Y'all have overwhelmed by your kindness, THANK YOU!

I would like to begin by saying that I'm overwhelmed by your amazing responses to my last blog post. I don't feel worthy of all your praise, I'm just a Mom trying to live my life according to what I feel God wants me to do. Thank you for all your continued prayers, they are so amazing and powerful.

Luke is doing a bit better. I do believe that he is finally starting to swallow a little bit again, this is a huge answer to prayer. We are not having to suction him nearly anywhere the amount that we were having to do last week. Nights have been so much better, I only had to suction him twice last night and he has only been on a little bit of oxygen at night, this is a huge answer to prayer.

My wonderful husband has blessed me by sending me on a 3 day cruise with some good friends for my birthday. I will fly down to LA on April 28th and catch the cruise on the 30th, which is my birthday. It is a repositioning cruise which means it goes from LA to Vancouver BC with no port stops along the way. My only goals for the this vacation are to relax, sleep, play games, read, eat and have fun, I'm praying for no stress that week. I have been having some health problems lately and most of them are related to the fact that I've been under too much stress, therefore have been told by numerous people that I need to take a break from the stress. Please be praying that Luke is healthy, that is the only way that I know to have a completely stress free week.

Once again thank you for your amazing support and prayers, they mean more than I can ever say!

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

It's Saturday Night and once again Luke is not doing great

I don't know what it is about Saturday nights but they have been and continue to be a huge trial for our family. It always seems like if Luke is going to get really sick it happens on Saturday, sometimes I wonder if "someone" just doesn't want us going to church on Sunday morning.

This morning I took Luke into see the ENT Dr. that took his tonsils out for a follow up appointment. The Dr. said that he looks like he is healing great. I did mention to him the fact that since Luke's surgery he has not been swallowing much anymore, in fact it has been horrible, especially at night. I think what happens is his saliva pools in the back of his throat and because he is not swallowing he doesn't breathe that great, causing his oxygen levels to drop. He wants me to call him back in a week and let him know how Luke is doing. Also suggested that maybe we should schedule another sleep study to see how he is doing at night. PLEASE be praying with us that Luke will start to swallow again and that we won't need to keep suctioning him all the time. I don't really want to go through another sleep study if we don't need to.

Sometimes I wonder who is still reading Luke's blog?? I was surprised to see that no one commented on our last post for a few days. I realize that not everyone that reads the blog needs to post a comment, I know I don't all the time, but because I know how much comments mean, I try to comment, even if it's just a few words of encouragement. The insecure part of me thinks that maybe I have offended people or that maybe they just don't care anymore, does that sound ridiculous?? At times I am haunted by a comment made by a friend of mine, whose son had a near drowning accident, almost 8 years ago now, she said, "that after 4 years people have stopped caring or believing that God is going to heal her son." I thought how sad, I continue to pray for Josiah and believe that God is able to still work a miracle after all these years.

It's so easy for us to give up on anything that we pray for a long time, but I want to encourage all of you out there that have been praying for something in your life, maybe salvation of a family member or friend, maybe a healing touch in your own life or someone close to you or maybe for a financial miracle, don't give up. There are so many stories in the Bible where God took years to complete the miracle that He began, His timing is definitely not always our timing. Remember, persistence in prayer pleases God! Sorry to ramble on, but I hope that in some way I have renewed your hope to believe that God is still the God of the impossible, for we (I) need to remember that daily!

May God richly bless you,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

We broke a record today by making 51 days of food for Luke, YAHOO!

I hope y'all had a nice Easter. We had a very good Easter, Luke was healthy, though he slept through the majority of the day. Luke is recovering from his surgery nicely, though he is still needs to be suctioned a whole lot more than he did before the surgery. I hope that once he heals some of the suctioning will lessen, I think that his throat has been too sore to swallow, so he let's all his saliva sit in the back of the throat until it gets to the point that he's not breathing so well. At night we have to suction him pretty regularly just to keep up his oxygen numbers. We take him in early Saturday morning, not a convenient time, but the only one offered for his follow up appointment, I'm pretty sure the Dr. will be pleased with his recovery, at least I hope so.

Here is Natalie with Joshua, Daniel and Isaiah and Just the Sisters!

