Post Birthday to Monday’s Chemo and a few days beyond

After Leia’s birthday momma was exhausted! It was more of a mental exhaustion than physical. Leia’s birthday was the first day Lisa had been away more than an hour or two from Chris. We tried to make this a special birthday. We knew she had been struggling with everything going on with the cancer diagnosis. Unfortunately, Leia said she did not feel as special throughout the day as we had hoped which led to momma feeling defeated. Birthdays have always been special and hearing it was the best birthday ever at the end of the day makes all the craziness worth it but thus year it is not what we heard. Maybe next year she will feel it more but we did the best we could and let her call the shots to decide what she wanted to do the whole day. Nonetheless, there was not a single picture snapped for 5 days due to the pure mental exhaustion, despite the fact Grandpa and Deedee spent a couple days with us, the Requena-Comfort’s came in town Saturday to celebrate Leia’s birthday too, and a couple other picture worthy moments happened.

Friday, Chris suggested we go out too breakfast when Darrell/Gene returned from taking Ivy and Lisa returned from taking Leia to school. We were all surprised! Chris has not gone out to eat in months so we all were happy to go First Watch. We dropped him off at the front door and picked him up at the front too. It was nice getting out of the house for a double date and enjoying eating in a restaurant again. Midday Lisa headed to Mimi’s to love on her and spend some precious time together. Today marked 9 years since Papa went to Heaven. It is hard to believe it has been 9 years! When I close my eyes I still can hear his laugh, see his smile and the way he looked at Mimi. He loved his girls! He is missed daily! How we wish he was here now but know he is in Paradise, walking the streets of gold, and praising God in Heaven. I still do not know why he had to go so soon and did not get the opportunity to spend more time with his grand-girls but know God has a perfect plan and it was His plan to call Papa to his final home. I hope we live a life that he would be proud of until we are reunited. Grandpa took the 4 grand-girls to get ice-cream Friday afternoon. Thankful our girls still have a grandpa here on earth that loves them well and spoils them.

Saturday, Grandpa and DD headed home after breakfast. Kelly, Diego, and the kids arrived at lunch time. They gave Leia her present and hung out with us for the day. We did not do much but the time together was sweet. Lisa and Kelly made a run to the Pig to get wine and food for the SEC Championship game. We enjoyed all cooking together and a mixture of small plates for lunch. Lisa was falling asleep not long after we ate so at everyones encouragement went to take a 30 minute nap. The short nap turned into a longer nap where Chris came to wake her up at half time. AL was up at half and Lisa was told if they started to lose she had to go back to bed. Surprisingly, AL won the SEC Championship; they were the underdog and not expected to win this year. The Requena-Comfort’s headed home soon after the game while we headed to bed.

Sunday was another low key day for us! Leia had her D-group Christmas party. She said she had a great time and came back with lots of goodies from it. Ivy had Evelyn over to entertain her while Leia was gone. Chris had Mark over to watch football then Wes over when Mark had to leave. Lisa entertained herself cleaning out the cars, turning off the water outside to winterize everything, and then took Leia to DSW for shoes for her band concert that was coming up. We had dinner delivered to us that evening and ended up calling it an early night again knowing Monday would be school and a chemo day.

Monday morning came quick. The girls all were up getting ready for the school day. Mimi came by to help take the girls and relieve some of the morning stress from Lisa as she also was making sure everything was ready for a day at the hospital. We left our house just after 9 and were thankful Mimi offered to drive us to the hospital since it was pouring rain the time we arrived and since we were dropped off we escaped getting drenched. It was a long day there! Lisa had to go ask twice for a update on chemo time as we were over an hour late getting called back to start it. Thankfully we did get it and lab work looked good. We did not get home until close to 5 pm. Chris was exhausted and slept most the night. Ivy went to see Sara dance at the basketball game with Mimi but they came back to eat dinner with us. Lisa and Leia got quick baths. Mimi headed home. The girls entertained themselves in the den while momma and dad hung out in the bedroom for the evening. We had a sweet family prayer time just before the girls’ bedtime. So thankful to be home! Oh Lord I pray you are near to us. Thank you God for your faithfulness and unconditional Love for each of us. Thank you for another day that we get to hug one another, talk, and be together.

The next couple days Lisa worked to catch up before our system black out at work. Chris slept a lot! The girls went to school and horses on Wednesday. There were cold sweats from the chemo. Days where Chris felt ‘off’ or clammy. Thursday morning, we had to call 911 as we thought Chris was having a stroke. He was unable to talk or move his limbs with full control. Thankfully when the paramedics came they determined his blood sugar level was extremely low; our reader was reading high. Needless to say we now have a new meter and Chris’s endocrinologist removed one of his diabetic medicines that can cause low blood sugar. There are days we are just tired. There are days where we just praise God for another day together. There are times where we get angry, times where we are sad, times where our faith is strong, times when we struggle to believe, and times we know that God has this and His plan is perfect. God help us! Help our unbelief when we struggle. Increase our faith. Heal Chris, oh Lord and he will be healed! Save Chris oh Lord, and he will be saved! For you are the one that we praise!!

Wednesday Leia with Mimi, aunt Stacy, and uncle Mark to a walk thru nativity
Thankful they took pictures for us to see our girl having fun