While church cripples, Sachem falls ill

While out on missionary work for Oklevueha Native American Church, Sachem Joy Graves of ONAC Kautantowit's Mecautea's health began taking a turn for the worst when pain unlike she ever experienced before landed her into a hospital who attempted to diagnose and provide care for the frail young woman.

Those of you familiar with Sachem Graves knows well that her strive toward a healthy life began long before even coming from her mother's womb, continuously causing an up-hill battle for her and dictating strictly her daily life's quality and activities. Graves was born with Bronchial Pulmonary Dysplasia, a condition found to be all to common in babies whom are born 4 or more weeks premature. Graves was in all actuality born 6 weeks before reaching full term, but her suffering wouldn't stop there, but on the contrary, it would prove to have only just begun.

In addition to being born pre-term and needing to be literally incubated in effort of growing and developing functioning lungs, Graves was also found to have been born with her ambillical cord tightly wrapped around her neck a total of 3 times according to he mother. As a result, our then yet to be born future leader found herself being deprived of both food and air. According to the physician who delivered Graves declared her "A miracle baby" and then added "She was the smartest of over 5,000 babies I myself personally delivered, as she knew that if she didn't force labor when she had, she would have definitely been a stillborn."

This, as time would progress forward would not only leave Graves with only 75% lung function and the constant struggle for breath, but additionally would lead to the second forever diagnosis of "Costrocondritis" as ultimately being born without lings would lead to improper growth of her chest cavity wall, leading to constant pain, especially as she struggle to breathe.

Ultimately being short of breath was nothing new to Graves as it had forever impacted her life as well as limited her physical activity, but on this day Graves notes that her ability to breather was "harder and more painful than I can ever remember it being." Thinking it was brought on by all the travel and stresses she was then dealing with, Graves chose to get herself grounded and then to rest a couple of days, thinking that the pain and struggle would subside, but when it didn't but instead worsened, church members lept into action and rushed Graves to a local Kaiser Permanente hospital. Graves had been a member of Kaiser since she was 3 weeks old and so it was believed to be the best course of action at the time.

What came as a surprise to Graves and the members, was when physician's concluded that Graves needed to be transported to another local hospital due to the seriousness of the condition physicians concluded was ailing her and instead of getting the "OK", Graves was told that the state of Oregon had in fact cancelled her kaiser coverage as of that very morning! What this would mean for Graves was Disaster. "One minute the phyician and staff are rushing saying how Extremely important it was for me to be transferred to another hospital and to be prepared for Emergency Surgery, but then the faculty was that due to no coverage, I instead was to be discharged and sent home to try and get my medical insurance coverage straightened out."

Frantic church members remained diligently at her side, trying to care for Graves as best as they could think to try, but what can one do when the doctors diagnose that the build up of Sepsis infection was "seeping into the tissue" of her skeleton-thin body and "toxically Poisoning" her? For the next few weeks Graves would do all she could to regain medical coverage from the state of Oregon but ultimately it would prove to no avail. All the while the state or Oregon continues to attack the church from other angles.

Smoke, prayers and even a cleansing and healing ceremony have been provided by church members along with medicines needed to help see her through until things can be all straightened out and medical care needed can be obtained. As of now Graves is weak but stable. Physically she is reporting to be in "Extreme pain" and her lung function is fluctuating between 30-50%. We ask you to join your prayers of healing and good vibes sent her and the churches way.