of taking things into our own hands and never sought his guidance, which could’ve saved us a lot of grief and some savings. In summary, after much prayer and conviction, we decided to try again, but we are not leading this charge. God has his hands all over this because there is nothing about this situation that makes an ounce of sense, which I will address next time.
Share this:
I am the worst blogger. Ever.
Posted by crusaderjennblog in Faith, family, health, Inspiration, life, marriage, MS on May 12, 2015
Updating and sharing… I get so caught-up in doing irrelevant tasks like decorating the house (as I should have done years ago) and baking and currently researching to understand trends, that when I’m riding such a wave of momentum that I cannot stop or maybe I don’t stop? Shortly after I completed the ‘making our house a home’ ordeal back in early April, I was able to again join a gym. I’ve missed that daily habit for several years and when my MS improved back in ’05 and we were still in WA, I joined a gym and enlisted the help of a trainer who coincidentally also has MS, and provided me with a detailed program of cardio exercises, strength-building and toning exercises for me to keep some level of strength. But, since moving, I really had not been in a gym in years. I’m thankful most of the strength that I’d built remained during my gym absence and I was able to work the same major and minor muscle groups each day that I did earlier, so it took only a couple of weeks to get back into the habit in 2015. So once again these activities became part of my current routine with lifting four days a week, and doing between 7-10 miles of cardio on my recumbent bike at home daily.
Another project that’s had my ongoing attention is getting our pool ready for Pool-Season. During winter and early spring, there’s a minor level of maintenance required except after days of excessive wind and leaves blowing into the pool a few days each month. We had a couple of weeks of windy weather in late April, which resulted in a slightly cloudy pool from all the dust and then the vacuüm stopped working, but was not clogged so I enlisted a professional to diagnose our pool’s problem. I didn’t know what I didn’t know and I hate to claim ignorance, but there were a few steps that went ignored with our pool maintenance. So after cleaning the filters and getting ALL the appropriate equipment, with my newly acquired knowledge of ALL the steps, the pool is running just fine for the coming summer Pool-Season, which now that we’re consistently involved with our small group from church and they’re aware of our pool, there are definite expectations of us hosting pool-related barbecues/get-togethers.
Also relating to Pool-Season, my hair is short again. Long hair gets hot on my neck and I gripe about it for a month, even with it pulled-up in a pony-tail and I finally give in to getting it cut. It’ll grow back, unless I determine the shorter do is a keeper… Another thing is for years, my sister has been on me to watch Mad Men and a couple of weeks ago, B and I tried it a third time and well…we’re finally in. Jon Hamm is gorgeous, which has nothing to do with anything, but have you seen “Million Dollar Arm”? He’s definitely also a DB in that film just like he is in MM… And Peggy? Why didn’t anyone catch-on to her being pregnant? I called that long before she even started showing… Speaking of pregnancy, my sister is due in August and we’re once again attempting to adopt, but this time is different so more on that later.
crusaderjennblog 