Hope it's okay with you,
@Red Sky at Morning , if I post a similar story to the ones you are quoting from Lee Stroebel's book.
14 years ago my wife was diagnosed with primary mylelofibrosis (PMF). It's from of cancer, were the bone marrow does not produce healthy red blood cells. The disease causes scare tissue inside the bones and as the bone marrow moves across the scar tissue it causes constant pain. Because of the constant scraping inside her bones, my wife's nervous system was overloaded and she developed an acute case of fibromyalgia. Primary myelofibrosis is a progressive but terminal disease. Many people who are diagnosed with it can live productive lives for many years and even decades before it becomes debiltating.
A few years later my wife started experiencing syncope episodes. At first it was a couple times a week, but at it's worst she was passing out 4-5 times a day. Eventually she was diagnosed with Addison's disease. It's an adrenal dsyfunction with no cure. Under stress her body does not produce adrenaline, so rather than her blood pressure increasing unde stress, it drops and she passes out. When it happens it is not a gradual thing where she notices it is happening and can sit down before she passes out. I have literally seen her standing having a normal conversation with a person and mid-sentence just slump straight to the ground.
Addison's can normally be treated with steriod medications (fludrocortisone) but the doctors had a hard time finding the right combination to work for her. Most people when diagnosed with Addison's, once the proper medication level is determined, they live long, healthy and normal lives, but have to take daily medication for the rest of their lives.
My wife struggled with extreme syncope issues for about 2 years. She could not continue working and she was constantly passing out and falling, often injuring herelf when she did. But she did not want to become bed ridden and refused to stop having a life so she contined to push and overtax her body. She was passing out mutiple times a day and injuring herself including multiple concussions. At the same time her pain from the PMF was unbearable. She was on high doses of opiates and lyrica, and still not getting much relief.
It got so bad at one point my wife secretly was researching Euphansia, because she couldn't take the pain but she refused to become a bed ridden patient wth no life at all. She was praying and crying out to God, because as a Christian she was obviously struggling with the deisre to take her own life. When she finally revealed to me that she was researching Euphansia, she said my reaction to it was the only thing that kept her from folowing through. Instead we decided to trust and believe God for her healing and his grace for her to endure through her conditions.
About 9 months later in late fall the PMF had progressed to the point that her doctors were giving her 3-6 months to live. My wife had won the battle against the lies of the enenmy trying to tell her to take her own life. Now the enemy was trying to discourage her with a different lie.
We were faced with the possibility that she was about to have her last Thanksgiving and Christmas with her family. We told the kids (at the time two adults on their own and two college aged) and made sure the holidays that year were very special. We planned her funeral and got her affairs in order just to get it out of the way, so we could move forward. We decided to find a new doctors that were not willing to quit on treating her. We also were determined to trust God and seek his wisdom and guidance. That was 7 years ago!
More than once she would have blood tests done and the doctors office would call back in a few days and tell her to redo them, because they couldn't believe that she was still on her feet after seeing the results. According to the test results she should have been coming into the ER on a gurney, not driving and walking herself into the diagnostics clinic. Eventually her blood test results began to improve, even though it is genearally accepted that late stage PMF does not go into remission. However the doctors had no other explanation but to say it was in remission. While we considered it a miracle, her health challenges were far form over. The Addisons and the pain form the fibromyalgia were still present.
In the midst of her health challenges she was determined to trust God to not only sustain her life but also that she would continue to minister and impact the lives of people that God brought across her path. I have shared previously that Matthew 25:34-40 is the mission statement of our home. Despite all this happening to her, when she made the decision to trust God and not take her life, she was also determined that she would still do what God had called her to do and impact the lives of individuals with the love and grace of God, by opening our home to those in need. In this same period of time we were presented with the oppurtunity to interim-pastor a small congregation whose Pastor had abruptly resigned and moved out of town. It was amazing to see the grace that God gave us during that period of time, even to the point that Jodie's medical issues, while still present were not hindering our ability to do what God had asked us to do.
Near the end of our time as interim Pastor's my wife began experiencing massive cramps in her calf muscles and her feet. They were so bad that her ankles would lock either fully contracted or fully extended. I could put almost my full 225 lbs of weight on her foot and not be able to move or uncontract her ankles. These cramps would last 1/2 hr or more at a time. Her family has a history of water retention issues that would make the cramps even more unbearable, so she was also taking furosemide. The combinatin of the flurdrocotisone and the furosemide was causing her potassium levels to drop, which was in turn causing the cramps. She was no longer passing out regularely, but the medications were messing with her body.
