July 21, 2014

This week was kind of dull, because I am still sick, but I just realized I never got to talk about my adventure to the hospital, so I guess I will write about that!

So last Thursday, I had been having stomach pains for a few days so I finally decided to call Sister Shumway and tell her that I needed to go to the doctor. We got an appointment with an LDS doctor in Centerton, Arkansas and drove down there to his office. As soon as he looked at me, he found out that the pain was mostly in my right side so he thought it was my appendix, and told us to go to the hospital for a ct scan. It was really funny because while we were waiting in his office, there were just all these pictures of ducks and duck statues everywhere. Instead of some kind of doctor's license or diploma, there was just one certificate that said "we would like to recognize you for your contribution to waterfowl conservation!" Sister Webb and I were like, "is he even a real doctor?" haha. I asked her how much she would pay me to say "thanks duck! I mean doc!" when we left.

We drove over to the hospital and had to wait like 3 hours before someone would even come talk to me. The radiologist came out and gave me two bottles of really disgusting yellow liquid that I had to drink over the space of 2 hours before I could have my ct scan. It tasted like lemonade mixed with cleaning supplies. In the meantime though, we were able to get two members of the Bentonville 2nd ward to come give me a blessing. And one of the families in our ward who lives down there came to keep me company. They are so sweet.

Around 8:00 pm, I finally got in for the ct scan. They put an IV in my arm that filled my veins with some liquid that made it feel like my body was on fire, and it made my mouth completely numb! that was weird. They got the scan done and then we waited about another hour to hear the results. The doctor called us and said "the good news is, you don't have appendicitis. The bad news is, your colon is almost completely inflamed and we're going to have to start you on IV antibiotics right away. Oh, and there isn't a bed at that hospital so you have to drive down to Springdale." Sister Shumway would not have that though so somehow she demanded that they find space for me in Bentonville and they did. Not sure how she managed that! I thought the hospital stay was just going to be for a few hours so I wasn't that worried about it, but then Sister Shumway called us back and told Sister Webb to go with the Rogers sisters and that I would just have to be alone for the night. And then she said I was going to be in the hospital for 3-5 days. So that was a little bit alarming. But President Shumway got on the phone and gave me a pep talk about Heavenly Father would help me through this and that he was going to have all the missionaries in the mission pray for me. Then he sent President and Sister Stout of the mission presidency to stay with me until I was ready to go to sleep.

Anyways, to sum up everything else, I got stabbed with a bunch of needles and got released from the hospital the next day. It wasn't so bad. Apparently President Shumway announced in his broadcast that I was in the hospital and that it was serious, and then all the missionaries started calling us to ask what happened so I'm pretty sure they all thought I had been hit by a car and was dying or something. But it was nice to know that everyone cared. I have definitely grown in my testimony of the power of prayer.

The last week and a half I have been sick off and on so we haven't had anything too exciting happen, but on Friday we saw our neighbor David outside and decided to go invite him to church. He said he would come and was so flattered that he invited us over for dinner the next day. He is really open to learning about the church! And yesterday, five less active members attended church for the first time in a while. It is so rewarding to see people remember and feel the joy that they felt when they were coming to church.

Love,

Sister Boll