Miracle In Progress-Part 3-Update

It has definitely been a while since I have got to update on the progress of my iritis.  Please forgive me.  This post will get you all caught up on everthing!!

At the end of June, I had a follow up visit and everything was looking great and right on track with my eye!!!  The dr was very pleased and reduced the amount of steroid drops to twice a day of each for two weeks!! Then I went back the second week of July for my next appointment and he said everything looked great and he wanted to keep me on the drops at the same dosage for just two more weeks then after that I could completely stop!!!  Praise the Lord!!  He also said that I wouldn't have to come in for anymore appointments!!!  Huge relief!!  Even though he had really been blessing us throughout this whole process with his generosity financially, it was a burden lifted off my shoulders to not have to pay out anymore in doctors visits for this.....at this point, we have probably paid out about $700......ON AN EYE!!! Crazy!!  Yes, I know it could always be worse.  But I know Satan was really attacking us in every way with this....especially financially!!!  In May, Mike and I had finally jointly decided that we were starting the Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace Program to manage our finances better and eliminate the little bit of debt we do have....and BAM! here we go in June and we get hit with this and other things that have came up throughout the summer!!  Thank heavens for our emergency fund we had in place and for God always being faithful and providing above and beyond!!

So my eye was right on track and on the Monday of the last week that I was finishing up the eye drops, my husband's brother passed away unexpectedly.  This has been a really difficult time for all of us.  Nothing can prepare you for a death that happens suddenly.  About a week and a half after Jeff passed away, I started noticing my eye was becoming blurry again even though I had continued on the drops.  I gave it a few days and then called the nurse at the drs office.....verdict, stress can cause iritis to flare up.  When you are under an enormous amount of stress, your body becomes really out of whack.  Your immune system doesn't work as it should and even though you try your best to take care of yourself during this time, its just not enough....it takes a toll on you physically.  Therefore, once again, it is taking it out on my eye.  Yes, this was kind of devastating because I had been so diligent about taking care of my eye and was so excited about being at the end of this.  And I felt like I should have done more to prevent it from flaring up again.  But in reality, there was nothing I could do.  Nothing that I would have done differently would have made things better.  So now I am back on the drops more and have to work from there.

This has not discourage me at all!!!  I know now that Satan's clock is counting down and this attack that he has placed on my body is coming to an end and God will be victorious!!!  The attacks of the enemy are only temporary but the faithfulness and mercy of God are eternal!!!

Ashleigh

Miracle in Progress-Part 2-Second Visit

     After 3 days of putting Prednisolone eye drops in my eyes every hour as well as Ketorolac three times a day, it was finally time for my second visit with the Doctor. During the 3 days that I had between visits, I had time to look up this crazy inflammation that decided to take over my poor eye.  Initially, I wasn't going to look up any of it!!  I didn't want all of the "facts" or "opinions" to try and infiltrate my optimism.  But then I decided TO check it out just so I can see how awesome of a miracle that is going to be performed!!  The one thing that really has stuck with me is Iritis is the third leading cause of preventable blindness!!!  How crazy?!  Mike and I never go to the Doctor unless something is SERIOUSLY!!! wrong.  In fact, the eight years that we have been together, Mike has NEVER once been to the doctor other than his eye doctor because he has astigmatism and wears contacts!!  But I could have lost the vision completely in my eye had I not been proactive and went to see the Doctor!!

     Luckily, 79% of people who do get this never get it again and they never know what caused it!! But the other 21% of people who have it to reoccur have a deep problem within their bodies and then they have to find the source of what is causing the inflammation to come (i.e; diseases, certain syndromes, infections, etc).  These are just the facts.....I am not focused on what could possibly be but on what IS going to be and that is a complete and total healing to my sight.  In words of a close friend, "Better than perfect vision restored!!"

     Thursday, June 20th, rolls around.  I was actually excited to be going to this appointment!!  No, I couldn't tell a difference in anything really except for my headaches had subsided and my eye didn't feel as "full" as it did when I had went in on Monday.  But my vision was still really blurry and very sensitive to bright light.  Despite all of that, I knew we were going to get good news.  I could just feel it!!  So they call me back, check the pressure in my eye, do a vision test, and the Doctor once again thoroughly examines my eye again.  He turns and types on the computer then turns back around to explain everything to me. (I'm beginning to see a pattern here. Hahaha.)  On Monday when I came in the pressure in my eye was a 25 which is really high and today it was a 19, which is high but its a normal high. So we were back in the safe zone.  My vision HAD improved and I had no idea!!!  I was able to distinguish more letters and easier than I had been able to at my first appointment!!  Also, he said the inflammation is responding to the steroid eye drops!!! (Hallelujah!!  The last thing I want to have to do is take an oral steroid OR have injections in my eye ball!!!)  He said when I came in on Monday, on a scale of 1 to 4, he would have rated me a 3+, almost 4, my eye was so severely inflamed and today he was rating me a 2!!!  He said this was the best case scenario for our time frame!!  Now we are going to start tapering off the steroid drops for the next week to start the weaning process.  We can't stop them cold turkey because the inflammation will just come back and worse than it was before so we have to take it really slow and make sure the eye is still responding to them while we reduce the amount needed until the inflammation is completely gone.

