My mom turned 70 in June. My dad wasn’t up for a grand tour — so he sent me!… To Jersey (thanks dad)! Yep. I’m a Jersey girl (By way of Massachusetts).
My mom wanted to have coffee with
friends she hadn’t seen in years. I want to see my other family (where I stayed). The family I babysat for, up the street… I use to just go over to hang with the kids and do crafts. They are still in my life. The girls are 5 miles away from their parents. The eldest has four littles and the younger sister has her first. The youngest child just turned 29 and opened his own tumbling gym last month. — The logo I designed for him… the centerpiece of the gym. (As they all keep telling) I was honored to be taken to see it.
Illness is lonely but there is life to be found. Find it. Be it.
I visited with my mom‘s friends too. Had a long lunch with an old friend who has her own amazing story to tell. Drove more than I’ve driven in a decade. The winding roads giving way to muscle memory and I could drive them blindfolded. …Freedom, joy…
We continued on…
We listened to stories that made me wish I had grown up in the late 50s in Manhattan— better days. Free days.
We laughed.
Spent a day in historic Schenectady, NY with my uncle as a tour guide. Then onto Rochester where my 91-year-old Nana cried because I came and sobbed because I left. Family — not just blood, is everything.
We need more of it in this world.
My sweet little mommy is not in anyway exciting. LOL but she is beyond one of my most precious gifts. Celebrating her life with friends and family, sharing meals, driving miles on end and playing Skip Bo, too… My body sometimes lets me do amazing things.
However…
I felt the moment when time was up, like a pebble pings a windshield and leaves a dimple… I feel the start of the spider-webbing-crack in that slow methodical way. I get sore, cognition fades, but joy remains.
Take a breath.
My body lets me take the trip and spend, but then I have to pay it back. August started with coming home from a nine day journey. Add to that the relentless thunderstorms, heat and humidity of a North Carolina August — I’ve been crippled.
I’ve Lost most days this month. I fake it other days.
Every memory of my trip, every moment with my mom… Is worth it!
Don’t cheat yourself of memories. Find a way. I need to find a way for so many things. I will never give up, but I must remember to rest sometimes, whether I want to or not. But there is joy in relaxing… so more plans! Actually, this week (more to come). Its taken me a month to put this post together and that’s ok!
Do you journal? Write it all! The good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful, the tears and the joy. It’s your life. It should mean the world to you. If it doesn’t, work on that…
If you journal, do you go back and read it? Or close it forever? I’m a close-it-forever-kind of girl. It clears my mind. Well that’s only sorta true because I have a lotta different Journals. “Morning Pages” journaling clears your mind right up (The Artist Way), gratitude journals, list journals, health journals. Heck, writing my blog’s first draft is hand-written in a journal. I love paper… especially, putting pen to paper. I’m not into the constant clickity-click of typing. I mean, I still need the keyboard. I’m dictating and editing as I go, because you know dictation doesn’t work.
Try one or all of them. Find what works for you. Download the health storylines app for your medical journal or all your journaling. Handy idea! Use my link to download the app!
#HealthStorylines #acromegalyalum #acromegalyacademy
#acromegalywarrior #keepgoing #vivelafrancenc
Vive LaFrance: Life as I know it 
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