I started writing this blog entry two weeks ago after my follow-up endoscopy. After the procedure I came home, and began to write about the technical process, but nothing about how I was feeling in that moment. I kept my emotions, my feelings, my hopes, my fears in a vault. This morning I reread everything I wrote on that Tuesday, and deleted it all because this is what I was afraid to write:

What if I’m never well again? What if I’m forever trapped in this present reality of food avoidance? What if this is the end?

As we walked to the doctor’s office, this morning, my legs felt heavy. Each step felt like I was heading toward a guillotine. I turned to JJ and said, “I should’ve made a Michael Scott video like the two videos he made when he was waiting to discover if his true love, Holly, was engaged to another man or if they had broken up. One where I could calm myself down if I’m too excited by the news or lift my spirit up if I find myself plummeting.” If you aren’t a huge Office fan, then you might have no idea what I’m referencing, and I would apologize for it if I also wasn’t thinking, “Why the heck don’t you watch The Office?!”

The wait today couldn’t have felt longer. I prepared myself for two possibilities: 1) The eosinophils have gone down in number, but they are still present. 2) The eosinophils are at the same level they were before the extreme elimination diet or worse. In my heart of hearts, I wanted to hear: “You are in remission! You have no eosinophils in your esophagus!” I just couldn’t speak that hope aloud to anyone, except God in prayer. I said it to friends and family, but I said it with the same conviction as, “Wouldn’t it be awesome to eat all the donuts you want and never get fat?” It was a pipe dream. I just knew it was too good to be true.

I was scared. If this failed, I didn’t know what options I had left. The elimination diet framed around my LEAP MRT test results as well as eliminating common allergens was the only thing I felt might work for me. I tried Flovent for 2 weeks, and it made me sicker, so I had to quickly get off that, especially after I discovered it was corn-based. The elemental diet was out of the question for me because all of the formulas contain corn derivatives. I felt sick whenever I thought about what was to come.

When my doctor came in, I truly wasn’t prepared for what she told me. She told me I was completely in remission. Not one eosinophil!!! I was in complete shock. Not even one eosinophil?! That’s a miracle! She told me she may see numbers come down after treatment of some kind in patients, but rarely do they go from high levels in the 60’s and 40’s to zero in every tested area. I asked her if she tested all the same areas as the first endoscopy. She said she had and they were all zero. I started crying. I couldn’t believe it. WOW!!!

I’m still in shock. God blew my mind today in a way that only He can. This morning I started my day hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst. Now I sit here, completely shaken, in the best way possible. Words fail me. I’m speechless. All I could keep saying over and over again in the doctor’s office and now in my apartment is, “Thank you, JESUS!!!”

The past few months have been incredibly difficult. I have been on the hardest diet a person can be on, and having to live with the knowledge EVERYDAY that in the end it might not work for me. When everything inside of me wanted to quit, I had to keep going. Honestly, God gave me a strength and endurance that could only come from Him. I’m so thankful He refused to let me throw in the towel.

I have been handed from death over to life. Every year of my life I will celebrate August 7th as the day I saw the power of God in my life. As the day He intervened and answered the cries of my heart. There is so much I want to say and write, but my mind just keeps going blank. I’m enthralled with the joy and wonder of it all. I want to bear hug every single person that has been praying for me. I want to grab the hands of every single person hoping against hope as they wait on God, and say, “Don’t give up!” I want to shout from the rooftops, “I’ve been delivered!”

Today I’m celebrating. Today I’m enjoying this victory. There is more to come on this journey and I know that I still have a long way to go with adding food into my diet again, but today the impossible became possible. Today I got my miracle.

This is the day that the Lord has made;
    let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Psalm 118:24 (ESV)