Around the same time her vision began to change. At first we thought it was just normal vision changes that come with age. (She is in her 50's) So she started wearing corrective lenses. But after 8 months her corrective lense prescription needed to be changed. This happened about 2 more times in the next 6 months and the eye doctors realized something else beyond typical aging was occuring. Long story short, she experienced a very rare side-effect to Lyrica (fibromyalgia medication). The lyrica was causing her optic nerves to swell to the point that where the optic nerves pass through the skull it was restricting and severing her optic nerves. When diagnosed she was told that she would likely become legally blind in the next 3-5 years. 3 months later after experiencing another syncope espisode, she awoke to complete darkness. Instead of 3 yeaers in 3 months she was diagnosed as legally blind. Though she experienced complete blindness at times, her vision would come and go, but the best she could see was silhouettes and extreme color contrasts. She could no longer recognize peoples faces.
This obviously brought about a complete change in lifestyle for both of us. Having been off the Lyrica for sometime her eyesight slowly improved. She still had trouble reading and could not drive a vehicle. We lived out in the country so there was no public transporatation and most of her friends lived closer to the city, so to expect them to drive out to her and bring her into the city and then drive her home was not realistic. The dream home we built in the country became her prison. We have since sold the house we bulit and moved closer to the city so she could get around and have a life. My wife was still determined to impact the lives of other people with the grace and love of God.
In the midst of the process of selling our home and finding a new one, My wife received a call from the doctors after having a regular scheduled blood screening done (which she was having done monthly because of all her issues). The told her immediately to stop what she was doing and go straight to the ER. Her potassium levels had dropped to life threatening levels. When she arrived at the ER the doctors looked at her blood report and couldn't believe that she had walked in the hospital on her own feet. They gave her 59 units of potassium and her blood tests were still coming back postive for low potassium levels. The doctor told me that previous to her, the most potassium that had ever adminstered to a patient was 19 units! She ended up in the hosptial for two months before they were able to get her potassium up to acceptable levels. During those two months, the emergency crash cart team was called in mutliple times as her blood pressure dropped below 40 and she became non-responsive. (basically she almost died mutiple times)
After all kinds of tests they eventually concluded that it was the combination of Addison disease medications and the furosemide (water rentention medication) that were sapping her potassium levels. For another year the endocronologist worked on balanacing her medications to no avail. Even on high levels of Potassium supplements and trying to eat a high potassium diet, they could not manitan her blood levels while on the Addison's medication. Eventually my wife took a step of faith and just stopped taking the Addison's medication altogether. We prayed and asked God to to maintain her blood levels and adrenal production without medication. That was almost 4 years ago.
Today she does not take any medication for Addison's or potassium supplements. Her vision is slowly improving to the point she can now drive a vehicle for short distances (20 minutes at time, anything...longer causes her pain and diminishes her vision). She has not had a major syncope episode in a couple years. She is still in pain, but now that medical marijuana is legal in NY, she is not as dependent on the opiates.
A year ago we were blessed with the opportunity to take over a business providing in home child and senior care. The business was stagnant as the previous owner no longer had a desire to run it. Despite her health challenges, my wife has taken on the challenge of running and growing the business. I handle the finances part time, while still working as a manufacturing engineer, but my wife's goal is to build the business to the point that I can retire from my engineering career and work full time with her on the business.
We are providing a cost effective solution (around half the cost of traditional nursing agency fees uisng a unique business model), for a very serious problem that exists today when it comes to families trying to take care of their elderly family members. For many families we are the solution that allows them to keep their loved ones in their homes rather than putting them in nursing facilities or retirement homes. Many of the clients that my wife meets with literally tell her that she (and our service) is a miraclous "God-send". They really have no idea how true that is!
Though my wife has not experienced a complete healing and restoration of her bodily health, she is still a living, breathing, walking miracle. Through the experience we have prayed and studied just about every different spiritual/biblical theory about sickness, disease and healing. I still don't have a definitive conviction about any of them, but I have learned alot about God and his grace, mercy and compassion through it. I know that when we have trusted God and accepted the spirtiual assignments that he presents to us, we have seen him also pour out his grace and miracle working power in her body.
Yes God still does miracles today!
