On July 20th, as we sat in BSA, listening to Dr. Sharp confirm our worst fears, our son had Leukemia, my head swam. It was as if the world around me had suddenly become fuzzy. As I tried to focus and assimilate all that the doctor was saying, it felt as though I had lost all ability to comprehend the spoken word. I could see his mouth moving and hear sounds but I could not seem to process most of the words he was saying. A few of his sentences did get through the fuzz in my brain. One of those was that our son, Joshua, had Leukemia. Another statement he made stood out with some clarity. It was something to the effect of, "You will need to depend on your support system to survive this". I can vaguely remember thinking, "Well, we have a good support system".
Dr Sharp's statement has rung through my head time and time again. In hindsight, it seemed to be a bit of an understatement. The truth of the matter is, I am unsure of how we could have survived without our support system.
From the very first day that we took Josh to see Dr. Turner to ascertain the source of his fatigue, until today, we have been show almost incomprehensible kindness from our dear friends and family. We have had amazing support on every front.
We have had many visit from family and friends. We know our home and animals are being watched over and cared for by wonderful dedicated friends and neighbors.
We have had financial support that has helped ease the pressure of the staggering cost of living away from home.
Most of all, we have had an army of prayer warriors marching beside us in this battle against a terrifying illness.
On some of Josh's worst days, I was unable to get a text out, yet we knew we were being covered in prayer. On other days, when things were going badly, I would, somehow be able to get a few bites of information communicated. On some of those days, we could, almost physically feel our prayer warriors go to their knees. Sometimes within 20 to 30 minutes of our texts going out, we could see a dramatic change in Josh's situation. Sometimes, a horrible day would take a turn so quickly it would be hard to comprehend and almost unbelievable had we not experienced it ourselves.
1 comment:
Ilene, I love you guys so much and I'm so thankful that you have so many wonderful people surrounding you with love and blessings. I especially love that first picture of some of the most amazing people in Texas (Turners and Simpsons) that truly loved on us and welcomed us with open arms. What a blessing to have them around! Thank you for your words of encouragement. I can't believe that we are walking down this similar path together; yet I can't imagine who else better for God to hand-pick for me to look up to in such a trying time. Your faith, your encouragement, and even your tears (and the fact that its okay to cry), have been such a blessing to me and truly uplifting for not only me, but my parents as well. They have really been blessed to hear your transparency in your blogs.. thanks for sharing with all of us how good our God is even in the midst of tough situations. We love you all!
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