WHY?

Last night we discovered that our friend has a rare and aggressive breast cancer called Inflammatory Breast Cancer. I am not educated enough on the subject to explain it -- but I would encourage all of you -- including men(for your loved ones sake) -- to read up on it and be aware.

We always think it'll never happen to us. Especially if it only affects 1 to 6 percent of women, as this does. Our friend is my age and has three little boys, ages 6, 2 and 1. Ironically her husband and Father are Dr.'s and she's has a medical background as well. In most cases the prognosis is not good. I was reading this morning that they have found recent treatments including mastectomy, radiation and chemotherapy that will help sustain your life for up to 5 years -- 1/3 of women will live longer.

I struggled to sleep last night, I continue to pray for her and yet I feel so sick about this. I think the helpless feeling is getting to me. If you will, please keep her in your prayers. There is strength in numbers.

Philip and I are so thankful for our blessings all of the time. We feel like we spend our lives thanking the Lord for all that we have and all that others do for us. We always feel that we are blessed beyond what we deserve. It's at times like this that I feel VERY humbled for the blessings we have. We spent a lot of time last night talking about that infamous question of WHY?

Our questioning our Heavenly Father of WHY has been explained to me like this:

Sometimes our small children ask WHY can't I do this? WHY can't I do that? WHY does the sun shine? WHY is the sky blue? As parents there are questions that we just can not answer WHY to our small children because they can't comprehend the scientific reasons or the logic or the 5 other explanations you'd have to give before you finally got to the answer.

As it is with our Heavenly Father -- he just cannot explain the WHY to us sometimes. We have so many things that we need to learn before he could begin to explain WHY.

This is where faith and patience are treasures. We ask our little children to have faith in us all the time, just as Heavenly Father asks us to have faith in him. Thus the scripture for us to become “as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.” (Mosiah 3:19.)

Remember to hug your loved ones and CHERISH TODAY!!!!