Healed and hopeful

Longtime American Family Radio (AFR) listener Kate Nolan of Kansas attended AFA at the Ark in October 2025. During her visit to Answers in Genesis’ Ark Encounter and Creation Museum alongside American Family Association (AFA) staff and fellow supporters, Nolan had the opportunity to talk with AFA Vice President Wesley Wildmon. She shared with him her remarkable testimony of God’s faithfulness during an unexpected health journey that changed her life forever. Nolan’s trip to the Ark was the first time she had traveled since the onset of her sickness nearly 10 years ago. Wildmon was so moved by her story that he asked her to share it in The Stand.

October 12, 2016, was a Wednesday. It started out like any other day. I was headed to work the evening shift at the hospital.

There were only four stop signs between my home and the hospital. When I stopped at the third one, I immediately felt sick. I threw open the car door just in time to “lose” everything I had eaten that day. It was bright green – a color very similar to antifreeze. I’m not a nurse, but I knew that was not right.

I went straight to the emergency room. The doctor I saw ordered a CT scan. About an hour later, she came into my room and scooted a stool next to my bed. I knew the results were not good.

I was admitted to the hospital instantly and put through a regimen of tests over the next four days. I had so many blood draws and IV drips that I lost count.

I could not get a straight answer from any of the doctors as to when I could go home. Even the ones I knew on a personal level were evasive.

Then, at 11:31 p.m. on Sunday, October 16, my life changed forever. A surgeon bolted into my hospital room, flipped on the lights, and said, “Miss Kate, wake up! I need to talk to you immediately!”

I had been sound asleep, but he now had my complete attention.

In a slow Mississippi drawl, he said, “My name is Dr. Brian Boyd. … Miss Kate, we have to get you to surgery now!”

I asked why, but he talked over me.

He explained that I was so critical that if I did not submit to surgery right then, I would not be alive in 48 hours. And even if I did, he could not guarantee that I would live through the surgery. If I did somehow make it through, I would wake up in the intensive care unit with a colostomy bag.

I was numb.

Dr. Boyd explained that my body was full of poison, and a mass the size of a grapefruit had to be removed immediately, or I would die. I was filled with both gangrene and peritonitis.

I barely remember him sitting on the edge of my bed, asking me to agree to surgery. I tried to protest, saying that I needed to tell my 83-year-old dad. Dr. Boyd shook his head, “No time!”

He assured me that the nurses would call my father and other family members.

Stunned, I took the pen and signed my name.

Covered in prayer

“Miss Kate, I do one of two things with my patients before surgery,” Dr. Boyd said, looking into my eyes with compassion. “I either pray with my patients, or I pray for my patients. Which do you prefer?”

I murmured, “Both.”

A quick prayer later, and I was whisked into surgery. I don’t remember much after that, but I do remember a nurse whispering a prayer as we entered the operating room.

Within seconds, I was asleep. No final words to family. No time to call my church family. Just cold darkness.

To this day, I have no idea how long my surgery lasted. It was dusk when I woke up. My dad, brother, sister-in-law, and brother-in-law were there. Several people I didn’t recognize surrounded me.

“What happened? Where am I? What are you all doing here?” I asked.

Slowly over the next few days, the pieces to my puzzle were put together.

I was in the same room I had been in prior to surgery.

No ICU! No colostomy bag either.

How did that happen? Only God!

Overcome with infection

After I was more coherent, Dr. Boyd explained to me that he removed 54 inches of my small intestine and 13 inches of my large intestine. The mass was not hard; it was pliable. It was not inside my colon, which explained why a colonoscopy did not find it. It was wrapped around the mesentery – a large vein that supplies blood to both the large and small intestines. The mass had been growing – very slowly – for over 25 years. Because it was pliable, it moved when doctors pushed on my abdomen, so no one knew it was there.

The mass had cut off the blood supply to both intestines, and large portions of each of them had died. It was slowly killing me. Even my brain was poisoned, which explains why I could no longer balance my checkbook and why I would get lost driving to church.

Part of me was stapled shut, but there were places that were gaping open. My gut was so inflamed that there were parts of me that Dr. Boyd could not staple shut. Two drains were inserted to remove the poison from my body.

I started running a high fever. Even with strict protocols in place, I had contracted a staph infection in one of the open wounds.

Doctors were worried. I was weak. My fever soared.

The pharmacy was working overtime trying to get the right “concoction” of antibiotics to help me fight not just two infections, but now three. Any of these infections could have been fatal in and of itself.

Because I was taking so many antibiotics, the inflammation in my large intestine became even more inflamed, resulting in another major infection: Clostridioides difficile, commonly referred to as C.diff.

Connected to hope

Long days and even longer nights followed. Days turned into weeks and weeks to months. I struggled with pain and depression. It was always one step forward and two steps back.

To pass the time, I had a choice of “hospital TV” or apps on my cell phone. I chose the AFR app.

To this day, it is my favorite app on my phone. The consistency of God’s messages from different ministries, JJ Jasper’s jokes, and the bantering on Today’s Issues kept my focus on God and His promises. My long, empty nights when I could not sleep were filled with soft, gentle messages from Pastor Joseph Parker. Sometimes, I thought he was speaking only to me.

I was not alone in the fight.

I had God … and AFR. The voices on AFR had become more than “radio folks.” They had become family.

After a long 108 days in the hospital, I finally made it home to stay. Practically bedridden for the next two years while recovering, I had AFR on 24/7. I was serenaded with the joy of Jesus and a message of hope.