update

so we still don't have very many answers.

the doctor is still leaning towards reactive arthritis. i haven't been able to get into the specialist yet, when i called the office the soonest they had a new patient appointment was in june. so thankfully my doctor called around and explained the situation and was able to find someone who could see me on the 15th of January.

the pain hasn't improved much, but thankfully i don't hobble around like an 80 year old anymore. with physical therapy and arthritis medication {plus a few others} that's gotten much better.

the doctor was concerned with a few other things and so we did more blood work right before christmas and haven't heard back from him yet, so we're taking that as a good sign. he did say that the bacteria is also attacking my nervous system and that's why i am so hypersensitive to touch, so if you see me, please don't touch me, it kills.

we called cooley about the appointment scheduled for 3 weeks after i got home and he said that there's not much we can do right now without this arthritis thing under control and to get that figured out and if my knees are still swollen and painful to schedule an appointment with him and then he'll be able to properly diagnose the problem. so fingers still crossed it's just the arthritis and i never have to go back to that office.

so that's all we know. and thank you for all the support and the notes and stopping by my house to visit and see how i'm doing. it means the world to me.

my diagnosis

the first monday i was home my mom and i went to visit my dear friend, Doctor Vern Cooley. this whole thing with my knees is getting a little ridiculous so when he walked into the room with his assistant the four of us just started to laugh and make jokes about my knees and how this whole ordeal just never seems to end.

we first did x-rays to see how my knee caps were tracking and if there were any problems with that. cooley said that my knee caps are set higher than they should be but it doesn't seem to be causing the problem. he also said that the space between my femur and tibia where my lateral meniscus is missing is getting smaller, but the gap hasn't fully closed yet and so it's not constant bone on bone yet. my legs, however, are extremely swollen and painful to the touch.

cooley's concerns were that if we operated right away with both my legs already being so irritated and swollen it would only cause more problems and pain with all that swelling plus additional swelling from surgery. on top of that concern, there's always been the fact that i'm so young and have had so many surgeries and they've all gone unsuccessful. what's another surgery going to do for me?

the verdict: intense physical therapy for 3 weeks to get down the swelling and see if the problem can be fixed through physical therapy, losing the extra weight i gained from those delicious frijoles and tortillas and not walking  around for 15 hours a day with a 25 pound bag on my shoulder. after those three weeks go back and see if there has been any improvement and if not we'll re-evaluate our surgery options and pray 5 and 2 are the last times i have to go under the knife.

he was also a little upset i didn't get a medical release from him to go on my mission in the first place....whoopsies.

tuesday the 2nd.

oh my goodness this day was so miserable! i drove home from rexburg, idaho. i had been touring the college, byu-idaho, to see if i felt any spiritual direction to my life. {no such luck -- total bummer} on my way home i made some stops to do errands that needed to be done or me or for my mom. there wasn't very much walking involved, but that night when i was laying in bed the pain in my legs was so intense i just started to sob. my mom ran up to my room to see what was wrong. my legs were so swollen and tight with swelling. my skin was gray and hot. my mom couldn't touch me without sending severe pain shooting through my either of my legs. i just laid there crying, "don't touch me! don't touch me! it hurts too bad!" needless to say, my mother is brilliant and started to realize that something else was going on.

we went to the doctor the next day and i started to explain to him everything that's been going on.
-if i walk longer than 20 minutes my legs swell to the point where i feel like it's going to rip my pants
-from my lower back down just aches all the time
-my knees throb. constantly.
-my ankles hurt to move
-my stomach has pains all the time, sometimes to the point where i can't even stand up straight
-my eyes have been strangely swollen (gross i know) and ache
-my fingers and toes get swollen and ache
-my skin is SO sensitive. even more than it usually is
there's more but i'm too tired to write them down. so basically i'm 20 years old and my body is falling apart. great, right?

so the next part gets a little scary. my mom and the doctor started talking about me possibly having MS or Fiber Myalgia. whoa. those are some big scary diseases to be throwing around there. but i was showing all the symptoms.

a terrifying needle prick and 3 viles of blood later we were waiting for answers.

on friday the nurse from the doctors office called and said that the blood results came back fine. i'm counting my blessings. and said that the doctor looked into it more and thinks that i have re-active arthritis.

re-active arthritis very rare and is caused by a bacterial infection in the intestines that causes your whole body to swell and causes severe pain in your lower back, knee and ankle joints.  reactive arthritis lasts for about a year but every case seems to be different, with some people it never fully goes away and others feel fine after making some lifestyle adjustments and with the proper meds.

