From a wheelchair and a ventilator — to walking out of the church.

I used to feel like I was created from leftover pieces. I had that feeling for all of my life. April 23rd of 2022 would have been 13 years that I'd been in the chair.

In April 2009, I was hospitalized with pneumonia and diagnosed with POTS — Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. That triggered Autonomic Dysfunction, which began to affect my breathing. As things worsened, I spent most of the next decade in nursing facilities. In 2017, I underwent a tracheostomy to protect my airways. For the last four years, a ventilator was breathing for me.

Then came Lent, 2022.

That night, at a healing service led by Dr. Mary Healy, the music was going on and I just reached up — like a child to her father — and said, "I need you. I need you to hold me and just take care of me."

At that moment, there was a word of knowledge spoken: somebody's lungs were being re-inflated. I felt like someone had turned water on in both of my ears, and it was going down my body. So I removed my vent.

We had spent years working between the portable vent and the home vent, keeping the batteries charged, knowing that if I came apart from the vent it was an emergency. And here I just removed it. There was no panic. No emergency. I was just sitting there.

When they made the altar call, I stood up. My husband Doug grabbed the wheelchair thinking he'd pull it along behind me. I said, "No — let's just walk." And I walked. The next morning, I was jumping on the bed.

The doctors, nurses, and therapists have been shocked. There is no medical explanation — one second not able to do this thing, the next second able. It is simply God choosing to act and grant the grace.

I question, "How do I live up to this? How do I be worthy?" And what I know now is — this is a gift. There is no repayment. I just need to live my life with God at the center.

When you pray, pray big. Pray for everything. You don't have to tone it down — God has the ability to do.