Well this week had a rocky start... So after our morning hike last P-day we had a big breakfast and everything and then showered and came here to do e-mailing. I had been trying to stay super hydrated but I guess I didn't do the best job ever. As we were here at the library I got these super deep stomach pains and chills, and my head started hurting like crazy. I warmed up when we went outside (even though my head was hurting like crazy) but when we went back into the apartment i just kept getting hotter and hotter! The heat just wasn't leaving me, I wasn't sweating, and I was just hurting more and more. My fever got up above 103 and we went to the clinic to get it all checked out. By then it was 104 and nothing seemed to help - nothing they gave me took it away.... Our branch president, President Domingues, came and stayed with me while Elder Oliver went to our appointments. He was doing a way good job caring for me but there was just nothing that was really making a difference - even this intense ice bath I had! My fever wasn't going and my head wasn't feeling any better. In the middle of this, we also gave a sister a blessing and were dealing with these huge changes we're going to make in the zone this transfer.
Anyway, by 10 I had just had enough and we decided to go to the hospital. So we went in, they did all these tests, put in IV's (gave me fluid and morphine) and I don't know what all they did since I was way out of it, but all I know is when I woke up I felt SO much better and the pain in my head went away considerably. They figured it was some mix of heat exhaustion and food poisioning (maybe from some bad horchata) that beat me up. So we got back at like 3:30 in the morning and slept in, and it was great to just be able to finally sleep! We went back to work in the afternoon and although the transition was a little rough I'm great right now. I'm just going to be a whole lot more careful about staying hydrated and definitely be careful about what I eat/drink.
The good news is that during all of that excitement, Elder Oliver had an awesome lesson with Annette, our only solid english investigator, and she's going to get baptized August 27th! So that was way cool - once I came back to myself I was way excited.
So we've been talking about some pretty huge changes in Yuma, and they're not finalized yet but I'll just give a hint of what we might do. So our mission is down like 20 missionaries and they're having to cut a lot of areas and things. They're especially down english missionaries so it looks like they're probably going to take all of them out of Yuma and we're going to have a zone of strictly spanish missionaries that also do english work. So we're thinking about dividing it up so that each companionship here in Yuma covers a couple of english wards, and also covers the spanish work in the area that corresponds with those ward boundaries. We're probably going to be back down to 10 missionaries here in Yuma, but we'll all be spanish missionaries as well as english. But we'll see what happens for sure - transfers are next week. So we'll find out soon enough.
Other exciting news was that even though a whole lot of people didn't come to church (in the branch - all of our big spanish families), we have all kind of potentials in our english ward! We found out about some kids that are going to be adopted that we will start teaching tonight, and we had a couple of non-members just randomly show up - which never happens. So that was pretty cool. Good things are happening there.
We also had a cool lesson on Friday that we weren't really expecting. So we were visiting this girl named Evelyn, who is awesome and wants to learn but her mom is just hanging on to tradition right now. She was there with a friend from school named Mariah, and they were being typical school girls, loud and ridiculous, not really being serious.... but then we started asking some questions, finding out that she used to really believe in God and read her scriptures, but friends convinced her otherwise and she stopped believing. She didn't feel like God was listening so she said she just stopped doing those things and kind of gave up. As we asked questions and explained things it was amazing to see how the spirit was working with her. She kept stopping and talking about these crazy feelings she was having, that she had never felt before. She felt happy and she was really recognizing the spirit. It was one of the most incredible lessons because by the end she was a completely different person. She recognized that yes, she did have faith in God and that was the only way she was really going to be happy. They kept on asking us what made us so happy - what we're doing that they aren't. So we told them! These small and simple things we do make all the difference in the world. They could see the light in our eyes and see that there was a happiness and a level of peace and joy that was available. So basically you can turn anything into a teaching situation.
Oh, and more random news...we found the community of christ church (the RLDS one) as we were searching for addresses the other day. Elder Oliver asked me if they were the RLDS church and I just didn't remember. We kept biking down the street and talked to this guy we found outside his house and of course we found that he was....the pastor of that church. I asked him a little about it and unfortunately how old the church was. He said,"Just as old as yours is! We came from Joseph Smith too." Oh boy...so yeah I found out real fast who they were and we kept our correspondence brief and pleasant so we didn't get into any kind of bashing. But it was cool because he actually gave us a referral! So overall it was a good experience.
But I think that's mostly it for the week - nothing groundbreaking or terribly exciting quite yet. Besides the fact that I almost died.... So yes, life is good!
Thanks for all you do!
Love you! ~ Elder Carlson
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