My fight with malaria

Usually I share everything on social media as it's happening in my life but the last few weeks I've been quiet. See, I got really sick with malaria. It started out with what I thought was just a virus: fever, chills, body ache and headache. But when I was only getting worse after five days, we decided to go get me checked out at a clinic. (We happened to be in Kampala still because we'd come for a conference and I got sick the very day after the conference finished.)

At the clinic they discovered through blood work that I had a serious case of malaria and I was also pretty dehydrated because I'd been throwing up so much. So they hooked me up to an IV for fluids and intravenous malaria medicine.

Even after the 5 day treatment, I still wasn't feeling better and my eyes were doing a crazy bleeding thing so we went back to the clinic, only to be shuttled on to the nearest hospital. I was admitted on a Saturday and discharged on a Tuesday. Those days in the hospital are kind of a blur as I was so out of it but I will tell you this, that I am so thankful for the marvelous staff of doctors and nurses, even the sweet ladies that brought me meals even though I couldn't touch them. It was a very good experience as far as medical treatment in a different country.

Another amazing grace of God is that my parents live only 4 hours from the capital where we were, so they dropped everything to come and help us with the boys. We also had dear friends jump right in and feed and entertain our kids, even sleep over night with them. We surely can't imagine going through this without the wonderful people and support we had.

I've now been out of the hospital for 5 days and am feeling almost back to myself. My appetite is back and I'm getting stronger every day. I think my energy will be lower than usual for a few weeks as my blood rebuilds but I'm so very thankful to be alive and for my God who walked with me every step of this valley, even when I was so out of it I could hardly pray.

We're planning to head home to Adjumani by the middle of the week and will gently ease into a new routine of homeschool with only one student - Joshua (his big brothers have started a new school year at Rift Valley Academy.)