     I was on cloud 9!!  This WAS the miracle I had been praying for.  Yes, I wanted to be completely and totally healed by that appointment.  But even though that didn't come at this one, it doesn't make the miracle of how far I had come in three days any LESS of a miracle for how bad off my eye actually was.  Healings sometimes take time and faith and being steadfast on what you know is the true and perfect will of God.

     While we were wrapping up the appointment, the Doctor told me he was going to put a drop of Atrophine in my eye to cause it to dilate for a while to keep any of the white blood cells and inflammation from wanting to stick to my iris and cause permanent damage to it (hence why I have been walking around with a crazy eye lately!! ;)  Then I went to check out with the receptionist.  They are such a fun loving group of people up there and were all joking around and talking with me so it took a good minute to get my next appointment scheduled.  When the receptionist handed me my appointment card she said, "Alright, we will see you next Thursday!!"  And I looked at her all confused with my check already written out just waiting on her to tell me the total, "Wait, I have to pay you for today!!"  To which she replies, "No sweetheart, the Doctor no charged your visit today!!"  I was so caught off guard.  My heart fell to my knees and I thought I was going to break into a million pieces on the office floor.  I could not believe it.  We had budgeted everything out for our week; tithes and offering, groceries, gas, etc, and had a certain amount left and were praying that it would cover my visit and I took it in faith that it was enough and the Doctor no charged my visit!!!!!  Is anyone getting this?!?!  Am I the only person in the world that gets completely moved when I realize that someone else has paid the price for ME?!?!  I have had people buy my food in a drive thru and to hear the words, "Oh, its already been paid for you." always brings me to want to move in way more compassion than I was ever operating in before.  God giving us Jesus as a living sacrifice to pay for all of our sins on the cross over 2000 years ago is the greatest gift I have ever been given.  But to have people to remind me of this through acts of kindness, love and compassion tears me up every.single.time.

     Lord, I am amazed by you!!  You are so faithful.  You know my needs and provide for them.  You never cease to blow my mind when I least expect it!!  I love you so much, Father and look forward to the miracle you will continue pouring out through this journey that I am going through.  I pray that these words and this testimony will touch someone else, that it will bring hope to those who are in similar situations and are having to learn to completely rely on You.  That in it all You will be given all of the praise!!!  You are so worthy, Lord....so so worthy!!

Miracle in Progress-Part 1-Diagnosis

On June 8, 2013, I had been having a great time with my children playing outside all morning, eating popsicles for breakfast, doing yard work with their Daddy.  It started out like the perfect day, but shortly after lunch, I got really sick to my stomach all of a sudden.  Then came the headaches and nausea.  I have not felt that bad in so long and even got to the point of wondering if I was somehow pregnant even though Mike and I had really actively been using protection for once in our lives!!! But thankfully the Lord decided not to give us such a wonderful blessing at this point in our lives and I just chopped it up to not feeling so great that day.  I asked some of my closest friends to please pray for me because I was completely miserable.  The next day, I woke up feeling better but by the time I made it to church the nausea had came back with a vengeance!!  While sitting in church I noticed my right eye was acting a little off and was blurry.  I had been having a little blurriness 2 days prior to getting sick but didn’t think anything of it but it seemed to be worse now.  So I figured I must have gotten food poisoning because Mike said he had been sick on his stomach too and my eyes were just acting funny and left it at that.  About midway through the week I finally got passed the nausea and upset stomach and was finally able to eat but the headaches and blurry vision remained, it was like looking through cloudy milk and I could see black stringy spots floating around when I tried focusing to look out of it.  By Friday, I was asking for prayers once again.  I really don’t like having to ask people to pray for me, even those closest to me.  I would much rather be praying for other people and pouring out on them than to have to ask for it for myself.  Mike left to go spear fishing for his Father’s Day weekend Saturday morning, the 15^th, at about 5 am. And I got up with the kids at about 7.  When I walked into the bathroom and looked into the mirror, the entire white in my eye ball was completely red.  I knew it wasn’t pink eye or a normal type infection you would typically get in your eye.  So I called the doctor’s office and they scheduled me an appointment for Monday afternoon.  Monday rolls around and I go to our family optometrist and he checks out my eye and noticed that my cornea is inflamed.  He dilates my eyes so he can see all behind them and informs me that the jelly behind my cornea is also inflamed and tells me he wants me to go see a specialist.  He can treat the inflamed cornea but not the further extent of the problem.  I honestly believe he wanted to get a second opinion because of what he saw.  So I get sent straight over to the specialist who sees me right when their office is closing.  They do a retina scan of both of my eyes, a pressure check, and then the doctor comes and examines my right eye very thoroughly.  He types on his computer and then turns around to talk to me. He was very straight forward, which is what I like.  Don’t sugar coat it, please just tell me like it is.  He said that I have iritis, a very bad inflammation in my eye, and it is a pretty bad case but treatable.  We are going to try to treat it with steroid drops but if that doesn’t work, then we will try an oral steroid and if that doesn’t work then I will have to have the steroids injected straight into my eye ball. He told me that it will take a good long while to completely get over this and that I will have to come in and see him several times before we are finished.  Then he turned and looked at me and said, “ I see you have no insurance.”  “I don’t and that is the most intimidating part about all of this!!”  Then he said, “ I have been exactly where you are.  I am not about to rake you over the coals or take advantage of you.  I do expect to get paid for my services but I won’t take advantage of your situation because you are going to have to keep coming back.”  I almost started crying right there.  This Doctor who took extra time out of his day to see me after hours, had so much compassion for me and the situation I was in with my eye.  

