Greetings to each of you from the U.S. of A!

At last, my feet finaly hit solid ground after THREE LONG DAYS of traveling, sleeping on bathroom floors (trying to see what it’s likie to be a homeless, street kid… J/Kidding.. It was the only safe place to lay my head in JoBerg as I spent 30 odd hours there.. and trusted the women in the airport more than the men …).

I had a great health check up before I left… More Ultra sounds, Xrays, and lab tets…. Nothing showed up… but I’m FREE from pain 100% and I’m so Blessed to be back to normal once again!. God is good and so were all your prayers…

More to come.. I’m away from the family to write this (no internet or computers at the house… feels like Africa after all. Just a simple farm life and good old family fun, I’m BLESSED!..

April 27

Greetings from Zambia, one last time…
Ready or not USA… HERE I come! Once again.
I’ll depart Zambia Monday April 28, fly to JoBerg South Africa (for a
38 hour lay over…Ugh!), the direct from JoBerg to Atlanta and
finally back to Dayton Ohio on Wed… Three days of travel, but i’ll
just cuddle with a good book or my bible, doze, and dream of all the
good food that awaits me!
I’ll be in touch once I’m on dry land once again!

April 20th

i’m still not better, but i’m getting there… I’m taking a lot of medicine etc (even though i’m not a pill pusher.. i have no choice but to swallow each pill and pray that it does more than my meditation, pressure points, reflexology etc..) …

i plan to have more tests done tomorrow… Lord willing. i’ve had to push back some of my own tests as there have been many deaths and hospitalizations here the last few days… so i’ve been really busy, and feeling ‘well enough’ to help them out. you do what you gotta do!

some of you asked about my kidneys… i’ve had kidney stones many times, but trust me, i could have only hoped that that was it.. this pain was MUCH worse and not so pin pointed to ONE area but THREE.

it seems to be the worst when i’m active.. walking, running, any time really, but sitting.. so i’ve been resting alot.

i do trust the surgeons here(i have no choice to since this is my home and may be for years to come), I just don’t trust the ones that i had to see last week… there are a couple hospitals to choose from, but the best one is closed on the weekends.. all i can say is “i’m not in the states any more”, and i’m sure most of you can’t fathom a hospital closing .. ANY TIME, not to mention the weekends.. welcome to Africa.

I have a ticket home next monday, so i’ll be back on Ohio soil and in the arms of my mommy April 30… rest assured.

your prayers are being felt and i hope tomorrow to find out a bit more with more tests etc… time will tell.

and i’ll keep you all posted as i have time…

thanks to each of you..

April 18

I was doing 100% better the last couple days but just now in the last hour or even since last night …the pain in SLOWLY coming back under my ribs again near the gallbladder.. It’s a dual ache, not a sharp pain… yet…
PLEASE be praying.
I think my insurance is only good here in ZAMBIA so I pushed my flights back to the last week of this month so I could get more tests done while I’m still here…

April 17 Yet another MAJOR catastrophe

Here I am once again, just checking in and making sure you have peace of mind that all is well, thus far!

Some of you know (as word travels fast) that I was in the hospital this week for severe abdominal pain that continued to build through out the week, but by Sunday I was beyond the point of return, or so it felt.

I was fortunate to have a Dr. from the states here (on a short term mission team) that was able to give me an exam, which she suggested immediate hospital care. She feared a burst ovarian cyst, burst appendix, or even gull stones… as the pain was every where and quickly increasing as the minutes passed us by.

We have one main community hospital (which is a sight for soar eyes, to say the least), and each Copper Mine has their own staff and hospital which is usually open to any one for the “RIGHT PRICE”… Money really does get you some where here… as it does most places in the world.

After one hospital was closed (after 22:00), one wouldn’t accept me as I wasn’t a Copper miner employee, and the last was full of what seemed to be incompetent employees. I was finally seen by a few doctors that were awoken from sleep to give me an ultra sound. This man wasn’t able to locate my ovary, saw that my kidney was okay (which we knew), thought my appendix had some fluid around it and infection, but wasn’t sure about gull stones… However the doctor that finally arrived disagreed. So who do you or can you believe in a time like this? [The one who should have seen it on the ultra, or the doctor who is trained to test and know a bit more.]

WHO trains and hires these individuals is what I want to know…???? Honestly! They took some blood, and did a few labs, and found that I was negative for Malaria, and my white blood cell count was way off, showing the sign of major infection. Not to mention my fever that was on going…

They requested that I be admitted for the night, but I REFUSSED. I feared with all my life that I would end up dead, as a result of their own lack of attentiveness, and would rather go home with Dr. Liz (from the states) and pray that God would work a miracle in the middle of the night.

Home I went, with a trunk load of antibiotics to take around the clock, not to mention the OVER WELMING doses of pain killers they’d given me orally and by injections (which were only making a dent in the pain)

I rested and woke up a bit better… Dr. Liz was able to tend to me a bit more, until she had to jump a plane back to the states. Here time in Zambia had finally come to an end.

All that to say, I’m still not sure what’s going on, but it’s now three days later and I’m finally back to ‘normal’ or so I feel. I’m a bit weak and dizzy from time to time, but I’m no longer on pain medicine, nor in pain for that matter.

I was planning to fly home this week… but that has been post dated for the time being. I’m hoping to be home in the states by next week to be checked out and examined on that end of the world.

Your prayers are being felt… as they have been the past month… [during the robbery, false accusations from Social welfare (child trafficking), the 17 murders that took place near my former mud house with in less than two weeks, being forced by Immigration to leave the compound (which became my 'family' and comfort, being told to dis-continue any form of ministry with the girls and boys on the street, the fear of not finding an NGO to come back and work for, throwing up and purging from dual ends for days on end and the list goes on and on… or so it seems]

I have a close friend here who had a dream the Tuesday before any of this began and she shared it with me, only giving me a bit of hope and light for what is to come. She said I was pregnant and really sick in the beginning. But when the time came to deliver I like most mothers were able to embrace the ‘new life’ and change that I’d just birthed. She furthered to tell me that her mom always taught her (she’s from Austria) that pregnancy in a dream means that it is a sign of hope, as new life is going to be birthed but only after all the pain, sickness, and discomfort have passed. Childbirth is rarely fun or easy from start to finish for anyone and I can only pray and believe that God is allowing all of this to come to pass to bring new life and new hope for me in the future.

As Psalm 121:1,2 says

” I will lift up my eyes to the hills-

From whence comes my help?

My help comes from the Lord.

Who made the heaven and earth.

So my eyes are lifted and I’m seeking his help.

I hope and plan to see most of you in the up and coming months, and seek your prayers during this time of restoration that the Lord is taking me through.