After “previewing” this, Tim was quiet and simply said this is a heavy blog so I wanted to give you a heads up…

I am attaching Sharon’s post for those of you who do not follow her Facebook page. Her son Cody also has Fibrosing Mediastinitis and is in need of some major prayers right now. He was recently in the hospital for a collapsed lung, pneumonia and now he is back in the hospital due to continuing to cough up significant amounts of blood. This was one of her last updates…

 “Dr. Thomas decided with Cody coughing up blood from the left lung he doesn’t want to take a chance of it going into the right lung, so they are going to intubate Cody & for now just put a balloon in the left lung to hold the blood in the lung until they figure out what to do with his lung. So chemical induced coma”

Recently, I have been approached by more people and they are trying to grasp how I live like this…how can I go through life with a smile on my face when I have so many challenges and a nasty disease that is sucking the life out of me…literally?!

Well, it is because of Cody and others fighting this illness that have even greater struggles than I do. While looking at Cody in the hospital takes me back to the days of my most severe symptoms and how I overcame them, it is also a reminder of what this disease can do…a reminder as to why I must cherish every day given to me. While my story sounds horrible to others, I am actually one of the “less complicated” cases of what this disease is capable of. Cody is only 23 and has been through more than anyone should have to go through! My heart aches for him and I can’t imagine the pain his mom is feeling.

I do know, the only way I have gotten this far is by God’s strength and by His grace.

We have been attending some churches in Waverly and while my family absolutely loves Praire Lakes in Cedar Falls, it would be nice to find a church more local, especially where the kids can become more involved.

Just over the weekend, we attended a church we have been to a few times, and the sermon was on blessings and broken. It is smaller than Prairie Lakes so I had to hold in my tears as I could relate to every stinking point the pastor was discussing but I didn’t want to be the new visitor sobbing😉 When he began the sermon with saying “God graciously works through our messy lives,” I knew it was going to be a long hour! Point being, through all of the heartache and disappointment, the hardships and the struggles, God is doing good.

It took me a while to get over the anger and bitterness of my disease, which again, the pastor specifically cited this week “fight bitterness by remembering God is doing good,” because bitterness is my biggest struggle…especially now seeing Cody in his hospital bed in an induced coma. It makes me hate this disease even more, and the fact that we continue to be a guessing game to all of the doctors in regard to what can be done to help us, can be even more frustrating…but God is doing good and we must keep Him as our focus!

All I can say to Cody and his family is that I  am so sorry and I will continue to keep all of you in my prayers. And I ask anyone who reads this blog that you please do the same for my FM brother!

Stay strong and battle on Cody!