Day 8: The Day’s Activities and FAQ’s

Today some of my favoritest people in the whole wide world came to visit me. Howard and Nancy Matson live in Wheaton now. When we first met them Howard was a professor at Trinity and Nancy was the small group hostess for my Trinity Wives Group. Their home was a haven for us.  Mark’s very first outing after coming home from the hospital was to their house. I had Mark’s first birthday party and Rick’s 40th surprise party there too. Many many warm, beautiful, fun, blessed hours were spent at their home.

Howard is a lung transplant recipient. We prayed and prayed for him to receive a lung and a couple of years ago he did. What a gift. I am seriously understanding the gift of organ donation in a new way. OK, duh, right?

On another note, I am having trouble keeping up with replying to everyone’s comments and questions so I thought I would do a little FAQ section. Here goes…

Q: Are you in pain?  A:Definitely. All the time. It’s not unbearable. If I sneeze, cough, or make an unexpected movement it can be pretty intense.

Q: What kinds of things are you doing? A: I can finally read a little at a time. I can sit and talk for awhile. I have only left the hotel once (yesterday’s Northwestern visit) and I nap alot. We are watching TBS movies

Q: But you look so good and seem so upbeat. Aren’t you fine? A: I am improving daily but still have a ways to go. I find I need to sit and rest between the smallest of tasks.  And let me tell you, you would look good too if you got up, fixed yourself up, did one thing, and then took a nap.

Q: You say you are not eating much. Why not? You need to eat! A: They told me to expect a serious decrease in appetite. My incision is right over my stomach and I have swelling and fluid and other yucky stuff in there so food in my stomach it puts pressure on my incision. My appetite will increase with time and the doctors have said that it is fine to eat very small portions. Please don’t worry about my food intake.

Q:Why are you so fatigued. A: Part of it is that my body is putting all its energy toward healing my incision and growing my liver back. It’s sort of like the first trimester of a pregnancy when the baby is growing at light speed and mom is exhausted. This will decrease as it grows back. Part of it is general anesthesia and its aftermath. Part of it is medicine. That’s my best guess from what I have been told.

Q: Can we call or email you? A: Absolutely. But don’t be offended if I don’t answer right away. I really do nap quite a bit. And my concentration is a little off so I can only spend so much time at the computer or reading at one sitting. I love you all and GREATLY appreciate all of you. Really, I’m overwhelmed at your love and support and have literally felt your prayers around me at times like a warm blanket.

Q: OK….No question here. Just something I wanted to say. I want to be clear that God gets all the glory for this thing. People have said very kind things about me but really, this has all been God, working through lives in a really cool way. He’s woven relationships together and made me a match when others were willingly in line before me. I’m not a hero. But God definitely is.

OK, that’s all. Nap time 🙂  Rick made us cry with his post here and Gay’s caringbridge is here.

Love you all bunches!  ~Sonya