the swelling explains why i've gained 12 pounds and can't seem to shed a pound. and it also explains why i'm constantly in some sort of pain. so now we are left to find a specialist to do more blood work and x-rays and find out what bacteria i have that's causing all of this and what we can do to lessen my pain.

we're guessing i got the bacteria my 2nd week in the CCM when i got extremely ill, but we don't really know anything for sure yet. fingers crossed we'll be able to get into a specialist soon and get some more answers!!

but on the bright side, the pain in my knees could possibly just be coming from the arthritis and they could be perfectly fine on the inside, which possibly means . . . NO SURGERY!!! :D  so we'll go see cooley again on the 18th and see what he has to say about everything. we're guessing we'll need to solve this other problem before we will really know what's going on with my knees, so fingers crossed we'll just avoid surgery all together.

being in pain all day and hardly being able to do anything has been zero fun whatsoever, but i'm so grateful that we are getting answers and finding out what we can do to get this pain in the past. i'm also grateful i do have other aspects of my health that are still good and i'm extremely grateful for my mom who is doing everything she can to help me and has been putting up with me and all of my tears from the pain and meltdowns because none of my clothes fit right and i feel fat all the time and that she'll sit down next to me in the middle of the isle at the grocery store simply because i can't walk anymore and need to sit down. the Lord truly has blessed me with so many things and i cannot thank Him enough.

journal entry from the air . . .

this is my journal entry as i came home:

well, I'm on the airplane right now, about to touch down on American soil. My heart is racing so fast. Any ways, I couldn't sleep last night, I was to freaked out about today. I woke up at 5 and the secretaries came and got me at 5:45 and took me to the airport, helped me through the giant line and got me to security and then left. It's strange to think that there won't be clapping noises in the streets all the time from the tortillarias or kids playing futbol or baseball in the middle of the street all day and it's going to be super strange to not have to pray throughout the whole meal to be able to not gag and keep the food down, except hermana silvia's food, i'm going to miss her delicious food terribly. So Hermana Sanchez and i were talking and decided that more bad things happen to you on your mission than good, but when the good moments happen it makes it all worth it. I honestly don't remember all the details about the bad times, i know i had them, i know this was the absolute hardest thing i've done, but details, i don't really know. but i'll never forget seeing Sergio in the church before us in a white shirt and tie and his face and smile. i'll never forget the night i committed Frank to baptism and the spirit. I'll never forget seeing Antonia and Flor become so accepting of the gospel and light up as we teach truth. I'll never forget David and Xiomara and how great their desire is to become an eternal family. There moments are what make the crappy days and weeks worth it and in the end that's all you remember.

Right now I don't know what I'm going to do -- this is the first time I don't have a plan for my future and I'm oddly okay with it. I just feel so much peace right now and we'll just take it one day at a time.

Un dia al la ves.

Amor, Hermana Tuddenham

I still don't really have a plan and still am taking one day at a time. there have been some complications with my health and so we're still trying to find answers to those questions, but one day at a time things get better and though at times i get discouraged, i'm starting to realize that this is the way it was always planned. from the moment i was going to submit my papers the first time and didn't. from the time i opened my call, gave my farewell talk, got on the plane to leave for guatemala. this has always been a part of my plan. i am so grateful for all the lessons i learned in my short time in the beautiful country of guatemala. it truly has changed my life.

coming home . . .

well, i'm home.

coming home early from a mission is very hard to do. for several reasons. of course all the whisperings around town and strange looks you get as people realize you're not supposed to be here, those are tough. but the hardest thing has been leaving the wonderful investigators I had back in guatemala and knowing that I will probably never see them again in this life.

so the first or second week of my mission i was playing basketball and went up for a shot and came down and landed on my knee wrong. it killed. but i just tried to ignore it and pretend that i was fine. after that i was super careful about what'd i'd do for deportes and on the days it would hurt i'd go out to the gym and just ride a bike. but for the most of the time it wouldn't be too bad because at that point i was still in the CCM and we'd be sitting most of the day, so not too much walking and for the most part they were fine.

my first day in the field, however, i could feel a huge difference and in the back of my head i think i always knew something was wrong with them, but i just ignored it and kept working.