We broke a record today, we made enough of Luke's food to last 51 days. The most we had ever done before this was 42 days. As mentioned previously it is a huge project and this time Lily and Zeke wanted to help. Zeke peeled carrots for juicing and then juiced them, Lily helped by peeling banana's, shaking soups and juices, drying dishes as they were washed and what ever else she was asked to do. It only took us about 4 hours because I had doubled the meat last time we made food so I didn't have to cook the meat today. As you can see by one of the picture we make a lot of eggs, eggs are very healthy for you, therefore we put in 30 eggs, that's not quite one egg a day.

One last sad note, I found out early Saturday morning that my cousin Carlon, who was married to my cousin Jeff died in her sleep. She was only 48 years old, she died of an yeast infection that had gone into her sinus'. Please be praying for Jeff and her two sons Justin and Jared, also for my Uncle Randy, Auntie Shirley and my other cousins. This loss was so sudden, the only "good" thing about it is that she is in heaven, no longer suffering from the extreme pain that she was in.

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

Keep Looking Up To God For Our Help, He is Faithful!

Luke had a great night, he only alarmed twice, compared to what he was doing that was excellent! I am thanking the Lord that he came through this surgery so well, I know many Dr.'s thought there could be some major problems. God is so amazing, he truly answers prayers!

What are your plans for Easter? We will be going to church in the morning and then over to Jill and John's home, which is my sister and her husband after church for Sunday dinner. On Saturday we plan to color eggs and Gordy's sister Pam and Husband Hal are coming over for a visit. It's so good to feel like a "normal" family this year, with the stress of Luke's surgery over and his sickness we can actually take a deep breath of relief. I remember all to well 3 years ago when Luke was on the Ventilator in the PICU during this time of the year, I'm so thankful we haven't back there since then.

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

P.S. I realize this is long but I wanted to share with you something that has greatly ministered to my heart lately. I went through one of the darkest depressions in my life last month and it was only with God's help I can say that my focus is back to where it should be, in Christ alone. On April 2nd, I read this in the The Streams in the Desert devotional book, that I love, the bold part is what has ministered to me the most:

They looked. . . and there was the glory of the LORD appearing in the cloud. (Exodus 16:10)

You should get into the habit of looking for the silver lining of storm clouds. And once you have found it, continue to focus on it rather than the dark gray of the center. Do not yield to discouragement no matter how severely stressed or surrounded by problems you may be. A discouraged soul is in a helpless state, being neither able to "stand against the devil's schemes" (Eph. 6:1) himself nor able to prevail in prayer for others. Flee every symptom of the deadly foe of discouragement as you would run from a snake. Never be slow to turn your back on it, unless you desire to eat the dust of bitter defeat.

Search for specific promises of God, saying aloud of each one, "This promise is mine." Then if you still experience feelings of doubt and discouragement., pour your heart out to God, asking Him to rebuke the Adversary who is so mercilessly harassing you.

The very instant you wholeheartedly turn away from every symptom of discouragement and lack of trust, the blessed Holy Spirit will reawaken your faith and breathe God's divine strength into your soul. Initially you may be unaware that this is happening, but as you determine to uncompromisingly shun every attack of even the tendency toward doubt and depression, you will quickly see the powers of darkness being turned back.

Oh, if only our eyes could see the mighty armies of strength and power that are always behind our turning away from the hosts of darkness toward God, there would be no attention given to the efforts of our cunning Foe to distress, depress, or discourage us! All the miraculous attributes of the Godhead are marshaled on the side of even the weakest believer who, in the name of Christ and in simple, childlike trust, yields himself to God and turns to Him for help and guidance.

Keep looking up -
The waves that roar around your feet,
Jehovah-Jireh will defeat
When looking up.

Keep looking up-
Though darkness seems to wrap your soul;
The Light of Light will fill your soul
When looking up.

Keep looking up -
When worn, distracted with the fight;
Your Captain gives you conquering might
When you look up.

Luke is Home Again And Doing Better All The Time!

Luke is home, hallelujah! For awhile the Dr. wasn't sure if we should come home, but I assured him that we could handle Luke's needs at home, he left the final decision with me and I chose to go. Luke is still on about a liter of oxygen and needs to be suctioned often, but overall sounds pretty good. The most amazing part of his recovery has been the fact that he has not been in pain. The Dr. told us the new procedure they use now has been known to cause little pain, he was right, his heart rate has stayed perfect this whole time, which is amazing for him, therefore we know that he is not in pain. His heart rate soars when he is in pain!

