Together again... but not in the way we thought

It's very rare that you ever find my whole family together in one place. Even when we are all in the same country our schedules are so crazy that they rarely correlate with each other. So a few days ago my family had planned on taking a family vacation to Arizona to see the Grand Canyon and "force" us to be together. I was very excited and looking forward to see this great wonder that everyone talks about. And I figured it was about time that we take "the classic American vacation" that I'm sure every family must venture at least once in their life. But unfortunately this trip that we were so looking forward to had to be postponed.

It started the day we got back from our trip to Ethiopia. My mom had been feeling a little bit sick, but after a few days, her flu-like symptoms only got worse. As we were packing up to leave for the airport we realized that my mom could barely walk anymore. At that point we knew something had to be wrong, but my determined mother still wanted to go on the trip! And instead of going to the hospital she wanted to figure out what was wrong when we got to Arizona. But after a little bit of debating, we decided that it would be wiser to go to the hospital here instead of Arizona. And good thing we did! Because by the time she arrived to the hospital her appendix had already ruptured and she needed surgery right away. She had made it just in time. The surgery went very well and she's healing up nicely. We all feel so blessed with the timing, despite what happened. My mom travels so often that we feel so fortunate that she was actually in America when it did happen. She visits such remote villages when she's overseas, without a doctor that could have performed the surgery. The thought of this scares me to think how much worse it could have been if it had happened only days before. So the fact that she was home when this happened was definitely a blessing.

But we were still able to have some family time today! My brothers, my dad, and I all visited my mom and we got to spend some time with her at the hospital. And even though the view would have been much more enjoyable at our original destination, this is forcing her to take a break which is exactly what she's been needing. And my dad and I have been taking turns switching out babysitting duty. Each day she's been getting more mobile and the pain has been subduing so much that we're hoping that she will be released tomorrow.

Thank you very much everyone for you prayers and support,

Julie