On the morning of August 21st, 2016, I woke up and immediately Bryan told me what had just happened to him. He woke up at about 4:20 am and remembering what we had just learned, that God’s time is between the hours of 3:30 am and 5:30 am, he decided to pray. His back was hurting and he couldn’t sleep so he walked around, cuddled with Maely, went back to bed and prayed some more.

As he prayed he thought about all the events that had taken place in his life since October 5, 2015. It started with two herniated discs in his neck, which were “healed” by a cortisone shot given to him by a doctor. Soon after the shot, his lower back started hurting and gradually got worse and worse until one morning he could no longer get out of bed. After an MRI, the doctor diagnosed him with a stress fractured spine and told him to go home and rest for 6-8 weeks. During this time he became even more weak and sick, losing 50 pounds of mostly muscle. As his back continued to be in extreme pain for the next month and a half, with the only relief coming from pain medication and steroids, he went to another doctor. This doctor did blood work and told him he was almost certain it was cancer, either leukemia or multiple myeloma. He referred him over to an oncologist, who had a bone marrow biopsy performed on him. The results came back as non-cancerous and he told us he thought it was some type of infection and referred him back to the previous doctor. This doctor called Bryan later that night and told him it was diskitis caused by a staph infection from the cortisone shot given to him 4 months ago. He immediately treated him with antibiotics through a pick line for the next 6 weeks. Once this was over his back still hurt, but after another biopsy and MRI was told the infection was gone and the remaining pain was permanent damage of his disc and spine caused by the infection. We were then told repeatedly by three different doctors that discs do not heal and that the only option left was surgery to remove what was left of the disc, remove part of the damaged vertebrae, and fuse his spine together with rods. We met with a surgeon and scheduled a date for surgery, but upon leaving realized we both had a strong prompting for Bryan not to go through with it. The next 4 months were spent discovering why.

Neither of us understood this “feeling” we had for him not to proceed with the surgery, especially because he was in so much constant pain and it seemed like everyone around us was doubting our decision. It was frustrating for both of us and we each took it to God in different ways. Bryan became pretty angry with God and I knew he was in an extremely dark place. Why did he feel like God told him not to have surgery when he was in so much pain? Every doctor he talked to told him surgery was the only way. Did God just want him to suffer? I felt helpless, everything I tried to do to help him failed, so I did the only thing that was left- I gave my problems to God and let him fight my battle for me.

My closet became my war room, my favorite place in the house where I could shut out the problems of the world and feel the comfort and love of our Savior. My prayers became taped to my closet wall after they were written out on a pad of paper with tears of anguish and helplessness. Inspirational scripture and religious memes soon became taped up there as well. As I continued to start my days here with Him, He comforted, guided, and taught me slowly, gradually, patiently- line upon line, precept upon precept. I learned to listen and make decisions with my heart, instead of my logical or emotional brain. I learned how to battle my demons and came to understand that any confusion, fear, or negative thoughts did not come from our Lord. He only gives us strength, peace, and comfort even in the midst of our trials and anything different than that does not come from Him. I came to realize God is always around us, we only need to learn how to see, hear, feel, and know Him. I felt like I was constantly being prompted to do things that I didn’t understand why. Sometimes I would realize almost immediately, sometimes it would take awhile, and some things I’m still understanding why. I’ve learned never to doubt what I’m being told to do if the feeling comes from my heart with strength, peace, and comfort- if it comes from God.

Many of these promptings took me on a path to understanding and learning about spiritual healing and energy. Because my logical brain and own personal biases could not fathom how this could be helpful in any way, I resisted. However, when God knows you need something, He doesn’t give up. He will persist and do whatever it takes to help you receive it, we only have to make that final choice to accept it. It started with hearing about a book, Health Revelations from Heaven and Earth, and feeling like I should read it. I didn’t. Then I heard about a humanitarian trip to Kenya that I felt drawn to. I set that feeling aside. I was told about an Energy Healing Conference. I didn’t go. I had so many logical reasons not to do these things, the two biggest being time and money. I was literally trying to stay afloat with finances and all the added responsibilities and stress that had been placed on me with Bryan’s illness. Somehow our good friends managed to get Bryan and I to attend a conference called Master Your Influence. This is how God showed me and opened my mind to really understanding how I could start to turn my life around. My logical reasons were just excuses and roadblocks preventing me from accepting a life that God wanted me to have.

The humanitarian trip to Kenya continued to randomly keep showing up, so I hesitantly started to find out more information about it. The more I found out, the stronger I felt a pull to go. I finally made the deposit and signed up for the trip. This was one of the hardest things I’ve done because so many logical, fear-based thoughts continued to enter my mind as to why it was not a good idea. Bryan’s illness and money were two very legitimate reasons of why I shouldn’t do it, but I couldn’t deny the strong prompting, feeling, or urge to go any longer. There are no words to describe exactly how and why the trip to Kenya changed my life. The land, the people, the service, the gratitude, and the love was greater than anything I’ve ever experienced. Not only was there this indescribable positive energy in Kenya, but also in the people who went on the trip in my group. I came to find out three of these woman referred to themselves as energy workers. My skepticism and logic were slowly replaced with curiosity and prayer the more I interacted with and witnessed the pure love that came from their hearts. I learned so much from these beautiful women and am forever grateful for the knowledge they shared with me. The only way to change our lives is to change our heart, and God used this trip to open my heart to the journey he had in store.

