7 months already!!!

Hey everyone,

I cant believe ive already been out on my mission for 7 whole months. It has just flown by. It feels like just yesterday i was out shreddin it up at the lake. I feel like im going to blink and ill be home. Im working as hard as I can out here. I love this work. Alot of good things are happening out here. The baptismal date that we had with Mark is getting bumped back a few weeks because he is struggling a bit with tithing right now but were doing a fast with him this friday. We set a date with Crystal Fuller. Shes the mom of the big black family we found in january. She was in ohio for a month so things were delayed for a bit but were back on track now. We have been working with Derek alot lately too. He's struggling. I feel so bad for him. I love that guy to death. He got out of rehab about 3 weeks ago and 3 days after he fell right back into drinking and smoking. We tried to go by everyday but he would never talk to us or answer the door because he felt so guilty and ashamed. SO finally this past week we got in contact with him and he opened the door. We asked him if there was anything we did to make him upset but he said no and that he felt so ashamed. His apartment was just trashed. Piles and piles of beer cans everywhere. It was ridiculous. He is a true alcaholic. Its so sad because he wants to change so bad. He just has crazy flashbacks of the war and his PTSD makes him go nuts too. So he gave us a key to his apartment so we can come by whenever we want to wake him up and have a little spitirtual lesson. He said majority of the times that we came over he was just passed out. So he told us to just come on in and wake him up. One thing about Derek though is that when you wake him up he starts swinging fists like crazy. Its because he's always have night tares of the war. So this morning we went to go to the batting cages and we went to go invite Derek and we went in to wake him up and i stood about 15 feet away and kept yelling his name to wake up and finaly after about the tenth time i said his name he started kicking and punching the air like crazy for a second hahaha it was scary but also hilarious. He felt like crap so he never came to the batting cages. but Us and the Bishop went over to see him yesterday and that really helped him out. He likes the bishop. So things are slowly getting better for Derek. He still hasnt gotten confirmed yet, so were working on that. Alot of other things are going good with our other investigators as well. Elder Wright and I are doing good together for the most part. Every companionship has there struggles.....So do we...hahaha its all good. thats what the mission is all about. I feel like im pretty easy going for the most part. Ive been eating healthy lately. Today I bought milk, bread, some iceberg lettuce and 3 cucumbers hahaha Mom you would be so proud of me. A few days ago i cooked some broccoli and ate a huge bowl of it. it was good haha. So im working on my healthyness. I came out weighing 215 and im still at 215. So i think for the most part im doing ok. We have been playing tennis like crazy lately. We wake up at 6 and go play at our apartment complex courts till 7ish. My companion is getting better at it. Well i think thats all the news I have for now. I hope everyone is doing great. I miss you all. PEACE YO

Love, Elder Fielding