Crazy Beginning to 2008

Quick update about me.

The year started off great for me but quickly turned sour. On January 2, I was heading home when I hit black ice and totaled my truck. The truck hit a telephone pole on the driver's side door. Luckily, the only car and person involved was me. I don't think that it knocked me out, except maybe a few seconds. I was conscious when a friend drove up and took me to the hospital. They put 13 staples in my head and did their tests which revealed a cracked vertebrae. I am blessed to be walking and I do not scoff at the new miracle God has afforded me. It's nice to know that my God loves me!


Once they called my liver team, I was sent to Emory to be checked out by one of their doctors and to make sure that my liver numbers were stable. No problems there and a couple nights later I was at home.

I have had to wear a neck brace 24/7 for the past 3 weeks and still have 3 to go but hopefully I will be able to get it off when I go back to the doctor on February 12.


Had a check up last week with the clinic and found out my liver numbers are GREAT!! I am now down to 5mg of prednisone a day. If everything is still good in March, I should be completely off of that nasty medication!

Another Update

It has been a few weeks since I have been able to update my blog here. As far as my condition goes, I am doing great! It seems things are pretty stable and being about 17 months out of surgery things seem boring. I am keeping my fingers crossed that things only get more boring about me on this blog.

On another note, I stumbled across a link to another PSC patient who was transplanted recently. Carl's Liver Transplant blog brings back some memories of the initial setbacks and victories that seemed to happen almost daily. He is doing well though and continues to recover. If you read this and are saying a prayer for me, try to include Carl in your prayers as well. From Sunday's update, it seems they are waiting for his liver enzymes to drop and level out a bit. Go on over and check his blog out and leave a comment. It is always fun getting comments! At least I think so!

On the organ donation front, I have another parent talk scheduled on Wednesday, September 5 at Children's Healthcare again. The last talk was so much fun and I expect this one to be no different. Jenn and I are getting to do the Q&A again so I guess the people at Lifelink liked us. We had a good time and everyone seemed to enjoy laughing at some of the things we have done and also get some information on getting a job post-transplant and keeping your spirits up in hard times. I enjoy the time I get to donate to the organ donation cause. I am wanting to get more involved. I have been entertaining the idea of putting my name out to churches to give my testimony and talk about the importance of organ donation. I am not really sure how to do this, so if you have any suggestions let me know!

Blessings seem to be coming into my life daily. Small blessings that, if I am not careful and watchful, I will overlook. Some big blessings where I have definitely seen God's hand at work. I am living with the strongest desire I have ever had to draw closer to God. Though things have not gone as I have planned lately, I know that they are right in accord with where God wants me in my life. I am learning to get my wants out of the way and look to God to show me where He wants me. He always seems to put me right in the exact spot at the exact time. I serve a good God! Without Him, I am nothing; with Him, I am everything.

When you pray, mention me!

It's A Good Life With Which My God Has Blessed Me!

I went to Emory this weekend to visit a man who had received a liver transplant just over a week ago. He was doing great and it was fun to get to talk to him and answer some questions that he had about his future. Things have turned out great for me and I gave him some encouraging feedback. As a transplant recipient, you never want to give people a false hope though. I know that there will more than likely be a few bumps in the road during his recovery. I let him know that, just as they told me, "everyone is different." What happened to me might not happen with him. I told him about my bouts with CMV and diabetes last year which is far from the fun part to tell. It was good to see him smile though when I told him that once I made it through that low point, it seems the mountain I am on just keeps rising. It is not always an easy climb but when you get to a vista point it only gets more and more beautiful.

I feel great as I stand on the edge of my second year of teaching since my transplant. I have never made it through a first day of school so naturally I am nervous about it coming. I am excited though because I know this year I should make it through it.

God has brought me so far in the past 16+ months. I am excited about where I am going and I am excited about where life is taking me. There have been some heartaches over that time but when I stand back and look at where I am, I have to thank God for the blessings. There have been many more blessings than I can begin to count. Many more good times than bad. I know that God knows what is best for my life; much more so than me. I am trusting Him that he will continue to bless me, but if he takes it all away tomorrow, I still have to thank Him for all He has done. I never thought I would feel as good as I do today, I have met some of the most wonderful people over the past few years, made relationships that will last forever, and have begun to see God work in my life with reckless abandon. I can't wait to see what the future holds for me.

Good News

Things finally seem to be settling down in my life. The drama seems to be fading and normality taking over. I still don't know where the chips will fall in my life but I am confident that they will fall in line with God's plan for my life. Only one thing is certain in my life right now, I need God and He doesn't need me. I am created for His glory not the other way around. I seem to forget this way to often!

I know the blog has taken a turn lately, but as the title suggests, I am constantly adjusting not only to my new liver but to life itself. I am 26 and trying to get things figured out in my life and am realizing that is a much tougher job than I set out to handle. I am learning to trust God more and more each day. I know things will always be a series of highs and lows in life but I am now realizing that with God.....I can make it through them all.

Thanks for everyones prayers and I love each and everyone of you.

My King

I put this video up on my myspace page but I figured I would post it over here as well. This is the "Man" who saved my life. This "Man" has done more for me than I could ever have asked for and without a doubt more than I could ever repay. This is the one who told me that I would be okay through my sickness and my transplant. I seem to have forgotten about this "Man" for a while, but I am trying to reconcile with him. The funny thing is he has already forgiven me for leaving him, I just need to forgive myself first. Hope you enjoy!

Hiking and God

I went hiking again on Tuesday up Blood Mountain. It was an overcast day which kept the temperature down as well as the visibility. The overcast skies made for some pretty decent landscape photos. The trail was pretty tough being that I have been lazy lately and the trail is steep for a couple of miles. I was struggling to make it a few hundred feet without resting. I would like to still blame this on the transplant recovery but I think that now this is pretty much due to my own laziness.

I kept on thinking about how peaceful it was up there. We only saw one man on the way up and a family coming in just as we were leaving. It seemed that we were the only two people in the world. It was a very relaxing hike and very fulfilling. I wonder why I am so hesitant to go when every time it is more than worth it. It is amazing to stand on top of a mountain and look over God's creation and see it as His canvas. We were in a wildlife management area so it had mostly been untouched by civilization.

God's creativity is awe-inspiring. If this is what he gave us to enjoy here, I can't even imagine what things will be like in that new Heaven and Earth. It is times like this hike that make you long for a closer relationship with God. I get so far away from Him that I forget how he has touched my life. He is responsible for my saving me spiritually and physically. I want to do the work that he has left me here to do. Some of that work involves raising awareness for organ donation, but within that I am raising awareness about a Savior who loves me and was willing to die for me when I don't deserve it. I feel that this blog should become a mouthpiece for both causes. This may cause a hit in the amount of readers that I have but I am making a shift to focusing my life less on Josh and more on my Savior and my King.