ABKA Nationals Highlights

  Mr. Murry was promoted to sixth degree black belt this morning, a highly deserved honor.  Also, Mrs. Rutledge and Mrs. Lester were promoted to sixth degree.  And the crowd went wild.

  Joshua won first in his kata division.

  Dad won second in both kata and fighting.

  My foot was only hit twice and with no sustaining injury. :)

Bulletin from the Couch #2

  Just a quick couch bulletin before I start on my capstone powerpoint.

  People are constantly asking me what I did to my foot.  I use the story Jason suggested: "I got in a fight with a squirrel."  Sunday, little Owen Beuhler asked me and I told him the squirrel story.  He didn't fall for it.  We shared a laugh and then I started to tell him the truth.  "They took my ligaments out and gave me some ligaments from a dead person.  They screwed the new ligaments into my bone with a screw that will slowly dissolve."  Owen looked at me for two seconds, said, "Uh-uh.  I don't believe you."  Then, being the distractible eight year old that he is, ran off.  I laughed about that all afternoon.

  School is avalanching down upon me.  Please pray that I get it all done and done well.  Pray hard.

  Chera's going to come see us about a month after graduation!  We haven't set a solid date, but I'm already majorly  excited!

So, I had my halfway check-up with Orjala two days early today.  And he says everything is looking great and I can start putting 50% of my weight on it.  Praise the Lord!

A bulletin from the couch

where I have pretty much taken up permanent residence. :)

Everyone but Dad and BonnieJean went down to the Bowie tournament over the weekend.  Samuel placed third in black belt weapons after deciding on the spur of the moment to compete.  Dillian Ramey and Crista Bailey took first and second, respectively, so he's hanging with the big dogs, for sure.  He also placed third in the super fight, coming in behind Greg Partridge and Luke Rosebure.  Ethan didn't fight because it was only a week from his black belt test, but he placed first in adult underbelt weapons and adult brown kata.  He got a nine from Mr. Holzbauer on his weapons kata!  Naomi came to help coach and decided suddenly to compete in kata!  She didn't place, but I'm so proud of her!  And after we all saw the flying pigs, she decided to do fight a 13 year old who didn't have anyone else in her division to fight.  Naomi won!  Joshua placed third in kata and second in fighting.  Isaac placed second in kata.  He lost his first fight by one point to the boy who went on to win the whole division.  Irony.  At the last tournament, Caleb forgot his kata and had to make it up.  This time he remembered it perfectly!

  Before the tournament, Scott and Theresa tested for fourth degree and passed.  I'm so excited for them!  I'm kinda disappointed they didn't do any board breaking, but that's just because I so enjoy watching them do it so well!  I can't believe they managed to test and run a tournament in the same day.

  After the tournament, little Alexis hit my right foot while I was standing in the hallway.  When I unwrapped my foot to take a shower Sunday night it was swollen really bad and black all down the right side and top of it with pooled blood under the skin.  It totally freaked me out.  Dad prayed over it right then and we called Orjala first thing Monday morning.  I didn't go to work or karate.  We unwrapped it Monday afternoon out of pure curiousity and it looked tons better.  I don't think a bruise on a normal, active person would go down that quickly.  It was just an answer to prayer!

  While I was home resting Monday night, Caleb passed his yellow belt test, Dad passed his orange belt test, and Isaac did all of his blue belt test with the exception of fighting and board breaking.  He'll do those Monday night.  I'm so excited for all of them!

  In other fantastic-answers-to-prayer news, I found out today that I passed the Comp II test out!  This means I get to graduate this May!  I am so wildly excited!

  And the saga of Anna's life continues...

  Tuesday was my first day back at school and it went great!  My foot swelled some from being up and around that much, but that's to be expected.  Mama graciously drove me around all day.  We're going to have to do some creative thinking to figure out painting class.  It's not a handicap accessible room.  I'm sure we'll figure something out, though.

  Wednesday was my first day back at work.  I got pretty tired around 2, but still got stuff done.  My bosses are so flexible--bless them!  The foot did fine.

