August 9. Connie’s birthday. It has been quite a day. Last night was probably the worst night I’ve had in a long, long time. I did not get much sleep at all. Couldn’t seem to get enough air, and I felt very light-headed. When I got up, I said to Daddy, I don’t think I can make it through another night like last night. So we determined that we would try to get the rest of the packing done quickly and be ready by 9:00 to go to town. Daddy texted Glenys to let her know that we were going to try to be ready for the early flight. We had a hurried breakfast and hurried around packing, although I didn’t hurry as much as I normally would have. We did forget a couple things, but not things that we can’t do without. MAF loaded off medical supplies for Owena and loaded on coffee besides Daddy and me. We took off from Owena around 9:30, but it took an extra fifteen minutes to get to Aiyura because there was lots of low fog along the shortcut that Aryan took. He kept circling around trying to find an opening, but finally had to backtrack and take the longer route. He dropped off the coffee at Aiyura and picked up a passenger. It was a little after 10:30 when we arrived in Goroka. The Aibai truck was not available because Karen and Rachel had just come out from Kiari and Aibai, The Kiari van is in the workshop so they had priority on the red truck. They had just arrived this morning too. Wesley drove us to CRMF in the MAF van; and just as we arrived, Rachel and Karen were getting ready to come over to MAF to pick us up. Instead we offloaded our cargo from the MAF van into the red truck and the young ladies drove it around back. Daddy and I walked around back. CRMF workers helped carry things upstairs. After we got everything up here into the apartment, Daddy called NTM to see if they could take me in. They said they would call back a little later. Noon came, and they hadn’t called back yet. I prepared a boiled egg to go on one of my tortillas and had my lunch here. After my lunch, I was thankful to get a short rest by lying on my side. I had just gotten up when Daddy came in and said “We’re ready to go.” So off we went to the clinic at NTM. I was very thankful to have Dr. Kevin as my doctor. He had arrived back in the country three weeks ago and had just finished his time of quarantine. Today was his first day back at work. I was thankful that he had no other patients. Freddie and Charity did most of the initial work and the blood work. Michela also helped. Dr. Kevin was very thorough, not just in making sure that they covered all the bases, but also in explaining things simply and in detail. We were there a total of two hours, much of that time just waiting for blood test results. At first it looked like some abnormalities, but Dr. Kevin felt that they didn’t line up with my symptoms and checkup so he had them draw more blood. Boo Hoo! Well, I lived through it, and there were no abnormalities. Praise the Lord for that. The big diagnosis was atrial fibrillation so he started me on treatment for that — metropol to slow down the heart rate and apixaban to thin the blood.* I have to go back again tomorrow morning to be checked and then other times throughout the next two or three weeks. It was going on 6:00 when we go back. Karen gave us a few carrots and tomatoes from their shopping (well, we paid her for them), and I cooked up the carrots and also some chicken that Daddy had bought when he went out to lunch. *Mom and Dad fly back out to Goroka in about two weeks. Please pray that the supply of Mom's medicine (apixaban) will be in by then. She has done well with that medicine, so she doesn't really want to have to switch to a different one. August 10. Yesterday evening, I had finished writing in my journal and was planning to write a note to Connie and send her birthday wishes. However, I started feeling really strange and seemed to all of a sudden be zapped of my strength. I got up, did what was really necessary before going to bed, and then crawled into bed without a shower. It was about 8:00, two hours after I had taken the first dose of medicine Dr. Kevin prescribed. Was I having a reaction to the medicine or was I just super over-tired? Or both? How I praise the Lord for a good night’s rest! I woke up once around 10:30 and was feeling somewhat nauseated, but was able to get back to sleep when I got back into bed. Didn’t wake up again until 4:15, and then I was wide awake. However, I was thankful to be feeling okay then. It was too early to get up so I lay there and rested until about 5:30. Then I got up and had the shower that I was too weak to get before bed last night. After that, Daddy was up, and we started our day. Took my second dose of medication with breakfast and was thankful to have no reaction. Did up yesterday’s dishes and wrote a birthday e-mail to Connie. Around 9:45, we were off to Lapilo for another visit with Dr. Ludwig. Michela took the vitals and did another EKG. Praise the Lord that my blood pressure and pulse rate were down quite a bit. The EKG still showed fibrillation. Dr. Kevin wants me to go back Thursday for another checkup (he won’t be there, but Dr. Bud will). However, there were no openings on their schedule. They penciled my name in and will call if something opens up. Otherwise, my next visit will be on Monday with Dr. Kevin. We were informed today that we will need to stay in town for two or three months so I can continue to be monitored until they are sure things are stable. After the doctor visit, we went to the NTM store and bought a number of items before coming back to CRMF. Rachel and Karen had been at the store shopping while we were at the doctor’s office. After we got back to CRMF, the Kiari van was out of the workshop and ready for them to use. By the time we got back, it was 12:30. We put groceries away, and then I fixed lunch. After lunch, I had a fairly long nap. Then Daddy and I went out to find some rice and a few other items we needed. We didn’t find any good rice, but we did find some nice potatoes at Papindo so bought a couple large potatoes to add to our supper. There was leftover chicken and carrots from my supper last night. This evening, I wrote an informative e-mail to C&C. Daddy and I tried to listen to a service from VBC Lattimore, but it wasn’t working well. We did see Connie and Bonnie singing a special, but we couldn’t hear much of it. So Daddy and I sang some songs together, read a Psalm, and prayed.
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