The Unstoppable Path to Healing

“I had come home one night and came in, you know, got my pajamas on, and was getting ready for bed. Then all of a sudden, my eye, my right eye, start twitching really fast,” Eve recalls. 

In April 2018, Eve Perry Washington began having stroke-like symptoms. She called 911, then she called Judi, her small group leader. “At that time my speech was already, you know, leaving. It was hard for me to get the words out so you could understand.”

“Her words were slurred,” Judi adds. “Very slurred. And that was unlike her. I prayed for her on the phone and then headed to the hospital--prayed all the way to the hospital.” Eve was rushed to the emergency room, where friends and family members were waiting. “When we got there, we actually prayed for her, laid hands on her, prayed for her because we were able to see her in the emergency room,” Judi says.  

Eve says, “I asked God when I got there, I said, ‘Listen, if I have to be in here, use me for your glory.’ I said, ‘I'm not gonna just stay here and not have you use me. I said, because I know this is not you.’”

Doctors ran scans and x-rays and found a brain tumor behind her eye. Dr. Kaisorn Chaichana of the Gainesville Mayo Clinic, says, “She had a meningioma. So, a meningioma is a tumor that arises from the meninges of the lining of the brain. It was on the left side, behind her eye. I think it was around 4 to 5 centimeters, so it was on the larger side.”

Judi says, “My first reaction was that we just have to believe God. We have to believe God. We know that what He's promised us and we have to stand on His promises.”  

Eve recalls, “'I'm not sure. I'm not gonna ask you why,’ I said, but I'm gonna ask you, 'If I'm in the hospital and I have to have this brain surgery, I'm looking to you, Jesus, to totally heal me. There would be no negative side effects.'”

“If they are on the dominant hemisphere of the left side in close proximity to language area, it can cause speech issues,” Dr. Chaichana adds. “If it is nearby the motor cortex which controls the motor functions, it can cause motor issues. In her case, where it was located, usually what we worry about vision loss.”

She was released from the hospital and scheduled to return to the Mayo Clinic in August where the surgeon, Dr. Betty Kim, would remove her tumor. The morning of the surgery, Eve felt total peace. “This is exactly what The Holy Spirit said. He said, 'It's going to be like you went to sleep and woke up, like nothing ever changed except for the fact the tumor will be gone.’ This is what I said to Dr. Kim: ‘Can you agree with me that everything will come out fine? I will not have any negative side effects from any of this.’ And she said, ‘I agree.’"

Her family and church friends continued praying for her. When it was over, the doctors told them they could go see her in recovery, where she was awake and totally coherent. “That was a little strange to me,” Judi adds. “I was like, ‘Okay, we can go back to see somebody that just had brain surgery?’ Okay, good. And so we went back to see her and to my surprise, she was talking and wanting to get up.”

“I knew where I was and I could, knew the people that was in the room, and I just raised my hand and began to give God praise,” Eve says. 

“Any brain surgery is serious,” says Dr. Chaichana, “but here at Mayo Clinic we are very sub-specialized, so we always see a lot of the same types of lesions. And after the surgery she was doing great without any vision loss.”

Eve recently married, and today is fully functioning and perfectly healthy. She is thankful for the excellent job the doctors at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville did, and she has had no side effects or required follow up treatment. “I never had headaches before, and I never had headaches since,” Eve says. “No meds at all, no anything. So I was so grateful none of that happened.” 

“When I see her, I know that she's a testament of God's power at work,” Judi says. “It increased my faith. I would always say that my faith was strong, but this did increase my faith even more so.”

“We need each other so don’t be a lone ranger,” Eve emphasizes. “Always surround yourself with prayer, and people of prayer, and people of faith.  We need each other. Prayer is powerful.”

To discover encouraging scripture and insights, please visit Eve Perry's website: Revealing Moments with God. You can also reach Eve Perry by emailing her at eve.perry72@yahoo.com.