Jacob's Journey

Words cannot describe what I felt the morning I heard the news. I woke up, laid in bed, reached for my iPhone and checked my email. I started deleting spam and saw a message from Sara Woodward, my dear friend and roommate from Snow College. She entitled the subject: Jacob. I knew it had to be good. Her message was simple, only a few sentences.

"For those of you who don't know yet or haven't heard, our Jacob was diagnosed with leukemia this last weekend."

My heart felt heavy as I read the sentence over and over again. Tears welled in my eyes. The next sentence is what probably surprised me the most.

"If you have to pick your cancer, this is the one to pick. It has an overall survival rate of 95% We are just facing over 3 years of Chemotherapy."

Optimistic. The best kind to get. Of course she would look at the glass as half full, she always did.

"We stayed in the hospital for 5 days and we're home now. We started a blog to try and keep everyone up to date. It's not totally up to date yet (sorry about that) but it's coming."

Five days. This is just the beginning and already five days! And she's apologizing to us for not keeping us up to date. Of course we want to know but to apologize to us! I was set back, astonished, couldn't talk.

"Thank you for all of your love and prayers. I can not tell you what that means to us.
We love you,
~Sara Woodward"

Gratitude. Of course I would pray! It's the least I could do.

I read the email over and over again. I cried in my bed thinking of her family and her sweet Jacob. He's the oldest of three, yet still so very young.

I have been asked recently about my birthday and what I would like and honestly I would like everyone to donate to Sara's family. Even with their insurance it will still cost them nearly $20,000 out of pocket. If you cannot afford to make any monetary donation please make a card, send a card, write a letter, draw a picture or just say well wishes. Pray. Everyone please pray. Honestly rather then writing on my facebook page, "Happy Birthday," send her and her husband a message on facebook. This is what I want and this is what they need.

In Sara's email she did include the blog for her son. Please read it by clicking here, it's called Jacob's Journey. I encourage all of you to read it from the beginning.

When I lived in Utah, Sara and her family took me in for Christmas when I decided I wasn't going home. They treated me as their own and were SO very kind. Please help me to pay their favor forward to them.

In the blog you will read, when Sara listened to the team of doctors they said she would be in for a marathon. Her response was, "I always wanted to run a marathon." Follow Jacob's Journey and run this marathon with them. Please I beg you, help them.