Category Archives: Adult Children

And we thought yesterday was busy…

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Today began shortly after midnight when Nelson woke to visit the bathroom. His comments to Ann Sophie didn’t make sense, and though the apartment was very warm, he was shivering. He asked for one blanket and then two. When she felt him, he was burning up–never a good sign.

He was also struggling to breathe, even after the left lung had been drained yesterday afternoon. Ann Sophie said he was doing rapid panting in a strange way and was unsure of himself. 

Ann Sophie called 911, and within 5 minutes the EMTs were at the apartment door. Baby Will awoke with all the confusion, and in this panicky moment, Ann Sophie knew she couldn’t go with Nelson to the hospital. decided to call an ambulance. The EMTs took over with confidence, and tending to Nelson’s needs. His oxygen level was at 80 and heartbeat dangerously slow. He’d been using Luke’s oxygen at 3.0 with no help, so they put it at 5.0. Nelson willingly went with them.

At the ER, they worked to stabilize him but all the new developments were overwhelming him faster than they could counteract them. After several tests and more blood work, they suspected a blood clot in the lung.

Time went by and when they were unable to determine the main problem, they admitted him to the hospital–for the third time. His swelling, which seemed to be lessening just the day before, seemed much worse. It was in his face, arms, chest, back, legs, feet, all of it. He was still panting, quickly becoming unnerved and anxious by his effort to breathe.

Unwilling to give him anything to ease his stress because it would suppress his heart further, they did more tests. What they found was a full left lung, the one that had been drained just hours beforehand. They removed another two+ liters of fluid to relieve his breathing stress, but that didn’t seem to help. The cancer was producing fluid at a much faster rate than before, and in addition to the lung fluid had begun filling the area around his heart, a matter of grave concern.

His blood pressure was extremely low, and they couldn’t get it up. They began considering a risky surgery to drain fluid from around the heart.

By this time Ann Sophie, who had been up through most of the night, wanted desperately to be with her husband, but who would watch baby Will? I had gone back to Michigan to receive our British relatives, son Hans and his family of eight. They were coming to the USA for the first time in four years to join the rest of us on a family vacation. So there was no extra pair of hands to help in Minnesota.

That’s when the guy who has been our saving grace again and again in these last weeks suddenly appeared saying, “I’ll take care of the baby. You go see Nelson.”

Luke worked his magic once more, and he stayed throughout the day, working hard to win Will’s approval, which was no small struggle. As Ann Sophie sat next to Nelson in the ICU holding his hand, she sent back a message that there were15 people in his room at once, working to save his life. For us, that confirmed he was in the best place he could possibly be. 

Nelson’s blood pressure was dangerously low, breathing was still labored, and their next step would be to intubate him. We prayed against that, a prayer God chose to answer

Throughout this day there have been ups and downs. They thought it was a blood clot in the lungs but then disproved that. Then they made the decision to drain some of the fluid from around his heart. We were overjoyed when the report came
back that the procedure was successful and his labored breathing had finally eased. A shunt was left in, in case future draining is necessary.

We are well aware that Nelson could have died last night. Since he is still very much alive, we’re singing praises to the Lord, who chose once again to let him live.

„The Son gives life to whom he will…“ (John 5:21)

Commentary from Nelson on a tiring day

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We have received some good help today. As I’m writing this, I’m sitting on a bed in a small room like any other hospital room. There’s a TV and snacks and a little table with the IV drip stand like usual, only this time it’s for chemotherapy and immunotherapy.

Picture this. I come to the hospital at 6:45 in the morning for a blood draw for them to continue testing things. Then I go into another room to talk to a doctor for a while about medications, making sure we should move forward with the chemotherapy.

After that, at about 9:30 AM, I come to this room. Today it took two nurses and one doctor five different attempts to find a functioning vein in one of my arms so they could run the IV. I guess I’ve been stuck enough times to make it difficult to find success.

