Update on Church and Pheresis

Church was very nice. The people were warm and welcoming. I was a bit bummed because the Pastor had been gone all week to a conference, so the former pastor gave the sermon. However, he was AWESOME. He did a first person message as Simon of Cyrene, the man who was forced to carry Christ's cross.

He warned of the inherent danger in doing such a thing, because, after reading from the Scripture, he said everything coming out of his mouth was just what HE thought Simon might have felt like. It was amazing though. He read of the account from the Gospel of Mark, who referenced Simon's children, Alexander and Rufus. Then he read passages from future NT books that mentioned Alexander and Rufus as members of the church, something that probably came about because of their father's encounter with Christ. It was really cool, and something I'd never heard done before. And something I'll never forget.

We are eager to go back Easter Sunday with Jacob and hear Pastor Dan preach and maybe meet some more people.

On the medical front: the treatment yesterday went FLAWLESSLY. There was a little hang up at the beginning because the nurse couldn't get a blood draw (and I would let her TOUCH any of the spots they use for pheresis...I can just see blowing a vein right before the procedure!). So we had to wait for a phlebotomist (I just love that word) to come up from the lab, and that took about 20 minutes. So by the time we finally got started with pheresis, it was a bit after 2. But then it was lickety split. Two needle pokes, perfect position, start the machine, ran perfectly, done in about 70 minutes. Right up there with a great run from the U of M. {and there was much rejoicing in the land!!}

So now we just pray my veins hold out for Wednesday and Friday, and then see how good I feel for how long before we do three more. It was SUCH an amazing thing, even with the delay today, which shouldn't happen in the future, how FANTASTIC it was to not have that hideous drive, and not take ALL stinkin' day to have this done. Beautiful.