LETTER FROM JANET HOCKER
Dear Friends,
Please forgive my silence. Hopefully, this will catch you up on what has been happening with me over the last few months.
IN THE PAST:
As most of you know, I had brain surgery in September to remove a cyst that had been there for some time, apparently. It was not cancerous, but the surgeon wasn’t able to remove the whole thing without causing further complications. I was in either a hospital or a rehab center for the next 3 months. On November 20th, I was discharged from my final rehab place, which actually, happened to be the same place where I had had surgery. From then on, I would be doing out-patient rehabilitation. I stayed with my sister, Diane over the holidays, and the first week of January, moved into my own apartment.
IN THE PRESENT:
I am now living in a retirement community in Youngtown, AZ. It is a wonderful community and I am very happy here. I have a small one bedroom apartment, and I am third on the waiting list for a duplex, which is a little larger and has 2 bedrooms. I have all my utilities paid through my rent and one meal a day supplied by the dining hall. I have maid service that comes in twice a month. Because of Covid, much of the community events have been cancelled or postponed. I am only slowly getting to know my immediate neighbors. My short-term memory was affected by the small stroke I had while in the hospital. So, I keep meeting some community neighbors over and over again. :) It’s hard for me to distinguish one short white haired lady from another. Obviously, I’m one of the “young” ones here, the average age of the people I’m meeting, being 80+. Living with the effects of my brain surgery and resulting stroke have been interesting, to say the least. All my senses have changed to some extent. My touch is much more sensitive, my sister thinks I need my hearing tested :), my taste is wonky, so I’m losing weight because foods and things that I loved before just don’t taste the same. I’m told, as with everything else, it will take a year for things to return to “normal”. So, I need to take advantage of this while I can and lose some weight. I got my eyes checked at a neurological opthamologist since my eyesight was so much poorer. I found out that I have low tension glaucoma. Interestingly enough, not as a result of the surgery or stroke. It’s amazing how you can think you are fine, only to discover that all this other stuff is going on, and has been for quite some time. The glaucoma will not affect my being able to drive...I can still see well. It’s just something I need to take care of and watch over the next 10 years or so.
Currently, the ONLY thing keeping me from being totally independent is that I can’t drive yet. My Oregon drivers license expired while I was in the hospital, and they don’t do online renewal.. I hope to get an AZ license, but because I had the stroke, I have to have medical clearance before they can issue me one. This has been quite the challenge for one reason or another.
IN THE FUTURE:
“What’s in store now?” you may be asking. Good question.
I’m on medical leave until June 30th, and then I will retire on September 30th. This is a year earlier than my original plan, but God had another plan for me. I had also thought I’d be going back to Austria for one final year at ICSV. Because of all my health issues, we (WorldVenture personnel and myself) thought it would be best to retire early. I’m satisfied with that; it’s just that when I left Vienna, I didn’t know I would be staying in the states. I’m hoping to be able to fly back, COVID allowing, sometime before I retire, to pack up my apartment and say my good-byes to neighbors, friends and the school. I also will be making a trip to Oregon and California to do a farewell tour of my supporting churches.
PRAY FOR:
1. Getting my drivers license.
2. Continued healing from medical trauma.
3. Trip back to Vienna.
4. Farewell tour of churches.
5. Availability of a duplex. This is a hard one, since I’ve been told, once people are in one of these, they don’t want to move somewhere else, so that means, essentially, I'm praying for someone to die. Not my idea of Christian love.
Thanks again for all your love and support especially over these months of silence. May God be gracious to all of you as He has been to me. I know He has been with me every step of the way, and has me in His hands. I praise Him for how far He has brought me.
Love to all,
Janet