This is just a short update. More test results have shown probable past multiple heart attacks that we were unaware of. Most days, I continue to feel weaker and to have more trouble breathing. The numbness in my hands and feet seems to be happening more frequently, my balance seems to come and go, and some days I’m fighting with more mental confusion and word retrieval. We know that the left ventricle isn’t working properly, but we’re still searching for more information about why and what to do. It’s easy to get lost in the just feeling physically bad each day and to also let the fear about what unseen things are happening in my body and what might be coming at us overshadow everything. We continue to fight against this human tendency. There is no peace found there.

Earlier this week, I took a few minutes to be alone, look at my flowers and marvel at their beauty and just let myself focus on and feel the things I have been afraid to face. I talked to God about those things, honestly voicing my emotions and fears in spite of logic. I’m so thankful that God fills our world with beautiful reminders of who he is and how much he loves us. My morning reading today reminds me that God is always up to something and never stops working in and through us. That we are never out of his sight or absent from his great desire to draw us closer to himself. That when we seek him, he will hear us and reveal himself to us even if that sometimes means pain or scary things along the way. 

“No one will conclude that God is good by studying life. The evidence powerfully suggests otherwise. The search for God will lead us through struggles, setbacks, and confusion. Confidence in a God who doesn’t always make clear what he’s doing at any given moment doesn’t come easily. If left to our own way of thinking, every one of us would conclude that God either is bad or doesn’t exist, that no God in this universe is good enough to be trusted with the things that matter most. As we look at how God treats some of his children, even those who abandon themselves fully to his care, we’re not impressed. If it is true that all our problems are rooted in the suspicion that God isn’t good (or isn’t good enough), then the only way through our problems is to know Christ better and thereby to find God. Finding God is developing, through Christ, an unshakable confidence in God’s absolute goodness and perfect love no matter what we may experience in this life. Shifting our foundation from doubt to confidence, from terror to enjoyment, from rage to worship will occur only when something stirs within us that makes us long, more than anything else, to build our lives on the reality of God. But we’re not there yet. No one is, not fully. Confidence in God and hope in his provision do not, in this life, always reflect themselves in a breezy joy.This is not heaven, and that’s why I need him so desperately in order to live in the pain and yet still love and give.”
~ Dr. Larry Crabb, Finding God 

Also in Rosenow family news. Meghan graduated from her nursing program this past Wednesday, and Scott had cataract and retinal repair surgery on his eye on Thursday. He is recovering well, but pretty incapcitated for awhile. He will have cataract surgery on the other eye in two weeks. As I type this, a dear friend and long-time supporter-of-our-family-in-practical-ways is downstairs trying to repair the kitchen sink that is falling out of the countertop. We have so much to be thankful for. We are so blessed by such a loving support system, especially in our church family.

We will continue to update as we learn more. I can’t say enough how much the prayers and words of encouragement mean to us, and to those of you who have felt led to help out by sending grocery gift cards or gifts of money, you can’t even imagine what a huge help this is. Thank you with all our hearts.