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| The lovely view from temporary lodging for 5 days |
Sweet Family and Friends!
Remember
how I have said before that Hermana Escobar and I have had some crazy
adventures and weeks? How I said, "It can't get crazier than that!"?
Well, I lied. This week definitely takes the cake. It has been crazy and
long. But is all good. We have definitely experienced, and learned,
and felt a lot! I promise that all that I wrote here is true. Believe it
or not :-)
Fabulous P-Day. It was wonderful
because I was able to spend a lot of time chatting back and forth with
my family. We also got some good grocery shopping done. After P-Day we
drove over to Chicago Heights for a lesson with a
less active family. It was a really good lesson. We discussed Elder
Ballard's conference talk about Following a Up and introduced them to
Preach My Gospel. Their 12 year old had a LOT of questions. He is
so fun and compares everything to Star Wars. When he found out that we
don't have TV and aren't even allowed to watch TV, he asked what we did.
We told him that we read our scriptures. He was like, "WOW! That is a
real Jedi!" So yeah, it is official, I am -real Jedi now because I am a
missionary, it's pretty cool! :-)
On Tuesday we had Zone Training
Meeting. It was...interesting. It was really good, but also kind of hard
for many. It was a call to repentance for everyone, which is always
difficult to take, but we learned so much from it. There have been so
many problems in our mission with disobedience with the iPads. President
Woodbury called and commanded us to repentance and taught us important
principles on being obedient with the iPads. While he was doing that, he
had us all turn in our iPads and he had Elder Taggart go through and
check them. I was so glad that I have been obedient and had nothing to
hide or be ashamed of on my iPad! Of course there are always areas I can
improve on, and I have some plans to do that, but it was so nice to
know that Hermana Escobar and I feel that overall we are doing really
well with using the iPads as effective tools but not being disobedient
with them. The rest of the afternoon we spent at home for Hermana
Escobar. She was able to get a blessing from President Woodbury, and in
it he said that she needed to do nothing for a day and a half. So that
is what we did. We went home (after a quick stop at Buffalo Wild Wings
for lunch of course) and watched the Hastening of the Work of Salvation
broadcast. She then slept for the rest of the afternoon and I studied
and cleaned.
Wednesday I spent the morning
cleaning, studying, and packing for exchanges. We were also able to get
together some clothes and other things to donate to a girl who is
leaving for a mission next week and she has nothing. We then went on
exchanges with the Hermana Training Leaders. I went up to Midway with
Hermana Smith while Hermana Escobar stayed with Hermana Whitney in our area. It was
so great because it was like going home, almost back to my old area. We
spent the afternoon doing stop-by's of different old potential
investigators. Nobody was home. We did have one really neat street
contact though. We started talking to this one woman who was walking her
dogs. We explained who we were and our message. She thought it was
great what we were doing but wasn't really interested. We asked if we
could share the Because of Him video and we did right there on the
street using our iPad. It was so powerful, she started crying! We were able to talk to
her a little more and I felt impressed to give her a Book of Mormon so I
did. I explained about it and I testified and it felt so good! She
isn't an official potential investigator but we definitely planted a
deep seed for the future.
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| Hermana Escobar in the hospital with her get well gifts |
Thursday...was interesting to say
the least! We decided the day before that we would push the time back to
exchange with our companions because otherwise we wouldn't have time for studies. So we
did studies and then we were getting ready to leave to go to a funeral that we were going to sing at. I received a call from Hermana Whitney, who
was with Hermana Escobar, and this is what she said: "Hermana Meanea, I
need you to not freak out (Hermana Escobar told her to say that :-) but
Hermana Escobar is being admitted to the hospital." I was like WHAT?!?!
Apparently she woke up that morning to the entire left side of her body
being numb and a excruciating pain from her head to her toes any time
she moved, not good. After talking with the mission nurse and trying
urgent care, they took her to the ER and the doctors decided to admit her. I
was so worried and so felt so horrible that I wasn't there with her.
Hermana Whitney said they were just waiting so she wanted us to go to
the funeral and then come down. We went to the funeral, and it was so
great to see my old district and talk with my former companion Hermana Black, but I was so
preoccupied, all I wanted to do was get back to Hermana Escobar. We found out
that the funeral wasn't going to actually start until later in the day, so we just
left and drove to Indiana, it was the longest drive of my life. We
stopped at the apartment just long enough for me to grab some stuff that we
would need and then we got to the hospital. Hermana Escobar had just got
put in a room after having an MRI and cat scan. She was doing better
because they had given her a good drug cocktail for the pain. Some
Elders were able to come and give her a blessing, it was powerful. The
Sister Training Leaders arranged for the other Hermanas to cover the
Noche they were supposed to have with members and investigators in their area, and they stayed the entire evening with us. No one had any
answers, they were just doing a lot of tests. Our District Leader was so
awesome and brought us a pizza because us other three Hermanas were
starving. After talking with President Woodbury, and the decision was
made to send the STL's home and we would see what things looked like in
the morning, hoping for answers. So Hermana Escobar and I spent a very
restless first night in the hospital. We were too anxious and stressed,
it was hard to sleep. So, yeah, that was our Thursday!
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| Hermana Escobar and I at the hospital |
Friday, a day we were hoping for
answers, came, but the answers didn't come. We were just doing a lot of
waiting and sitting and resting. They took 4 different labs of blood to
test, but nothing showed up. We were able to get together with 2 other
sets of sisters to make arrangements for me to be able to go home for a
few minutes, shower, change, and get some other things we needed, and to
take our car back to the hospital because it was still at the apartment building. The
afternoon was spent waiting for Hermana Escobar to be able to take a
full body MRI and Vision Evoked Response test, but it never happened
because everything was so backed up in the labs. President Woodbury was able to come
see us and gave Hermana Escobar another very powerful blessing. It was
neat because in the blessing he talked about how The Lord had intended
us to be companions at this time because I was supposed to be able to
take care of her. I have definitely been trying my best and don't want
to leave her side for anything. In the afternoon she started having a
really bad chest pain, but her heart monitor didn't show anything. They
took an emergency EKG but nothing there either. It eventually subsided
slightly, but just adds to the mystery. This night, some of the Sisters
brought us chocolate milk shakes and coloring books. That night was a
lot better in the hospital because we were both so utterly exhausted that we slept
really well.
