Bit of an Emergency...

First letter to come...

So last night Elder Timms and I were laying in bed and he snuck up on me and jumped on me. I flinched and my Elbow ended up glancing his eye. He had a cornea transplant december 2014 and it came out last night. We went to emerg at 10:30 and then eventually they sent us to Winnipeg so I drove and we arrived at the hospital there at 2:00am. We were there with President Craig seeing an opthamologist until 4:00 am. I then went and stayed at the assistants for a time until going back to the hospital where Elder Timms had stayed overnight. I went with President Craig to the airport where we picked up Elder Timms' dad. We got him to the hospital in time for him to see Elder Timms before the surgery. Elder timms went in for surgery today and is now in recovery. Tomorrow they will do a scan and we will see if he can stay out on his mission or not. I just returned to Brandon with Elder Velasquez who is my companion from anywhere from the next 4 hours to 4 days. Please keep Elder Timms in your prayers. The surgery he had and the two more he will probably have are very serious and some surgeons were not qualified or willing to try doing them. Sorry for the late emails but this is why. 

Elder Stewart 

Second letter to come...

They explained the surgery to me. So since his cornea roe from 10:00- 2:00 on the top of the eye there was a 1mm gap there causing all of the fluid to drain from his eye. The vitreous jelly was what started coming out next but with it being thicker it could not come out it got caught causing the leaking to stop but it also is pulling on the retina causing a very high rist of disconnecting the retina completely. They need to go in put the vitreous jelly back in place re-attach the cornea and check the retina. If the scan does not go well tomorrow then they will send him home and they will have to do 2 more even more major surgeries and remove the lesne completely apparently so they can fix the cornea or something. Super interesting but scary too. the jelly did not come out it was just fluid which according to the doctor the body remakes extremely fast so at least for the time being there will be no nitrogen in the eye. It has not lost shape to any considerable amount. The biggest concern is the retina becoming detached. It would cause a major risk of blindness at least temporarily. Yeah and the doctor was a resident and he was like only 30 so it makes me feel like it wouldn't take too too too long. We will see though.

Third letter to come...

This week was very full of activity and lots of fun! Monday we had a service project and that was good as usual. That night the assistants came in from Winnipeg and we had a good night with them. The reason they wame was for zone conference which was on Tuesday. The whole zone came down for it and it was really fun to see everyone! Zone conference itself was really a good experience!. President Craig presided obviously and Elder Timms conducted. There were many great portions given. They were very similar to the portions given at MLC. Elder Timms and I got the opportunity to give the main training portion and it was on finding new people to teach. We did a fun activity where each companionship is videod as they practice a tracting or street contacting approach. After videoing it we all gathered back together to watch and evaluate them. In preparation for it we were talking about how to make more people feel comfortable with it because it is not a very fun thing to do. I was trying to liken it to the lives of the zone members. What we came up with was that every member of the zone likes either sports or music. So we related this activity to watching film in sports and listening to a recording of yourself in music. All three of these activities have the same purpose. The purpose is to self evaluate and improve. The training went amazing. Wednesday we exchanged with Thompson Elders and I was with Elder Wilcox. We found a new family to teach, they are from India but are christian and are reading the Book of Mormon! The rest of the week was good up to Elder Timms little or not so little thing last night.

SOrry for the short letter but I need to get going. It is technically proselyting time but President Craig told me to get the things done that I need to do so I have to email!

Elder Stewart