27 YEARS AGO....

Summer always seems to go by so fast.  I thought this year might be different.  We would just be sitting around enjoying the long days of summer.  Well I don't know where the past month has gone, but summer is going by too quickly.  Saying that is a good thing, since I was concerned about 100 long, boring days.  We are at day 58 and we are on the downhill side of isolation.  Kevin has had a really good month.  He continues to feel well and the biggest challenge has been to keep inside these four walls.  He has asked the doctors many times, "If I feel so good and my blood count numbers are so good, is there a chance that some of the restrictions might be lifted."  In such a nice way the doctors say, "That is a really nice thought, but we'll talk about that at day 100."  A week ago Friday, the Physician Assistant we saw was Ali.  Ali is a cute, young doctor that looks like she is Megan's age.  She came in the room and asked what our plans were for the upcoming 4th of July.  Kevin's response was, "I am going to spend the first couple of hours digging in the dirt in the garden and then we are going to a crowded, public swimming pool to swim without sunscreen and then we are going to find the busiest restaurant in town and eat."  Ali's response was, "then I will have a hospital room ready for you on Tuesday."  Luckily the entire team at the Bone Marrow Clinic have a sense of humor and are well accustomed to Kevin's sarcasm.  Ali continued to ask Kevin the regular list of questions about how he is feeling and then she told  him, "I wish I could have a whole bunch of transplant patients just like you sitting across from me and telling me all the good things you just told me.  You are rockin' this transplant."  It is true, Kevin is "rockin" this transplant thing and we are grateful.  Grateful for a wonderful donor, grateful for faith and prayers and a loving Heavenly Father who watches over Kevin.  On Friday we went to the hospital for our doctor visit.  Kevin had a couple of minor issues he was concerned about.  One of them being some little tiny red spots under the skin on his fingers.  The doctors were a little perplexed, but nothing goes uninvestigated.  Dr. Hoda suggested a blood culture on Kevin's central line.  The central line has three different lines and they cultured all three to identify if there was possibly some sort of bacteria in one of the lines.  They also continue to monitor his medications.  Kevin is at a point where they are trying to taper the medications and Kevin feels great about that.  On Saturday, Kevin got a call from the clinic. They called to tell him there is a bacteria in one of his lines and we needed to go to the hospital to begin a 10-day infusion treatment to eliminate the bacteria.  So that's what we did.  The infusion is a small bag of an antibiotic that only takes 30 minutes to drip.  So we know what we'll be doing for the next 10 days.  We go back to see Dr. Hoda on Monday and they may arrange to have the infusion done by home health care or maybe we can do it at Altaview Hospital, which is closer to home.  We can do anything for 10 days.  This bacteria seems simple compared to some of the more serious complications.  Kevin still feels good and continues to walk every evening.  Any sun at all would be very serious for Kevin, so we enjoy our walk when the sun goes down.  He finished one good book and has started another one.  He is able to do some work at home each day and Brandon and I are learning negotiation skills as we get to listen to Kevin on his speaker phone on conference calls talking about buying tractors and stuff.  Each time we visit the clinic, the thought that comes to my mind time and time again, this is just a little too easy for us.  Kevin is being blessed. 

Yesterday Kevin and I celebrated our 27 year wedding anniversary.  I could tell you it has been blissful every single day since our wedding, but that would be a little unrealistic.  But what I can absolutely tell you is I have never felt more joy and happiness.  I have reflected on the blessings that we enjoy because of our marriage in the temple.  I told the kids today in Primary that the decision I made 27 years ago to be married in the temple was one of the most important decisions I have ever made in my life.  For the past 2 1/2 years the temple has been a place of comfort and peace and where many answers to prayers have been received.  Kevin's name has been on the prayer roll in countless temples and he has felt the strength of those prayers.  The temple is a tender mercy.  Tiffany was in Chile serving her mission when Kevin was diagnosed.  Figuring out how to fight cancer was hard, but for Kevin figuring out how to tell Tiff the news was much harder.  He knew Tiff well and knew that she would want to be here with her family.  Kevin loved his mission so much and his heart broke when he thought of her maybe wanting to leave her mission early to be at home with him.  He just couldn't do that to her.  He was determined that she would complete her mission.  After much prayer, the day came that we would talk to her on the phone and Kevin would tell her of the sad news.  Tiff's mission president had called her the night before and told her she needed to come to the mission home the next morning.  He didn't tell her why.  Tiff's first thought was what she had done wrong.  But she remembers thinking just don't let it be something with my family, I can't handle that.  Tiff and her companion made the couple of hours journey from her area in Lampa to the mission home.  President May told her that she needed to call home.  Heavenly Father had prepared her.  She can now see that she was strong enough.  We talked with Tiff for about 45 minutes and a great peace filled all our hearts.  It would be okay.  At the end of our conversation Tiff said, I feel like I would like to sing you a song.  She was hundreds of miles away from home at what would be one of our family's hardest times, but she knew something with an absolute surety.  In her beautiful Spanish, Tiff sang "Families Can Be Together Forever".  At that moment she knew it, Kevin and I knew it and Megan and Brandon knew it.  We are a forever family and always will be.  That is the blessing of the temple.  There is nothing Kevin and I could have ever done that would be more important that our temple marriage and the sealing power for our family.  Cancer can cause confusion and havoc, but it can't break that forever bind that is ours because of the blessings of the temple.  This week Tiff received a phone call from Chile.  Her first baptisms were a father named Ricardo and his son Felipe.  Tiff and her companion continued to work with this family until finally the mom Patty was baptized.  Kevin and I had the opportunity to meet this family when we visited Santiago.  As we arrived at their home, Ricardo came running out the door grabbed and hugged Tiff (he figured he could do that now that her parents were with her) and then he grabbed Kevin and wouldn't let go.  We didn't understand the Spanish words, but we knew what he was saying.  With tears flowing down his cheeks he expressed his love for us that we would send our daughter so far away from home to bring the gospel message to his family.  We instantly loved the Sanchez family.  The Sanchez family have three daughters, none of them seemed too interested in the gospel message.  A few months after Tiff's mission she was able to return to Chile to do her student teaching.  She visited the Sanchez family one weekend and Sammy, the 17 year old daughter told Tiff that she had been baptized.  On Tuesday of this week, the Sanchez family called to tell Tiff they are preparing to go to the temple and to be sealed as a family for time and all eternity.  There oldest daughter and her husband have been baptized and they want to have there little boy sealed to them also.  Tiff called me from Provo (where she is being an EFY counselor for the summer).  She was crying as she told me the wonderful news and these were her words.  "Mom, this is why I went on a mission.  I went to find a family that needed the blessings of the temple that my family enjoys."  The knowledge that "Families Can Be Together Forever" is a tender mercy.