Update on Samuel - Monday 4:30 pm

Monday - 4:30 pm
The nurses explained that we need to be prepared for Samuel to sometimes take three steps forward and two steps back. Today he seemed to be doing really well around 2:00 pm, but is pretty discouraged now. His fever spiked again and they increased his dose of vancomycin. He was put back in the neck brace. I am not really sure why though because yesterday they said that part of his spine was fine when they did further scans. Maybe they found something new. We will ask more questions when the spine team comes by. He is nauseous, but the GI tube keeps him from throwing up. He is pretty down right now and says stuff like, "Why did I fall asleep?" He said he left for the ranch house at about 9:45 pm. He said he was tired from studying for finals all week and that he planned to stop at the store at the end of 1948 because he was thirsty, but he never made it that far. Jacob said he saw Samuel pass by the house on his way to the ranch house where he lives, but at that point everything was fine. Julia talked to him before he left for the ranch house and sent him a text at 2:00 am because she realized he wasn't there. When he didn't respond, she thought he must have decided to study and sleep at the house. That would not have been unusual for him because their math lab class works much better with the internet at the house than at the ranch. His sisters thought he stayed at our house and we thought he was safely at home at the ranch house. Several friends drove past his truck that night, but you could not see it at all. Someone who went to the scene and looked at the truck said it looks like he flipped end over end and then rolled sideways down the steep ditch. It is a miracle that Samuel is here. He missed a culvert by about 6 inches. Had he hit that he would have landed in a deep dry creek. There's so many things that we realize were blessings. We will probably never totally understand why something like this would happen, but I know that God held Samuel in His arms all night and He is holding him in His arms now. I know without a doubt that God is not finished with Samuel. I've seen how He pulled Samuel through when he was four years old against all odds. When I see Samuel leading the youth at church and see how God is using him, I know He had a plan for him years ago when he was so ill in Johns Hopkins Hospital.