Gretchen's little 4 year old boy needed some major dental work done to the
extent he had to be put to sleep.  At first, a couple of weeks ago when one
of his teeth abscessed, they thought they would have to literally remove 80
percent of his teeth.  Due to the abscess and a double ear infection, he was
in the hospital for two days.  If you are wondering how this could happen,
they neglected taking care of his teeth, that is, Gretchen and her husband,
Chris.  Fortunately, yesterday the ministry Gretchen is enrolled in, allowed
her to go and spend the whole day with her son in the hospital.  They never
let any of these people in the rehab ministry go any place alone so she had
another girl from the home with her all day.  One reason was because they
were concerned that just being around her son, and especially her husband,
that she might walk away from the home.  Girls, and boys in the other drug
house, come and go all the time.  Anyhow, we got to talk with Gretchen
yesterday and her son had four front teeth removed and 7 crowns and caps on
other teeth.  So, in short, he came out with flying colors and he didn't
lose but the four teeth fortunately.  I called today and his dad had taken
the day off to stay with him but he says his teeth aren't hurting but his
tongue and his throat were hurting due to the tube they had to put down his
throat and I suppose they really did a lot of pulling around on his tongue
while working.  Anyhow, Taylor is doing fine today and getting some extra
rest.  He has a cold anyhow and a cough and I was hoping they would have
waited to he got over that but they didn't.  It appears that Gretchen will
be coming home most Saturdays now for awhile and eventually she gets to come
for the entire weekend.  Her Saturday visits are alone, that is, no one from
the home has to come with her.  Gretchen told me, or did I mention this in
an earlier message?  Gretchen told me that they have had several new girls
admitted to the home and she is often awakened during the night and called
upon to go and pray with the other girls who are having a difficult time
during the night.  Sorry.  I just had to stop and cry a little bit there
just thinking about it.  Sandy and I have waited many years to see our
daughter acting and caring for others and praying over them.  She talked to
me a great deal about the hours she spends praying every week.  I know some
on the list don't believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the gift of
tongues but she told me all about her prayer language and how she spends
time praying for people by name in tongues and all sorts of other
testimonials related to prayer.  I believe she said that one day she prayed
six hours for our new grandson that my youngest son and his wife are
adopting because of a hold up that occurred in the final hearing which was
supposed to be today.  A problem arose at the pre school Anthony goes to in
the mornings and he came home and told his mom and dad that the teacher
pulled his pants down to see if he had any marks on his body.  People were
called, meetings were arranged, and come to find out, it was true.  So the
social services had to cover their tracks on this a little because they
found out about it from my son who called to complain.  The Social workers
involved with Anthony's case were really mad this happened at the school but
as I said, to save face, they pushed the adoption back a little longer.
This is another way of saying, you didn't do anything wrong as foster
parents but we want to cover our butts in case something might come up
later.  Anthony does have behavioral problems, they say, but frankly, he is
just a strong willed child.  I married a strong willed child but she was a
little older than a child when I married her.  If you call 21 older that is.
Frankly, I have always envied strong willed people so I don't think little
Anthony has any behavioral problems at all.  We have to work with him a
little more than our other grandchildren but if your mother was a drug
addict and gave you up after a year and said she didn't want you, you might
need a little extra attention, too, if you were only four years old.  Which
reminds me of something I will share in another message concerning children.
I believe you will find it very interesting.

Phil.