Patience is a virtue

I have been trying to be more patient lately but I'm not sure how successful I have been. It seems like I'm always waiting for something...waiting 4 MORE MONTHS for Kyler to get home...waiting 31 more days until we FINALLY move to the new hospital...waiting ONE MORE WEEK until I see a Dr. at the University of Utah...waiting to feel better.

My life for the most part is great and I don't want to complain. I have a great family and awesome friends. I have a great job that I love and have great people to work with every day who have become really good friends as well. I have good doctors and good health insurance. Watching General Conferance a couple weeks ago really made my heart full of gratitude for the wonderful blessings in my life. I realized that the Lord has blessed me with so many great things, that I should be willing to be a little more patient for the extra things I want. I enjoyed all the talks in conferance...and I was proud of the fact that I stayed awake through most of them even though I had just had surgery and was hopped up on pain pills. :) Elder Kent F. Richards of the Seventy said in his talk on pain that, "Healing blessings come in many ways, each suited to our individual needs. As known to Him who loves us best, sometimes a healing cures our illness or lifts our burden, but sometimes we are healed by being given strength or understanding or patience to bear the burdens placed upon us." I was given a blessing by my branch president about a month ago one weekend when I was super sick. He basically said a very similar thing...that I would start feeling better eventually. I just need to be patient and endure whatever comes my way. Another talk I enjoyed was by Paul V. Johnson of the Seventy. He talked about trials and quoted Elder Orson F. Whitney saying, "No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. … All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable. … It is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire.” I really believe that to be true.

So here I am trying to be patient...I actually have recovered from my surgery really well. I had a couple miserable days (day 3 and 4 were the worst) and I didn't go back to work until Tuesday (not Monday like I had planned), but it was not NEARLY as bad as I expected. I got the splints taken out a day early because I had a night where I was waking up every hour with blood gushing out my nose and I couldn't take it anymore. I called the nurse and she said to come right in. I was so excited (especially since I had called the day before to move my appointment from Thursday to Tuesday like the Dr. told me I could do and the receptionist rudely told me that the spints HAVE to stay in a week, and they didn't have any openings anyway...psh.) Anyway, life was much better after that and I can really tell that I can breath much better. I think it will take some time to really tell if it's made a difference in how I feel, but I can already tell it was worth it. I've seen Dr. Mayes (the ENT who did the surgery) at the hospital a couple times since then and he always says, "Hey Jill! How ya doin'? Breathing good?" It's kind of funny but I love telling him that yes, I'm breathing good. :)

Also on the plus side I got my vitamin D level checked again and it is back in the normal range, so I just have to take one vitamin D pill a day now instead of two. I have an appointment with the Rheumatologist in a couple of weeks to see how the medication is working for that, and I think it's going pretty good. I haven't been having much trouble with my joints.

My stomach has been about the same. Every time I decrease my prednisone dose, I get sick again. Dr. Smith has been great, even though I'm starting to feel like I'm probably the bain of his existance. :) He finally did say that he wants me to see someone at the University of Utah to get another opinion because he can't figure out why I'm still having so much trouble. I have an appointment Thursday the 28th...wish me luck. I increased my prednisone dose again this last Thursday back to 40 mg but actually haven't started to feel much better. Sunday was horrible. I was ok in the morning when I went to church. I came home and took like a 2 hour nap, and when I woke up I did not feel so good and it just kept getting worse and worse...until I was curled up in a ball in my bed bawling because it hurt so bad. I had taken imodium and percocet and neither seemed to do anything for a LONG time. Finally about 8:00 I decided I was going to live and was able to get up for awhile. I went to bed later and the next morning I miraculously made it work. Today I talked to Dr. Smith again who told me to start taking 80 mg of prednisone, which I was not excited about. I can tell that it is making my face poofy. It has also made me a little bit grumpy at times and affects how I sleep. But hopefully it will help and I can start decreasing it again in 3 days. He also gave my an antibiotic. Dr. Smith told me if it doesn't help to call him this weekend because he's on call. He's so nice. I'm just trying to wait patiently for one more week and praying I get some answers. It's weird that it has all of a sudden decided to get really bad the last few months. Before if I got pouchitis, it wasn't very bad and I could take an antibiotic and it would go away. Now it gets really bad and doesn't go away...ahhh! Anyway, I guess there was a little complaining in there, so sorry about that. :) I guess life goes on and I can't just put my life on hold because I have a stomach ache. I just need to be patient...

p.s. Sorry no pictures in such a long post.