Thursday, September 16, 2010

Better than a hallelujah update.

So, many of you may have read the Better than a Hallelujah post. That was written the night of my niece Ammys surgery to remove a tumor. God has really been placing on my heart this song as we go through this journey. I will admit that night I was very angry with God. I still don't fully understand why I get to go through the journey of cancer again. It was not fun the first time and definetly not fun the second time watching Ammy go through it. One thing this song has continued to lay on my heart and get me through this is that sometimes it is are cries of anger and sadness that God would rather hear. So during this journey I will continue to give my hallelujahs to God but will also not hold back my cries and prayers from him as well. If you have not seen my sister's update on Ammy I have posted it below. She is much better at explaining it then I am.


Ammy Update

I must apologize to some of you who have been waiting to hear an update on my beautiful Niece Ammy after her last surgery. I know you have waited a long time and we have not shared much details with you. As a family we all needed some time to process and wait for more answers. We greatly appreciate each and every one of you and your many prayers. As far as her surgery she is recovering great and enjoying her first week at school. The Doctors removed most of the tumor located on her spine. Yes I did say MOST that is why we have been quiet for awhile. We knew bits and piece of what might lay ahead but it was just to hard to talk about with so little answers. Yesterday we met with Ammy's Oncologist and got more information as to what might lie ahead. Where to begin ... Ammy has a tumor that will not go away with Chemo or radiation so basically the plan is to keep that crazy thing from growing so she does not have to have any more surgeries. The tumor as is now does not hurt her or cause much problem it is however something she will have to check on for the rest of her life thru regular MRIs. So how do we stop the tumor from growing? The best way at this point in time is a chemo therapy treatment. The treatment is a 6 week coarse that will include 3 different pill forms of chemo and also an injection two or three times in that 6 weeks. This coarse of treatment will be repeated 8 times, so that means it will take about a year to complete. She will be having surgery in a few weeks to get a port put in her chest to make blood draws and injections much easier. Once the port is in place treatment will begin a few weeks after that. The side affects are she will feel sick to her stomach and her hair might thin a bit as well as weakened immune system. She will continue in school and learn to be very good and washing her hands to keep yucky germs away. The chemo is hopefully to keep the tumor from growing any bigger over the next 2 to 3 years. She will be continued to monitored thru MRIs and if new growth happens we will start a new plan. Ammy's spirit is well and she is such a brave little trooper. Thank you again dear friends for your prayers and support!!!

Africa #2

Africa update #2.

Sunday- We spent the day at Jaska. This is the secondary school which boards junior high age kids. I never thought I could learn so many life lessons in one day. These kids are amazing. They are in school 9 months out of the year and only go home 3 times for a month. The kids lead the service today. They did many presentations for us that were so moving. The one that moved me the most was a group of 5 kids. One girl would pray in swahli and then all 5 of the childre would sing. Lord we pray for this Valley make this Valley a mountain of God. Then she would pray some more. I was totally in tears. These kids have a trunk with their stuff and that is it. It is a small trunk that sits on the end of their bed. They also sang a song called I am not Forgotten which talks about how they are not forgotten because God knows who they are. It says I have a hope and a future, God has a plan for me. It is so true. God has a huge plan for all of these kids. The Jaska kids go to school everyday. Monday- Friday is traditional school. Saturday I believe they spend 4 hours and on sunday 2 hours in independat school work. They go to their class room and just do work. There is no adult supervising but they know what they are to do and do it. This would not happen in an american school. We got to eat lunch their and chat with other groups from other states. We then we shopping at the local mall and prepped for VBS which started the next day.

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Begining of my Africa updates

Life has been full of ups and downs lately. Today as I feel somewhat down I am looking at the ups. This brings me to finally blogging about Africa. Sorry it has taken about a month to write about it. Writing and talking about Africa is such an emotional experience. I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to go on this mission trip. We stayed at a hotel. That was nice considering what we thought we would be staying in. I shared a room with wonderful girls LaReina and Natalie. We were the young ones of the group. We arrived Late on Friday and went right to bed as our last flight was the longest flight and packed. We had to sit for 1.5 hours while waiting for those with connecting flights. On top of all that the ground AC was not working so it was super hot and there was not air circulation. We were exhausted. When sleeping you had to have a mosquito net over you, which was very claustrophobic and annoying when you had to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Saturday morning we woke up had a delicious breakfast at the hotel (All the food was pretty good, by the end I was sick of eggs and rice thoughJ). After breakfast we went over to the main school Pingani that also held the main operations of Missions of Hope International. On our way to Pingani we were hit almost immediately with the sad reality of what is going on in Africa. By the side of the road was a child, maybe junior high sniffing glue. In Africa this would be there form of heroin. Many of these kids are street kids who sniff glue to try and forget the misfortune they live in. When we got to Pingani we had an orientation meeting over what missions of hope does and what they are planning in the future. After the orientation we took a walk through the pingani slum. All of the slums run along the Mathare River. It was so devastating to see. There was garbage everywhere. All the kids wanted to hold your hand and have you take their picture. They would say “How are you?” Over and over again as that was all they knew. It was a real eye-opener. The houses are so close together and most were smaller than my bedroom. We were able to go into a ladies home and talk to her. Her house was decorated with old newspaper and wrapping paper. Raphael one of the social workers who was giving the tour shared that her house was decorated because she was a Christian. They did this to show that the love Jesus and our thankful for all he has given them. There was so much to take in and it was only the first day. That afternoon when we got back we went shopping in which I totally got ripped off because I do not barder well at all. Well that was only the first day in Africa. I will try and blog again tomorrow more of what we did. I am going to try and blog each day until I am done detailing my trip. I will also add some pictures soon.