Saturday, February 16, 2008

Well, I have started this update several times and I’m finally going to sit down and finish it this morning. We have had a great start to our year. We have stayed busy and everyone is doing well. A lot has happened this month so let me see if I can highlight the major things and share them with you.
As I told you the last post, we attended a pump class right at the beginning of January. We knew once we completed that class that we would have to spend an entire week on a very regimented meal plan. We would have to select a specific carb amount for each meal and eat that amount of carbs at that meal for the entire week. Our meals had to be at the same time each day for the week. We would also have to check Jonathan’s blood sugar at each meal, 2 hours after each meal, at bedtime, midnight and 3 am for the entire week. Needless to say, I was a little overwhelmed at the thought, but knew that we would be able to do it. There would be a couple of days that it would really inconvenience us because of our schedule, but overall, we should be able to handle one week. My biggest concern was that I would forget to do something or miscalculate something and we would fail and have to do it again. But thanks to those of you who wrote to encourage me and share your experiences with me, and lots of prayer from all of you, we were able to successfully pass our week of blood sugar logs and meal logs. I only forgot to check Jonathan’s blood sugar one time throughout the entire week. Ironically, I remembered it while I was leading a prayer group at my house with a couple of my Mom’s In Touch friends and I was thanking God for helping me not forget to check his blood sugar this week when I suddenly remembered I should have checked it an hour ago! Well, so much for that prayer time! But God was gracious and when I called and explained what I did, they told me they would not fail me for one miss. I got to share Jonathan’s story with the dietician who called about his log as I explained why we did what we did. We got a positive response from her and from the educator as well. So we are now on to finding the right pump for Jonathan. Once that happens, we have been told that we will be on that same regimented meal plan for 4-6 weeks, so this one week we did was just a shadow of weeks to come! Really, it was not a bad experience and I learned some things during that week that I think will help us in the long run. Thank you for your prayers for us and for your words of encouragement. We are praising God for helping us succeed in this process thus far. At the end of our week of pump logging, we went camping. It was the coldest camping trip we have ever taken! But we had a great time anyway. I needed that weekend to rest, relax and recuperate from getting up 2-3 times a night checking Jonathan’s blood sugar throughout the week. I was pretty pooped to say the least. We had a lot of fun, as we always do, and enjoyed visiting with friends we hadn’t seen in a while. The kids and I had the privilege of singing for our Senior Adult friends at Lakeland Baptist Church early in the month of January. They are a wonderful group of people who love us and pray for us regularly. Mr. Al, in particular, reminds us every time he sees us that he continues to pray for Jonathan every day, right after he prays for his children. I can’t tell you how that encourages my heart! To know that people are praying for us brings us such hope and peace as we continue to walk this road God has called us to walk. That has been the single most amazing part of this journey. I can remember getting emails and having people tell me of those they knew all over the world who were praying for Jonathan when he was in the hospital. I was awe struck to say the least! God used that to bring peace and hope during those dark days and long term, to change my perspective on what it really means to pray for someone who is in need of God’s work in their life. I will never view prayer the same way ever again. Well, we had a great time singing for our friends there at Lakeland and look forward to sharing some time with them again soon. We have spent the last 5 Saturdays at the gym watching Jonathan and his 76ers team play their final season of Upward Basketball games. This has been the most exciting year of Upward Basketball that we have ever played! Jonathan has improved physically so much this year! He is running so much better now. He is getting better at remembering who his man is and where he is suppose to be on the court. He is making plays and helping make plays without the “J play” this year. It has been an exciting year. It breaks my heart that this is our last year to participate in Upward. God has used Upward to bring such healing and growth to our lives. This is the third year that Jonathan, his teammates and coaches have played together. They are the most incredible group of men/boys I have ever been around. The boys on Jonathan’s team are so kind and helpful with him. They never hesitate to help him remember his place, point him in the right direction, and encourage and praise him when he does well. I have never been so impressed with a group of 11-12 year old boys as I am with these guys. They have truly been placed in our lives by the very hand of God. So I will try to concentrate on enjoying these last 3 games instead of thinking about the end of this wonderful season of basketball. We had a great day on Thursday as we celebrated Valentine’s Day. We took the day of school and played together the whole day. We made cookies for a special friend, went to the mall and shopped, met Dad for dinner and ended the day with Jonathan’s basketball practice. I spent the entire day enjoying my children, constantly aware of the overwhelming blessings God has given me. It was one of my favorite Valentine’s Days.
God has been so good to us and we are so blessed. We have received so much from His gracious hand. I am overwhelmed by His blessings. You, dear friends, are part of our incredible blessings and we thank God for each of you. We are grateful for your continued prayers for Jonathan and for our family. I hope you will continue to pray for him and for us as we continue the process of selecting a pump and getting him started on it. Please pray that God will guide us and give us wisdom to know which one we need to get, that He will provide the finances that we will need to get it, and that the timing will be right to get started using it. Pray specifically that Jonathan will not gain any extra weight once he begins using the pump. We are still working on our diet and exercise, but seem to have hit a stopping point on our weight loss. As many of you know, that can be quite frustrating. So pray that God will reward our efforts by allowing us to see more weight loss and that Jonathan will be able to maintain his weight and not gain, once he begins using the pump. Jonathan is doing so well in school and he continues to make great progress in his schoolwork. He is still memorizing lots Scripture for Awana and Sunday School. He continues to sleep well also. Overall, he is in a very good place right now and we are so thankful for that. Thank you for your faithful prayers and for the love, support and encouragement that you faithfully give to us. You are a precious treasure that we never want to take for granted. Thank you for waiting on me to post again and for continuing to check on Jonathan’s progress. Until next time, may God bless you with His most wonderful blessings.

Romans 5:1-5 - Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given.

No comments: