Dear Praying Friends,

Greetings to you all in the name of Jesus Christ our Savior and Friend,

I wanted to take a moment to thank so many of you for your thoughts, encouragement and, most of all, for your prayers.

I am new to building ‘lists’ for my computer and hope you will forgive me (and correct me) if I have sent this to you in error, more than once, or improperly in any way.  Also, if  you know of anyone who you believe would like to be added to this list, please let me know.

As most of you know, we are back in the states on home assignment “furlough” and have recently found our planned path to be quite different from the one we new seem to be following.

I want to keep you as updated as possible so it seemed time to write to you and let you know what is happening in our lives at the moment, but I will begin with a brief update for those of you who may not be aware of our current situation.

Brief Update:  Following a routine medical exam in mid March, I was put on a new medication that was very hard on my system and I became quite ill with what I presumed (and still do believe) was a rather severe ulcer.  After ‘doctoring’ this for about 6 weeks, my stomach symptoms began to radically improve, but at the same time “I” was not getting better.  I seemed to be getting weaker and weaker.  While Larry tried to convince me to get medical attention, I was resistant since my symptoms were so vague, however, once I noticed my urine turning orange and my eyes beginning to have a yellow cast, I agreed with him that I would see a doctor soon.  This all came to a head when we began packing to return from Memphis to Jackson, MS which had been our ‘home base’ up until that time.  On this day, I realized I was just too weak, when I had to rest four times just to make the bed.  I knew I needed some medical attention.  Through the help of wonderful friends in Memphis, arrangements were made for me to see a doctor that very day.  Agreeing that my ‘color’ didn’t look good, he ordered a series of tests that all returned looking pretty normal except for a CT scan of the abdomen that clearly demonstrated a mass in my pancreas.  The doctor then made arrangements for us to speak to Dr. Al Weir, a respected oncologist and author of When Your Doctor has Bad News.  The findings appeared conclusive, and we sent our first URGENT PRAYER request. 

Being a nurse, I knew that a diagnosis like this was on the top of my “worst case scenarios”, and we began immediate preparations to return to Florida.  I wanted to go there, because my children, Father, home church and many ‘loved ones’ were there.  I knew I needed follow up care and wanted to do it there.  We arrived at my Dad’s on May 11, 2005

From the beginning of this ordeal, we have seen God’s hand holding us securely and one of the first ways He did this was by providing Wanda, one of my dearest friends to be specialized oncology/Hospice nurse.  Since she knows me well and what my potential needs would be, I trusted her to finds me a loving doctor who would be able care for me; she began work on that immediately.  The next amazing thing that had “God” stamped on it, was the answer to where we would stay.  While we were immediately offered places from loved ones, we knew that, as a family (especially a family of a two year old), we would need to have a place we could call our own for a while.  My dear friend Danny (who also is technically my ‘step brother-in-law’) buys and restores houses.  He was just finishing with one and had rented it out already, but the deal ‘fell through’ and he offered us the uses of a lovely home that is absolutely perfect for our needs.  If you are reading this story from the Internet, it is still best to reach us this way: 
LarrynJanet@yahoo.com
On May 28, 2005, I sorted through our "address book" to try and find the addresses of all that we knew that might be interested in keeping up with our ever-changing condition and continuing to lift us up in prayer.  This page includes part one of this first letter with links to what comes to follow.
Please follow this link to the second part of this inital letter.
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