Are you pregnant? and other fun experiences....

Okay, so I'm sure that you are all freaking out about my subject line. It's a joke. I'm not actually pregnant, and there is a story behind this. I will get to that in a second.

So this week was probably the worst week of my mission. Nothing could compare to it, I'm sure. I got really sick this week. I won't go into too many details, but I got some kind of stomach virus and couldn't keep any food or water in my body. The doctor was pretty concerned that I was getting majorly dehydrated and so she decided I needed to go to the hospital. I'm sure you can all imagine I wasn't too happy about that. I hate going to the doctor. My grandma will tell you all that I am stubborn about going and usually wait until it's worse than it should be. But this was kind of scary, so I took care of right away. So after not having worked all week, on Thursday I had to go to the hospital. Now, I don't know if you all remember, but I'm in the Philippines. Now, I love this place and sometimes I can't imagine going back to America, but let me just tell you that medical care here is NOTHING the same as the states. You all know, I know a lot about hospitals, I've spent a lot of time in them in my lifetime (not for myself of course) and my mom was a nurse. Hospitals are like my thing. This was pretty much everything you can imagine about a horror hospital. Okay, so it wasn't quite that bad, but let me give you some details. There were cockroaches in my room, the walls were leaking some kind of water, there was a crucifix hanging on the wall, I had to carry around my own IV bag (no carts or anything), the nurses never wore gloves to do anything, including removing my IV (yeah, she got my blood all over her hand... gross), they don't have any clean water ( you have to bring your own), they don't do anything nice for the person that has to stay all night with you and the food was... let's just say... anything but desirable. Back to my subject line: So my doctor is actually an OB-GYN. Her husband was our mission doctor but he is working abroad now. So she is taking over for him for awhile until their family moves to meet him. So because they all know she is an OB-GYN, EVERY SINGLE PERSON kept asking me if I was pregnant. It was ridiculous! I kept politely saying no, until finally I got kind of frustrated and said, "Um, no, I'm a missionary...", while I showed them my tag. I'm sure that didn't mean much to me, but I needed to make sure they all knew that I was definitely not pregnant. All in all it was a pretty traumatic experience. It scared me into NEVER getting sick again while I'm here, and hopefully never again in my whole life. It was also an incredibly frustrating experience since I wasn't able to go out and work. It was awful. But it also provided Sis. Elwood and I with some great laughs amidst all the craziness. And now, I'm totally better. The doctor thinks I just got the virus out and once I was rehydrated, she let me go home. After a little rest, I got back to work and I am SOOOO happy to be back. I was going crazy.

So that was really the majority of my week. I stayed in. I'm sorry to admit that, but that was my reality. But now we have these amazing goals for this next week. We kind of had to start over with this area because our investigators just weren't progressing. We're also supposed to be looking for the wealthy and the learned so that we can baptize leaders and not just people that will end up as a financial burden for the church or inactive. We have an area in our area that is perfect for that and so we are excited to find new people. We already have! And we have hope for a lot of referrals. Pray for us!!! :)

Well anyway, unfortunately that is all there really is to report about this week. All the illness stuff took a bit of a toll on my companion and our companionship. We ended up having a pretty intense talk about everything and then probably one of the best experiences of my mission talking everything out. I love Sister Elwood. She is amazing. She is teaching me so much. She is such a great example to me of faith and loyalty and dedication, and everything. She really is just incredible. And we have a lot of fun too. We have had some great experiences together, teaching, talking, etc. She's awesome! Next Monday we have transfer announcements (can you believe it?!) and she may transfer out. I'll be pretty bummed. I never feel like I am with a companion long enough to learn everything I need to. But the Lord knows best!

I love you all so much and hope that everyone on the other side of the world is healthy and happy and loving life. I am!

Love you all!

Sister Jackson

P.S. I know I said I would do pictures, but this computer is being retarded and I'm having problems, so hopefully next week! Love you lots!