on the end of that first week, one day we were out and we had been working all day long and it was probably 6 or 7 and at that point every step i took would send the sharpest pain shooting through my whole knee. it literally felt like someone was taking a knife to my knee each time i took a step. but i just kept telling myself, 'you knew coming out here that your knees were going to hurt. just keep going. it'll be okay.'

week 2 in the field the pain was still there. it wasn't getting any better. at the end of the day, we'd be sitting in our desks doing planning and they would just be throbbing. by the end of that week, my companion had even noticed that when we were out walking i was in pain. so one day after we got done praying for studies she noticed a bruise and asked if my knees were okay and so i told her the history of my knees. i've had four surgeries on my left knee and don't have a lateral meniscus and i've had one on my right knee and had the meniscus repaired, i've had 3 lateral releases and each time more and more cartilage gets torn. so that day we walked to a part of our area that is far away from our apartment and that's when the pain started getting really really bad. not only was my left knee aching, but now my right knee was starting to be very painful as well. at this point the pain was not only in my knees, but it was starting to move down into my shins and up into my thighs and there was so much pressure in my legs. so after almost not being able to walk home that night we called the mission nurse to see if there was anything that we could do to help. she said continue taking ibuprofen and on P-day buy frozen peas and use them to help with the swelling at the end of the day.

week 3 was so hard. they would hurt in the morning even before we went out and started working. they were so swollen. my companion would tease me and call me old because walking was so painful i guess i walked like an old person. the pressure in my legs was so painful. i'd be laying in my bed at night and the pressure in my legs made it nearly impossible to even fall asleep. the nurse came to our area to do flu shots on wednesday and looked at my knees. she touched my left knee and i just started to cry from the pain. so she had me go email my mom and ask her to contact my doctor and ask him if there was anything that we could do. so my mom emailed the nurse and told her what the doctor said and the nurse called me and read me the email and said she'd give the information to presidente caffaro and he would send the information to the mission department in salt lake and they are the ones that decide about whether a missionary needs to be sent home for medical reasons. the problem we were facing is presidente caffaro was in panama at a mission president conference so he wouldn't be able to do anything about it until saturday when he got back. so for the rest of the week hermana sanchez and i would do our studies in the morning, go eat lunch at hermana silvia's house and then we go out contacting and to as many lessons as i'd be able to go to before i couldn't walk with the pain. so the last half of week 3 consisted of a lot of going out and working and then going back to the apartment to ice and rest and then going back out and then icing. not being able to be out working all the time is so hard as a missionary. you have one purpose as a missionary and that is to invite others to come unto Christ. and not being able to do that is so hard, i just felt like i was being a terrible missionary and like i was wasting the Lord's time. saturday morning i got a call from presidente caffaro to check in and see how i was doing. i told him about the pain and how the week had gone and also about feeling like a terrible missionary. he assured me that that was not the case and that those feelings were coming from satan. he read me a scripture, it was D&C 124:49 and brought me so much comfort. he said he had submitted the report and that we'd most likely hear from salt lake on monday.

so monday rolls around and it's p-day. it was a rough day, because that's our only day to get everything we need and the grocery store isn't exactly right around the corner. we went to email our families and the church that has the computers isn't even in our area, so my knees were already hurting before we were even half way there and then my companion needed to get some money from her family at the other end of our area. so we rode the transmetro to one of the mercados and we were at the bank and presidente caffaro called and said that salt lake had just emailed him and said to send me home. when he said that, tears started to come right away and then he thanked me for my service and said that they would miss me and that hermana caffaro would call me later and that the AP's would call me with my flight plans.

later that night at 8:45 we were at an investigators house eating dinner and the phone started to ring. it was hermana caffaro and she called to see how i was doing and thanked me as well. i love the caffaro's so much. there was an immediate connection between me and hermana caffaro, she is the nicest person and helped me so much with the adjustment to being a missionary in the field.

after that phone call the phone rang again almost seconds after i hung up with hermana caffaro and it was the secretaries to the president and they said that a taxi would be outside of my apartment at 9:15 to take us to vista hermosa where we'd be spending the night and my flight would take off the next morning at 8:30 and that the elders would be at my apartment at 5:45 to pick me up and take me to the airport.

after a very rushed goodbye to the people i love with my whole heart and some hectic packing of just throwing everything in sight into which ever bag it fit in we were on our way to vista hermosa.

that night consisted of re-packing and absolutely no sleep. all night long i listened to airplanes taking off and landing. my heart was absolutely racing all night long. i couldn't believe it was actually happening.

the day started off at a cheery 5am. my companion woke up with me and we both sat there as i got ready and we tried hard not to think that these were our last few moments together. we spent the morning laughing, like we usually were for the almost 4 weeks we were together.

