Last year Lori & I were praying about a way to put the focus of the Easter season more on Jesus for our family.  We came up with the idea of giving to others like Jesus gave to us.  We called it “Give Good Friday”.  Today was our second year doing, “Give Good Friday,” and it went great!  We had 48 people come out to participate.  WESH 2 News came out to cover the story.  (You can read it and watch the news spot here.)  We met and prayed, and then went out and did random acts of kindness in the community.  Then we met back at Curry Ford Park and had lunch and a time to share.  This is the best part, hearing what others did and how God blessed them.

For those of you who might not know what “Give Good Friday” is, we go out into the community on Good Friday to help others by buying their lunch or gas, bring treats to fire stations, hair dresser, or nail lady.  Paying for someones tolls.  Handing out bottles of water with money wrapped around it to people at bus stops to pay for their bus fare for the day. The list goes on with other idea’s to give.  Good Friday is the day that God gave His all for us, and we want to give to others.  Our statement to people that we give to is, “Today is Good Friday!  It is the day that God gave good to us, so we want to give good to you.”  It’s a tradition that we look forward to continuing in years to come.

Thanks to all that came out to help today.

And I am sick. Nothing new. For some reason I always get sick on or around my birthday. I had the flu one year, tonsillitis one year, meningitis one year, strep throat one year.  This year I have some nasty cough, and I am going into surgery in a week in a half.  (The surgery is a good thing.)

But my birthday has not always been bad.  14 years ago on this day I proposed to Lori.  She threw me a surprise birthday party, (that I knew about) and I surprised her and asked her to marry me.  Greatest thing I ever did:-)  I was soooo nervous and just before I was going to ask her, someone in the crowd yells out, “Hey did you all hear that Greg and Rachel got engaged last night?”  Everybody started saying, “Man, everyone is getting engaged, what is going on…”  suddenly everyone at the party was down on engagements.  Thanks mystery yeller in the crowd!  But I still proposed and everything was fine.  It was a great night and a great birthday.

We had a great time last week on the Disney Wonder.  The boys loved it.  We didn’t get to sea sick, so that was a good thing.  It was a little crowded on parts of the ship, but all in all it was a great time.  My Crohn’s held up pretty good, there were a few mishaps, but all in all it didn’t ruin the trip.  The weather was great, sunny everyday, a little cool at times, but really good weather for middle of Feb.  The shows that we saw were awesome.  It is amazing what they can do on that ship, and the movies were good also.  We say Bolt in 3D and Bedtime Stories.  Bolt was cute, but Bedtime Stories was really funny.

Here is my favorite pic from the trip.  The rest are on Facebook, but this one is special to me:-)

So I had my procedure today.  My Dr. filled me with enough air to blow up the goodyear blimp.  Man I am sore.  The news was mixed.  I won’t go into the details, but it’s not good.  I am seeing another specialist next week to see about surgery.  We will see what he thinks of the results from the colonoscopy.

By the way.  I don’t always like to talk in great detail about my Crohn’s on this blog, I like to keep it family friendly, but I have started another blog called, My Life With Crohn’s.  It is a ‘kiss and tell all’ blog about living with Crohn’s.  I don’t hold anything back in that blog.  If blunt talk about bathroom issues don’t bother you, you might want to check it out.  I am typing the history of my 5 years leading up to today.  I guess it would be a 5 year biography of my life.  I do want to warn you, it will not always be pretty, it will tell all of what I have gone through and am currently going through.   If you are interested it is http://mylifewithcrohns.wordpress.com or you can click here.

By the way, I changed the names of co-workers and friends so I wouldn’t embarrass anyone.

So I (Chaz) have to go get a colonoscopy tomorrow and today I have to prep for the procedure.  My doctor tells me that I have to take 5 Dulcolax tabs.  I am thinking to myself, “are you crazy? I have had diarrhea for 5 years, everyday, and now you want me to take a stool softener to help me ‘clean’ out?”  But it gets better.  Then for lunch today I got to drink 64 ounces of turbo-lax.  The recommended dosage for a day is 4 to 8 ounces.  I am taking 8x that in a 2 hour period.  Can you say, “Run Chaz Run!!!! (to the toilet).  To top it all off I don’t get to eat anything today, so I am starving, gushing liquid, and weak as all get out for the day.  I will be glad when the scoping is done tomorrow:-)

Our taxes are done.  Nuff’ said.  (Yoo-hoo!!)

Many of you know I posted a few months back about my Crohn’s.  I wanted to update.  Unfortunately it has not gotten better.  I am still on Remicade, but it doesn’t seem to be working.  We are giving it some more time before we call it quits, but it doesn’t look good.

Had I written this blog a few days ago you would have read a completely different tone.  I would have talked about ending it all, but God has continued to give me grace through it.  It is a very up and down thing.  My emotions can be all over the place at times.  Sometimes I feel completely helpless and useless.  What good is a person that can’t step more than 20 feet from a bathroom?  Really, what am I supposed to do with the rest of my life confined to my home?  I guess I could start a home business, just kidding.  (really don’t email about your wonderful program that can generate thousands of dollars, I don’t want it.)  Other times I am upbeat and positive.

