Joel's Journey: We Tangled!!

Monday, March 19, 2012

We Tangled!!

If you were to ask Mercy if she had a good birthday, she would say "yes, a great one"! And that's exactly what she said!! I am glad this party isn't lasting "an entire week!" as Flynn said! Seems like it's all over far to soon compared to the preparations for the party but if a little girl or a little boy remembers their party, the work that a mom poured into it, it is worth every moment!!

Lots of photos via iPhone, but hey that's alright, documentation is what it is all about!!

One of the highlights for Mercy was Daniel skypeing her from Australia!!!

And to end the evening/birthday blowout.....the movie, Tangled!!!!

3 comments:

Danielle said...: Oh my goodness! Looks like So much fun!!! I LOVE your hair Mercy! ;) And wow...doug is looking more and more like Caleb! weird! :)

Happy Birthday Mercy! :); March 20, 2012 at 10:18 AM
LJR said...: Everything looked so beautiful! And glad she got to talk to big brother too, how special. Happy Birthday Mercy, I am glad to see you had a great one spent with your family. Did you ever capture Flynn Rider? :-); March 20, 2012 at 11:13 AM
I'm Kristen said...: WOW. You nailed it. SO beautiful!; March 20, 2012 at 2:32 PM

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Joel's Story

Joel, our 11th of 13 and a twin of Josiah, at age 3 was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma, a childhood cancer, on December 6th, 2006. Joel had three perfect years of health and he and Josiah celebrated their 3rd birthday Sept. 13th, 2006. The first of Oct. Joel started having unexplained fevers for a few days and would return to active play. After the fourth round of fevers we took him to our family Dr. which they said his iron was low, so we treated that for a few weeks and took him back only to have his hemo. showing lower than before. We were referred to a hematologists and saw him a few weeks with blood checks twice a week. At a visit on Dec. 4th we showed the Dr. the bumps, (which were tumors but we did not know at the time) on Joel's head and he was very concerned and we were told we needed to admit him immediately and start extensive tests the following day. Joel went through rigorous testing and then the dreaded results were given. Joel was at a stage IV the most extensive stage, but we were hopeful that the Lord would use the means of Chemotherapy treatments to restore Joel's body. Joel endured 8 1/2 days in the hospital, came home for Christmas, and returned for his second round of chemo Jan. 3, 2007. Joel had a seizure that night after midnight and went into a coma due to a tumor bleeding in his head area and causing his brain to swell. After tests the following days, the Dr. declared Joel "brain dead" and took us to court to force us to take Joel off life support, as we did not agree with the medical field's definition of death. Our family sought to stand with the scripture, "life is in the blood,"and until Joel's heart quit beating naturally, he was living. We were making arrangements to bring him home and on January 23, 2007 his little heart stopped beating and he went to be with the Lord Jesus in heaven. Our lives are changed forever. God is faithful in the midst of this trial and we look with great hope to be with him someday.