Bryan is quite sensitive to energy and immediately noticed a change in me, although neither of us quite understood it. I think this change in my heart allowed him to feel safe in making his own changes, as he was ready to experience the peace and love God also had available for him. Occasionally we would share with each other strong thoughts, feelings, or impressions that came to us. One morning during prayer, it came to me that we would both be extremely grateful for this trial in our lives and better off because of it. That there would actually be a time in the near future that neither one of us would go back in the past and change what had happened to him. I was nervous to tell him this impression because I knew how extremely horrible the last 9 months had been for him and the excruciating pain he was constantly in. His reaction was what I anticipated. “Easy for you to say, you haven’t been the one in pain all this time.”

As we continued to do our best to keep our daily communication open with God, I realized I needed to buy the audible Health Revelations from Heaven and Earth so we could both hear whatever message was within it’s pages. This book ended up teaching us so much about healing, we could just feel the truth of it as we listened to and discussed it’s contents. I felt like everything, all the bits and pieces of health and healing we had been learning about this past year, came together as the complete big picture in this book. It taught us how the mind, body, and spirit are connected and when one of these are amiss, the rest will follow suit. For whole health and healing, each one of these needs to be cared for and nourished just as much as the other. This helped me realize what Bryan needed, so I reached out to one of the energy workers from my trip to see if she could help.

She immediately contacted a fellow friend of hers to come over and meet us the next day. He spent three hours with us just talking and getting to know our story and who we were. He talked about the benefits and importance of sound and how he has a gift of playing music energetically to help people with healing. Seeing as he was a Melchizedek Priesthood holder in our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, he gave us both one of the most profound, inspiring, and beautiful blessings we’ve ever had the opportunity to experience. As we discussed our experiences with him, we discovered Bryan sees and feels things and I hear and know things. That is why throughout our marriage it had been so difficult for us to relate to and understand each other, yet since knowing this it has become an amazing journey for us to unite together and trust in one another.

Bryan and I asked both of these energy workers for their help. My friend would perform foot zoning on Bryan, while her friend played music to the energy he felt in the room. While they did this they counseled, mentored, and used their intuition to relay whatever Bryan or I needed to hear at the time. Most of these sessions ended up being some of the best marriage therapy we’ve ever experienced, as it was really a form of spiritual therapy. Many very personal, revealing, and faith-promoting events happened during these sessions, which encouraged us to want to seek and know Christ even more. These sessions gave Bryan the strength and willpower to really start listening to and following God and doing the things he had felt prompted to do, but had previously disregarded.

One of these promptings was to quit taking the pain medication he was being prescribed. He has had addiction setbacks in his past, and seeing as he was still in so much constant pain, this was extremely difficult to do. Three days after he had his last pain pill it was Sunday morning and he was still suffering from horrible withdrawals and extreme pain. As I prayed for him in my war room that morning, I mostly pleaded with God that He would show Bryan His light, give him hope, give him mercy, help him have faith, that He would reach out and give him something, anything, he just needed strength to get through this. After I prayed I woke Bryan up to tell him about an appointment we had with a member of our bishopric in about 30 minutes, but he was not happy. He told me he wasn’t going, in fact he was pretty angry that I agreed to the appointment when I knew what he was going through. He accused me of not caring about him or his pain or what he was going through. He told me to cancel the appointment, we could meet with him another time. I finally agreed, but as I stood up and started to walk out of the room, something told me I needed to get him there. I turned back around and apologized, but let him know that for some reason I strongly felt he just needed to go and that if I really didn’t care it would be a lot easier to cancel rather than force him to do it. Stake conference (a bigger than normal church meeting where many people attend that usually attend elsewhere) was right after the appointment, but I reassured him it would be a quick ten minutes, we wouldn’t attend stake conference, and then he could come home and sleep and not be bothered the rest of the day. He grudgingly got out of bed and dressed for the appointment.

The appointment went as expected and as we were leaving we saw people ushering in for stake conference that was just about to begin. I was ready to walk out the doors until Bryan asked if we were staying for stake conference. I replied that it was up to him, as I did what I was told to do and got him there. Apparently he had now received his own impression as he walked into the chapel and sat down, with me following his lead. Our stake president gave an amazing talk (along with many others), but Bryan was miserable. He was constantly fidgeting in his chair trying to get comfortable and had to continuously get up and walk around, or sit right outside of the chapel in the foyer. Near the end of conference he came back in and whispered he had just had an interesting experience. In that instant I knew God had answered my prayers from that morning and this was the reason I needed to get him there.

