The Faith of a Family by Roger Davis

It was Friday, 9 Oct. 1953 day of the “Little-Brown-Jug” football game. This game was the traditional cross-town revelry between Ogden and Weber High Schools. The victor received the honor to hold the trophy, a brown
jug, until the following year. It was a big event in Ogden, Utah. I was sixteen years old and a junior at Ogden. I arrived home after an exciting day. The thrill of the game was on the minds of the student-body and we had a great pep-rally that had raised the excitement level even higher. I was looking forward to attending the game at the rodeo grounds on 17th Street. It was a beautiful fall day and I felt so good and happy. There was a basket of freshly harvested plums setting on the back porch of our home on Monroe Boulevard just south of 32nd Street. I grabbed a handful and went to my radio shack to work on my hobby. It wasn’t but a few minutes after eating the plums that I experienced the most painful stomach cramp. Usually a cramp will ease after awhile but not this one and it was so
painful. I went looking for Mother. She began treating me with treatments she had used over the years to keep her family healthy. Nothing would ease the pain. I could not sleep and Mother was up with me all night. I even tried standing on my head to ease the pain. Dr. Ross, our family doctor, arrived in the morning and after an exam said it appeared to be appendicitis. He offered to drive me to the Dee Hospital and prepare for surgery. At the hospital I remember being awakened several times throughout the day with doctors pocking and probing me and asking where it hurts. All I could say was: “it hurts everywhere.” By Saturday evening they decided to do exploratory surgery to find the problem. My sister Shirley was a nurse at the Hospital and was given the permission to watch the surgery
but not participate. The next thing I remembered was waking up Sunday morning hearing Father telling members of my Sunday school class what had happened. I was amazed as I heard that my small intestine had become strangulated by hole in the lining of my stomach and when they operated gangrene required them to remove about three feet of it. I was woozy and fell in and out of sleep as I tried to visit. Dad said that I was very blessed to be alive. I knew that my family had been fasting and praying for me and that I had received a priesthood blessing. I was in the hospital twelve days and my parents and siblings took turns sitting by my bedside. Late one night Donald became worried about my deep sleep and irregular breathing. He kept looking for someone to check me but could find no one. Finally a nurse friend of Shirley’s, who was just getting off work and thought to herself “I’ll check on Shirley’s brother before I go home” came in the room. She realized that I had been given too much pain medicine and my pulse had become very slow. She sounded the alarm. Doctors came running from all parts of the hospital.
They gave me a shot of Adrenalin that got my heart going again and caused me to wake up with a shock. I saw Dad, Paul, Donald and several Doctors in a circle around my bed. I kept saying: “what’s wrong, what’s wrong.” They said: “everything is OK now, just go to sleep”, they gave me a priesthood blessing during which I fell asleep. This happened before anything had been written about near death experiences. Two things that I remembered very distinctly were a very bright light that was the center of my focus and the indescribable peace. It was so peaceful that I was upset for being forced to wake up. I am grateful for Mother’s care through a long painful night, for Shirley watching over me in the operating room, for Dad’s blessings, for Sterling building me a new radio shack, for Paul managing all the bills, for all who took care of me in the hospital, for Donald and Shirley’s friend who followed the promptings of the spirit and for the faith and prayers offered in my behalf. I will be eternally grateful that I belonged to a “Family of Faith.” I didn’t get to go to the “Little-Brown-Jug” game but am still alive. I don’t know who won, probably Ogden. Ha