"To our amazing and very loved family and friends,

This is Mike again. It has been a number of months since my last update on Connie. I have been meaning to do this for a very long time, but unfortunately life gets in the way. A perfect example of this is, I sat down on Tuesday to write this update and within a couple of minutes of my start, Connie called me and said she had the chills and a fever. Well, that alone sent chills down my back. The last time she told me that was at the end of December 2023. At that time, Connie ended up in the ER and then the hospital with a blood infection.

I ran out of the house and went to pick her up at our office (Transformed by Love Ministries) and we went directly to the ER. They did all of the normal testing and pulled blood cultures. After about 4 hours in the ER they decided to send her home with some antibiotics and we were to watch her. The blood cultures would take 48 hours to determine if she had another blood infection. By 4am on Wednesday morning she began vomiting and her temperature had spiked to 102.4. She tried resting a little longer, but then we made the decision to head back to the ER.

Once back at the ER, they were giving her things for her nausea and doing a lot more testing. It had been around 14 hours from the first blood cultures from Tuesday. They were able to determine she tested positive for bacteria in her blood. With that knowledge she was hospitalized once again. She has now been on a regiment of antibiotics to kill the blood infection. It was determined by her Infectious Disease Doctor in Duluth that her port that she has had for 7 months needed to be taken out since the line had become infected once again during her weekly port maintenance procedure.

Today (Monday) is Connie’s 6th day in the hospital. She should be released from the hospital later tonight. Once at home, she will continue with homecare for 14 days, infusing additional antibiotics to ensure the infection is gone. With this behind us, Connie will continue to get stronger every day. Unfortunately, this has taken a big toll on her.

Prior to this infection Connie was doing really well. Many of her medications had been taken away. She had her first round of vaccinations. These will continue over the next 6 months. She has 25 vaccinations she must go through to get her immune system back in place. In January, she started her first rounds of Maintenance Chemo. This is a 6 day treatment where she receives a white blood cell growth shot each day and then is infused with chemo. This regiment is given to her every 6 to 8 weeks and there will be at least 6 rounds of it. Hopefully this will conclude some time in August. Our hope is by August, she is still in remission and that all of her immunizations are complete and we can throw our masks away once and for all.

Connie was diagnosed with AML on December 23, 2022. We know cancer is a lifetime journey, but we hope and pray by the end of 2024 our lives become more normal. We can’t thank each of you enough that have been on this journey with us for all your love prayer and support. We could not have gotten through this without each of you. Connie has been absolutely amazing throughout all of this. She is bringing as many people to Christ as she can, this is her life’s work. She will take her last breath doing God’s work.

Blessed are You, loving Father, for all of your gifts to us. Blessed are You for giving us our family and friends; to be with us in times of joy and sorrow, to help us in days of need, and to rejoice with us in moments of celebration. All glory, praise and honor be Yours alone, forever and ever. Amen.

May God bless you and may His peace be with you,

Mike - AKA 'Connie’s husband'"