Once they get that squared away, they begin emptying one bag of liquid into me after another. The amazing thing is that the contents of the bags are poison in one sense. After this, I’m not supposed to kiss my wife, and when I go to the bathroom, I’m supposed to flush the toilet two times after sitting down to pee, because the fluid is so radioactive. But apparently this stuff is death to cancer.

It’s not cheap, though. I’m told that the bag containing immunotherapy costs more than $30,000. Can you imagine spilling it by mistake?

I have five of these chemo/immuno infusions scheduled over the next many weeks, each one with a CAT scan in between to monitor progress going forward. Today I’m receiving the second of the five. In three weeks I’ll get the next one.

All the testing, scans, appointments, consultations, studies, and everything else comes down to me sitting here in this hospital bed with that clear liquid going into my blood. And that’s the cancer-killer. Isn’t that weird?

After the three hour infusion was over today, I was scheduled for another draining of my lung called a thoracentesis. This time it was the left side instead of the right. In the four months since this medical drama began, I’ve only had the left lung drained once, and there wasn’t much extra fluid there then. Today they pulled out 2.2 liters—breaking my old record for biggest draw ever, which was 1.6 liters. No wonder I needed oxygen all the time. There will be pain for a few days every time I take a breath, but that will gradually subside. And meanwhile, I’m able to get more air.

It’s been a tiring day, but as I said, we received some good help today.

“In the Lord…my heart trusts, and I am helped.” (Psalm 28:7)

Nelson’s Sister Linnea, Conclusion

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All Christians are called to disciple others. We’re all supposed to influence each other for good. But some people do it more than most, and Nelson is that kind of Christian. (I wonder how many of you reading this right now would say Nelson discipled you in some way? Probably a lot!)

I’m not sure who I would be without my big brother. I definitely would not have gone to YWAM, so I wouldn’t be Adam’s wife and we wouldn’t have our six wonderful kids.

I’m also not sure where I would be spiritually. As a kid, I thought of Christianity as a lifestyle. We were good people and we went to church every Sunday because it was the right thing to do. But Nelson showed me that a true life of faith is so much more than that! It’s an adventure.

It’s about meeting with God when you first wake up. You open your Bible, read and pray, but you also listen. You wait for God to speak, and you trust that He will guide you. You expect that God has good things planned for you, and you look for His hand in every circumstance.

People in YWAM have almost no money, but somehow they go all over the world! I watched Nelson do it and then I did it, too. During my YWAM years, God took me to China, Taiwan, Nepal, India, Japan, Thailand, and New Zealand. In between, I lived in Hawaii and then Montana.

I held the sweetest orphan babies, hiked through the Himalayas, and met Christians who had left everything familiar to be lifelong missionaries overseas.

Those years shaped me in a way nothing else could have. How can you complain about a van without air conditioning after you’ve watched a mother in Calcutta nurse her baby while lying in the gutter on the side of the road on a 90 degree afternoon? I will always be grateful for the gift of YWAM in my twenties and the brother who encouraged me to go.

Right now our children are ages 3 to 13, and they all love their Uncle Nelson. We live way down in Florida, but Nelson still finds a way to visit. He has always gone out of his way for people, including us. Our six year old is named after his uncle, and out of all our kids, little Nel asks me about his Uncle Nelson the most.

I read updates from the blog to the kids in the mornings, and we then pray together for him and Auntie Sophie and baby Will. Even little kids understand the power of Nelson’s thankful spirit right now. Even now in this season of battling cancer, Nelson continues to influence the people who know and love him, always toward God and His faithfulness.

I am thankful to have a little time in Minnesota this week, to chat with Nelson and Sophie and hold baby Will as much as possible! And I’m thankful for the things I’ve learned from my big brother—mostly that a life following God is the best kind of adventure, full of laughter and strong coffee, wild stories in faraway places and friendships that never end.

It’s a life of peace and gratitude even when circumstances are crushingly hard. Nelson has suffered through so much this year, but he is still the Nelson we all know and love. Still strong, still optimistic, still up for a good conversation about what God is doing in our lives.