hardest day yet.

Today was the hardest day I've had since

coming to Kazakhstan in August.

Harder than homesickness,

harder than eating organs,

harderthan dancing all night long in stilettos.

Harder than a week on my own without power,

harder than missing my Midwest Christmas,

harder
harder

harder than everything.

Today I sat with and cried with and listened to and held and pr-yed
for a young woman who was, just 4 days ago, widowed. A young woman
who has a little boy who is almost 4-years-old. A young woman who had
huge plans for the future with her beautiful family. A young woman
who, until today, I have never seen without a smile. A young woman
who is one of my dear and precious students.

It was her husband's 30th birthday. He was young and healthy and
successful. He was a wonderful father and a loving husband and a man
of high morals and good character. He was out with his wife and
friends celebrating—dancing and eating dinner and laughing and joking.
After they left the restaurant, she went to her mother's house to
pick up their little boy, and he went home with his friends. When he
arrived at home, he went to the bathroom, and for no explainable
reason, had a heart attack. She was just arriving when it happened.
They called emergency services, but the ambulance took over 40 minutes
because the paramedics in this little city just don't care. She laid
on the floor with him as his face turned blue. He couldn't talk, but
tears streamed from his eyes. She told me today that his tears were
because he didn't want to die, because they had big plans for the
future, because he knew how good his life was, because he understood
exactly what he was leaving behind. By the time the paramedics
finally arrived, he was dead. They told her that it was a blood clot
that had formed in his leg and traveled to his heart. His life ended,
and so did a big part of hers.

After spending the morning with her, I left to teach my first lesson
of the day—the lesson she attends. As I told the other girls in the
class what had happened to their classmate, we all cried together.

The reason this is so hard for me?

I've fallen head over heels in
love with my students.

I've fallen HARD.

When they laugh, I laugh.

But when they hurt,
it
rips
my
heart
out.

Please lift this student and her little boy HIGH before the throne this week.