It is going to be OK

I realize my sanity was a little questionable day before yesterday. Adam and I both felt like we were teetering on the edge of a breakdown. This is the stuff that no one talks about. No one ever says that it is ok to feel like jumping into the river when your entire life crumbles around you. They only say "oh it is ok", "you will get through this", or "I am praying for you". While I love prayers and have a strong faith in God, sometimes I just want someone to take on one of the problems and FIX it. Fix it right then. Let me give you a brief rundown of our past 2 weeks: Weston needs a heart and lungs NOW (his meds are no longer working as effectively), Adam has to go back to work asap so that we can keep our insurance that will only pay 80 percent of his transplant expenses, he will not get paid for the first few months of work because we will be paying back ins premiums that have built up while Adam has been gone, I am having Ellie on Monday, and we found out today that the apartment we live in that is rented through the hospital is ending their contract so we have to move by Feb 10 or pay 2600 a month in rent. Social work also did an estimate of how much we need to fundraise for out of pocket expenses and they came up with 100,000 to 200,000 dollars. AND-I am being induced Monday so Ellie will be arriving (the highlight of the week!).

After a short pity party for our situation, I posted on facebook-not really knowing what else to do. I was amazed by the support we received from our family and friends. Having a child with a critical illness is stressful enough but to add all of those other things to the mix-well, it is just overwhelming. Everyone keeps saying that "God doesn't give you more than you can handle". I would like to see some research on that because I feel like Adam and I have gotten more than our fair share here recently.

Pity party over and now looking forward. Friends are working on fundraising ideas and I am thankful that they are taking over. Weston ate mac and cheese yesterday and has had a pretty good day today. I have spent a lot of time wondering about Ellie's timing. As most everyone knows, I was pregnant before we left Tennessee. Every once in awhile, we talk with someone who can't do math and they seem to think we got pregnant while up here-you know, because critical illness is so romantic and the few times Adam and I have even slept in the same bed, making a baby was 1st on our list. Anyways, no one ever could have thought that we would be here for 8 months and probably longer. No one ever would have thought our family would be torn apart. But, the other day, it dawned on me why God sent Ellie at such a stressful time. Ellie is the one positive experience we have. Weston (and the other kids) are excited about a baby sister. Weston cannot wait to hold her, feed her, and give her a bath. God sent Ellie to us to give Weston something to look forward to and something to be happy about. Ellie is a blessing and for the first few months, I had been taking that for granted.

Fast Forward

We have been in Philadelphia 7 months and 1 day. So much has happened since we arrived and we have gone on so many wild rides. First, we were separated from the kids because we were here and Weston was so sick. We were told Weston was going to die which was horrible. Thankfully, he is a fighter and Adam and I beat the heck out of his back with this vibration thing 24 hours a day to get the pneumonia out of his lungs and he not only survived but he did better than he had. Then, we brought the kids up when things were a bit more stable. We agreed they would stay until after Christmas or until Weston's transplant-whichever came first. We were so hopeful that he would get a transplant during the holidays. Holidays are the big transplant time-but they have came and went now. I have been worried about how I would feel this week about no transplant and I am not going to lie, it is heartbreaking to know that he needs something to desperately and there is nothing that we can do but wait. The kids went back to Tennessee on New Years Eve. It was bittersweet. We knew that we were going to have to send them to minimize the germ risk during cold and flu season for Weston but we will miss them and their wild ways. The apartment has been so sad and boring since they left. I have pretty much decided that 1) I would never do well living alone and 2) I will probably not do so hot when the kids move out of the house.

Ellie is growing and can arrive anytime. Ideally, baking for another week would be great but since it feels like she is kicking my lungs, I believe she is ready to exit. My doctor said that I have to stay in the hospital for 48 hours after she is born. I feel that is excessive since I am going from 1 hospital to go sit in the CICU at CHOP where there are zillions of doctors just in case something went wrong. I will push for an early departure once I see how labor goes. The only labor that I really had a hard time recovering from was Sutton and with him, I lost so much blood that my blood pressure kept dropping and I kept passing out-even after I had been discharged. I feel so fat at the moment. Maybe it is because I can't breathe or because Weston insists on me getting up and down a bazillion times to do things for him which makes me groan and pant. I can't wait to lose the weight. I am usually never worried about dropping the pregnancy weight but I am also usually at home running after the kids and it just falls off. I love my Zumba class at home so I am hoping to get Zumba for the Wii so I can do it pretty soon after Ellie is born. I have the 30 Day Shred too that I did before I got pregnant and it is a good workout-probably not for the super athletes out there-but I liked it just fine. I just can't wait to hold sweet Ellie and bend over without thinking I might throw up.

Looking at the year ahead, everything is so up in the air. Everything depends on Weston's transplant. Our family is on hold and it is frustrating to have no control over anything. Our main friends up here are hospital staff. I told Adam we need to work on that. Being here has put things in such a different perspective. So, I keep thinking, fast forward hopefully 6 months or so, and I will be blogging about how we are going home, how great his transplant went, and how excited we are to finally get back to Blountville. I still need to post picts from Christmas. I promise to do that soon-or at least before next Christmas.