We're trying to be intentional about how we're spending our time and it feels like something is finally clicking. Being home is giving more time to get chores done and play together and just breathe a bit. It's hard but good.
On Tuesday we rather suddenly drove down to see Seth's cousin in Vancouver, as they were there visiting other family. To be honest, it was hard to make the decision to go because we've stayed so locked down since the pandemic hit Washington. But we don't get to see him and his family very often because he lives relatively far south in California so it would take us twenty hours to get there if we drove, so to only drive two hours south to see him made it worth the potential germ exposure. We love him and his family and we wanted to see him as he fights brain cancer, even as we are trying still to avoid interacting with people because of this virus.
Job was, as usual, the star of the show. There's something about his small little two year old sized body, his raspy voice that never stops talking now, his scars, his story, his weird name, his magnetism, that just attracts people to him.
We ended up seeing a lot of people and found it difficult to socially distance, so now we're kinda feeling like we should socially distance longer. And Pierce County cases keep going up, sooo, here we are. Still at home and it's almost July! Seth still wishes everyone would just go out and get each other sick so then our family could eventually go out.
It all seems so silly but every time I want to just go do whatever I want then I think about the long term effects of every hospitalization. Who would watch the kids so Seth can work? Could Ezra recover from the trauma of being afraid for Job's life? What would they eat? What about the financial costs of driving up and down and ordering room service? What about the weeks of recovery at home from being apart and being scared while apart? None of those things by themselves is insurmountable. We could figure out a solution to each concern. But it's that they all pile on top of each other, one after another.
And I'm not even going to a place where I wonder if Job could survive this virus. I refuse to think about that. A regular ole cold has been so dangerous to him, so I'm sure COVID19 would send him to the ICU, but I just can't think about it. The research coming out about the long term effects of the virus also have me concerned because we're still dealing with the long term lung damage from other viruses. Like just this morning Job couldn't finish the silly kids exercise video I had them doing because he still doesn't have the lung capacity he should by this age. I know he's improving even daily and it's a process but I don't want to pause the progress, let alone go backwards.
It all seems so silly but every time I want to just go do whatever I want then I think about the long term effects of every hospitalization. Who would watch the kids so Seth can work? Could Ezra recover from the trauma of being afraid for Job's life? What would they eat? What about the financial costs of driving up and down and ordering room service? What about the weeks of recovery at home from being apart and being scared while apart? None of those things by themselves is insurmountable. We could figure out a solution to each concern. But it's that they all pile on top of each other, one after another.
And I'm not even going to a place where I wonder if Job could survive this virus. I refuse to think about that. A regular ole cold has been so dangerous to him, so I'm sure COVID19 would send him to the ICU, but I just can't think about it. The research coming out about the long term effects of the virus also have me concerned because we're still dealing with the long term lung damage from other viruses. Like just this morning Job couldn't finish the silly kids exercise video I had them doing because he still doesn't have the lung capacity he should by this age. I know he's improving even daily and it's a process but I don't want to pause the progress, let alone go backwards.
It'd be easy to stay in a place of fear and just wallow there. I don't want to do that. I really don't. I want to just think about how every day of Job's life is already determined and how God's plan for him is a good plan. I believe that! But I forget that I do sometimes.
But in all of this continues to be the transplant team's recommendations. They want us to stay 3 weeks behind whatever phase we're in and wear masks. There could be a point where someday they'll say Job is ineligible for a second or third transplant because we haven't followed their rules. If we don't wear masks one time will it make a difference for his transplant eligibility? No, even if he got COVID19 from it. They're really gracious and understanding and I don't feel like they're holding a second and third transplant above us. But patterns of disregarding their recommendations? Why would they "waste" an organ on someone like that? So it does feel like we're always thinking about staying in compliance, which is usually perfectly easy to do. Sometimes it's hard, of course, like when the team said we shouldn't go to Florida this last Christmas. We didn't go even though we'd been looking forward to going back to Florida ever since our first trip in October 2017, even though the hope of going sometimes seemed all that kept us going through such an awful post-transplant journey.
We ended up seeing my BFF and her two kids as well, since what is a trip to Vancouver without seeing my favorite greater-Vancouver-area residents? Seth took Wednesday off, besides a phone meeting that he did in the car while the boys were soooo quiet, so after we played at the creek for a couple hours we got Dairy Queen. Our first fast food/take out since March. Driving home we did a "worst songs draft" and played each song as it was selected. Of course everyone had their grumpy moment in the car! But I also just love car rides with all five of us and sitting there, talking about bad songs was just one of those perfect moments that I want to remember forever.
We definitely took a couple days to recover from such a whirlwind trip. Since we'd slept in a tent in a back yard, we set it up in our backyard too and Job enjoyed the novelty.
I stayed up later than I have in ten years talking on the phone for longer than I maybe ever have, so I was especially thankful that my sisters came over to swim and the boys got a bit of energy out in the pool with them. We got to see tiny little Mila too, which is always our favorite.
We ended up seeing my BFF and her two kids as well, since what is a trip to Vancouver without seeing my favorite greater-Vancouver-area residents? Seth took Wednesday off, besides a phone meeting that he did in the car while the boys were soooo quiet, so after we played at the creek for a couple hours we got Dairy Queen. Our first fast food/take out since March. Driving home we did a "worst songs draft" and played each song as it was selected. Of course everyone had their grumpy moment in the car! But I also just love car rides with all five of us and sitting there, talking about bad songs was just one of those perfect moments that I want to remember forever.
We definitely took a couple days to recover from such a whirlwind trip. Since we'd slept in a tent in a back yard, we set it up in our backyard too and Job enjoyed the novelty.
I stayed up later than I have in ten years talking on the phone for longer than I maybe ever have, so I was especially thankful that my sisters came over to swim and the boys got a bit of energy out in the pool with them. We got to see tiny little Mila too, which is always our favorite.
No comments:
Post a Comment