Trigger Happy

November 26th, Thanksgiving Day

Today- I am crazy thankful for the health of my family (most adult members not pictured- but I am thankful for them all as well!).

Yesterday, I contacted a friend to ask about a gal I knew slightly through scrapbooking.  I live in the same town as this gal, and I used to see her around often (at Target) with her son who is the same age as Beth.  She also had a brand new baby last year.  WOW!   Lots of work, a second grader and a new baby!  I haven't seen her in awhile.  Over the summer, I had heard she caught the flu and had developed pneumonia and ended up in the hospital.  I never heard anything else.  The story I heard was so not what I expected to hear.  The story I heard made me so grateful that my mom came through the flu without complications.  The story I heard made me so grateful that I chose to get the kids vaccinated, and I am scheduled to receive the shot as well.  The story I heard makes me want to do something to help.  The story I heard makes me thankful for life itself.

I received the information from a friend, but in doing a bit of a search, I found a public version of her story to share with you.  This is the story taken from the cocoa daisy blog:

"The other thing keeping life in perspective right now is what has happened to Linda Buranasakorn, a former Daisy Diva.  For over four months she was in intensive care fighting for her life.  There were many, many times over those weeks that it did not look like she would make it through.   Linda has two little boys and baby Olie was just 3 months old when she entered the hospital.  Fortunately, Linda did survive and last week she finally left the ICU for a rehab center.  This is so hard to even write, but because Linda’s blood pressure had dropped so low when she first got sick, her doctors have had to amputate both of her legs and the tops of all her fingers.   It seems so unbelievable that after everything she survived, that she would then be faced with the prospect of losing so much.

It’s hard to sit by and do nothing while a friend suffers so horribly.  I can’t do anything to help return Linda to her former self but what I can do is try to put a dent in her looming medical bills and the purchase of her prosthetics.  We at Cocoa Daisy are beginning to formulate ideas for a big fundraiser for Linda after the New Year.  I know the immense generosity of scrapbookers and I hope that we can look to you to help a fellow scrapbooker through this unimaginable hardship. 

If you have any great ideas on ways to raise money for Linda, I’d love to hear them!  I am hoping to get a large contingent of the scrapbook world on board with this so hopefully there will be lots of prizes for scrapbookers who donate to this cause.  Look for more information to come."

So...I bet lots of you know her too, right?  Really moving, right?  Wow.  Her whole life is changed now.  My heart hurts for her and my heart is grateful that she is alive for her family.

I am so thankful for my health and the health of my family.  I am thankful for my friends.  I am thankful for this life. 

Happy Thanksgiving.

 
 
 
 

November 25th

Today, I am thankful for EVERYTHING!  Really, really feeling grateful today....overwhelmingly so.

  One big thought happened tonight after Drew got home from work and I ran to fill up my gas tank (I had noticed how low it was as I pulled into the driveway but didn't want to go back out earlier).  I was sitting at the pump and saw a man walking through the parking lot with a big sweatshirt and backpack on.  I had seen the same man the night before in another parking lot around town.  I began to wonder if he had spent the day and night walking.  He didn't look like a homeless man, but he left the parking lot with no car, and kept walking through my city.  Could have been a coincidence, but could not have.  At any rate, it set me to thinking more about our financial situation.  Two years ago- this time of year, when I needed gas- Drew would tell me whether I could 'pay' for gas or whether I had to charge the gas.  I HATED that situation, being so broke that we couldn't even pay for gas!  I feel SO lucky to have come so far in our plan- to actually be able to pay for gas, go to Target, buy groceries, throw a birthday party for our kids, without drama.  It took a lot of work to put Drew through school and live on a part time teacher's salary.  It took a lot of focus on the goal to not lose our minds (me) and our relationship while working toward the goal.  I feel so lucky now that he has a job he loves which provides us the security to live comfortably.  Yes, I work and my income is vital to our survival, but he is now the 'breadwinner' and I am grateful for that as well.  By no means are we living the high life.  We haven't re-started our retirement savings accounts, we don't have any college accounts, we haven't even got savings to take us much past what we need each summer when I don't get any paycheck.  We DO have secure jobs.  We do have enough that we were able to take a trip to see my family after 6 years.  We do have enough to do the daily stuff, and I can even get pedicures again!  We do have a plan for the future.....a pause button is on, to be sure- but this time with our children is a worthy pause.  We are SO SO LUCKY! 
 

November 24th

Today I am so thankful for the beginning of the Christmas Season! 

everything cozy, outside and in!

 

November 23rd

Today I am thankful for weeks with no homework where we can just sit around and dream about the upcoming holidays and PLAY each afternoon!
 

November 22nd

I am thankful for Disneyland.  We have had many family celebrations there over the years, and I am always glad it's there for us.  Today we went to wish this little guy a Happy Birthday.

This picture was taken on his first visit, his sister's 2nd birthday, Jan. 2004.

Happy Birthday Matthew!
 

November 21st

I am thankful for birthday parties that go off well and make little boys very happy!

Drew made a special appearance as Darth Vadar, and fought a good fight...but alas- Evil did not prevail at this party!

We had some team building time, where we teamed up the boys (random colored-lego draw) and assigned them tasks to build together in a set time, 8 minutes.  After each build, we danced it out to the Star Wars Cantina song!  Then we rotated partners and started a new build.  We did this 4 times, so everyone had a chance to work together.