The entire time while I had been hearing all of the good, bad and ugly that came along with my diagnosis, I just had complete peace and kept singing inside myself the lyrics to a Rick Pino song, “I’m leaning on my Beloved.  Leaning on my Beloved.”  And throughout it, I was leaning on God and the testimony that will arise out of this and bring Him so much glory and honor and praise…but I felt like He was just wrapping me up in His arms and letting me see and feel that no matter what comes, what I am faced with, what Satan tries to hinder or throw at me, that He is there…He IS FAITHFUL…HE IS A COMPASSIONATE AND LOVING FATHER WHO HAS THE MOST DEVOTED HEART FOR HIS CHILDREN!!!

When I was leaving, the Doctor went over the billing with me and charged me half of what I should have been charged!!  What a blessing!!  So I scheduled my appointment for Thursday and left.  I was in so much shock, honestly.  I kinda thought I was going to get told that I had three babies really quickly, I’m getting older, my body isn’t what it use to be and my eyes are taking the brunt of it so I needed glasses.  But no, it wasn’t anything like that at all!!  It was my immune system is attacking itself for some unknown reason and it just took it out and manifested on my right eye!  This was on the complete opposite end of the spectrum!!!  I was confused for about five minutes…I had a moment of “really?! Why me?” and then got my focus on The One back and was able to look at the bigger picture a little.  There will come good out of this!!  There will come a victorious testimony!!  Spiritual growth and reliance on Him will happen through this healing process!!  A miracle will arise!!!  I am more than confident in who He is and what He is going to do !!!  My heart and lips will praise Him through every day of this attack and trial that I am walking through.  My faith will not waiver for my trust is in Him!!

Kase's 1st Birthday Party!!!

Kasen's 1st Birthday Party!!!

Words cannot describe how much FUN Kase's 1st birthday party was!!

I feel like I am getting the hang of throwing birthday parties now! Ha!

Sun, water and plenty of snacks = a bunch of happy kiddos!! 

We had our close family and friends come!!!  

I LOVE having a boat load of kids at my house!!

I love the giggles and free, fun, carefree spirit of children!

Check out this super hot man of mine!!!

Mmmm-hmmm!!!  ;)

We had a pot luck dinner since his party was later in the afternoon.

(We also combined his bday party and our house warming as 1 party! Lol.)

More cute pics!!!  :)

Love these 2 boys!!

Time for cake!!! 

Singing Happy Birthday!!

<This is my favorite part of every birthday party!! Haha!>

Someone was NOT happy about the cake!!

He didn't like getting dirty and absolutely

WOULD NOT EAT IT!!!

Hahaha!!!

He is my first child to not want the cake!!

After I finally stopped torturing him with the cake, he was ready

to go.  So we stripped down and he took off!!

His party was definitely a hit and I am so grateful to all of our 

family and friends who joined us for this day!! There was no way I would 

have rather spent the day celebrating my baby love's special day!!

We love you guys!!

And once again a HUGE thanks to Seth for being our personal photographer

so we could spend the day focused on our sweet boy and guests!!  ;)

Happy 1st Birthday My Baby Love!!

Happy 1st Birthday My Baby Love!!!

Kasen~

    I cannot believe how quickly this past year has gone by.  I knew that this day was coming, but nothing could have prepared me for it.  

