This is a post about tithing. Here is the story:
Tyson and I moved to a new apartment complex at the beginning of May. This new spot is two blocks from campus, the same price as our old place, in a way better neighborhood, and it has a dishwasher. Our old managers were not very happy that we decided to move. We told them we would not be renewing our contract in the allotted time stated by our contract. I think they were mad because we were not obligated to find someone to move into our place, we could just leave.
Moving day came and my mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and I spent all morning deep cleaning the house. I personally spent at least an hour in the bathroom on my hands and knees scrubbing the tub, toilet, and floors. Remember: I was five months preggo at the time. You try deep cleaning a bathtub at five months preggo. It ain't easy!
Now, our managers are really old. Like...way old. So their daughter usually handled the apartment affairs for them. She came to check the apartment before we handed over the keys and, except for a few things to be fixed, gave us the all-clear.
In our contract it stated that out of a $600 deposit they would keep $150 to have the carpets and windows professionally cleaned before the next tenants moved in. We had broken a light cover and lost a bolt to another so those needed to be replaced as well. We were expecting around $400 of the deposit to be sent to us. We received a check for $147. Needless to say, we were shocked! Apparently, the daughter felt like we hadn't done any cleaning and since she had to re-clean, she took the time/labor out of our deposit. She did this without providing us a cleaning check-list, telling us to fix things while she was in the apartment, or notifying us of what had to be re-cleaned. My father-in-law is an attorney and was not about to put up with their shenanigans. He sent a letter asking for a full account of what was deducted from our deposit and why. We got the list with things like "Dust on Vent" or "Crumbs in Oven", the time it took to clean, and the amount deducted. Dust on the intake vent? Really? You're going to charge us $20 for some dust? Uh-huh.
Father-in-law gets really passionate about things and wrote another letter saying that the accounting was ridiculous (I'm paraphrasing, here) and that we deserved more money. So we received another letter and check for $50. Um...not really what we had in mind.
This brings us to a few weeks ago. Yeah. This has been going on for forever. Father-in-law had a chat with Tyson and me to discuss what we should do. I was all about taking the money and giving up the rest since the daughter was being dumb and I didn't want any more confrontation and I certainly did not want to sue them. I did think it was strange that all communication was going through the daughter instead of her parents, who were the actual managers. Father-in-law called our managers (Old Man and Old Woman) and talked with Old Man about what was going on. Old Man had no idea any of this had been going on. Old Woman and Daughter were supposedly handling the situation. Father-in-Law told Old Man what had been happening and Old Man said he would talk to his daughter and call my Father-in-Law back.
One week later (today), Father-in-Law receives a fax from Old Man. It said that if they received a letter from my Father-in-Law saying he wouldn't sue them (we weren't planning on it) they would send him a check for an additional $213, bringing our total deposit refund to $410. Tyson called me to give me the news and I was thrilled. I honestly didn't expect anything more but this is a true blessing.
Yesterday, Tyson and I wrote some pretty hefty tithing checks. We spend a lot of weekends with his family so this was the first time we could pay tithing to our bishop in a while. I was mildly freaking out because we are trying to save for the baby and really needed that money. There was no question in my mind about paying our tithing but I was a little worried about paying rent, paying for baby, etc. The $213 we will be receiving is about as much as we paid in tithing and
fast offerings yesterday. When Tyson told me, I just started to cry. I never thought I would have a tithing story worthy of the Ensign (haha) but I feel God's love for Tyson, me, and our baby. He knows that we are doing our best and trying to be obedient.
3 Nephi 24:10 says "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in my house; and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it."
I feel like the heavens have been opened and my heart is not big enough to hold all the love that God is pouring out for me and for my family. I am grateful that God is bound by righteousness and that I can count on Him to help me if I am doing all I can to be obedient.
05 July 2011
My Trip to the Hospital
Many of the people who read this blog already know that I spent Friday, July 1 in the hospital. This may be redundant but I wanted to write down the story since I think it was quite the experience.
Thursday night I was having some back pain. Just muscle tightness, nothing crazy. I had Tyson rub the achy spot for a while and then went to bed.
Friday morning I work up at 7:15am and my back pain was still there. Same exact spot. I didn't think much of it, took some Tylenol, and finished getting ready to go to work. The pain wasn't going away at all so I got out a rice pack to apply some heat. Didn't work. I had Tyson get an ice pack. Also failed. Finally at about 8am I was in so much pain that I was lying on the floor in tears. Not good. We had tried calling my doctor but he was delivering a baby and wouldn't call us back. Tyson called my mother and she told me to just go to the hospital.
We got to the hospital shortly after 8:30am. Because I'm 33 weeks pregnant, I was wheeled right over to the Women's center. They took all my info and gave me some Percocet for the pain. Well, the Percocet did nothing. I was still in tears so after another hour they gave me a shot of Morphine and a shot of Phenergen (anti-nausea). Still didn't work. The doc wanted to ultrasound my kidneys and bladder to look for kidney stones but my bladder was totally empty. I was given a large mug and two cups of water. I got the two cups of water down but I was feeling pretty nauseated. You see, I hadn't eaten anything in hours. So I puked up all the water I had been drinking. Puking up pure water was really weird. There was no stomach acid so it didn't hurt but it was just weird.
