One
of the most stressful events of our mission was Joe being sick. It started with a cold on Aug. 21. He felt bad for a few days then began to feel
better. A week and a half later he was
progressively getting sicker again. He
had flu-like symptoms along with a constant productive cough. We decided to see a doctor. Here it is easy to see a G.P. We call and usually get in the same day. Joe had no fever, clear lungs, no sore throat
and clear ears, just a bad cough, all over body aches and extreme fatigue. The
doctor said he just had a virus and to wait it out but he would do a blood test
for infection. Then, since we don’t have
the universal health insurance here, the doctor says it will be 27.60 euros,
takes out his wallet, pockets the cash and prints us a receipt! Two
and a half weeks with a virus seemed a long time to us but the medical
community here is very conservative
in treatment, i.e. have an ear infection? It will just clear itself up with
time, no treatment needed even if your eardrum bursts.
The
next day the doctor’s office called in some alarm and said Joe’s infection
levels were very elevated, they thought he had pneumonia and needed an
antibiotic. That weekend Joe was so very
sick; fever, clammy skin, coughing, body aches, feet swelling, and high insulin
needs. Amoxicillin for five days was the
drug of choice here. The senior couple
brethren gave Joe a blessing. I tried to
exercise my faith and not worry but wasn’t very successful. I was frightened.
In 3
days Joe began to feel better. We
breathed a sigh of relief. He was still
coughing, had very little energy and his chest still hurt but seemed to be on
the mend.
A
week after finishing the Amoxicillin he began to get worse again. I had been worried
that 5 days of antibiotics weren’t enough and it wasn’t. We made another trip to the doctor. He now had a low-grade fever and his lungs
weren’t clear. We went for another blood
test and also a chest x-ray, and got another prescription. This time he got
Doxycycline for 7 days. The chest x-ray clearly showed pneumonia.
By
this time Joe had been sick for a month.
I was frustrated with the conservative treatment and worried the
antibiotic was still inadequate.
President and Sister Bunnell showed up at our house to check on Joe. (President Bunnell was a pediatric physician
assistant in his previous life!) He
checked Joe over and said everything looked fine. We obtained the chest x-ray which was then sent
to Frankfurt to the Area Medical Director.
He concurred that it was definitely pneumonia, that hopefully the
Doxycycline would cure it, but if not, recommended another antibiotic which is
the drug of choice in the USA for pneumonia.
A
week later Joe was clearly on the mend again.
We prayed that he would get completely well this time. He wasn’t coughing, but was exhausted all the
time and had lost 20 pounds.
It
has taken another two weeks for Joe to be up all day without needing several
rests/naps. Six and a half weeks after
it all began, Joe is feeling good and back to work.
Although
medical care in the Netherlands is modern and available, it’s enough different
that it was very stressful to deal with.
What if we needed to go to the emergency room? Where is that? How do we get treatment we deem
adequate? Communicating is harder
because we don’t speak Dutch. Thank
heavens they speak some English! For that
we are so grateful!
It
has been a learning experience. We are
even more grateful for good health, and for loved ones, friends and
missionaries who prayed earnestly for him.
We are grateful for Sister Esther Fletcher who told us she had put his
name on the temple prayer roll. She is a
sweet, kind, caring soul with Down’s Syndrome who is serving a mission here
with her parents. Our dear friends, the
Oostveens, came over to check on us and Jan loaned us his stethoscope and pulse
oximeter (he works on an ambulance crew : ) so I could monitor Joe’s illness. We learned patience as we took several weeks
off from our mission work. That is so
hard!!! We learned to find different ways
to approach our missionary work while he was recovering so we could still
serve. (When Nephi’s steel bow broke he
found a different way. He made a wooden
bow and arrows. Not as good as steel but
kept them from starving. He created a “work around”). We couldn’t do all the usual work in the
usual way but we managed to find ways to do the core work of our mission calling. We learned more about praying with real
intent. And we learned to say “thy will
be done” as we prayed for healing….. and perhaps that is the most important
lesson of all. 
