Keeping The Sabbath

Exodus 31:13

… Verily my ^asabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you.

The sabbath has been reemphasized over and over and we keep it today. It is a special day, a day of rest, a day to do things to honor the Lord.

Gratitude

I am grateful for my brother and sister helping my dad and mom at the hospital.

Random Thoughts

I haven\’t written the last couple days because I had Brother Gibbons over helping me with the light in my kitchen and it\’s been late when he finished, but a lot has been going on.

I have been concerned about my mom since she returned from Utah this last time. My dad finally finished writing up what he wanted to talk to the doctor about what he\’s seen in my mom\’s behavior and took it to the doctor. She told him to take her to the ER. 

She was admitted and a bunch of tests done – CT scans, MRIs, speech therapist tests, etc. And now she\’s been transferred to Iowa City, the major hospital in the area and a university and major research hospital.

It turns out first they found she had had a small stroke in the back left side of her brain. Now they found she also has two tumors, one on the right side of her brain – I\’m not sure where the other one is. I don\’t know yet how large or how aggressive they are or anything else.

The doctor Nathan talked with today said that they need to determine more things before they discuss options – surgery or other treatment or anything – and that she will probably be in the hospital several days at least.

I think and hope that they finally got her admitted. She had been in the ER waiting for a room in the neurology unit. She was admitted to Genesis East in Davenport for about a day before they transferred her to Iowa City.

The first tests the speech therapist did with her at Genesis she was alert and able to answer all the questions easily, but when they repeated the test the next day she was confused and unable to answer the questions and not even able to remember simple things like when her birthday is or even what month it is.

Shari said when she talked with Mom it was very weird, she couldn\’t keep a train of thought or remember anything. The same thing I\’ve been noticing the times I\’ve been talking with her when I\’ve been able to get her to talk at all, not like her normal conversations where she is very talkative. Shari said when she talked to her at the funeral she wasn\’t like that and attributed the occasional forgetting to getting old – the same thing I thought at the funeral.

My Dad is trying to control the information that goes out and only tell part of what happens and wants all the information before he shares. We\’re trying to get him to see that he should share as much as possible so we can more fully support him and share the load with him. As Heather put it, fear/pain/sadness shared is halved and joy/happiness/faith is doubled. I understand that he feels very out of control at the moment, and he\’s trying to control things. But life is going to happen no matter what and we want to support him.

I love them both very much and wish there were something I could do more to help, but all we can do right now is wait and talk to him.