“Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish is work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything.” (James 1:2-4, NIV)……my daughter, Angela’s favorite scripture.
She persevered in prayer for me for 9 years, and on June 1, 2008, I made Jesus Lord, and was baptized by her and her husband.
September 16th, 2009 started out as a normal day for my daughter, Angela Williams. Angela had been a disciple since 1999. She lived a very busy life as a wife to her husband, Bekure, and as a mother to her two daughters, T’siona, age 6 and Desiree, age 10, and a daughter to me. First and foremost in her life, was her relationship with God. He gave her the strength to get through her busy days. She was working on her Bachelor’s degree full-time and working full-time in a substance abuse facility for young mothers, as well as being very active in her church, the Groton/New London ICOC. On this particular morning she called me at around 10:30am, just to chit-chat a little before she went to work. As always, when we talked on the phone, our parting words were “I love you.” This day was a day that changed our lives forever.
Around mid-day, I received a call from her husband, Bekure, saying that Angela had a seizure at work and was being transported to the local hospital by ambulance. I had a hard time wrapping my head around what he was telling me. I remember thinking, “that can’t be possible… I just spoke to her a couple of hours ago and she seemed perfectly normal!” Thankfully, I only lived a block away from the hospital, and I arrived at the hospital just as the ambulance was bringing her in. When I saw her and talked to her, I could tell that there was definitely something amiss. She was awake, but seemed to be in a daze. She could speak, but talked in a monotone voice, which was not normal for her. She complained of a headache in the area of her forehead. It was not long before her husband and kids got to the hospital. I remember how frightened we were, as we tried to reassure the children that the doctors and nurses would take good care of their Mommy. We very quickly alerted some of our brothers and sisters in our fellowship, and they showed up to take care of the girls and start a prayer chain. Angela’s co-worker (one of the sisters from church), who had been with her when she had her seizure, arrived quickly at the hospital, and thankfully was able to tell the doctor that she had witnessed Angela having a seizure that lasted about eight minutes. This sister’s husband had a seizure disorder, so thankfully she knew what to do to prevent Angela from being injured as she seized.
Shortly after Angela got to the ER, she was whisked away to have a CT scan of her head. It wasn’t long before the ER doctor came to tell us the results of her scan. None of us were expecting to hear what the doctor was about to tell us. She said that Angela suffered from a “subarachnoid bleed”, which meant that an aneurysm in her brain had ruptured and blood was pooling between her brain and the thin tissue that covers her brain. The doctor said that the neurosurgeon on call would come to assess Angela and give us the plan of action. After the neurosurgeon looked at Angela’s CT scan he came to examine her and tell us what he recommended for Angela. He said that she would have to have a procedure done to stop the bleeding and that they weren’t equipped to do it at our small-town hospital. His recommendation was that she be transferred to Massachusetts General Hospital, where they had state of the art equipment and some of the best Neurosurgeons in the US. It was then that I realized that Angela was in a life-or-death situation, and I prayed that God would wrap his loving and healing arms around her.
A few hours later Angela was air-lifted to Mass General. Bekure and I went to our homes to pack for the trip. Thankfully, a couple from the church who had children close in ages to Angela and Bekure’s girls took the kids to their home where they could stay as long as was needed. Once the girls were reassured that Mommy was in God’s hands and that He would take good care of her Bekure and I left to go to Massachusetts, praying along the way that God would heal Angela. Family members were called, and they all made plans to come to the hospital as soon as they could.
We arrived at Mass General late that night, and learned that Angela was in the Neuro ICU. We found our way up to the unit. I honestly didn’t know what to expect once we got there. Much to my surprise, when we got to Angela’s room she was awake and alert and seemed to be doing pretty well, considering. It wasn’t long before medical personnel came and explained what the plan was to repair Angela’s aneurysm. They would go in and do a “coiling procedure” to close off the ruptured aneurysm. They fully expected her to do very well since she was a normal, healthy woman in her 30s. I settled into the waiting room, and let Bekure have some time alone with his bride. He stayed with her and prayed and read the Bible to her. The next day I learned that Angela had asked Bekure to make sure “I” got plenty of rest, as I had a lot of pain in my back and legs and had a lot of other medical problems, one of which was having recently been diagnosed with diabetes. It was so typical for Angela to be concerned for my welfare – she cared about other’s needs before herself. She was truly a Godly woman.