45 minutes later our cell phone started to ring and the elders said they were outside. mi compa ran outside to open the gate and let them in. my suitcases were gone in a flash and hermana sanchez and i walked outside behind them and had a very brief tearful goodbye before the elders had to take me to the airport.

after waiting in the luggage line for two hours, the elders walked me to the security gate, i turned and shook their hands and thanked them for their help and then i was on my own. this was really happening.

after navigating three airports and going into shock after feeling how cold utah is, i was back with my family.

that night as i was released, i cried more tears than i did than on all the days combined that i said goodbye to loved ones and left to go to guatemala. i sat in my stake president's office and sobbed like a baby. i was actually crying so hard president pullan said i didn't have to take off my nametag right than, that i could wait until later that night when i felt ready.

so there's my story. i may have cried as i typed this out and it may have taken me two weeks to actually finish this. but whatever is my next step in life is {i honestly have no clue about what that step may be} i will always be grateful to know that Heavenly Father has a plan for us -- a better plan than we have for ourselves and i am very grateful to know with my whole heart that Heavenly Father does indeed hear and answer our prayers in the way He sees best fit for us. He loves us. I know it.

week 9: will of the Lord

Whoa. Well this week threw a curve ball didn´t it? Was not expecting that at all. Presidente Caffaro submitted the report to Salt Lake on Friday about what´s been going on and he said we´ll know what they decide by today. The nurse says she´s almost positive they´ll be sending me home to get it fixed and that they usually do it really quick for health needs, she said her guess is that by Wednesday I´ll be home. But Presidente said he´d call me when he finds out for sure and I´m sure either him or I will be in contact with you about what they decide. Whoa. Ha it´s been a very emotional week. I can honestly say I´m more nervous to come home than I was to come here. But I don´t want to talk about that anymore so ya...

Any ways, this week was good! It´s been so hot! Finally!!! I have been a happy camper. 

Monday was a good day, P-day is always a good day. That night things got a little rough. All of our appointments fell through and no one would talk to us. We saw one of our investigators that was supposed to get baptized on Saturday smoking. So there goes that baptism. It was a really rough night.

Tuesday Hermana Sanchez and I woke up and were still upset about the night before and we went out and were walking every where trying to find people and go to our appointments and once again no one was talking to us. It was so frustrating! We were out trying to talk to people, going to our investigators houses, less actives, knocking on random doors and seriously no one would talk to us. We were feeling pretty down about everything and then we said a prayer to just find somebody. We then went and knocked all the doors in an appartment complex and were able to teach one lesson and the lady did not like it. But after that we went back out and were walking and still not having much success but then I realized, that I was out walking and trying to find people and doing everything that I absolutley could and that the Lord only asks us to do all we possibly can and that´s what I was doing. So I felt better. That night we felt like we should go to do how to begin teaching with one of our street contacts from last week. Her name is Flor, she´s 16, lives by herself, can´t read and is so prepared for this gospel! We taught her and she just ate up our message and said at the ends of our lessons, if she feels like it´s the right thing to do she wants to get baptized. Such a tender mercy and made the whole day worth it.

Wednesday we had an awesome zone conference about how to be better missionaries and meet our goals. Wednesday was a tough day for my knees. I could only make it to one investigators house before I literally could not walk. So we went back to the apartment and tried to find a ward member for me to stay with and another to do divisions with my companion. So such luck. PLEASE PLEASE work with the missionaries in your ward. It´s so frustrating when no one works with us.

Thursday was good, we were in and out of the apartment all day because of my knees. When it got to the point where I couldn´t walk we´d go back and I´d ice them and then we´d go back out and then in and out. It was so frustrating. But that night we met our district leader at the church so he could give Sergio the baptismal interview. He passed!! He got surgery on Tuesday so he won´t be able to be baptized for a little bit. But I´m so excited for him! And after the interview Elder Hart and his comp gave me a blessing and it was in spanish and I didn´t understand everything, but I felt the spirit so powerfully.

Friday we spent most of the day in our apartment once again because of my dumb knees. But we had one amazing lesson with our investigator Antoina, she has been so prepared and is so excited about the Book of Mormon and is progressing so well. I´m so excited for her. Her husband can´t read but she´s reading the pamphlets to him and the Book of Mormon and they both feel good about them. This gospel is so amazing!!