At that point, the nurses decided to put me on an IV to get fluid and pain meds in me. Well, I was dehydrated so finding a vein was going to be interesting. Okay, my veins are tricky anyway but this no-water thing wasn't helping. The nurse who was assigned to place my IV tried twice in my right arm and once in my left before calling the anesthesiologist. The new nurse got the IV in my left wrist. You know those teeny-tiny veins in your wrist? That's where they put my IV. They put so much tape on my arm! Once the IV was in, the Morphine started really working. A while later the first nurse came back to draw some blood. She tried in my right arm again! She stuck me, missed, and then was fishing for the vein. That normally wouldn't bug me but she told me, "I'm sorry it hurts; I'm fishing." SERIOUSLY?!? Why would you say that to me?!? Tyson was livid. She finally gave that up and drew blood from a vein in the back of my right hand. By the time she was done I looked like a freakin' pin cushion: all taped and cotton-balled up. No good.
They kept me overnight and I went through four or five IV bags. That's a lot of fluid. They let me go the next morning at about 9am with a prescription for Percocet in case the pain came back.
The end.
Okay, not entirely. I do not like pain. Or needles. After this experience I discovered I am a whole lot more tough than I thought I was. Or maybe I was just desperate for pain relief. Either way, I am less scared of getting an epidural in a few weeks. This was a great trial run for Tyson. He had a really hard time coping with me being in pain. Now he knows what that feels like so when I go back to have the baby, hopefully he'll be a little bit calmer than he was this time. This was the same hospital where I'll be delivering and I appreciated how kind the nurses were to me. Even the one who sucked at placing my IV. This particular hospital is a little smaller so they are able to give more intimate attention. I have also heard that kidney stone pain is worse than labor pain. I guess we'll just have to see about that.
Thursday night I was having some back pain. Just muscle tightness, nothing crazy. I had Tyson rub the achy spot for a while and then went to bed.
Friday morning I work up at 7:15am and my back pain was still there. Same exact spot. I didn't think much of it, took some Tylenol, and finished getting ready to go to work. The pain wasn't going away at all so I got out a rice pack to apply some heat. Didn't work. I had Tyson get an ice pack. Also failed. Finally at about 8am I was in so much pain that I was lying on the floor in tears. Not good. We had tried calling my doctor but he was delivering a baby and wouldn't call us back. Tyson called my mother and she told me to just go to the hospital.
We got to the hospital shortly after 8:30am. Because I'm 33 weeks pregnant, I was wheeled right over to the Women's center. They took all my info and gave me some Percocet for the pain. Well, the Percocet did nothing. I was still in tears so after another hour they gave me a shot of Morphine and a shot of Phenergen (anti-nausea). Still didn't work. The doc wanted to ultrasound my kidneys and bladder to look for kidney stones but my bladder was totally empty. I was given a large mug and two cups of water. I got the two cups of water down but I was feeling pretty nauseated. You see, I hadn't eaten anything in hours. So I puked up all the water I had been drinking. Puking up pure water was really weird. There was no stomach acid so it didn't hurt but it was just weird.
At that point, the nurses decided to put me on an IV to get fluid and pain meds in me. Well, I was dehydrated so finding a vein was going to be interesting. Okay, my veins are tricky anyway but this no-water thing wasn't helping. The nurse who was assigned to place my IV tried twice in my right arm and once in my left before calling the anesthesiologist. The new nurse got the IV in my left wrist. You know those teeny-tiny veins in your wrist? That's where they put my IV. They put so much tape on my arm! Once the IV was in, the Morphine started really working. A while later the first nurse came back to draw some blood. She tried in my right arm again! She stuck me, missed, and then was fishing for the vein. That normally wouldn't bug me but she told me, "I'm sorry it hurts; I'm fishing." SERIOUSLY?!? Why would you say that to me?!? Tyson was livid. She finally gave that up and drew blood from a vein in the back of my right hand. By the time she was done I looked like a freakin' pin cushion: all taped and cotton-balled up. No good.
The end.
Okay, not entirely. I do not like pain. Or needles. After this experience I discovered I am a whole lot more tough than I thought I was. Or maybe I was just desperate for pain relief. Either way, I am less scared of getting an epidural in a few weeks. This was a great trial run for Tyson. He had a really hard time coping with me being in pain. Now he knows what that feels like so when I go back to have the baby, hopefully he'll be a little bit calmer than he was this time. This was the same hospital where I'll be delivering and I appreciated how kind the nurses were to me. Even the one who sucked at placing my IV. This particular hospital is a little smaller so they are able to give more intimate attention. I have also heard that kidney stone pain is worse than labor pain. I guess we'll just have to see about that.
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