Some OK days and some hard days.

With the start of the school year, our family is desperately trying to get into a new rhythm. But, cancer. If you're keeping up with our journey, Nathan's hemoglobin dropped from 9 to 7.7 on Tuesday, which required a blood transfusion on Friday. Unfortunately, that meant that Nathan had to miss school. After sitting in the chair for 5 hours, something happened in his back. He believes his muscles were tightening and not loosening up again (think never-ending Charlie Horse). This went on the entire rest of the day. Massive pain. (Like the most pain I have ever seen him in.) Fortunately, he was able to take all the drugs (hydrocodone, benadryl, and ambien) and was able to fall asleep. When he woke up in the morning, the muscles had relaxed and he felt pretty good. This morning, he thought it would be a good idea to get a warm bath before the school day and the same thing happened to his back (only lower). I had to drive to school and get him and bring him home. Nothing was helping the pain. Thankfully, he had treatment this afternoon and that meant we could tell them about his intense pain with the hopes that they would "fix" it. Morphine was music to my ears. YES PLEASE! Much to our dismay, the morphine took the edge off a little (like dropped the pain level one notch), but his back is still currently tensed up and wickedly painful. It's moments like these when it's much harder to see God's love in the suffering. How can there be any "good" in this? It's painful to watch someone you love suffer. I would take it from him in an instant if I could. Isn't that what REAL love is? It's not an emotion. It's an action. I would take all the suffering if it meant that he didn't have to. Because I love him that much. Sound familiar? Jesus did just that. Because he loves us that much. Elisabeth Elliot says, "It's only in the cross that we can begin to harmonize the seeming contradiction between suffering and love." It's hard to think about, truly think about, the suffering Jesus endured to pay the penalty for my sins. He suffered so I don't have to. And why would he do that? There's only one reason why. Love. And when we suffer here on earth, we long all the more for our inheritance, in heaven which Jesus purchased for us on the cross, where there will be no more brokenness, no more suffering, no more death. Paradise. What a gift! Thank you Jesus. Our one and only prayer request right now: *PLEASE pray for Nathan's back muscles to relax and that he would be able to get good sleep and feel better in the morning! Thank you everyone!!