Well this week has definitely been the most exciting yet. Me and Elder Bass were having a great week until we got Ebola (not really but I'm sure it feels similar to how we felt) on Friday.
Our week started out great we had a few really good lessons with some new people that we came in contact with last week. We have a few that are really promising and I am excited to see what happens. We also got our transfer calls on Tuesday and I am getting a missionary named Elder Call who will come join me in Holt. I'm excited to see the things that we can accomplish and I know that The Lord is bringing him to Holt and putting us together as companions for a reason at this time! I am extremely sad to see Elder Bass leave and it has been really hard to see him packing all of his stuff and realize that I will have a new companion tomorrow. Me and Elder Bass worked so well together and we were getting a lot done but I know that Elder Call will be able to pick up right where we left off.
Me and Elder Bass started feeling a little under the weather on Wednesday and so we did what anyone else would do and stocked up on Vitamin C and cough drops and went out and worked! We did a lot of door knocking and helped a family move all of Thursday afternoon and really weren't feeling that sick at all. Friday we both woke up feeling a little more under the weather and by the afternoon we called the mission president's wife and told her that we thought we had the flu... We both had fevers, muscle aches, head aches, and just felt crummy... We laid in bed the rest of the day and were up almost all night sick. I was not able to eat or drink much of anything at all from lunch Friday until we were in the ER no matter how hard I tried. Saturday we were even worse and by Saturday evening we had both thrown up blood (sorry if this is to much detail), me twice and him once, and the mission doctor told us to go to the ER around 10:30pm. We went in and they got us back almost immediately. We were asked several times if we had traveled outside of the country recently or been around someone who had traveled out of the country recently (probably just to make sure we didn't really have Ebola). We were both super dehydrated and so they gave us both fluids and several medicines in an IV. They ended up telling us that we didn't have the flu but had a combination of a few things including a really nasty virus... They gave us a few medicines and me and Elder Bass have slowly started to feel better.
Probably not the best way to end my time with Elder Bass as my companion or to spend my birthday but I can definitely say that it is a birthday I will never forget! I don't think I have ever been wished "Happy Birthday" so many times in the first few hours of my birthday--by several nurses and doctors and a creepy hospital security officer. The members of the ward here did so much for us. We had several people bring us food and other things that we needed and I had a few people from church even drop by birthday presents. It was truly a humbling experience and it made me really glad to be serving in such a great place such as Holt.
One last thought that I was thinking about earlier in the week that I wanted to share with y'all. As I was thinking about my upcoming birthday I was reminded of an experience I had a few years ago when I had the opportunity to volunteer at the MDA camp. I was the counselor to a camper, Michael, who had a birthday one of the days that we were at camp. I remember the red carpet was really rolled out for him. I think "happy birthday" was sang to him over 25-30 times. People were constantly wishing him Happy Birthday and making sure that his day was as good as it could be. I remember overhearing one of the other counselors mentioning to someone else that they had never seen anyone make such a big deal about someones birthday before. The person they asked said that they make such a big deal about birthdays because a lot of the kids that have muscular dystrophy don't live to have many birthdays and so they want to make sure that the birthdays that they do have are the best that they can be. It was truly humbling to me and helped me realize just how thankful I am for the blessings that I have received in my life. And since Michael passed away this past year it was humbling to be reminded of the countless life lessons that I was taught by a young 14 year old boy. It really has helped me to not only be thankful for birthdays but also for every single day that I have been blessed with.
Well, I think that is it for this week. Thank you for all of the birthday wishes and for the continued support and prayers. I promise I am feeling a lot better today than I have been and there are plenty of people here in Michigan that are looking out for me! I hope y'all have a great week.
-Elder Bloskas
P.S. We busted the piñata and took this picture a few days before we almost died. I thought y'all would enjoy seeing that me and Elder Bass got to at least enjoy my birthday a little bit!
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