Timeline

We thought we would give you a timeline for what is happening this spring before we go off to Zambia. We ask that you would keep us in your prayers.

February 16th, we will be presented before the Personnel Subcommittee to be approved as missionaries with the IMB.

March 18th, will be the appointment service. This will be at Taylors First Baptist Church in the Greenville, South Carolina area. If you want to attend, please email us and we will get you the information.

April 20th - June 18th, we will be in Richmond, Virginia, for Field Personnel Orientation.

We will update here if any of this changes.

God bless,
Rita

My Mother

Please keep praying for her. One week ago she went to the nursing home for physical therapy. She stayed only two days and went back to the hospital. They put a pic line back in and put her back on antibiotics and steroids. She seems to get much better just overnight. Her one lung is better. The other lung looks like it did a month ago when she first came into the hospital. She had another biopsy on Monday. This time they went down her throat. They couldn't do the biopsy because her blood was too thin. They did flush the lung. She also is back on a full oxygen mask 24 hours a day. They can not keep the oxygen level in her blood up where is needs to be. Being in the hospital is affecting her mentally. She has been in too long.

Please pray for the doctors, that they would find out what is going wrong with her and they would figure out the right medicine to get rid of the pneumonia. Pray for the nurses caring for her. Pray for her that she would heal quickly. Pray for my Dad to have lots of patience and a good attitude. Pray that he doesn't get drug down in all of this. It is going to be a long winter for them.

Thanks for your prayers.

Rita

Medical Approval

I have medical approval!!!! Email came today telling us so from IMB. The next three months are going to be a whirl wind. Lots to do.

My Mother

Please pray for my mother. She is in the ICU with pneumonia. As of today, January 10th, she has spent 14 days in the hospital. She wasn't getting better and so a biopsy was done on her one lung. It showed that she just had pneumonia - something curable. Because of the biopsy she was on a respirator. On Friday she came off of the respirator. The drain tube was suppose to be removed that afternoon. Keep her in your prayers, that she would heal faster and come home soon.

Mom, when you get home and read this - we video taped Christmas for you. Love you.

OK, I would like to know how come sometimes my paragraphs are separated and sometimes they are not. My Christmas letter posted beautifully, but older posts look awful. If I wait a week or two and go back in an edit, sometimes it fixes them and sometimes is doesn't. I don't get how this blog thing works.

So, I am sorry for my posts that all run together with no paragraphs. They had paragraphs before I posted them. I have even tried to edit. I can't keep going back to edit old ones. I have enough to do with my time.

What I deleted out of my Chistmas letter

I started writing my Christmas letter about two days before Christmas. I was two pages on my medical saga. So I rewrote it. Below is was I deleted for those who what to read about me.

I told you in last years Christmas letter about having heart problems and that I was seeing my old family Doctor here in SC in Jan. I did see him. After hearing my story of what was happening and about the doctors I visited in Louisville and without any tests, he declared that I was having classic anxiety attacks. He sent me home with three different medications to take, which I didn’t touch, except the one pill once. I was having one in the morning. The pill I took was for when you are having one. It calms you down. I having never in my life worked so hard to stay awake. How anyone takes that medicine and works at a job is beyond me. We researched it and decided he could be right at that time. We have since decided he jumped to a conclusion and should have don’t a lot more testing first to rule out anything else. It really doesn’t make sense. When I am having one there is nothing to be anxious about. My heart also pounds. I can take my pulse without feeling for it. My Endocrinologist sent me to a Cardiologist in September. He had me wear a halter monitor for 24 hours. Basically, my heart is beating properly even when I think it isn’t. He said, “His job is to ensure me that I am fine and will not be falling over dead.” My blood pressure is really too low to put me on anything anyways.

In February we went to what the International Mission Board (IMB) of the Southern Baptist Conference calls “Candidate Conference” in Richmond, VA. That was a week full of flying, interviews with lots of people, and a complete physical for both of us. Steve’s cholesterol was too high. We knew this and have been working on getting it lower. It was lower than it was before, but they wanted to see it lower. So for three months he was very good. He ate oatmeal for breakfast, cheerios for lunch, and I stayed away from any recipes that would add to the problem. He also took a lot of supplemental vitamins and such. It worked.

At my physical the doctor felt that my right thyroid lobe was enlarged. I had to have follow up with my family doctor here in SC. She couldn’t feel anything, the blood work was all normal. So she ordered a CT. That showed lumps. So off to a surgeon I went. It turns out he is a Christian and was a wonderful, caring doctor. He took out my thyroid. At my one week follow up visit the pathology report was back saying it was cancerous. So off to a cancer doctor I went. He only forwarded me on to an Endocrinologist. I have had to learn to spell all kinds of new words!! The cancer doctor did order a CT with iodine contrast which ended up being a mistake. No other cancer showed up in that CT which is good.

Treatment for thyroid cancer is to remove the thyroid, which we had already done. Next, is to go off your sinthyroid for four weeks and go on a low-iodine diet for two weeks. Then I took a small little sip of radio-active iodine. Because your thyroid needs iodine, mine was then iodine starved and the radio-active iodine goes straight to the area that the thyroid was, killing off any residue that is left of your thyroid.

I left the endocrinologist in June thinking that this would happen at the end of June. She discovered that CT with iodine contrast that I had. Because of that I had too much iodine in my system. We had to wait until the end of Aug. to do it. Our time table to go overseas seemed to keep changing every month or two.

I still need medical approval to move forward. My endocrinologist gave me approval October 20th. In November they informed me that I have had two blood tests with my platelets being too low. This has been low for years. We have known this. We wonder why they didn’t mention it earlier this year. Steve called Travel Health America (THA) several times in Nov. to see what we can do to move the medical approval process along. Last week Steve called THA again. He then called our candidate consult in Richmond to see what we need to do to move forward. We keep missing deadlines. Soon Tobias will be 13 and then he will need interviewed for us to go. On Friday we finally found out what we should do. They wanted copies of my cardiologists’ visits in Sept., another blood test for platelets, which I did on 12/16. Once they get these results and they are OK, then the IMB doctor will talk to the area rep to see if I can travel once a year for tests that I need. If he approves this travel then I will get medical approval.

Sometimes we wonder if the devil is doing everything in his power to discourage us. Other times – we know God has a plan and his timing is perfect. We are definitely called, but maybe we are not to go yet. Please keep us in our prayers. We want God perfect will and timing for our lives. Pray that we don’t get too discouraged through this process. As of right now I need medical approval before Christmas in order to do all that needs doing before Orientation starting April 20th. We could go to the next orientation. But if we miss that one, Tobias will need to be interviewed. We will probably start looking for a pastorate job in the states. I have to have tests once a year for the next five years. After I pass the five year mark healthy and the kids are out of the house, we could apply again. We will also consider going with another organization.


I seem to have taken most of this letter to write about me. I covet your prayers. This week I had more blood work done and my platelets and white blood cell counts are too low. So we are trying to get an appointment with a hematologist.

Since I wrote this letter I have been to a hematologist. My white blood cell count was back to normal. My platelets were lower yet, 112,000, but he looked at things under a microscope and decided that my platelets were large, thus giving a false low reading. We waited, not so patiently, for a letter to be transcribed from the hematologist. On Thursday it was fax to IMB. The Doctor there said that this letter is all he needs for me to get approval. Now we are just waiting for everything to go through Travel Health America. Although, THA was told this is a rush order please via IMB (not us).

So there you have it: My Medical Saga. Hopefully, something like this doesn't happen anytime soon in my life. I have had quite enough of seeing Doctors, there offices, and hospitals for now.