WHAT  IS  YOUR  BLOOD  WORTH?

IT  ALMOST  DIDN'T  HAPPEN

BECOMING  GRATEFUL  IN  THE  MIDST  OF  ADVERSITY

A  REAL  TEAR-JERKING  STORY

The year my sister was dying, I learned more about living that ever before.

As kids, we would fight and argue all the time, yet we were best friends. We would drive our mother to her wits end with our orneriness. The farm we grew up on was the perfect place for us to grow up. As we grew up, married, and had children, we grew apart a bit. There was even a smidgen of competition between us. She was terrible with money and seemed to always need more. This became an issue with some family members. Then she and her husband divorced, and the money struggles continued. Then that terrible day happened when she was diagnosed with terminal cancer at age 47. I was devastated and determined to find a cure for her. We tried both conventional and some not-so-conventional treatments. Nothing worked, and a year later we buried my sister. Read More

A couple years back, my mother was diagnosed with cancer. It was terminal, but chemotherapy was recommended for pain and maybe a few more months of life. I took mother to her treatments twice a week. My first thought when I saw this place was, “What a gloomy place.” Most of the patients didn’t look like they had long to live. But as time passed and I began to notice the interaction of those patients between each other, I was really surprised. I would see these people giving encouragement to one another. This was something to behold – a terminally ill patient giving hope to another patient. One patient was particularly giving and then stopped coming. I assumed he got better and didn’t need the treatment anymore. The next day I found out he had died. This hit me hard. He was always so happy and encouraging to others. It finally hit me. He was actually feeding off others. Read More

I was 50 years old, and I couldn’t read a newspaper. I had never read a book. I avoided meaningful conversations with others. And I had no idea how the government worked. Oh yes, I was a high school graduate, but I never got out of the 2nd grade reading level. I didn’t cause trouble in school, so they just let me move on to the next grade. My only salvation was having that high school diploma which enabled me to get bottom end jobs. You can’t imagine a life where you always have to hide the fact that you can’t read. You get really good at deception. Read More

I have always struggled in life. I’ve dealt with weight problems, health problems, a broken marriage, depression, and trouble making it from one month to another financially. But three years ago, something happened that has really made a difference in my life. I was asked, and accepted, a request to deliver hot meals two days a week to the home-confined elderly. This was exactly what I needed. I spent so much time just dwelling on my problems, but my new little job delivering meals two days a week really started changing things. Read More