Not quite Ebola, but still.

Hello people. Sorry my "happy days" post is running a bit late. I had intentions of catching up with that today, and it didn't work out, and then I ended up leaving my "good things" notebook at my parents' house, so I can't finish it tonight, either!

I'm here this evening to ask for prayer. I had been thinking about doing a post over the past day or two to do this, but didn't get around to it. That's probably a good thing. I might have sounded selfish and ugly at the time. I definitely would still like to have your prayers- for direction and peace and discernment and maybe a miracle or two ("longshot" job opportunity turned into an interview and an observation day, I fell in love with the prospect- being a teaching assistant at a preschool that serves children on the autism spectrum- and didn't make the cut, unfortunately. I'm not angry and totally understand- my experience with special needs kids is limited almost exclusively to older children and teenagers, so if someone with more experience with the littles came along, it definitely makes sense that the job would be offered to them. I'm just sad because I felt really happy and fulfilled during my time there, and was looking forward to taking my life in a new direction.)

But I digress. There is a more urgent prayer need than my restlessness and dissatisfaction and hurt feelings. My mom is pretty sick. And I would like to ask you to pray for her.

She missed work on Friday because her face hurt- she suspected a sinus infection. She was frustrated with herself because there was much to do at work, preparing for an event that would take place on Saturday. But I did talk to her that morning and she sounded pretty icky. She missed work again on Saturday because she was still sick. And I was frustrated with her because I was going to come see her at work and have lunch with her. I didn't talk to her much yesterday. I went back to bed after I found out that she was staying home again, and I stayed in bed until my husband came home. My depression issues are acting up again- I just laid there and thought. And alternated between feeling sad and angry and disappointed and frustrated about so many things that are going on right now. I feel bad because I should have checked on my mom sooner, but I didn't want to talk to her because of this frustration (and really, such a tiny percentage of it was directed toward her. I just didn't want to talk to anyone.) I finally said something later that night because I was having a really down moment and wanted someone to pay attention to me.  And she just said that she felt bad again. Finally she said that her face was so swollen that she couldn't see out of one eye. That's not normal. That doesn't happen with a sinus infection. My mom has some other health issues, too (doesn't everyone in my family?) and she gets hives and things a lot, so I thought maybe this was one of those times where she was just having a weird body thing happening because she didn't feel well, and I told her she might need to go to the hospital, since having your face balloon up is not normal. She said she was home alone (well, my brother was there, but he is asleep a lot and he can't drive.) My dad was at a play with my cousin and my aunt. So I said "well they will come get you, you know, or I could take you." And asked her if she wanted me to. She said no. Who wants to go to the emergency room? It's expensive and a pain  in the butt. I decided to text my dad and tell him what was going on, and told him that he might need to take her to the hospital even though she said she didn't want to go, and he said they were leaving the theater and he would let me know if they were going to go. And then I went to bed.

They ended up going to the hospital this morning, a little after 4. Mom made the decision that it was time to go when  the swelling started spreading upward around her eye, running along her nose and up under her eyebrow. She texted me but I didn't hear it. And then my dad texted me two hours later to tell me they were going to run some tests. I don't remember responding to this text, though, but I did. I must have seen it when I got up to go to the bathroom, and written "ok keep me posted" before falling back to sleep. If I had heard the first text I would have been awake and freaking out when the second one arrived. Or I would have been over there. I'm so frustrated with myself for not hearing it. And being so tired that I don't even remember the second one coming through. All I know for sure is that when I got up this morning and finally stopped hitting snooze on my alarm, I saw these texts and immediately started crying.

My mom apparently has a staph infection in her face. And it might be MRSA. Which is a scary thing to say. She said she heard the doctors and nurses throwing the acronym  around outside her little cubicle thing, but when they finally came and talked to her, they just said "you have a staph infection." And MRSA is a kind of staph infection, so if she has it, technically they wouldn't be liars. The people working the ER this morning were apparently pretty terrible, and based on the other things I have since learned (like not disposing of bloody rags in the biohazard bin, or not telling her and my dad how to prevent the spread of infection to the rest of the family, or not giving her a prescription for  the pain) I would not be surprised if they flubbed the delivery of her diagnosis. She got to go home with a prescription for strong antibiotics and orders to see her regular doctor within the next few days. I don't want to sound alarmist, but if she doesn't make enough progress in her recovery within that time, she may have to be hospitalized and treated with more aggressive antibiotics through an IV. That's how MRSA operates. If it's MRSA.

My poor mom is in a lot of pain. I spent the day with her today and will be back to take care of her tomorrow, too (I'm so glad that my schedule is weird this week and I'm off on Monday!) She hurts so badly. Her face is still pretty swollen- it looked really bad when I first saw her this morning, and then it got some better, and when I left the swelling had gone up a bit again. Seeing her makes me really scared, and I have to remind myself that if things were really that scary, they wouldn't have let her come home from the hospital. But I am really worried. And I feel bad that she feels bad. I hate it when my mom cries. Especially when I can't really do anything about it. She really can't do anything but take her medicine and keep putting heating pads and warm washcloths on her face. It's so sad. So I would like to ask you to pray for my mom, that what she has isn't the big scary version that doesn't take too kindly to treatment. And that she feels better very soon. Like tonight, preferably.