My Dearest Brother,
Oh boy… I hate to be a downer but this was a REALLY tough
week for us. I hope that your week brought a lot more happiness and sunshine
than my week did… I will try and accentuate the positive as I go through my
re-cap here but, I can't lie... it was a downer of a week.
Monday I woke up not feeling really great but decided (late)
to go to Boot Camp anyways. I was 10 minutes late to my class but only missed
the instruction part of our workout so it wasn’t a big deal because I know how
to do the individual exercises. By the time class was over I was feeling much
better and I came home very optimistic and glad that I went. I sat down to
breakfast and to tackle my normal scripture reading and journal writing and
noticed that I was having a very hard time seeing the pages. There were these
bright white circles in front of my eyes. I thought it must just be related to
my blood pressure and just having come home from Boot Camp so I pressed on and
went through my normal morning meditation. By the time I was finished with that
the headache was starting… Migraine. I have only had one before but it was so intense
and unexpected that I ended up in the Emergency Room.
After doing some reading on the internet I found out that
only 1 in 5 people are blessed with the “aura” – the white lights that
interfere with vision. This aura serves as a warning sign to people susceptible
to migraines. I am very grateful for this because it means that in the future I
can take my migraine medication when the aura starts to prevent the onset of
the migraine itself. Unfortunately, I didn’t have migraine medication this time
around and so Jake had to take off from work and come home and rescue me –
another tender mercy that he actually had the time available to do that. I laid
on the couch with my eyes covered and an ice pack on my head until he got home with
the medicine and then spent the rest of the day drained in bed. I had to
reschedule my piano lessons but was able to find time to do so without too much
trouble.
Jake spent the day running around with the kids trying to get our cars fixed. Both cars were leaking antifreeze quite badly and we were going through gallons of coolant like it was gasoline in a vehicle used for extensive travel... luckily he and grandpa were able to make the minor repairs needed to patch up both cars and they are, miraculously, still running.
Tuesday and Wednesday proceeded quite normally although I
wasn’t quite myself. I pulled myself out of bed at 5 am on Tuesday morning and
got to the gym just to find that my instructor was home sick. And that evening I
drove through horrible traffic to school only to find that, once again, my
instructor was going home sick. It took me over an hour round trip to get to
school and back (normally it takes me half of that time) and I was disappointed
at the wasted time. Wednesday I was heavy laden with huge amounts of homework
and a massive project for communications that was hanging over my head. Once we
ate dinner that night and I was suddenly experiencing unusual heartburn I was
pretty much done with the week and wanted nothing more to do with it. Little
did I know….
I woke up Thursday with the stomach flu. Massive stomach
cramps that were so intense I felt like I was in labor again and I even blacked
out during one of them because the pain was so overwhelming. I called mom to
come and rescue me and she took the kids for the day while I spent the day
absolutely miserable in bed. I hardly ate anything, couldn’t teach again, but
was able to keep everything I did manage to eat down until 9:30 that night when
it all decided it didn’t want to be in my body anymore. I went to bed
exhausted, sick, and ready for the day to be over.
Friday maintained much of the same scenario although I was
able to keep everything down this time for the whole day. Dana (my
mother-in-law) was so gracious as to take the kids this time but I had run out
of time for rescheduling piano lessons. There was just nowhere left to move
them because of having to change so many days. I called each of my piano
parents and apprised them to the situation at hand and told them I would take
every precaution in moving forward. I wore a medical mask during each lesson
and sprayed diligently with disinfectant spray as well as trying to keep my
hands washed. It was exhausting and hard but I managed to survive the four
hours of lessons that I had to teach that day. Jake and I were supposed to go
out on a date that night but I wasn’t feeling up to it so we just stayed in.
Saturday I really wanted to be up and feeling better because
Deanne and Luke got married in the Oquirrh Mountain Temple! We were on course
for the temple and only running slightly behind on time when we entered the
doors and I reached into my pocket to pull out my recommend to find that it was
not there. I could hardly believe it. It fell out of my skirt pocket at Mom and
Dad’s house while I was ironing my skirt and I, like the sick brain-dead person
I was, didn’t even check to make sure that it was still there when we left. We
raced back to the house as fast as possible and walked into the sealing room 3
minutes before the ceremony was supposed to start. Luckily Deanne and Luke didn’t
come until about 20 minutes after that and I was very happy that they weren’t
just sitting there waiting for us.