I have not been sleeping well either.  I have not slept for more than 3 hours at a time in 6 months.  Those of you who have children remember those early days of getting up all night.  It really takes a toll on you not getting long amounts of sleep.  I am usually up 8 to 10 times a night to go to the bathroom.  Some nights are better, but most are not.

We have begun trying some other things to help with my stomach, no gluten, no wheat, no dairy, no sugar, no soda… the list goes on.  We will see how that works.  At times I feel like the old TV show, The Incredible Hulk, with Bruce Banner walking down the street with his backpack in search of a cure to set him free from the evil monster within.  I think I can hear the music now…

Lori and I have been married for 13 years this September and we still hold hands with each other.   It is such a simple thing to do, but the effects of holding hands will strengthen your marriage.

A recent survey by YouGov revealed that 95 per cent of people who have been married over 50 years hold hands in public, suggesting it’s the secret to having a long-term relationship.  Holding hands in public tells others around, this is the one I love, and lets our spouse know, I love being with you.

Holding hands also reduces stress.  A University of Virginia study of 16 married women who scored high on a marriage-satisfaction inventory showed that simply holding their husband’s hand eased both physical signs of stress and their brains’ responses to pain.

Researchers took magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of the women’s brains as they confronted the stress of a small electric shock in three instances: while being alone, holding a stranger’s hand, and holding their husband’s hand.

Simply holding a hand was enough to reduce physical symptoms of stress, researchers found, but only a husband’s hand produced signs of stress and pain relief in the brain.  There is something calming about holding your spouses hand.

Another study was done similar to this.  Researchers from the University of North Carolina told couples they would have to give speeches. Before they did so, 100 of the couples sat holding hands for a short time, then they embraced for 20 seconds. Another group of couples rested quietly and were separated from their partners. During their speeches, heart rates and blood pressure rose twice as high in the second group compared to the hand-holders.

This Valentine’s day you can begin living a healthier life and building a stronger marriage just by reaching out and holding the hand of the one you love.

I wanted to share a testimony with you about what God has done in our lives.  Lori and I have always tithed, given 10% of what we make to our church, and God has been faithful to always meet our needs.  Last year God put this crazy thought into my head, “Why  not tithe what you want to make.”  I had to let that rattle around in my brain for awhile.  ‘Tithe what I want to make.’

I have always been faithful to give God a percentage of what he has given me, but now I was thinking, “Why should I wait for God to bless me more, before I give him more, why not tithe on the income I would like to make?”  So I did just that, I set an amount that was way above what we were projected to make.  Something that I thought was comfortable for us to live on.  Then I took 10% of that and began giving that each month as if that was our income.

We got our W2’s the other day and guess what??????  We ended up making to within a few hundred dollars of what I had been tithing 🙂 I don’t know how, I don’t know where, but God completely blessed our income this year.

Does this mean that if you increase your tithe God will match it?  Probably not like our story, but God will match the money and bless you all around.  His blessing doesn’t always come back in money, sometimes it is bills that have been reduced or helping your car run a little longer.  We have had many other major bills in the past year get reduced drastically when it was all done.  It was like God’s favor was upon us.

You can’t out give God.  He will never run out of his resources.  He will never let your gift go unnoticed or unrewarded, He will bless you when you give out of a cheerful heart 🙂

As you know I have been trying to connect with our Golden, Chloe, but she isn’t making it easy.  Her newest thing is she pees when she sees me come home.  I go in, try to talk sweet to her, rub her head and then, ‘splat’ pees right there on the floor.  AGHHHH!  You’re killing me girl, you’re really killing me.

I forgot to mention how much HAIR she sheds!!!!!  We had friends that had a dog and when we would go over to their house we would see balls of hair around the house and we would say to ourselves later, “how disgusting.  I would never let my house look like that.”  Now here we are, sometimes I can’t tell if our carpet is white or light brown from all the fur scattered around.  We have lint brushes through out the house so our guest can ‘de-fur’ themselves before they leave.  Our vacuum cleaner is getting a work out.

So the other day I decided to go tan outside  in this nice weather we have been having.  I brought Chloe out with me so she could play in the backyard.  I put on my lotion and laid down and guess what… Chloe came over and started licking me.  I guess she likes coconut flavor human arm.  I kept telling her to stop… lick… stop… lick… Chloe, STOP!…………. lick.  Then she decided she wanted to lie next to me.  So she got down and rested her whole body against the right side of my body.  It was fine, kind of sweet, I was rubbing her head… lick….  stop….. lick…. Chloe!!!  She finally put her head down and started to rest, but that only lasted for a minute, then she got up and went down by my legs to lay down.  I was getting comfortable as the sun … lick… was beating down on … lick… me.  “Chloe, stop licking me!”  Every time I would correct her and look at her she just stared at me, like she didn’t know what I was talking about.  Then she moved up by my face … lick… that was about it, I was done.  I got up and put the blankets away and went inside.  Guess what I discovered inside???? When she rubbed up against me she rubbed half her hair off on me, sticking to my sun tan oil.  I looked like have Sasquatch half man.

You’re killing me girl, you’re really killing me.