Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Yesterday afternoon, before moving our dad into hospice care, our pastor, Tito Mercado, gathered us all around Daddy.

We had a beautiful, precious, sweet time together as Tito proceeded to commend Mommy and Daddy's marriage which has been filled with grace for 25 years.

We wept together and yet rejoiced as Tito told us all that he had never encountered a couple who had undergone such suffering and trials in their marriage.

We all laid hands on Daddy and prayed for him. The Lord was there with us as we lifted up our precious Daddy and committed him to the Lord's care.

Daddy was at peace. He is at peace...complete peace.

"For better or for worse, in sickness and in health, in life and in death..."

Thank you all,
Megan

- Update -

1. Vital signs are and have been stable for over 12 hours now. We are esp. thankful his blood pressure is up. It was critically low. His temperature which was at a life-threatening 85.8 got up to 96.6, which, while not life threatening, is completely debilitating for someone like Chris with MS. It was around 91 when we left last night which is much better for him.

2. Chris has two infections, both of which, combined with the MS, have put him into a status of critically ill. First, is a urinary tract infection. This has responded well as of last night to antibiotics. Thank the Lord! Two, he has pneumonia. While it is not a severe case for normal healthy people, it is very serious for Chris.

3. He had to be on oxygen 20% midday, but as the afternoon progressed, they continued to up that to 100% and finally had to resort to using a bipap machine, which is a mask that forms a seal on the nose/mouth area and pumps oxygen into the lungs. By last night, his oxygen levels had come up, and held steady so that they could remove the bipap machine.

He came very close to having to be put on a ventilator if the bipap machine failed to get his oxygen levels up. This is a serious step to take, and not one to make lightly. We are thankful the doctors did not have to do that.

Concerning interventive measures, Chris and I talked quite a bit in the last two months about what he would like to have done and what he would not want done should the need arise to visit this issue. Chris, who was never one to want a lot of medical intervention, decided that he did not want to be artificially prolonged.

If the doctors had told us they needed to put him on a ventilator, even though Chris said he did not want to, I would have asked them to do it, but only so that our children could be with their daddy before he goes home to be with the Lord.

Chris is close to going home we believe. He is fairly unconscious, non-responsive and has had no nutrition since Thursday except hydration and electrolyte and glucose supplementation.

He is not stable or responsive enough to move from the ICU unit here at St. Francis Medical Center in Colorado Springs. With almost complete certainty, he will not be coming home to Virginia.

Because of this, we flew Bethany, Megan, and John out here to be with their daddy. Chris parents just flew in early this morning. In addition, our family life pastor is flying in today at noon.

We don't know how much time we have left with Chris, but we believe it is not long. As a family, we all knew that Daddy was getting worse; we just didn't expect him to be getting ready to go home to be with his Abba Father quite this soon. We are all at peace with whatever God has planned, knowing that because He is there, it is all good.

Thank you for your prayers as we prepare and spend our last days and hours with Chris. May they be filled with many precious moments and sweet fellowship with him!

The Klicka Family