the whole story.

i'd be lying if  I said I wasn't thinking about the short two months I had as the start of my mission experience ALL the time. whenever my mind wanders, it heads on back to the six weeks I spent in mexico trying (key word) to learn Spanish, and the 4 weeks I spent in texas, mostly being so sick but somehow finding a way to spread the gospel here and there. when I think about these two months, it's a little baffling. crazy is the understatement of the year, and after everything I went through, there is NO way I could ever even think about denying that our father in heaven has his hand in EVERYthing. this is pretty much what happened.

April 8, 2014. I said goodbye to my family and the life I was comfortable with to head out on an 18 month adventure that just so happened to start in mexico city, mexico. I had to switch flights three different times, and sleep on the airport floor. not to mention I was sad and alone and super confused at this point as to why I ever thought a mission sounded like a good idea.

 I arrived in mexico and met my best friend, Hermana bleyl. we hit it off absolutely instantly and she made my experience in the ccm one of the best experiences in my life. flash forward about 5 weeks jam packed with a lot of classes, some sketchy meals, times when I laughed so hard I cried, and overall gaining a stronger testimony and being so overjoyed with my decision to serve a mission.

that's pretty much when things started to go downhill. I started feeling pretty crappy for reasons still unknown. I started throwing up and I passed out on the night before I was scheduled to fly out for texas. the doctors in the clinic in mexico wrote that off as me being dehydrated because i'd been sick, and that sounded like a good enough reason for me as long as they would let me fly out when I was supposed to. that night we flew on a red eye flight to Houston, where I oh so charmingly threw up on the plane. we finally made it to the mission home and I dismissed my mission presidents wife's questions about my health, not knowing at this point that I was sicker than I thought.

I was assigned to labor in Dalhart, Texas with Hermana rocha as my trainer. I was in love with the area and my trainer taught me SO much and we had so much fun together. we pink-washed the area, and it was in desperate need of some love when we got there. needless to say we had our work cut out for us!

 the first two weeks were hard. we would leave the apartment after study time and i would throw up on the side of the road a couple of times which would force us to come home. i basically slept, waking up only to make appointments and throw up. i passed out a few more times and i was really starting to get concerned because this was starting to seem like a bigger deal than i thought it was. at this point i was in contact with my mission presidents wife and the mission doctor in salt lake. things continued like this until my third week there, when one day i woke up and felt pretty good. i didn't throw up or pass out for six days, and i thought i was on the other end of this sickness. we worked our butts off, making up for the time we lost. the lord blessed us SO much in that week, we met some amazing people and were blessed enough to commit an amazing lady to baptism. things were going so well for us, we were being blessed like crazy. then one morning i woke up and wasn't feeling so good anymore. we had district meeting in dumas, about 40 minutes away. we had district lunch after, and i was not feeling too hot at ALL. we headed back to Dalhart and the minute i walked into the apartment i started throwing up again, and basically didn't stop for the rest of the day and all night. the next day we contacted my mission presidents wife and she told us to drive to Amarillo to the urgent care there, about two hours away, and to leave as soon as possible.

upon arriving at the urgent care, we learned that i was crazy anemic and that i was still losing blood, but they couldn't determine where i was losing it from. they called the ER before we left so they would be expecting us. we got to the hospital and they checked my blood level again and found that i was short about half the blood in my body. i was admitted to ICU and received a blood transfusion that night. the next day i was scoped and the source of the bleeding was found. because i had been throwing up so much, my stomach was producing a lot of acid. the acid burned a hole in my stomach and an ulcer developed. the ulcer was bleeding and that's where i was losing so much blood from. because my body was lacking so much blood, my heart was working like triple time to keep me going. when i arrived at the hospital, my doctor later informed me, i was not far from a heart attack. i spent a few nights in ICU and then was released. i was sent home to recover because the doctors said i was in no condition to do the things needed of me in the mission field, at least not for a couple months.

i learned A LOT. through every single day during this time Hermana rocha and i had experiences that couldn't be written off as anything short of tender mercies from heavenly father. never before have i known so strongly that my father in heaven has a unique plan for me and that this, even though i have no idea how right now, is part of it. i have the strongest testimony that God puts people in our paths for our benefit. my companion was my companion for a specific reason that was made so clear to me while i was in the hospital. there is no way that any person could have known how much we would have needed each other, there is no doubt in my mind that was divine.

i also learned SO much about faith. i don't know why that happened to me. i don't know how i could go my whole life and be as healthy as can be, never have any problems, and then the minute i get away from home have everything go wrong. but i do know that there is a reason i went through that and that i'm home right now. i don't know what it is, but i don't have to because the lord does and he is in control. my life up to this point has pretty much gone how i thought it was going to. i haven't been thrown any crazy curve balls and I've been incredibly blessed. BUT i feel so much gratitude to my father in heaven for this trial. i have never REALLY had my faith tested before. this experience has taught me that no, life isn't always going to go as planned. sometimes things are going to happen and it's going to be really hard and we're not going to understand. but that is the time when we have to rely on the atonement of Jesus Christ, because he has literally been there and experienced everything we're going through. he understands. and he loves us. and ALL we have to do is turn all our pain and hard days over to the lord and we can have peace. and that is what I've learned in these past few months.

i wouldn't trade these things that i have learned for ANYTHING. i feel so incredibly blessed to be where i am in life right now, and to be able to say that i know this church is true. I've never known anything like i know that. i know that god is mindful of EVERY one of us and our individual situations. i know that Jesus Christ is the savior and redeemer of the world without this experience, my testimony wouldn't be where it's at. i am so blessed.