The last few weeks have been overwhelming.  Mid-may, we went on an amazing camping trip and were lucky enough for my mom to come along.  We made so many wonderful memories and even captured a few.  The day after my mom went back to Alabama, my step dad got sick.  Within a day, he was pretty sick and in the hospital.  He wasn’t responsive, but rebounded after the first day in PICU and we all had hope he’d be fine and the plan was for him to go to rehab upon discharge.  But then he took a turn for the worse.  His blood pressure was low, he had a high fever, pnemonia and was septic.  The infection was too strong for his lungs to battle and his body could no longer fight.  We’d all let our guard down because he had been responsive, even sitting up and talking, the day before.  And then he was gone.  He’d battled with his health for 15 years since his spinal cord injury.  Yet his death felt sudden.  We were all in shock and the sadness hit hard.  It was really important to my mom that my family travel over to Alabama.  We wanted to be there but it was hard for us.  We haven’t traveled that far with Jude in almost 4 years since his vaccine injury and the last time we did, he got really, really sick and the demyelination returned.  We’ve done short trips with him and he did great, so we decided to give it a shot.  I’d just spent 2 weeks planning for my family to be away for 4 days camping.  I think God knew I needed that trial run, plan and mindset to prepare to take our family of 6 and a weeks worth of food for all of us, to Alabama on 2 days notice.  We were nervous about Jude flying and the tickets on short notice were over $4000, so we rented a white passenger van, meal planned and shopped for food as quickly as possible and make the trip to Alabama.  The prep for the trip and the trip itself logistically went very smoothly, we were so blessed and thankful for that.  I was thankful that we got to go spend that time with my family and be there to grieve and celebrate Larry’s life.  He didn’t want a funeral, instead, we held a celebration of life service that was hosted at my mom’s home.  We were so thankful that so many of his friends came and shared their memories of him.  We were able to stay through the week and then Ty stayed for another week.  My mom had 3 of her and Larry’s kids in the house and 11 granchildren, it was a busy place.  She decided she wanted Ty to stay for awhile longer to help out and adjust to being there on her own.  I am so glad he was able to do that and be a blessing to her.

I wish I could say that when we got home things were quiet and calm and we settled back in easily.  Not so.  We got home and Kylie, our 17 year old lab mix dog was not doing well at all.  We knew she’d had a few issues thanks our awesome neighbors and dog sitter letting us know.  We took the kids out of the van from the long drive home, took one look at Kylie, and loaded everyone back up and took her to the pet ER.  We were terrified they were going to suggest we needed to put her down and we’d just got in to town after being away from her.  We just couldn’t face that thought.  Thankfully, they felt that with proper treatment of her bulging disk, she’d bounce back.  Thank God!  We wanted more time with her and we wanted Ty to be able to come home and see her again.  It’s so hard to know what to do in situations like this.  We don’t want her to suffer or be in pain, but we love her and want her with us.  Pet parenting is hard.  She was unable to walk and we had to carry her outside to go to the bathroom.  Thankfully, with meds and a visit to a pet chiro, she’s doing really well now, walking, less pain….doing well.  Then that first night home, our AC went out and my laptop broke, again.  I was ready to wave my white flag.  I’ve spent this last week catching up on a massive amount of work for Life in Motion.  Thank you to each and every one of my clients who have be oh so patient with me over the last few weeks.  It really means so much.