Saturday Hermana Trapnell called me and talked to me about what´s going to happen this week and she read me the email that dad sent and after that Presidente Caffaro called to check in with everything and he read a scripture to me that brought me alot of comfort becuase honestly I´ve felt like the crappiest missionary ever this week. But he said he submitted the report on Friday and it´s now up to the general authorities to decide what to do. So now we´re just waiting to hear back from them.

Sunday was amazing. I´m tearing up right now just thinking about the power I felt from the family fast. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You guys honestly have no idea what a strength that was for me. I woke up and just found so much comfort about everything and was so happy and was able to be out and working all day. It was honestly a miracle. No matter what happens, everything is going to be okay and it´s part of a bigger plan for me. It might not be ideal or what we expected, but that´s where faith plays in and I´ve just found so much comfort in that. So thank you. I have the best family in the world and don´t know what I´d do without you guys. Sunday there was also a big earthquake! It was awesome! Earthquakes are still my favorite things.

So that´s what happened this week. Oh also, I will never ever complain about having to do laundry with a washer and dryer ever again. It´s 5 billion times easier than doing it by hand. That´s all I can think of so I guess I´ll let you guys know when we hear from Salt Lake and what they decide. Maybe they won´t decide today because we aren´t the only mission in the world that they need to think about, but whenever we know I´ll be in touch. 

I love you guys so much. Thanks for everything! 

Love, Hermana Tuddenham

week 8: Lots of learning

Hey family! Sorry about the email last week, there was so much going on and so many people trying to talk to me and I was trying to write and it was just insane. So I´m sorry! I´ll try to do better!

So my trainer is Hermana Sanchez and she is amazing and fluent in english! That seriously has been the biggest blessing in my whole life at the moment. She´s from El Salvador and is so helpful.

So this week was really good, but to be 100% honest (and I told you before I left that my emails aren´t going to be the cheesy ´´oh everything is perfect, this is the best thing ever´ emails missionaries usually send. They´re going to be truthful) This is so hard. I knew the living conditions would be bad, I knew I´d be walking around all day long, I knew my knees would be swollen and hurt and I was ready for all of that. I was not ready for people pointing at my laughing at me all day long, I was not ready for how lonely it feels to only understand maybe 1/40 of what´s going on in a conversation, I wasn't ready for not being able to understand the hymns during church and not having Ang come up to me after and patting my back and saying ´hi hon´ or no hugs from Kim, or not sitting in between Cami and Brittany in the chapel in Cedar. It´s little things like that, that I had no idea would be so hard - but I also had no idea how happy I´d be walking around all day long attempting to talk to people. 

So on Monday we had P-day and Presidente and Hermana Caffaro came and played with our zone and Hna. took the sisters to go get ice cream and after hna sanchez and I went grocery shopping and I found peanut butter! YAY!!! 

Tuesday we went to go find two girls who we contacted in the street and they weren't home so we were standing outside of the door and this old lady is up on the mountain and says, you can come teach me. So we hiked up to her house and taught her. Her name is Antonia and she lives in a tiny hut and has a dirt floor and is really open to our message! It´s awesome. She has 7 dogs, a cat, and a bunch of chickens. During the closing prayer a chicken came up and pecked my foot....who would have thought that 6 chickens would just be chillin´ with us during a lesson? I thought it was pretty funny.

Wednesday was terrible. During language study I just felt so overwhelmed with the language and just started to bawl. Then later that night at an investigators house they were talking and I couldn't understand and I´ve gotten really good at understanding the phrase, ´she doesn´t understand does she?´ and one of the investigators said that and I felt the tears starting to come, so I asked to use the bathroom (that I do know how to say in spanish) and in this tiny, dirty bathroom, underneath the stairs I just sank onto my knees and started to sob uncontrollably for a good 5-10 minutes. Not one of my finest moments. I remember saying, ¨heavenly father¨ but I don´t think I got anything out past that. It was terrible. I´ve never felt so alone in my life. But then I read in Matthew 14: 29-32 and realized that I am Peter. We all are Peter and that the Lord has his hand constantly stretched out to us and that it is up to us to take a hold of it so He can pull us into the boat and the storm can stop. So after I finally stopped crying our investigator, David, started making jokes and had me laughing so it was all better and I finally realized who he reminds me of. He reminds me of a mix between Daddy, Shawn and Tony. I love it! 

