Janet’s update

How are you all?

We’re thankful that my plastic surgeon expects my follow up surgery to be done later this year! I am waiting for confirmation of a date! This will involve day surgery by 2 teams of surgeons – refining of transplanted oral flesh and 3 implants being put in my right maxillary (upper jaw), in preparation for teeth. After waiting for 2 1/2 years this is good news. 👍

There is a possibility that a theatre could close unexpectedly if staff call in sick, in which case my surgery could be cancelled (active cancer patients take priority over reconstructive surgery patients who have had tumours removed previously). We are hoping and praying everything goes smoothly and to plan. We will let you know the date of surgery when we finally hear. 🙏

The following update is the latest sent out by Sarah after 24 years of Treatment Resistent Depression, leading to Direct Brain Stimulation surgery in June this year. 💛

“Hello friends and fam,

I’m thankful for you! It’s now just over 2 months since surgery. Since I last wrote the improvement in energy and depression symptoms has been sustained 😁

Here are a few things I’m very thankful for:

• Just being able to wake up! ☀️ without complete physical exhaustion and without being overwhelmed by longing for death
• Genuinely looking forward to spending time with family and friends for the first time in a very long time! 🤗 (I was so drained by ppl before that I dreaded it and was in bed for days after or in between seeing fam or a friend – didn’t share this with most ppl)
• Having the energy to cook and bake again 👩🏼‍🍳🧁& enjoying housework & basic life tasks I wasn’t up to before
• Enjoying going for bush walks and being able to appreciate/notice nature more without my thoughts being in another, darker place 🌿

I still need to take things fairly slowly, still can’t feel positive emotions and I get frequent surges of anxiety that I’m going to get worse again.
I’d appreciate continued prayer for me to learn how to live each day with a shifting internal landscape and to manage my anxiety.

I’d also appreciate prayer physically – I recently managed to slip on the muddy bank of a creek, fell and bashed my head 🤦🏼‍♀️ My newly operated-on head did not appreciate it – I have a mild concussion with bad continuous headache, some nausea and quite fatigued but no signs of a bleed in the brain. Please pray it settles down soon and the knock my brain got hasn’t negatively affected anything from surgery 🤖

I zoomed with Dr Doshi and he said the leads in the brain wouldn’t have moved from where they should be but sent me for a CT scan to be sure.

Thanks and love to you 💛”

Sarah still has some fatigue at times but we are grateful to God that her other symptoms of concussion have eased and she is less anxious about the wires in her brain having been disturbed.

We are making the most of our last 19 weeks in Cross Culture, enjoying time with our church family and friends, while Sam is busy with normal ministry and team responsibilities, preparing for a pastors’ retreat, a leaders’ retreat (including all volunteer leaders and families), and an elders’ retreat day in the next few weeks. 🙏

Love

Janet and Sam