Health

Seeing is Believing

We have returned from a month in Asia. It was crazy and amazing. We started with a surgical eye team who performed cataract surgeries, then went to Vietnam for a week and ended with a medical team back in Cambodia. The trip finished with Kim and I getting stuck in Hong Kong for a day due to flight delays. In the end, it was pretty amazing to see how the Lord worked. 

Starting with the eye team, we knew it was going to be an impactful trip when the team’s flights were delayed due to mechanical issues and we had to scramble shift everything by a day to accommodate them arriving a day later than planned. In total we saw 250 patients and performed cataract surgery on 17. Watching the joy on their face as they got their bandages off the next day and could see was amazing. Cataracts are a huge problem in Cambodia, we even had a 17 year old kid with cataracts already. The trip ended with the team having their flights cancelled due to a winter storm in the US and us scrambling to get them rebooked and home. 

After we saw them off we hopped to Vietnam and got to go and work with the Hmong people in the far north. We were able to provide them with backpacks and fed the kids. It was truly amazing and we are hoping to start a new tutoring program in the village.

We then made it back to Cambodia to pick up a medical team. We had clinics for 5 days, saw over 800 patients and saw some amazing things. Kim worked on a patient that had been shot in the neck by Pol Pot’s regime over 40 years ago. We had difficult dental situations where the team prayed and the Lord moved. A family with a genetic eye condition came to the clinic, most were either blind or mostly blind. The team is working to get them into our school and provide education services for them. You never know who will show up and how we can minister to them. They had us host a medical clinic at a Buddhist temple on what was being celebrated as the anniversary of the beginning of Buddhism. When we showed up, the temple had put all of the festivities on hold, moved the Buddha statue into a closet, invited the governor and he shared a group of Christians were coming to provide medical care. It was a surreal experience and a lot of lives impacted.

Kim and I are home for 10 more days before we head to Togo, Africa to look at a new MANNA medical clinic, then off to Romania for the grand opening of our newest medical clinic. Thank you for your prayers!

Full Steam Ahead

It has been a great couple of weeks. Last week we were at an awesome missions conference at our home church, Trinity Baptist.  We got to share and update on our mission work and catch up with other  missionaries we know.  The church was a huge blessing to us.

This week I finished my 5th ozone treatment.  I have several more treatments left over the next two weeks.  I can tell they are helping.  There have been several days in the past two weeks that the extreme fatigue, etc. has subsided. It comes back, but with each treatment it seems to get better.  I appreciate your prayers.  If you missed my last update and have no idea what I am talking about, here is a link for you to read it: “Health & Service”

I ran across this article recently and it was a great reminder of what happens to these children if we are not able to get to them first.  It is hard to believe we were in Thailand just a few months ago working with our project for refugee children.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/02/world/asia/thailand-child-refugees-hrw/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

This is why we do what we do.

Roller Coaster

Life definitely has its ups and downs, as has my health over the past year or so.  I don’t share much about my medical status because I never want to complain.  I have been blessed beyond measure and honored to do what I do.

However, several people have been asking about health updates, and more people are aware of the issues I am working through.  So, I thought I would send out an update on where I am at and what is going on.

After 64 vials of blood, a week in the hospital and about every test known to man, I can safely say that having had West Nile, Malaria, Lyme Disease, E. Coli, Epstein-Barr Virus, candida, multiple bouts of pneumonia, and other infections aren’t the healthiest things for your body. LOL.  But, the Lord is faithful and has sustained me and allowed me to continue doing the mission work.  I have not felt well for a long time and after having seizure-like episodes every 72 hours for months I was put in the hospital back in March.

There is too much to list everything, but here is where we stand right now.  It appears the Malaria caused my immune system to drop to the point that the Epstein-Barr virus from my mononucleosis 17 years ago reactivated and began attacking my body.  Both diseases have damaged my liver, which was causing the seizure-like symptoms.  The doctors have me on a strict regiment of vitamins and medicine to repair my intestines, thyroid, kidneys, pancreas, adrenal gland and liver as a result of everything.

This week I started my first treatment of a new ozone therapy that was developed in Italy to help combat the reactivated EBV, among other things.  Basically, they take out my blood, fill a bag with it and some other things, then infuse ozone into it.  Next, they run it through a machine and back into my body.  It will be several weeks before we can evaluate the effectiveness of the treatments.

Through all of this I can see how much the Lord has taken care of me and all that He does in my life.  There is no way I should be able to do what I do if it wasn’t for His provision.  I am even more grateful and appreciative of the honor to do this work as a result of this.  Thank you for your support and letting our family do this work on your behalf as well.

I am excited to announce that we picked up another supporting church this month and we will be their first foreign missionary to support.  There is so much to be thankful for.