Bekure and I spent that first night in the hospital family room trying to sleep as we waited for Angela to go to have her procedure done. I’m not sure just how much we slept that night, but what I can tell you is that we spent a lot of time praying for Angela. I begged for a miracle for her. Each and every time I heard Bekure pray, he prayed and thanked God for Angela’s healing before it was evident. His faith was unwavering. After spending a lot of time with Angela, we had to leave for a while to figure out where we would stay. Bekure and I knew were were going to be staying for the duration of the surgery. Thankfully, God provided for us in a big way -at first by having my next-to-oldest brother, Tom, and his wife come and pay for a couple of nights in a hotel for us. Also brothers and sisters in the church helped us financially to stay in a hotel for a while. Right before we were going to leave to go to the hotel, Angela said to “Bek”, “Baby, do you think that you could get my college textbooks so I can study while I’m here?” That was typical Angela, wanting to make sure that none of her spinning plates hit the floor.
The first evening that we were in Boston, Lilian Hislop from the Boston ICOC came to let us know that they would help us in whatever way they could. Members of the church lined up meals for us and housing, should we need it.
Since Angela was quite stable since she had arrived at the hospital, the coiling procedure got bumped to the next day. That morning, before Angela was taken to the operating room to finally have the procedure, we prayed with her that it would be a successful procedure, and Bekure read the Bible to her. The doctors expected that it would take several hours and promised to find us as soon as they were finished. We did leave the hospital for a while to gather necessities. When we got to the hotel we made phone calls and tried to rest a bit.
Later in the day, we received a call from the doctor, telling us that Angela had made it through the coiling procedure fine, but once she was back in the Neuro ICU she had another seizure and had a significant stroke in the frontal lobe of her brain. The doctors and nurses repeated how grave her condition was. Because of the procedure and subsequent seizure and stroke it was likely that her brain would swell, and they had to do a procedure to insert a sensor into the space around her brain to monitor the swelling. She was also at risk of having another rupture, or having spasms in her surrounding vessels in her brain. She was kept in a medically induced coma to keep her still so that she would heal. We didn’t see any of this coming. Our prayers became fervent, pleading to God to heal Angela and to bring her back to us, at the same time being willing to accept God’s will no matter what He decided.
The next day many friends and family members arrived to visit Angela and to offer help in whatever way we needed it. It was a blessing to see so many people gather around us and Angela and to have that much prayerful support. Angela’s sister, Melissa, and her husband and kids came from Springfield, MA, as well as her brother, Jordan. It was truly amazing to see how many brothers and sisters from church came. I had always known that Angela had touched many lives and was loved by many. All of my brothers and sisters arrived, along with their spouses, and one of Angela’s cousins came. Bekure’s sister, Askale (a disciple as well), also came, offering prayer and helping to figure out housing for us. Neither Bek nor myself wanted to leave Boston, but desired to stay near the hospital. One of the leaders of the Boston church came, also offering assistance in whatever way we needed it. It was a real blessing and very humbling to see how people from one of our sister churches rallied around us – offering prayer and other support to us, making us meals, and sometime housing us. We thanked God daily for our brothers and sisters and prayed that He would bless them richly.
That evening the swelling in Angela’s brain increased. Medical personnel said that they would continue to monitor the pressure, but if it continued increasing, they would have to do an operation.
