"What is that? Nothing, I'm sure."

This is the day that The Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it.
This is also the day that this blog shifts from a blog about God's work in Africa to God's work in me.
Of course, I have written blogs along the way about what God was doing in my own heart, struggles I was facing in my life, things He was teaching me personally. However, this blog is about to go to a whole new level of personal.

Some may say, "How can you share that? How can you put that all out there?"  Well, I have been doing that all along the way. Others might not process things the way I do. I am a writer. I always have been, though at times in my life I allowed myself to get too busy. As a wise woman told me recently, "Your journey will not look like anyone else's. Don't make it anyone else's but yours." Others may retreat to a cave within themselves. That is not me, at least not at this point. I am a writer.

So to begin, we must go back to the beginning. At the beginning of 2014, I felt a lump in my left breast.  I think I blew it off.  To be more precise though, my husband felt the lump one day in ?January or February.  That is the day we took mental note of it to keep checking on it.

Thoughts like, "I'm too young for that to be anything." "I have nursed all three of my children for a year each. That is supposed to help prevent anything." "I don't have time for that. We have too much work to do. I have young teammates to encourage and mentor as they learn language."

As if to show me that He had all those things under control that I thought I had to be there for, God began pulling us away from our town. March had a homeschool conference, but we had to go up early to get Visas done and for us all to see the dentist. A one week conference turned into a two week trip away from home. Then we had the opportunity to go to some training in Zambia in April and May. We took a few days before the conference to vacation a couple of days down to Victoria Falls and before that we had to go up early to get Mariama to the doctor for her boils. When the training was over, we had some college students come join our team for a few weeks and their orientation kept us in the capital a few more days. One month of training turned into almost two months away from our home. While we were away during this time, our teammates had been going out to share in villages with a local brother, and they had been able to see many open doors and two baptisms. I was humbled. God did not really need me. God was going to do the work whether I was there or not.

During the time that those college students were there, amidst all of the activity we had going on, in the quiet moments, once again the lump was felt. Not that it had ever gone away, but my husband and I began to grow more concerned. Rephrase. I was not concerned because I was still rationalizing. In addition to all the arguments I gave earlier, I said to myself, "It's just hormones or something. It somehow has something to do with pre-menstruation."  My husband grew more insistent that I go get it seen about in the capital. I reassured him that I would when we went up for a retreat and then our supply shopping. I would go for my routine checkup. He wanted me to let our medical friends know what was going on. I made a passing mention in an email to them about other things that I would be having something suspicious checked out.

After the retreat, we went to the capital for a few days of vacation. Then we began some grocery shopping and doctor visits. One of those was to see my doctor, who had delivered both Mariama and Lydia-Ann. As I sat waiting to see him, my heart began to be heavy within me. I knew something was about to change. I knew I was going to leave there different.  I knew....