It's Been a While...

I'm sorry it's been so long since I've last updated. Things have gotten a little bit crazy around here and I feel like I can barely keep up with it all. Chandler started first grade and also has soccer, Thomas started preschool, Anna started dance, I enrolled in three classes at BYU, and seem to have never ending other things pop up with callings, volunteering in Chan's classroom, potty training Anna, planning birthdays (we have one in July, August, September, and October), etc., etc., etc. But I can tell you honestly that, even with all of the stress in my life, I feel great. And that is such a miracle, truly it is.
Stress was my worst enemy before. Things got stressful and my body would shut down. My neck would hurt, my head would pound, my left leg got weaker, my energy was sucked out of me. My vision would distort things and make them look like they were moving when they weren't, my balance went out the window, and the dizziness would worsen. And I still had to push through and complete my daily tasks, and try not to let anyone know how I was feeling because I didn't want anybody worrying. Now, I have all of these stresses, and I get stressed out like any normal human being would, but I don't have this terrible disease dragging me down, and for that, I am so incredibly grateful.
It's been almost 4 months since my liberation and I am literally symptom free. I am stronger and healthier than I have ever been and I am trying really hard to take great care of this body I've been given, because I truly feel like I've been given a second chance.
A lot has happened in the past little while. I ran into a friend recently in Alpine who also has MS and I told her about my liberation. She was very excited and contacted her good friend who just happens to be a vein surgeon. Long story short, her vein surgeon friend took her into a local hospital a few weeks ago and looked at her veins. One of her jugular veins was refluxing blood and another vein near her left ovary (her left leg is her trouble leg) was closed. They weren't able to get the lower vein open because it was spasming so they'll have to do that in the near future, but he did open up her jugular and she has seen amazing results!!! Right here in UTAH!!!!!!!!! Very exciting.
In some not so exciting news, my dear, sweet, amazing sister Andrea was diagnosed with MS. Andrea is the sister who played a HUGE part in making it possible for me to go to Costa Rica and be liberated. She has been such an incredible support to me and is one of the closest friends that I have. Anyway, I am determined to figure out how to get her veins looked at and fixed. My hope is that we can possibly get her into my friends' vein surgeon friend, but we don't know if that is going to work out. But I just don't want her to suffer with this stupid disease like I have. It breaks my heart. It's more difficult to find out that someone you love so dearly has MS than it is to find out the same for yourself. I want her to be able to get liberated and look back on it as a difficult few months, not years. We WILL get her in. It's just a matter of figuring out when and how.
Anyway, so that's where I'm at. Feeling great, sad that my sister is not, and wanting desperately to help her. I've been feeling very overwhelmed the past few weeks though, like I'm stretching myself a little to thin. Gotta figure out how to lighten my load a little bit, but in the meantime, I'm just thankful to not have symptoms on top of it all.