Growing Old With Grace

Sitting at my mom and dad's house. Dad's legs are worse, and they hurt him at night. He has artherial sclerosis. It's serious, and could jeapordize him keeping his legs. Some nights the pain is worse than others. We are learning how much we love and care for each other, and how important our family is to us.

I'm sitting up with dad tonight. He is up and down a number of times and needs help getting out of bed and into his wheel chair.

Mom (her name is Grace) is diong o.k., but it's getting harder for them to manage in their own home. It gets a little comical at night when she has taken her hearing aid out, and we try to talk to her.

She says that she turns her hearing aids off when her boys (including me) are home. She says that we are loud enough that she doesn't need them. I think that means we're big mouths.

It's good to be home, and I realise how much I love my parents, and that they have been wonderful to me and to all of us children.

Adam

Marge's "Procedure"

I'm sitting in the food court at Bronson Methodist Hospital, Kalamazoo, MI. I've spent the morning with my wife Marge as she is prepared for a surgical procedure to remove fibrous tissue from her left breast. It is not cancerous, but it is also not considered benign.

So, this morning she put on all of the hospital gown stuff, filled out paper work, and then had an xray so that they could exactly locate the tissue to be removed. Now she is in surgery. They are using a local anesthetic along with something to make her very sleepy.

Surgery should be done soon, and the doctor will give me her assessment.

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I'm very impressed with the folks here at Bronson. They show compassion and are meticulous in following safety procedure. I'm sitting next to Marge in out-patient post-op recovery. The surgeon said that the procedure whent well, and that the tissue looked good. They will do a full biopsy on the tissue to verify that it is not cancerous. They don't expect it to be, but it is good that they are making certain.

Marge is dozing while the sedative wears off. She doesn't remember a thing from the surgery. This is an odd sort of experience. Something that could have become cancerous was removed, so it's not as if Marge will feel better after she heals. Perhaps she will feel more at eases. Perhaps not. I'm sure that she will be even more vigilant now that she has had a breast cancer "scare".

From Marge: "Thank you for your prayers."

I was visited by a dear friend from Bethel, our home church. Edith Lepke. So, I had some company while I waited for Marge to come out of surgery. Marge's surgeon was a nursing student once upon a time and Edith was her teacher. So, they said hi to each other. I think that's what makes Marge's surgeon so exceptional: she was a nurse first, and then went back to school to become a surgeon.

Marge will have "light duty" the rest of the week. I'll be the house keeper, cook, and chofer along with working at Pfizer and continuing with our missionary pre-field work. The children are eager to help pick up the slack and do well at helping.

In fact, out of necessity, I've started Maryellen on a Microsoft Publisher tutorial so that she can learn to do the design and layout of our quarterly print newsletter. I'm hoping this summer the kids can learn web design too. It's great learning for them, and it takes a load off of me.

Adam

Sunday in the Meadow

I've been calling between 10 and 30 churches each week and sending out between 5 and 10 information packets to churches. I was speaking with pastor Pendell at Green Meadows Bible Baptist Church, and he said to go ahead and send him a packet.

We didn't have a church scheduled for Sunday, so we decided to take it ourselves and visit. Just ten min. from our house, this church was full of country charm. It was refreshing.

We're enjoying meeting new people and sharing in their worship services.

Adam