After that, they were ready to get the wiggles out again.  We told them to find the 'force' within them, because we had heard that they sky was full of meteors and we needed their help to fight them off.

Each jedi had a chance to fight off the meteors.  We used a blow up light saber, because there was a LOT of swinging going on!  They got a bit crazy by the end, but they laughed a lot too!

We played a game of  "indian chief" to calm things down a bit after our clean up.  In this game, someone goes inside and comes back and has to guess who the chief is....the chief is the one starting the patterns that the kids make, so the guesser has to observe who the kids are watching.  Probably more subtle in the over 6 crowd, but not too hard for these guys to figure out, so everyone played well.

Then we had the crappiest pinata to ever have been purchased at party city.  A one punch chuck.  I think I am taking it back with a sign that says 'don't buy Darth's head' but Drew says no- it was a pull string pinata that we hit- so it's our fault.   dumb pinata.

Cake time!   Drew made this awesome DeathStar cake for the boys - yay!  Did give me some stress because it wasn't ready at 10 a.m. awaiting the 2 p.m. party, but that's just me.  It was perfect- and I am so glad he did it!  It was yummy too and everyone loved it!  I am grateful for that today too!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

November 20th

I am thankful for pre-birthday fun covered in frosting and sprinkles!
 

November 19th

Today, I am thankful for no line at Farrell's!  More importantly, I am thankful that I managed to get my kids the H1N1 vaccination, and it went off with little trouble, and no reactions.  I had major drama making a decision about the shots- but I am glad now that it's over and I don't have to think about or worry about it any more!
 

November 18th

Today I am thankful for time spent with my dad.  We got to see him twice this year!  He is wonderful, fun to be around, and I am sad that it's such a long distance between us.  Happy Birthday, Dad.  We love you!
 

November 17th

Today, I am grateful for a lot of things....I finished my report cards (way early!) and I had a horrible day that ended up being super productive.  I have an outline for my brownie troop's activity tomorrow that I am pretty excited about.  I had my 'post observation conference' today, and it went well...so I could use any one of those many things today....BUT, while sitting here doing some of those things tonight, I saw a commercial about living with crohn's disease.  More than anything else today...more than many of the things I am grateful for on a regular basis, I am grateful for my colon resection.  I can't tell you the way my life has changed since I had it done in 2000.  I spent much of my youth with active crohn's disease.  My mom says I was born with it, but I was officially diagnosed in my early 20's.  I spent most of my high school and college years looking for a diagnosis to why I was in so much pain, unable to eat many foods, and had to spend so much time in the bathroom.  The pain is unlike anything I can actually communicate to someone who hasn't experienced a flare up, but it feels like an alien is trying to get out of your body...but nothing's there to come out.  I always imagined that it would feel like labor, but I never got to labor, never even felt one contraction, so I can't compare it to that! 

Everything about your life is complicated when you have crohn's.  You must always know where there are bathrooms available, and it doesn't matter if they are dirty or clean- you have to use them.  You can never predict what your 'safe' foods are, because they can change at any minute, and a food you've eaten often will suddenly become an enemy.  The pain is bad.  Not a joke.  Bad.  Who do you talk to about it either?  I mean, come on...it's related to your poop...you don't spend a lot of time in high school discussing it with others.  Everything else is exacerbatedas well.  My joints would hurt.  I would have peri-oral rashes.  My periods were ridiculously painful.  I am sure I can't even remember the other things, because time has softened some of the memories.  The drugs were fab.  One pill I was on was 16 capsules a day!  Steroids made me grow a mustache.  I had to do infusions through an IV, but I had anaphylactic reactions to them, so I had to do benadryl at the same time....after I let the nurse know I couldn't breathe anymore. Fun.  When it all stopped working, I would just barf constantly.  More fun.

When the scar tissue had narrowed my intestines too much to allow stool to pass- I had no choice but to submit to the colon resection.  I did not know how it would turn out.  NG tubes?  A bag?  I was scared to death.  It was pretty freakin' painful too.  You have to poop through those intestines after the surgery.  You have to go quite a bit before they let you out of the hospital, and it is nothing like normal.  It is grip on and avoid crying- or cry, what the heck, and it has to happen.  The toilet in my hospital room was tall too- a former orthopedic room.  I am not tall.  So I had to drag my IV pole in and then be on my tiptoes.  The lady I shared my room with had stomach cancer.  She did her business on the floor more often than in the toilet.  Wow.  My incision was supposed to be small.  It wasn't.  I keloid.  It's really pretty.

I had two weddings I was scheduled to be in within weeks of the surgery.  I wasn't able to be in one....and the whole thing turned out to be another painful situation in and of itself.  The second wedding was my sister's, and I was able to get to that- but we had to fly.  Flight does something to your intestinal gases.  Made for an AWFUL night.  I wasn't able to pass gass normally through my unhealed intestines.  I wasn't at home.  I was in an unfamiliar hotel writhing on the floor and barfing, etc.  More good times.

Who would have thought that all of that would have become the best thing that ever happened for me?  I was able to get healthy.  Become 'normal' and with the help of one small drink each day - eat, drink, and have normal b.m.'s , like other people.  I was able to get pregnant and carry babies.  My doctors were unsure if I would be able to do that or not, and we're still unsure if my absorption led to their small sizes at birth.  Now- many people don't even know that I have crohn's!  Amazing.  I am not high risk for all other viruses due to a reduced immune system.  That's flippin' wonderful.  What a life change.  What an amazing life change.  I am so grateful that I had that surgery!