When a cornea transplant tries to reject...

What a difference a week makes. We should have been boarding an airplane to travel to Utah this morning. But we aren't. 

Last Monday Steve noticed that his eyesight was kind of milky so while I was in for a final tear test [for dry eye] he asked the doctor to check his eye. Well an hour later it was determined that his eye was not only inflamed but that his cornea transplant was threatening rejection. A regime of steroid drops to control the rejection and other drops to counter increased eye pressure caused by the steroid drops began. By Wednesday it was determined that he needed more care than could be accomplished in a few days. A call to the mission office medical folks and our mission was postponed until he gets medical clearance. 

Wow! It is so weird to be in limbo after working so hard to get ready to go. His eye is improving and was 50% better last Friday. We are hopeful he will have further improvement when he goes back in today. After his eye is back to normal the doctors would like to monitor him for a few weeks to make sure he is stable. And then they will give him medical clearance so we can again get a schedule to report to the Missionary Training Center in Provo and actually fly to Sydney. We are so grateful for good eye care professionals and their competent staff who care about us. His eye surgeon knows the name of a cornea specialist in Sydney so when we arrive there will be someone there as a backup.

So, here we are living out of our mission suitcases in the home of our daughter, her husband and our grandchildren, just waiting to see what unfolds. We spoke in church yesterday which would normally have been our 'goodbye' talk but it was a 'provisional good bye'. It is interesting to me how life works. Often we make plans and then life happens. We know that our Father in Heaven is in charge, even over things like our eyes. 

We have no doubt that there is a reason for this delay. We just do not know what it is. But we accept the Lord's time frame. Experience has taught us that the Lord uses great economy with the events of our lives. What I mean is that this delay in our schedule will impact not only us but will also affect others in necessary ways that we may not understand. I strongly believe that things happen for a reason. We are grateful to know that the Lord knows who we are. We feel confident that all will be well.

In the meantime although we will miss our Thanksgiving gathering with several of our children in Utah, we will enjoy our time with our daughter's family here in Washington. We were able to enjoy watching our grandson perform as Prince Charming in his high school musical of Cinderella and just enjoy spending the time with this special family.

I will also be able to continue organizing our pictures which project has turned out to be a much larger than I first anticipated possibly because I not only had our pictures and negatives but those of my mother's and some of Steve's mother's.  I have even had to order MORE archival sleeves. But I believe I will have enough time to finish the project and preserve those memories. We may or may not leave before Christmas. Only time will tell. But the Lord knows and it will be alright.

In the meantime we live in our interesting state of limbo just waiting to see what the Lord has in mind for us.