   You have been absolutely amazing!!  You are not a good last (belly) baby!!!  You are such a joy and have been the best baby EVER!!!  Every since the moment you entered this world...the two days that it was just you and I in the hospital after you were born....the first few months.....while enduring the craziness and chaos of your older brother and sister....you have been nothing but awesome!!

   I can't believe how you joined this family and we didn't skip a beat!!  There was no adjustment period!!  It was as if you had been here forever already!  You were definitely meant to be ours!!

   I am so proud of the little man you are becoming!!  I wish we could just pause and stay at this time period for another year or so.  I pray that you will always be my baby.  Always want to let me hold you, kiss your face off and tickle you til you can't breathe!!  It has been such an honor to be your Mommy.  

   I look forward to this next year you are entering into.  It is going to be so much fun watching you learn to walk and talk and become so rough and tough!!  You are going to become so independent, so quickly!  So here we go!!!!.......much love and many blessings over you my sweet baby boy!!  I will love you forever and always.

Love, 

Mama

Our New House!!! Part 2-The During!!-The Inside Edition!!

This has been a long time coming!!

We.....especially Mike....have been working our hineys off

this past month!!

It is amazing what our home has turned into!!!

But there has been a whole lot of late nights, intense work, and 

a few stressful moments here and there.

Here it is, The During!!!! 

Moments (and memories) from our hard core week of 

fixing up the house!!!

This is our first picture of the work being done on the house!!

My handsome, hard working husband painting our living room!!

We were told it was going to take a TON of paint to repaint everything

but we actually had a contractor DONATE an entire 5 gallon bucket of paint to us!!!

Talk about blessing!!!

When Mike had finished painting the living room, I did not like it!! Ha!

I felt so bad about not liking it because it was free paint!!

But we both had agreed that it was just temporary and we would repaint it later

and at the least, this paint would be a good "priming" coat for future painting......

ok, sounds good no?!

Well the next day we went into the house during the daytime and both

LOVED the color!! Hahaha!!  

Turns out the lighting wasn't so good the night before!!

And our FREE PAINT worked out awesomely!!!

Note to self: Don't speak against your blessings!!! ;)

The Livingroom!!

In the middle of all of the painting, we still had quite a bit of cleaning left to do!!

I had some pretty awesome ladies to volunteer to lend a hand!!

We had so much fun and even celebrated our first birthday in the house!! 

 We had to repaint Adia's room...it was the worse one out of all of 

the kids' rooms....so we decided that we would let her pick out the color

she wanted her room painted.  She, of course, wanted green...her favorite color.

Gecko green!!!

Mike and Seth taping and cutting the room!!

It is very green, but she loves it and it fits her and her little personality

perfectly!!!  She was so excited when she saw it for the very first time!!

Her exact words were, "Oh my, I love it!!  It's so beautiful!!"

Hahaha!!!  Well worth letting a 4 year old make such a big decision!!

Mike ended up doing quite a bit of work by himself, so one day the 

kids and I took him lunch and had a little picnic in the back yard.

I hated him being there all alone.  I felt like I should have been there with him helping.

But he kept reassuring me that I was doing exactly what I needed to be doing,

taking care of our children and packing.

Thankfully he did let me get a sitter a couple of times and come and 

help out some.

The Hallway!!

The Kitchen!!

Mike actually let me pick this color and the color of our bedroom

out!!  I love both of them!!  Our kitchen is Olive and our 

bedroom is Grey!!

Kaleb's Room!!

Our Room!!!

Check out the hideous paint job that it had!!!

We had to rip out the carpet to obviously. It was 

pretty disgusting!!

NEW CARPET!!!!

WOOOHOOO!!!!!!!!

Last minute we decided we needed to paint the ceiling....

This is still a work in progress!! 

We do have a few other things we are going to

continue to work on too...the closet bathroom,

repainting our pink dining room, finishing the ceiling...but all of that 

will come in time. 

This is just what had to be done before we could even

move in.  I have a feeling we will constantly be working on this house.

We have really enjoyed working on projects while we have been

in here!!  It definitely makes a huge difference when it's 

your own home that you are investing your time, effort and money

into...a sense of accomplishment that you will thoroughly be able 

to reap the benefits from!!

And finally........

THE MOVE!!!!!

A huge thanks to Stacie Miller for keeping my two big kids 

one morning  for us

and 

to Crissy Megow and Liz James for keeping all 3 of our babies for a whole 

entire day so that we could completely move!!!

You 3 ladies were the biggest blessing during all of this

and I have no idea how we would have done it without you!!!

Thank you to everyone who came out and helped with all of 

the remodeling and painting!!!

Each and everyone of you helped out so so much!!

......Up Next....

THE COMPLETED PROJECT!!!!

:)