CONNOR UPDATE

Dear Ones who have held the intention of healing and courage for Connor and his family,

Below is the latest update on his progress, and even with a few setbacks, Connor and the Dunham’s will soon be able to return to Alaska.

I have been playing – with the help of a sister-writer here in Port Townsend – with two new made up words: consti-patience and antici-patience.

Consti-patience is similar to impatience, wanting life to go as we want. We force it along angered by our helplessness and feel backed up with emotion, regret, resentment, resistance, and despair… almost immobilized, and for sure depressed. Our negative emotions take us hostage and we feel blind-sided by life’s challenging circumstances.

Alicia, modeling for the circle of support that surrounds her, has taken on with such AMAZING GRACE the journey from consti-patience to antici-patience. She has found fiber for the soul and has moved free with forward and backward steps. She now sits in antici-patience.

Antici-patience demands a dance across the fertile void. You can allow yourself to fall in the pit swallowed up by all your limiting thoughts, or do ‘a-void-dance’ by choosing mindfully where to place your energy while accepting your humanness. Alicia is maneuvering a tiring path, making it as smooth as possible by marrying the joyful thoughts of longing and intention, those of finally being able to go home, with those of being fully present. She has taken this on as an exercise, a spiritual discipline, an opportunity to notice and see infinitesimal positive steps forward. Joy is everywhere because she knows how to savor the everyday miracles, antics, and joys of her children in this moment, exhaustion and all.

Alicia calls up from only God knows where the patience and focus that is called for right here and right now, and stretches to make room to accept her shortcomings, her boredom, her irritations, and her weariness. Grace carries Alicia, Connor and all of us through the ‘unexpecteds’ and wonderings that shower us each day. Beyond that, we get to choose.

Although the next mile marker is on the horizon, in sight and we are getting close, we must focus on our feet deliberately, meditate on the sound of each step, each breath, and be her now. Please don’t let go of their hand yet.

So, with great antici-patience, we all continue to vision Connor running with his little brother, Carson, in their own back yard in Alaska at just the perfect time. Until then, we breathe, we pray, we welcome all the wonders of life.

In Joy, Rhonda 360.385.5850

Here is Alicia’s UPDATE ON CONNOR:

Hello to all,

I hold my breath every time Connor has a sniffle, falls down, or complains that something hurts. Yet with each day that passes, I am grateful that Connor has become a curious, energetic, and inquisitive normal two year old. All the signs of the amazing journey he has been on have faded and although my fears will never be completely gone, I am learning not to let them overpower my daily life.

The last few weeks have been hard. We are all looking forward to going home and as time gets closer the days seem to go on forever. Both boys got a stomach bug a couple of weeks ago and are just now starting to get back to normal. This hit Connor worse than it hit Carson because of his weakened immune system. Over the last 2 weeks, Connor has lost about 3 pounds from not wanting to eat and not being able to keep much down. Connor had a doctors appointment today and we were all hoping that they would say we were free to go back to Alaska but his blood tests and weight were not quite where they would like them to be. The doctors are reasonably certain that his weight drop is due to being sick and that it is just taking his body a little longer to get back to normal. Therefore, they are postponing giving us an exact date until his appointment next week. They would like to see his weight go up and some of his other labs a little more stable before sending us home. If everything looks better next week it is a good possibility that we could be home before the end of the month!! Even thought this is not exactly what I wanted to hear I want to be in the best place for Connor. When God feels it is time for us to be home He will make it happen. So until then we will patiently wait until next week and pray that Connor’s appetite continues to improve.

The encouragement that continues to surround us is unbelievable. I just added up all the Alaska Airline Miles that we have received just from everyone using our phone number when checking out and it is over 20,000 miles. That is enough for a free airline ticket for Steve! Thank you all for your support.