SamBeller.org

Saturday, December 25, 2004

Merry Christmas & Happy 2005

This Christmas, the Bellers visit Old Style, in fairy tale. You see, at times the things we learn in fairy tales are far truer than CNN or ABC.

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a brown-eyed woman and her silver-headed husband. Their enchanted cottage stood at the end of a narrow lane, north of a large city; a dangerous city despite the bright and beautiful lights. Time passed and the woman had first a son, then a daughter, and soon another son and another daughter.

Each day the six found reasons for laughter. They made each other laugh and told funny stories, made funny faces, and together they bravely marched into the future. Though unknown to the world around them, the family was engaged in a secret fight for the cause of beauty, truth, and goodness—the passions of the one true KING. Each day, the children carried with them a small arsenal, personally equipped with ancient wisdom, which demonstrated itself in kindness, patience, and a keen eye for justice. Although their skills were not fully developed, and sometimes their kindness was mixed with selfish motives, their patience with frustration, and their perception of justice was sometimes skewed. Nevertheless, each week, and often daily, they successfully battled against the Fire Giant as he strove to divert the world from the bright path.  The KING’s ancient wisdom strengthened them at every waking moment and even as they slept.

The KING revealed their journey to them not all at once, but in manageable portions so as not to overwhelm their small minds.  A revelation came showing their first-born son to have miraculously been given royal blood to flow in his veins.  Why the family was bestowed in service to a secret prince was not clear in the beginning. 

Yet, still, the family clung to living for the KING’s desires: beauty, truth and goodness, adding love, joy, and peace to their arsenal.

And so, the enchanted cottage became a palace in which the family, alongside dutiful staff, was transformed into servants, caring for every need of this young prince as they continued in their secret missions in the city. Without intention, many virtues were added to the younger children’s arsenals.  Soon, they became strong and wise solders in their cause.

The first daughter developed a keen discernment of character and an intense love of truth, often expressed in music and drama.

The second son proved himself strong beyond reason, for his limbs were thin. But, his strength came from his arsenal of tenderness, laughter, and love.

The second daughter became quite skilled in patience and compassion. As she was a witness to the young prince’s life of devotion to the KING, this enabled her to care for those in need.

Through the KING and this young prince, Truth was displayed and, somehow, transformed all who were around this young family.  The transformed lives bloomed and blossomed all around their cottage. 

The husband and the wife watched the four young children with wonder and awe as they saw the KING’s riches poured into their lives.

On this day, we pray that you are swept away by Beauty, Truth and Goodness and transformed by Love.

“I am the way, the truth and the life.” John 14:6
“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” John 8:32

Much Love,
The family of the enchanted cottage.

Thursday, November 25, 2004

Happy Thanksgiving !!

From all us Beller People ....

We are thankful for
... being together - David, Kelly, Sam, Tevah, Jacob and Simone
... Sam being well again
... a warm house to sleep in
... food of nearly every flavor in our home at present
... our Lord, in his amazing love and care for our family

and ... all of you ... who love Sam and go to your knees on his behalf.

Take time to be still and see your blessings.

Saturday, November 20, 2004

Sam Home from the Hospital!!

Thank you all for lifting Sam up in prayer.

We were able to bring him home on Saturday just after noon.  He transitioned well to his home ventilator on Friday night and was able to be off of the ventilator all together for 3 hours on Saturday.  He was all smiles about going home.

His muscle and nerve biopsy surgery went well on Friday morning as did the EMG and MRI on Thursday.  However, after all of that, Sam was plenty ready for everyone to stop messing with him.  The EMG showed some nerve malfunction throughout Sam’s body.  That’s new information for us and indicates that his initial brain injury may not be the total source of Sam’s increasing muscle weakness.  The MRI showed the same brain damage that was there as a baby - no change.  It will take several weeks to get results from the biopsy.  We are praying that this will all give us more information to help Sam in some way.

Thank you everyone who brought us meals, helped with the younger three kids and lifted Sam up in prayer.  We are also grateful for God providing great nurses, respiratory therapists and doctors for Sam.

We are thankful that he is home and we are all enjoying just being under one roof! 

Thanks to all of you who have a place in your heart for Sam.  He is truly an instument of God’s grace and an example of purity, innocence, determination and our dependence on our Lord for every breath we take.

