he's home!

Picture of cards made by the kids. And they each donated a stuffed animal to keep daddy company and to comfort him.

Who's home?

Eric... husband of mine, father of four

Where was he?

In the hospital.

Typhoid

(well, probably - that is what they think, anyway.... and what he is being treated for).

Yes, he was in the hospital for four days (remember, he was sick on our anniversary?... it got SIGNIFICANTLY worse!!). Many, many people prayed and God answered. He got better quite quickly over the last 24 hours and so they sent him home. He still is taking medication, of course, and we won't have the results of the typhoid testy thingy for several days (..... a lovely ordeal of removing some bone marrow from his sternum. I should have him be a guest blogger on here and tell you all about it. It sounded super fun!! Like high school, but funner!) but they are treating him for it anyway because it is so yucky (a well-known medical term to describe illnesses).

Some of you may think I am a lousy wife because I did not mentioned it sooner (it may explain why my previous entry was a smattering of Psalms 18). Well, pretty much all I was talking and writing about for the last week was about how Eric was doing.... aside, of course, for saying things like "Lucy, stop waving those scissors in Mia's eyes" or "What in the world did you get in your hair now, Cade?".

Blogging has been sort of an outlet for me, and I didn't need to "outlet" more about what my poor husband (and children) were going through.

Now that he is home, however, and he can field (to some degree - he still feels pretty poopy) the calls and emails himself, I feel released.... yes, even ready to enjoy, to tell my 10 followers the events of the past week. Okay, I realize that most of you already know since I emailed and/or talked to you about it....

I mentioned what the children were going through ("Children", by the way, just came out. It sounds much too formal, like they aren't mine or something. Or like I have a nanny and only see them in the evening after they are scrubbed and tubbed and adequately fed.

Anyway, the kids....

They have had a very hard week. As you know, they have had a pretty miserable summer - being bored out of their minds, friendless, somewhat confined, aliens in another country... all that rot.

And then this.

They just saw how pathetically ill their dad was - he looked and sounded (and smelled.... did I say that?) absolutely horrible, then went to the hospital - a scary place in their minds - so the whole thing was pretty tragical. To them the hospital is a place where people look like they are about to die and have tubes coming out of every place imaginable, and then some places that you don't (maybe even shouldn't) imagine.

So yes, they were very worried.

The blessing in it all was there was much fodder for conversations about God being in control. And God making daddy's body, so God knows best how to care for his body. And how we often don't get why in the world God allows people we love to get sick (and worse), but we know He is Good and so we have to trust that He knows what He is doing. And that He is so very much bigger than we can imagine, and His "brain" is so much more smarter than we can even try to think about, so we just get to work at trusting that He knows best.

But they were still worried.

Naturally.

And it showed in their actions, treatment of each other, emotions, and in pretty much everything. Poor babies.

But now we get to praise God that He choose to heal daddy.

Good times.

(Normally that phrase would be said sarcastically, but not in this case.)

We may have some difficulties ahead. Eric could relapse. It could be something else that they have to treat differently. Or it could be all over. But right now we are just happy that not only is he home, but he has his sense of humor in tact (well, he thinks he is funny....), and a smile on his non-pasty, non-gaunt looking face.