When we got home, Bryan told me his experience. He said when he was sitting in the foyer, a woman he had never seen before was sitting across from him when suddenly she looked right at him and pointed up. She said, “God has faith in you.” She repeated, “God has faith in you. Jesus wants you to know He has faith in you. He wants you to know He’s with you. He’s around you all the time. He’s suffered more than you have. He knows you can get through this. He loves you. He’s here to help you.” Then she came over and sat down by him and continued, “He loves you. You can get through this. He can change this in an instant. There’s something you need to learn. This has happened for a reason. You need to have faith in Him because He has faith in you.” As she proceeded to tell him more of the message, Bryan asked if she was inspired to say these things to him and she said yes. He told her a little about his story, back pain and coming off pain medication. She waved it off as if his story was inconsequential and replied, “Don’t give up. You have something to learn. This can all be over in an instant, God has the power to heal you. You have something you need to learn first. As soon as you do, you will be healed. When this is all over, you will be grateful for this experience and you’ll be better because of it. You’ll be able to use this to help others. You’ll be able to sympathize with those in pain and that have been in your situation. Thank him for what you have, for this experience.” She handed him a pad of paper and instructed, “He wants you to write stuff down. He’s talking to you and wants you to write things down.” After conference she walked up to him again, gave him a hug, and affirmed, “God loves you so much.”

We now knew more than ever how hard God was working to be a part of our lives and communicate with us. Over the next week we continued to communicate with our Lord and  follow His promptings and teachings that came to us as we attended BYU Education Week and the Provo City Center Temple. Bryan was still in pain not only from his back, but his whole body felt like he had been hit by a truck from the withdrawals he was experiencing. He had no energy and could barely walk, while sitting also caused immense pain. This was especially discouraging at times for both of us, but we continued to just put our focus on Jesus Christ. At one point the Spirit strongly impressed upon Bryan that what he needed to learn was to immerse himself in God and be obedient to His will.

As Bryan pondered all of these recent events early morning on August 21st, he finally fell back asleep, but then woke up again. He saw Bryly and I lying next to him in bed, with a little girl who he thought was Maely on the other side of him. Suddenly, he was paralyzed and couldn’t move or open his eyes. He said he was a little scared, but for some reason knew it wasn’t bad. He then felt himself start to lift up about 2 feet above the bed, as he realized it was his spirit actually lifting. Then he saw orange and yellow comet like balls start flying at him, which lasted about 10 seconds, and somehow he knew they were meant for his back. He slowly lowered back down, still not able to move. First he felt movement in his feet and gradually it worked its way up his body. His eyes were still shut closed, so he had to use his fingers to pry them open. It was all black and for a moment he thought he was blind. He slowly regained his vision, when his eyes suddenly popped open and he became fully awake from what he had just experienced.

Immediately he noticed his back felt different. It felt like he had a back brace on, or extra muscle had been placed right where his disc hurt so badly before. He noticed that sharp stabbing pain he had experienced for the past 10 months was gone and as he moved around in bed it didn’t come back. He just stayed in bed until I woke up and he told me what had happened. I asked if he’d gotten out of bed yet, but he hadn’t because he was nervous to. When he did, the pain was still completely gone. He had been healed in an instant.

Later that morning I went to my closet, my war room, and prayed and read my patriarchal blessing while I wept tears of gratitude. It was like my blessing had been written for me that morning, although I had received the blessing when I was 18. I have never been so grateful, so blessed, so happy for such a miracle. Just the day before his back had hurt so badly, EVERY day his back was in extreme pain. I was in shock and kept asking him how his back felt all throughout that day (and the next couple of days). That was the first day in 10 months he had been able to sit through all of church without any pain and without needing to get up and walk around. He felt so good he went to the gym the next day and did squats and other exercises he hadn’t been able to do since he was injured.

Since that time we have been meeting with close friends and family, telling them the miracle that had just taken place and how it came to be. We have no doubt this was God’s will and is for His own purpose, a purpose that we are continuously understanding. God healed Bryan’s back in an instant, but Bryan also had to be mentally and spiritually in a place that allowed it to happen. This took much longer and came through learning to fully and completely immerse himself in God. He did this through prayer, meditation, scriptures, obedience, following promptings, blessings, energy healing, and acknowledging all of God’s tender mercies. We can both now say we are extremely grateful for this last year, are better off because of it, and wouldn’t change anything if we could. We are both still learning and striving every day to immerse ourselves in God. It’s a daily battle, some days harder than others, but we have continued to learn the more we immerse ourselves the easier it gets.

God wants His miracles to be told and heard by His children. He wants us all to know what He can do for us. He is constantly trying to be a part of our lives, if we would only slow down and acknowledge Him. God can only help us as much as we allow Him to. The more we seek Him, the more we will see and feel His light. God wants YOU to immerse yourself in Him.