  Wednesday night I unwrapped my foot all the way for the first time to take a shower.  The shower really helped, but having to mess with it that much really hurt.  I went straight to bed afterwards, just exhausted from the shower.  I slept through the night, but the pain has kept up today.  Anytime I put my foot down to crutch anywhere it starts hurting, in extreme waves or throbs.  So, I've skipped my two morning classes to keep it elevated.  I wonder if we didn't wrap it well enough after the shower.  I also wonder (Mama's idea here) if there was still some of that local anesthestic from the nerve block still in my foot.  When I unwrapped it and massauged it in the hot shower, did it increase the circulation enough to get rid of that last bit so now I'm just finally feeling what it's been like all along?

  It's thundering and raining right now, but it's cold.  By tomorrow they say it's going to turn to snow.  Weird March weather.

  I'm gonna catch a few winks before my 2:30 class.  Thanks for praying everybody!

Update on da foot

Hey everybody!  Thanks so much for praying for me and asking about me!

  The main objective of the surgery was successful.  They got my ligaments out and got the new one in.  My doctor, Orjala, said that the ligament that went sideways around the back of my ankle was pretty severely deteriated (sp?) and that the ligament that went sideways around the front of the ankle bone had disintegrated to the point that he could barely find any fibers to pick it out.  They sewed the top of the new ligament onto the bone and tissue and screwed the bottom end of it into the bone.  That's a dissolving screw.  Until that ligament takes a really firm grip it's really important that I don't bear weight on it.  I can bear 25% of my weight on it, which basically means that I don't have to hold the cast up all the time.  If I put my weight on my left leg then i can just rest the right foot on the ground.

  My anesthesiologist, Dr. Boyles, not only put me under general anesthesia but also gave me a nerve block.  I get to keep the nerve block until Monday to help with the pain over the first couple of days of healing.  There's a catheter on the side of my knee that has a little tube running out of it into a medicine pouch that looks just like a bladder, I swear.  I carry the medicine in a little shoulder bag.  I can adjust how many mls an hour I get, but we're trying to keep it pretty low so it will last longer.  All the tubing makes going to the bathroom a little difficult, but I'm managing. :)

  Really the only complication I've had is that I threw up this morning absolutely everything I had put in my mouth since the surgery.  What was weird was it didn't smell at all,  had no stomach acid at all.  This kinda explained why I had been in such pain the whole time--I hadn't ever digested my meds!  I call my anesthesiologist around noon just to check in each day, so we told him how weak I was feeling, how much pain I was in, and how I had thrown up.  He had given me two different prescriptions for pain, one stronger than the other.  He said that the stronger one I had been taking, because it was hurting so bad, can slow down your digestion.  He said that I apparently reacted to it strongly, because it had shut down my digestion completely.  He felt really bad that I hadn't gotten any pain meds.  He had me switch to the lower strength pain med but turn up the the medicine into the nerve block.  I've kept down everything I've eaten since and I can tell that I'm actually getting the pain meds--they make me really sleepy.

  Speaking of which, I'm going to take one now and get to bed.  Love you all!

  Hey everybody!  Praise God, my surgery went well!  I'm exhausted, and in some pain, but everyone's doting on me.  They're so sweet!  Thank all of you for praying!

Spring Break

  So, my spring break has been up in the air longer than I wanted it to, but this has turned out to be a good thing.  God had it all planned.  Tuesday, I had an appointment with Dr. Orjala, the orthopedic dude who perscribed me the phsyical therapy that helped my ankle so much.  I wanted to find out from him if my diagnosis would be considered a preexisting condition when I switch insurance policies in May.  It would be.  So, the grand conclusion of the matter is that I'm having lateral reconstruction with allograft on my right ankle a week from tomorrow.  I'm a little nervious, but mostly I'm excited about the possibility of not spraining my ankle 3-5 times a year for the rest of my life!  The one concern I have is driving after the surgery.  I don't know that I can go very long financially without working, but I'm just not sure how feasible driving will be.