Thursday was awesome!! I saw a volcano explode!! (I've seen 2 more since) It was awesome! I 

didn't have my camera though...so no pictures, sorry! But after I saw the volcano explode we were contacting and we contacted this family and the mom started making all sort of excuses about how they don´t have time and blah blah blah, and then she said, ´my son is in english classes and he has this big test and he needs to study´and then I said, I can help him study. I know english. And she asked how much I charge for tutoring and I told her that it would be free, just a service and she looked shocked and then agreed to have us come back and help him. So basically we´re going to baptize the whole family. It´s going to be awesome. But the coolest thing was Thursday night. There was not only one, but TWO EARTHQUAKES!! 

Friday we went and contacted with a member, she´s in her 60´s and lives alone and has a friend who she thinks needs the gospel, so we went with her and shared our message and her friend started crying and said that her husband is sick and has all these problems and she knows that the gospel will bless her life so much. Amazing!

Saturday was good, I met Juan Lopez. We walked past him and he started talking in english and normally I ignore men who talk in english because they just want to get my attention and it´s just dumb. But for some reason I said hi back and then he started up a conversation and he´s from LA and he gave me all the updates of what´s going on with football and said we could come teach his family on monday´s before football is on. 

Sunday was so much better! It was just a good day. At church we had an elder in our ward get home from his mission and then we went and ate lunch with his family and he was Kaden Newburger´s companion and so we talked about that and he said Kaden is doing awesome. Then that night we went to teach Sarleth and we got there and she was trying to make her house warmer. So me and my comp insulated her house using cardboard and a nail gun. Cardboard. My heart broke. Seriously, we have it so easy in the states. I feel so spoiled. 

So that´s all that I can think of for this week! Hope all is well with you guys! I love you so much!! Have a great week!

Love, Hermana Tuddenham

week 6 & 7

Hey family!

Okay wow. So much to say. So our last week at the CCM was awesome and very sad. Our district got so close, it was tough for all of us to say goodbye. 

So I told yáll about that song that we were going to sing for our last devotional and we had some people from the airport come over to have lunch at the CCM so we can have a better relationship with the airport and they´ll help out more with missionary needs. So our teacher had us go sing that song to them and the spirit was so powerful. This tough old man was sitting in front of me and none of them are members of the church and this old man just had tears running down his face, along with several other people. It was such an amazing experience.

So one of our last nights in the CCM we were waiting for our teacher and two other companionships to get done with teaching and so we were all chatting and having fun and someone brought up quarter basketball and one elder had never heard of it before so we played it with him and he had pencil marks all over his face and we were laughing so hard and presidente walked in...ya...not one of the brightest moments, but it was still so funny.

Mom I got the letters!! YAY! Thank you! They made my night!

So I´m really short on time and there is so much to say, so you´re just going to get parts of the week.

Presidente and Hermana Caffaro are the nicest people. I love them! They know Rachel Cox and are related to her some how and they also know Dave Richards. Such a small world!

So my area is Monte Maria and it´s in the capital just like 10 or 15 minutes away from the CCM. I´m the first missionary to start in this area so that´s kind of neat...We have some awesome investigators. We have 6 with baptismal dates and I am so happy for all of them!

My spanish is terrible. Absolutely terrible. I hardly understand anything, but each day it gets a little better and I understand a little more. Which is good.

It is freezing here. No joke. I am always so cold! It´s really pretty and I love seeing the city lights at night. The area is pretty poor and it is just heart breaking. I wish you guys could see the way these people live. Their homes are made out of pallets and scrap wood. It´s so sad. But they don´t complain, this is the only way of life they know. You guys seriously have so idea how blessed we are.

So as far as being the only white person here, it´s great.....I get honked and whistled at everywhere we go. Men always blow me kisses and one night we were teaching a lesson in the street and I was in the middle of teaching and this drunk man just comes up and kisses me! Thank heavens I turned in time and he just got my cheek....but still...this place is crazy! Little kids will see me walking and they all look at me and yell that I´m a giant. It´s so funny. 

That´s all the time I have for this week. My comp is uploading pictures with my camera right now, so I´ll send some of those! I love you guys so much! (They had a camera glitch so there are no pictures this week. However, the one below is when she left the MTC in Guatemala for the Guatemala City South Mission on Tuesday, October 28, 2014).

Love, Hermana Tuddenham