Please be praying that Luke's oxygen levels will even out and that tonight he will do just fine, we could all use the sleep. Thank you once again for the prayers, y'all are amazing!

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

Luke's surgery went great and now he is doing great again!

Luke is once again doing good! His surgery went better than expected and then the excitement began. I knew something was going on because the Dr. said that they should be calling us in about 15 minutes to go see him after the surgery was completed. After sitting there for 30 minutes we realized that something was wrong. They called us to go to the surgery waiting area, when we got there the nurse was on the phone saying, "do you want mom to come?" I immediately knew something was going on and even though she told me I wasn't needed I asked her to take me to Luke. I was so glad I did Luke was freaking out he had 3 nurses and 2 Dr. standing over him trying to figure out what to do, you see his secretions were out of control which was causing his oxygen levels to be out of control and he was yelling. They were getting ready to suction him, which I knew he needed and then I told them that I would suction him the way he is used to at home. I begin to pray and talk with him and he began to settle down, they had his head way to far back therefore he was chocking on his secretions. The Dr.'s asked me if Luke was normally like that I told them that though Luke does not need to be suctioned all the time, he definitely would need some extra suctioning at this time. I got him settled down and stable, the nurses kept thanking me and saying they were so glad that I had taken over, Mom's really do know best!

We got up to his room around 8:00 p.m. After giving the nurse all the information again, we got him settled in and on oxygen. It was definitely a rough night Luke's oxygen needs were pretty high all through the night, I didn't get to sleep until around 3:30 a.m. when the nurse finally turned up his oxygen, he had mask on so we could turn up to I think 6 liters, once we did that he stayed stable. He is doing great now and I'm ready to go home were just waiting for the nurse to decide we can go, since Luke's Dr. said we could go when she felt he was ready.

Praise God, I'm so thankful for His amazing touch in Luke's life, He is so faithful to allow Luke to come through this surgery so wonderful. We are also grateful to hear that Luke's airway is looking good, the Dr. did a scope down there to be sure that there was no scarring from his Trache sight. The Dr. said the only thing that gave him any concern was the fact that he had quite of bit of cloudy secretions in his lungs.

When I ran down to get something to eat this morning, I ran into a old friend, her daughter Stephanie is in surgery right now, she had hip displacements when she was born and now 27 years later she is having surgery once again to fix the problems she's been having. Please keep her in your prayers, I know she will need them especially today and while she is recuperating.

Thank you for all your prayers, I know without a shadow of a doubt that they are the reason why Luke is doing so good.

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

Luke's Getting His Tonsils/Adenoids Out Today!

We are getting ready to go to the Hospital, Luke is getting his tonsils/adenoids out today at 5:00 p.m. I have a wonderful peace from God, that all is going to go smoothly. Dr.'s have warned us of all the horrible things that can happen today, but we serve a mighty God, who holds healing in His Hands. We will spend the night there and my prayer is that we will be able to come home in the morning. I know so many are already praying and we are so appreciative of your prayers, we feel them! Please keep them coming. We will let you know how he does later this evening.

God bless you,
Luke's Mommy Suzi

Guess Who Got A Haircut Today?

If you guessed Lukie Man you guessed right! I know I cut it a little too short, but giving him a haircut is no easy job, especially since I did it by myself this time, usually I have help.

As you can see by the last picture Luke was saying "enough pictures Mom." Praise God he is doing so much better. Last night I was so blessed by seeing his wonderful oxygen and heart rate numbers, they stayed great all night long. Though today on our way to PT/OT he threw up a bit, so I decided he needed one more day of recuperation before he gets out again.

Tomorrow I hope to get Luke into the Hyperbaric chamber and then off to Poulsbo for our last time with "Matt the Rolfer," I misunderstood him to say that he would no longer being seeing patients there so we didn't even realize he was still there until he called to ask if we would be interested in going one last time. We will be sad to say good bye to Matt, he has blessed us on numerous occasions with his generosity and kindness. When I get home we will be getting ready for Isaiah's 10th Birthday party. A few of his friends will be spending the night, oh joy, I'm sure I won't be getting much sleep that night, but I'm looking forward to his party.

I have mixed emotions about next week, Luke's surgery on Tuesday is something that I know he needs but at the same time don't want to go through. I've been told by a few of his Dr.'s that this surgery can be dangerous, it's not like a "typical" child getting their tonsils/adenoids out. I know that it is in God's Hands and I just need to keep it there.

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Suzi