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| The chair I got to sleep in by Hermana Escobar while she has been in the hospital |
Saturday started early with a
full body MRI and X-Rays at 7:30 am. This was the worst time for me because
Hermana Escobar was gone for 3 hours and I was alone. I hated not being
with her and not knowing what was going on. That time passed very
slowly. She finally was brought back and we had lunch before she was
finally able to have the Vision Evoked Response test. This one I was
able to go with her to. It was kind of funny because she got all of
these electrodes hooked up to her head and had to stare at a red dot on a
checkerboard screen. We then went back to the room where Hermana
Escobar rested for a while because she was so exhausted from all of the
tests. We also found out that we would probably be there until at least
Monday, waiting for all of the test results to come back. A little bit
later a nurse told us there was a chance she could be released that
night. But the results never came in, so she wasn't. We did have a
visit from our ward mission leader and his wife. They brought us tacos
and we had a good visit. That night, at the pleading of Hermana Escobar,
we did a mini exchange with the English Speaking Sisters. I really didn't want
to leave, but Hna Escobar was very forceful. :-) Sister Spackman stayed
with Hermana Escobar and I went with Sister Goff. We ran home so I could
grab things and then we slept at their apartment. It was nice to sleep on a
bed and to actually sleep the whole night without vitals checks, 5:00
AM blood labs, heart monitors going off, and every other sound that kept
us awake in the hospital!
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| Hermana Escobar and I at the hospital with her stuffed bear |
Sunday morning I went to the
English Ward PEC and then MCM with Sister Goff. We then had Sacrament
Meeting. It was so weird going to a sacrament meeting in English. It was the first time in 8
months!!! Everyone was so confused about why we were together but it
made sense when I explained that we did it so I could take care of the
Spanish Branch and Sister Goff could cover her ward. Hermana Escobar and
I had our investigator and recent converts come to church so Sister Goff and I
went to the Spanish classes to be with them. Stater Goff was so sweet to be
so willing to attend the Spanish Branch meetings even though she doesn't
know any Spanish. It was good and everyone was so worried about Hermana
Escobar. Finally, after church I was able to get back to my companion. I missed
being with her so much! That afternoon we had a TON of visits from the
Branch. The Elders came first to administer the Sacrament, but they
weren't able to do it for nearly 4 hours because of all the other
visitors that flooded in. They all
brought food and little get well presents and talked a lot. Finally the
Elders were able to administer the Sacrament to Hermana Escobar and get
on their way to the branch presidente's house for dinner. The rest of the evening
was spent with Hermana Escobar resting because she was SO exhausted from
all of the pain and from all of the visitors. She is semi okay as long
as she is on strong enough pain mess, currently Tylenol 3 with codeine.
We had a last set of visitors. It was good and we had a lot of laughing. It was another very
long day. No answers yet but we are hoping that she will be released
tomorrow!
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| Hermana Escobar hoping she can be released after her 5 day hospital stay |
It has been so amazing to me
because Hermana Escobar has never stopped sharing the Gospel. We talk to
every nurse that comes in. We have given away a couple of Book of
Mormons, and even taught the Restoration. We have a super cool story.
Saturday night we met a nurse who is actually a member of
the English ward. We were talking with our nurse and about
how we are from Utah. She was like, "Oh, this nurse that I know is trying to get to
Utah!" We put two and two together and figured that this nurse might be a member
:-) We found out that she is the only member of the Church out of 1800 workers here at this hospital! Our
nurse introduced us to this nurse member and we talked for just a minute. On Sunday the member nurse came up and found me and
told me that she was supposed to get off at 12:00 am that morning but
she ended up staying until 2:00 am having a Gospel discussion with her
coworkers because her coworkers know us and have seen all of the
missionaries going in and out. Now the member nurse is getting her co-worker's contact information
and they will be some amazing referrals for the English Sisters! The member nurse came back in early Monday morning and was actually our nurse (she might have requested to be assigned to us) and she spent some time
telling us about her missionary experiences and we shared in her
excitement. How cool is that?!?!
So yeah, that was our week. With today being our Monday P-day, we are hoping that all of the medical test results come back today and that the doctors will decide to discharge Hermana Escobar. Whatever happens, our past week has been crazy. But we have had so many
blessings, so many tender mercies. I know that the Mission President telling Hermana
to stay in bed for a day and a half was inspired because as soon as
that day and half ended, that is exactly when the problem became
apparent. If she hadn't listened, what would have happened? Maybe it
would have been worse, maybe she would have pushed it to far, who knows?
Then it was such a miracle that we were on exchanges and that Hermana
Whitney was with her because she was able to take care of things because I
don't know if I would have been okay in the ER. Overall, it is such a
tender mercy to me that I have been in the hospital since Thursday with
no problems. You may remember that I have this problem with medical facilities. I
pass out anytime I am in them. But I have had no problems because I have
needed to be here with my companion and my Heavenly Father needed me to be here. Our
Father in Heaven is SO amazing! I love Him and know He love us more than
we can imagine. I hope that you all have an amazing week and that I
have not as quite of an exciting one! :-)
Eternal Love,
Hermana Allyse Meanea
Sent from my iPad from the Illinois Chicago Mission