The next morning even more brothers and sisters arrived at the hospital. So many were there, along with family, that we worried that some of them would get asked to leave due to the number of them and the noise level. The doctors brought Bekure, my son Jordan, and myself into a conference room. He explained that the pressure in Angela’s brain had continued to increase, and at that point doing a craniotomy was the only option that would give her brain a chance to expand, without pressing further into her brain stem. They presented the question to Bekure, my son Jordan and myself if we wanted Angela to have the surgery. It would entail taking out the front part of her skull, and leaving it out indefinitely. The doctors were very frank with us, telling us how critical Angela’s condition was, and suggesting that family members go in to see her before the operation because she might not make it. There was no way that we wouldn’t want her to have the surgery; we all agreed that we wanted to give her every chance of surviving. We did ask the friends that were keeping Angela and Bekure’s girls to bring them to the hospital. Bekure wanted to sit with them and tell them that their Mom was very, very sick and might not live, but that we were all praying very, very had that God would heal her. It goes without saying how upset they were.
Many hours went by before Angela was out of surgery and brought back to the ICU. I don’t think any of us were prepared for how she looked. Her head had been shaved, and her face and head were very swollen. It was hard to connect who we were seeing with the happy-go- lucky and loving woman she was. We all took turns going in to visit her. She was surrounded by so many people who loved her. One comforting fact was that as our fellow disciples went in to visit her she was prayed for and had scriptures read to her.
It would be many days before we would see the fruits of our prayers. Her condition remained very, very critical. We noticed every twitch, praying that it was the beginning of her healing. It’s hard to describe the look on the faces of the doctors and nurses caring for Angela when we reacted to movement. They told us that they were random involuntary movements, and then they reiterated how ill she was and how unlikely it would be that she would make the full recovery that were praying for. We reinforced to them that God is a God of miracles, and that we believed that God would heal her, and bring her back as the Angela we knew and loved.
Many days like this passed. She developed problems with the vessels in her head going into spasms. When this happened they would have to go in with a catheter and stretch out her vessels so that blood could pass through and not create increased pressure in her brain. She continued to be on a ventilator and was unable to be weaned off of it. Friends came off and on to see her, sometimes standing by her bed praying, reading to her, or singing some of her favorite “Songs of the Kingdom.”
Bekure started praying a very specific prayer, asking God to have Angela awake, be off the ventilator, and be talking to him for his birthday, which was coming up on September 29th. Each day, we prayed that prayer with him. Bekure made sure that EVERY day began and ended with prayer…..always thanking God for the miracles that He had done and the ones that were going to happen, never letting his faith waver. He prayed for the day that Angela would stand up in church and tell of what God had brought her through.
On September 26th, Angela started getting a head start on Bekure’s wish. Three of Angela’s friends from church had come to visit and were standing on one side of Angela’s bed talking to her. All of a sudden, Angela coughed, coughed again, and her eyes opened. The sisters and I looked at each other, and I said, “Did you see that?!” They said that they did. Then Angela coughed again, opened her eyes again, and they stayed open. I quickly went to the other side of the bed so that she could see that I was there and she looked right into my eyes. I told the nurse and he came over to her bed and told me that he had deliberately lowered her sedation to see if he could get a response from her. We quickly contacted Bekure to come back in her room. He stood beside her, looked into her eyes and said, “squeeze my hand”….AND SHE DID!!! The nurse asked her to hold two fingers up….AND SHE DID!! The angels must have been singing…we sure were!! We were on cloud nine. Nurses who had cared for Angela when she was in a coma came in and shook their heads, then cried. What a blessing to be able to witness non-believers seeing God’s healing power!
Now that Angela was awake, they started lowering her ventilator settings so that before long they would be able to take her off of it altogether. They weren’t able to get her off of it for Bekure’s birthday, but she did it on mine, the 30th! Best birthday present I ever got (or ever will get)!! Angela was definitely on the mend!
October 2nd brought us another surprise. When we got to her room, they had her sitting in a recliner. To protect her head, they had a helmet on her and they had to strap her in the recliner because she couldn’t hold herself up. She never looked prettier to me! One of the first things that I asked her once she had begun to speak, was what her favorite scripture was. Her answer, “James 1:2-4!” It was then that I knew that her relationship with God was intact! What a testimony!
