Series: Becoming Debt Free...The 12th Year...

Here are the previous posts in this
Becoming Debt FREE series...
The 1st and 2nd Years
The 3rd and 4th Years
The 5th and 6th Years
The 7th through 10th years
The 10th and 11th years


February 2005 brought our family many changes...

1. Brian was now at a new job fitting in well and receiving a better paycheck.
2. I was in the middle of a year of homeschooling the boys...something never thought I'd do, but something that was necessary that year to help one of the boys catch up to grade level.
3. We were in our new house enjoying our new furniture!  :)
4. We were praying about adopting a child even in the middle of our "unknown" medical circumstances.
5. My sister-in-law had just been diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer
6. I was awaiting my diagnosis.

Finally, after six long months of waiting for my doctors to try to figure out what I had we got the phone call.  My blood work had been sent of to Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. The doctors there diagnosed me with Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis.  This was not really a life threatening disease, but definitely one that had the possibility to be life changing.  I was just happy to finally have a name for my disease.  The good thing about this diagnosis was that it was NOT leukemia or any other type of cancer. What a relief!  I would be put on some medicine to try to slow down some of my not-so-pleasant gastrointestinal symptoms and to lower my high white blood count and hoped that all would be well.

On our 11th wedding anniversary my husband, over or romantic dinner, surprised me by letting me know that he had been praying and felt that the Lord was indeed leading us to adopt a child.  With my diagnosis being more mild than we previously thought we both felt comfortable enough to take the plunge to start the adoption process!  We went home that night,  prayed together submitting to the Lord's will and asked that He would provide the necessary finances for this adoption.  We stepped out in faith and trusted that that He would do just that!  We attended an information meeting a month later, signed papers and eagerly awaited to know who our 3rd child would be.

As Spring turned into Summer we were trying to decide what road to take in the boys education.  I had a rough time  keeping up with homeschooling due to all my doctor appointments.  One day a friend of ours knocked on the door. She had been sent by an anonymous person with a message.  This anonymous person felt lead to send our boys to any private school of our choice.  We were stunned, excited, elated, in unbelief that anyone would be so generous!  After praying about it we felt that we could not turn down such a gift...besides, we had been asking the Lord for direction...we felt this was pretty clear direction!  We were able to send the boys to a Christian school that we had only dreamed of sending them to before.  What a blessing it turned out to be.  The boys loved their new school!

As time went on I continued to have diarrhea and frequent stomach pain.  This resulted in more upper endoscopy's (scopes).  The results of those always showed that I had stomach ulcers.  I continued to regularly see a Dermatologist for my skin rash, a Gastroenterologist for my stomach issues and a Hematologist for my high white blood count.  I was put on a Gluten Free diet for 3 months to see if that would help my symptoms....It didn't help at all.  

All of the doctor visits and scopes were starting to add up.  I was constantly trying to figure out ways to make a little extra money.  I worked evenings at Walmart over the 2005 Fall/Winter season as "Christmas help," but that was only temporary.  Brian was always taking on extra side jobs here at home.  Somehow we managed to make it through another year living paycheck to paycheck.