2 Corinthians 12:9 - but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

Sam and family.

Thursday, November 18, 2004

Sam's Pneumonia Better, Pray for Procedures

Sam is still in PICU.  His lungs are much clearer than when we arrived on November 9th.  From a respiratory point of view, we are getting very close to being able to go home.  We hope to be home by the end of the weekend.

On Thursday, November 18th, Sam will have an EMG to test for certain muscle disorders and an MRI to observe any changes from previous MRIs.  On Friday, he’ll go into the operating room and have a muscle biopsy to check for muscle disorders/diseases.  Please pray for:
- no complications during the tests
- for a clear outcome from the tests
- a new plan of treatment for Sam if a new diagnosis is found.

Just FYI: In the last few months, several of Sam’s doctors have voiced concern that his brain damage doesn’t provide all the answers to why Sam continues to get weaker every year.  There are several tests that are available now that were not done when Sam was a baby in our search for a diagnosis.  So, we are pursuing these things now to find any missing clues to Sam’s health and hopefully to be able to gain information that will help Sam.  Since he’s in the hospital right now, it is easy to conduct these tests - though unrelated to his treatment for pneumonia.  Please pray for God’s hand in these tests and for the outcome of the tests to be good news!

Thank you for your love and prayers - The Bellers

Monday, November 15, 2004

Sam Improving Slowly in Hospital

Sam started making a slow turn towards recovery this weekend.  His lungs are still full of junk, but better.  PICU doctors want Sam to finish his IV antibiotics in the hospital setting (7-10 days depending on how he’s improving).  This puts us there through Thursday, Nov 18th or as long as Sunday, Nov 21st.  He is having a hard time breathing sitting up right now and is still on the ventilator continuously with added oxygen, six daily nebulizer treatments and 8 daily breathing treatments with a special pulsating ventilator nebulizer followed by CPT (chest percussion).  There is not much time where Sam is just left alone… and during that time, he falls asleep inbetween all the treatments.

We continue to do additional tests while he’s in the hospital to look for another diagnoses for Sam (since we are there, it makes it easy to get this stuff done).  More on this later.

Please pray for Sam:
- lungs to continue to clear and nose to dry up
- to be able to sit up without breathing trouble
- last longer between breathing treatments
- transition from hospital ventilator to home ventilator
- transition back to his normal trach tube
- require no extra oxygen
- tolerate breathing on his own off of all ventilators again for 6-8 hours/day
- for him to just feel good!

Also, please pray for the rest of the family to remain healthy (Tevah has had a stomach virus over the weekend, but is feeling better as of Monday).

David’s parents, Richard and Janie will be arriving on Monday afternoon to man the fort at home, run kids around and keep things sane.  We are SO VERY THANKFUL to their willingness to sacrifice their time to come take over here.

Thank you for your love and concern.
David & Kelly, Sam and kids

Wednesday, November 10, 2004

Sam Is At Medical City PICU

Sam was admitted in the the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit on Tuesday November, 9th.  The doctors are calling this a Broncho-Pneumonia: It is caused by the bacteria Strenotrophamas Maltophilia (not that that helps anyone who’s not a doctor, but it’s interesting trivia). This bacteria is a dinosaur in the pseudemonus family that is resistant to a few antibiotics. It turns out he was on the right antibiotic before we switched to Levaquin over the weekend.

Since his admission, they’ve started an IV for fluids and for giving his antibiotics. He’s on two antibiotics, Bactrim and Cipro.

He’s doing much better on the hospital ventilator. The home ventilator has limited features, but does fine for most occasions. The hospital ventilator has improved his comfort. Sam’s not grunting anymore, and his respirations and heartrate are good. He’s on the ventilator constantly right now and is in no shape to start weaning him off of it.  Finally today he’s beginning to loosen up so he’s getting stuff out. Before today he’s been so tight we couldn’t get anything out of his lungs.

No idea how long he’ll be in the hospital, but at least through middle of next week.

While we’re in, we’ll try to get some “re-diagnosing” tests performed: blood test, perhaps a “needle test” for checking on Myasthenia Gravis. They’ve done a heart sonogram, and have arranged consults with his Neurologist and with a Geneticist. We’ll keep everyone informed.

Thanks for your prayers!