The ceremony was wonderful and we were very happy to get to
be there to celebrate with them. They snapped a quick picture afterwards but we
were all quite anxious to get out of the bitter cold, plus Nathan had started
this horrible rasping sound. We went over to Schmidt’s Pastry Cottage for their
luncheon. I was hoping to get a salad there but their salad dressings were not
gluten-free so I ended up not eating anything. I didn’t want to run the risk of
getting something that would make me sick that was expensive and not very
good. I ate when we got back home and Jake was supposed to go help his family
work on their house but Nathan was doing worse and he felt like he needed to
stay and help me take care of him since he wouldn’t stop crying.
We ended up deciding that we needed to take Nathan to the
Kidscare. We were afraid that the rasping meant his ever pervasive cold had
turned into something much more serious and since RSV and strep are very prevalent
right now we wanted to make sure he had the proper medications if he needed
them. The receptionists at the clinic assured us that the sign indicating that
the wait was 1 ½ hours long was only for the adults and that the wait for the
children was much shorter. Well… 2 hours later we finally left the clinic with
the knowledge that Nathan has croup. Since croup is a viral infection there is
nothing that the doctors can do for him. They did, however, give him a steroid
medication to help his lungs relax so that he could sleep well last night. They
were all very kind and encouraging and I was grateful that we had gone in to
make sure even though it was such a long wait.
By the time we got out we were all exhausted and starving.
It was past 7:00 pm and so we stopped at Café Rio to grab some take out and
head home. I guess we should’ve known better than to think we could just stop
at Café Rio on a Saturday night. I had to wait for 30-45 minutes to get our
food and was so wiped out by the time I finally walked out of the restaurant.
It had been snowing fairly regularly for several hours while we were out and
the roads were a slippery nightmare. We were very fortunate to get home safely,
without incident, and quickly got the kids fed and to bed so that we could
climb into bed and eat our dinner and watch The Mentalist.
Oh… and on the way to Kidscare Jake informed me that he got
an email right at the end of his work day on Friday informing him that he didn’t
get the job for the accounting position that he applied for.
Wow… right? Can you believe that all of that happened in
just one week? I can hardly believe it myself. And I know that there are people
out there who have much worse weeks and much worse things that they have to deal
with and everything but I saw this quote this week that really sums up how I
feel about that:
I’m not trying to dwell on all of this. In fact, all things
considered, I think I have tried to be pretty positive throughout the week and
very grateful for the tender mercies that have been extended to me. I have an
amazingly supportive family who has saved me on so many occasions this week.
They have blessed me and lifted me up when I felt like the whole world was
trying to keep me down. But I would be a fool to not admit that this week was
very hard and that it did get me down and that I wouldn’t wish this kind of a
week on my very worst of enemies. (If I had enemies…)
So here is to hoping that this next week brings some light
and positivity that is much needed in this darker hour. I am worn and tread
upon but I plan to pick myself up and press forward with full faith in Christ
that things are going to be okay. I am down, but I am not out yet and I know
that I can get through all of this. I am stronger than my trials and greater
than my sorrows - they will not defeat me.
I love you Jeremy. Continue to keep us in your prayers, I am
not ashamed to admit that we need them right now. It has been a long and cold
winter but spring is coming and new beginnings are on the horizon. I can feel
it.
Love always, Shayla
I kept my medical mask on while Nathan was visiting with me on Friday night so that he wouldn't get sick. He wasn't so sure what he thought about that...
Mom made some homemade Vegetable Soup that I got to have. It tasted so good on my healing stomach.
We have had a fly infestation in our house lately. Nathan took it upon himself to tackle the problem and was using this tool to go around the house and sneak up on them and suddenly yell, "WHA!" as he slammed the tool down on their unsuspecting bodies. (I don't think he actually got a single fly...)
This is a darling picture I snapped of Grandma and Grandpa Troff at the temple with Zakiya. They are such awesome Great-Grandparents!
Cute kids trying to stay entertained at the doctor's office.
Nerds rule. I would totally be all over this valentine present if I ate sugar!
QUESTION FOR MY READERS: Have you had days (or weeks) that you wish had never happened? What do you do to help you get through hard times and remain positive? Leave me a comment letting me know! I love hearing from people!
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