One Medical Mystery. Thirty Years of Suffering… But Today Is a Hallelujah Day.

I don’t remember when counting days turned into counting months, then years. Counting by decade was easy enough, but “three decades” doesn’t carry the same weight as “over 10,000 days.”

For nearly thirty years, I endured—survived—an undiagnosed illness. I saw more doctors than I can count, was turned away from clinics, and even told my suffering was all in my head. The long road finally curved toward answers in 2022: Mast Cell Activation Syndrome.

Two months later, while sorting through my mother’s prayer journals, I found a worn paper she had used for years—a prayer for my healing. Reading it was undoing. My mom had contended for me until her last breath. The answer came years later.

For Cryin’ Out Loud is a medical memoir-devotional for anyone waiting on healing or hope. Each chapter pairs my stories from this decades-long journey with the scriptures and prayers my mom left behind—her faith steadying mine when mine dead-ended.

This book is for every reader still in the waiting room, still whispering “Why me?” and still daring to believe that even here, God is present, faithful, and worthy of praise.

The Journey So Far

1995 – The Medical Mystery Tour begins.
Unrelenting symptoms appear during my first year of teaching and grad school. The hospital later refuses to see me unless I agree to a psychiatric evaluation.

2012 – A rare-cancer diagnosis offers hope—and then another detour.
I’m told it’s Carcinoid Syndrome. It isn’t.

2016–2017 – My mother passes away.
Her prayer journals become my inheritance, though I’m not yet ready to open them.

2022 (Spring) – A name for the mystery.
After nearly thirty years, the puzzle clicks into place: Mast Cell Activation Syndrome.

2022 (Summer) – The discovery.
While sorting through Mom’s papers, I find her worn-thin prayer for my healing. That moment becomes the heartbeat of this book.

2023 & 2024 – The writing adventure expands.
I attend a Writers’ Conference in Switzerland, where the manuscript—originally called Emo-Devo (short for “Emotional Devotional”)—begins to take shape.

2024–2025 – Becoming For Cryin’ Out Loud.
The manuscript evolves into a blend of memoir and devotional—part lament, part hallelujah.

November 6, 2025 – My mother’s birthday—and another beginning.
A meeting with an acquisitions editor marks one more milestone on this long, grace-filled road.