Surgery on Wednesday 12/17 at 7:30 a.m.

Dear friends,

I just drank my last drink of water and finished a snack. I am not allowed to eat or drink after midnight. Greg and I leave for the hospital at 5:30 a.m. I check in at 6:00 and surgery is scheduled for 7:30. It is supposed to take about 1 1/2 hours. Everything is straight forward and my doctor will also take a very careful look around inside my bladder to see if she can determine the reason for the blood that has been showing up in my urine. If she notices anything, she will call a urologist to come and look and take care of whatever is wrong. Other than that she is fixing the anterior wall of my pelvic muscle which has a hernia in it, allowing my bladder to colapse in. She will put in Bovine mesh which heals well and will also put a sling under/around my Urethera to prevent the sagging of that also.

We expect to be done and home by early afternoon, and I plan to just lay low and rest. Jenni is coming home ready to help me Thursday night and I was able to get most things done today that I needed to. Surgery eve is always a strange time for me. I have to keep telling myself not to drink or eat before we leave. Putting trust in the team of medical folks tomorrow is a little strange, but I like to just rest in the Lord as I put my trust in them. Often we get to share our lives somewhat before and after the surgery. I hope Greg and I can be an encouragement to someone tomorrow.

Please pray for my surgeon's skill to be in top form, and that the Lord will guide her hands. Pray for me to recover well and it would be nice to come home without a catheter. Pray that if there is anything for them to find in my bladder, that they would see it. Pray for me to have no clotting problems now that I am off Coumadin. And pray for speedy healing and also for Jenni to be able to get in even though they are expecting snow Wed. and Thurs.

And please pray for those in Arrissa, India who are suffering tremendous persecution.

I will update you tomorrow on how it went. Thank you again for praying! Blessings- Nancy