The month that Ken finished his Master's, I went in for surgery and they told me I was pregnant and had to have a medical termination.  "You can't carry this baby," the doctors told me.  "Your life is in danger."

"I'm not pregnant," I told them.  It had been ten years since our last child was born.  I was all through with babies and diapers and lack of sleep.  All of our children were in school.  I had finished a degree in Pre-Med and had plans to go to medical school.  But God had a different plan.

I had learned my lesson about unexpected pregnancies when I was pregnant with our third daughter.  God decides when life begins.  I explained to the doctors that I had lost a child twelve years earlier, and that I wasn't going to lose another one.  "I will carry this baby."

"You can't," they told me.

I did.  But to tell the truth, it did almost kill me.  I had a tumor inside my heart.  It was robbing me of oxygen and strength.  I had open heart surgery after Jonathan was born.  Everything turned out fine in most ways.  I didn't get to go to medical school. I didn't get back on my feet for years.  But he was worth it.  I wouldn't change a thing.

He was like a toy.  We just passed him around.  It was a lot of fun.  I teased him after he was grown.  "You didn't learn to walk until you were three or four because someone was holding you all the time."

But I was done.  No more babies.  It's a bad thing to lose your health.  But there are a lot of things that are worse.  I am thankful for my four children.

1 Thessalonians 5: 18  "In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you."






Ken went on to teach an NEO for twenty eight years.