Angela’s ongoing physical healing wasn’t the only healing happening. All of my siblings came to visit her; my oldest brother, who is 17 years my senior had held a grudge against me for almost 20 years. He didn’t want any contact with me at all, let alone be in the same room with me. God allowed those walls to be torn down. That very same brother was one of the family members who visited Angela in the hospital. My brother apologized to me, and asked to let bygones be bygones. He hugged me, and told me he loved me. I was able to share my faith with him that day and have more since then. Our relationship remains very good.
Angela did have a couple of setbacks, but continued to bounce back after them. Soon she was moved to the regular Neurology floor. As she continued to get stronger we felt that we could arrange to stay a little further from the hospital. One of the Elder couple’s opened their home to us. Angela got stronger and stronger, working towards going to a rehab facility. This was the woman that doctors and nurses thought wouldn’t survive!
On October 19th, she was transferred to Gaylord Hospital in Wallingford, CT. When she left the hospital she was unable to sit up on her own, let alone walk. One of the doctors at Gaylord just happened to be a disciple and part of our church in Groton…no accident there! This is when the real work for Angela would start, as she re-learned many of the things that we all take for granted. Each day was packed full of therapies. For her first few days there, a couple from the Hartford ICOC let us stay at their house with them. After that Bekure and I took turns staying with her at rehab, encouraging her along the way. A feeding tube had been put in to feed her temporarily and then she eventually graduated to solid foods. Once that was accomplished all that was left for her to do was to get stronger. One of her therapies was occupational therapy. The therapist would take her down to the therapy room to work on different tasks. One thing she had her try was getting on the computer and into her email account. Angela got on. First, she sent an email to Bekure, and then proceeded to try to delete the thousands and thousands of emails in her inbox. The therapists had to pull her away! Later that day I headed home to take over with the kids so that Bekure could go back up to stay with her. Before he left he asked if I had sent an email from her to him. I laughed and told him that Angela had done that by herself! Needless to say, that made him happy.
Angela continued to improve daily as she got stronger and stronger. She was anxious to get home to her girls. Off and on she would be able to talk to them on the phone. They were anxious for her to come home as well.
On November 24th,2009, our sweet Angela was discharged from the rehab facility, and (using a walker) walked through her door at home. That was a truly glorious, victorious day. Her next challenge was to get back into the daily routine of family living.
That December, Angela made a quick trip back to Mass General so that the part of her skull that had been removed could be replaced. She was only admitted for a few days, and recovered quickly. Imagine the look on the faces of the doctors who treated her there at Mass General as they watched her WALK in their door!
At Angela’s two year follow-up appointment, one of the surgeons that we had reached out to and invited to church said he still had the invitation and planned to go at some point. He admitted that he previously wasn’t a believer in miracles, but admitted to Bekure that he truly believed that God was responsible for Angela being able to walk through the door that day.
Of course, Angela and her family have had their challenges over the years, but they are all doing very well. Angela, this year, is once again volunteering in Kid’s Kingdom. Her oldest will soon be 14 and has the heart to become a disciple. She recently returned from Teen Camp. During a phone conversation with her, I asked her what stood out to her the most during camp. Her reply was this….. “Nana, they were saying that how you act at home is how you really are, and that SCARES me! I am praying for God to work on my character and help me be more respectful.”
I am extremely thankful for the relationship with God that Angela and Bekure have. They continue to be an inspiration. Nobody could ever say that Angela was previously shy about sharing her faith, but she is even bolder now. She doesn’t hesitate to tell anyone who will listen about what God has brought her through.
I am forever thankful to God for the Body of Christ that stays consistent no matter where I go. Not only have they been there for my family and for me, but I have been blessed to see how they have been here for us during all the devastation from the tornadoes in Oklahoma this year. The Oklahoma City ICOC was blessed to have many wonderful brothers and sisters in our midst for several weeks this summer, as they volunteered to help the tornado victims. The kindness and sacrifice of our brothers and sisters will never be forgotten.
