Our family has recently embarked on significant change. As mentioned last month, we made the decision to put Elliott in school and with that came the request for a lot of change in our lives. The call to trust others. The demand for faith. We answered the requests as best we could.

Move. We lived in Katy, a suburb of Houston. Katy is where I grew up and where I never thought I would return. However this guuuuuyyyy that I married and eventually had a child with seemed to fall in love with Katy and well, I lost. We lived in Katy for 4.5 years in a new build home in a new subdivision. I remember when we went to pick out all the accessories and accents that you can feel, in the purchasing moment, make a home. Wood floors, back splash, granite - it all mattered so much at the time. As if our lives would unravel if we chose the wrong cabinet stain. It was our first experience adult-ing. We were kids playing dress up in a mortgage cape and high heels meant to aerate the new lawn we needed to care for. It’s no wonder we never won “yard of the month”.

When we decided that Elliott was destined for The Rise School of Houston… we realized the commute would destroy her. I work Downtown, Brad works in the Galleria area, and the school is near the Med Center. Katy is no where near any of these places. These places we would travel to and from daily. If I barely survive the commute, why on earth would I put my child through that? I think she has enough on her plate.

Proceeding cautiously we decided to rent out our home and rent in the city. We eventually landed on a place that was 7 minutes from Elliott’s school, 8 minutes from my office and 25-ish minutes from Brad’s work. Sorry Brad. Looks like you lost this time! Muahahahaha. Just kidding. You are the best. Please don’t leave me.

Moving from the burbs to the city meant we lost the lawn, lost the driveway, lost the spread out floor plan, lost a bedroom and dining area. A living space that was one story and very spread out (perfect for hosting - something I hope to do in the Olympics one day) morphed into a living space that was three stories and verrrry skinny. Speaking of skinny - I climb more stairs in a day that I probably (definitely) have in the past year. Come on thin thighs…. come to mama!! **fingers crossed**

This change in lay out meant a change in all the stuff we own. So it meant selling things, storing things and moving the things that would fit. This move was a lesson in stuff. Why do we own all this stuff? When did we acquire all of this stuff? Do we need all of this stuff? NO. In my next life I plan to live in a tiny house and be a minimalist. Which means I can never set foot in a Target. Ever. And I must cancel my Amazon Prime subscription immediately upon entrance to the aforementioned next life.

It was also a lesson in moving and how moving is terrible. It’s why they make commercials about friends pretending to be busy when another friend asks for help moving. Despite us not fully loving this new city house, we will now live here forever because the idea of moving again sounds significantly worse than dealing with a poorly designed plumbing system.

Dog. We have a dog, Reggie, who is somewhere between 13 and 14 years old, which puts him somewhere between 91 and 98 in human years. With the loss of a yard and knowledge that we would never walk him… it was necessary to make sure he was taken care of. Thank God for my wonderful in-laws. They have a quiet household, sans kids and chaos. They also live in a beautiful neighborhood complete with evenly paved sidewalks and ample yards for Reggie to mark his territory on. They are also angels on earth and agreed to take care of Reggie knowing that we have our hands quite full and, again, that walking him in the park on the next block would never happen. Therefore, Reggie would never get to pee. Ask a 98 year old to not pee and tell me how it goes will ya? Anyways, Reggie is literally living his very best life at the ripe old age of 98. Had I known how good they would treat him I would’ve asked them to take him 5 years ago, when we actually could take care of him.

Nursing. Sending Elliott to school meant our beloved nurse, E, is no longer going to be taking care of Elliott as she would be cared for by her teachers. E has been with us for over 18 months and as I wrote in my card to her after her last shift - “If I had known how much you would mean to our family, I would’ve loved you so much sooner”. The truth is I resisted nursing with all of my might in the beginning, I resisted E. I didn’t want anyone else to take care of my child but me. I resented that fact that I had a child that needed a nurse. I resented all the approvals required from strangers when I wanted to change my daughters calories or give her Tylenol for a fever. I resented it all and I resented it for a long time. Still, I have days where I get in this anger mode. Much less frequently then ever before, but still - I can’t help but go there from time to time.

The day I said goodbye to E, I could not stop crying. I am already a crier by default but this was just excessive. It was the kind of cry where I couldn’t stop it. No matter forced thoughts of algebra or vacuuming - the emotions were to strong to defeat. I violently sobbed as I hugged her for the last time. “Thank you” didn’t carry enough weight to express my gratitude.

If you are reading this E, I love you.

Sleep. After almost 2 years of not sleeping my brain finally exploded. I couldn’t lose my superfluous weight because I was eating terribly and excessively. I was breaking out and stressed, almost always. On most days, I was a wife that I wouldn’t want to marry. Not to mention I feel that I am constantly failing as a mother to Ellie. Turns out sleep is super important to the health, and sanity, of a human being… interesting.

So upon losing our beloved day nurse, we transitioned to seeking a night nurse(s). We had been adamantly against this for quite some time. Brad and I are both stubborn - makes for a very interesting marriage. We also almost always think we can do everything by ourselves. Turns out, we can’t…also interesting.

After 3 attempts, we found a night nurse, G, who loves Elliott and who takes good care of her while we get to sleep. Sure, we have a bit of a learning curve with G as E helped to raise Elliott and to be with a child for more than a year and a half means you get to know that child pretty damn well. G is doing her best and with every night we get to know each other better and become more accustomed to each other. I will say it’s a very odd thing to have basically a stranger in your home, in your child’s nursery, taking care of her while the moon is out and you are in a helpless REM state. I’m not sure that I will ever get used to this no matter how much I grow to love our nurse, it’s still weird. Weird but necessary. So I will embrace the weirdness and be immensely grateful that having a night nurse is an option - which means sleep is an option.

We have G for 3 nights a week and **drum roll please** in a wonderful turn of events, and after multiple adult-style tantrums with our nursing company, we also have E back for one night a week!!! This is 4 nights of sleep everyone. I am no math genius but 4 nights of sleep > 0 nights of sleep. Let’s break this down into an SAT style analogy-

4 nights of sleep : Awesome Aubrey :: 0 nights of sleep : OMG she is comingggg!!!!! RUN.

Therapy. New zip code means new therapists. *sigh* So all three therapists (PT, OT, Speech) that had been with Elliott since basically the beginning of her life after the NICU would no longer be helping her learn and develop. Saying goodbye to each of these women also brought tears - more than I thought. But I guess saying goodbye to people who had taught your child immense skills in all arenas and who also loved her and genuinely cared for her well-being would bring tears… how did I not see the crying coming?

While I love our new PT, am getting to know the new OT and have yet to find a new ST… nothing will replace the memories and appreciation I have for Elliott’s first therapy team.

If you are reading this Y, L, & B - I love you all.

School. I touched on this last month. About all the preparation and people it took to ensure Elliott would be safely cared for at school. I also joked (not joked) about being at the school for the better part of a month making sure all was good. Well… on day 8, I went back to work. It took 7 days of me observing, offering guidance, answering questions and stepping further away day by day to know, without question, that my daughter was where she was meant to be. I thought it would take 30 days to get to this place, but I got there in 7. Seven. That either speaks to my laxness as a parent, or to the commitment, capability and environment that The Rise School of Houston offers. My money is on the latter. The progress Elliott has made and the relationships we’ve built with the school staff, have made me a fan and supporter of Rise for life. I am tremendously grateful for their commitment to keeping her safe at school, with her trach, and challenging her to be her very best self.

So all of this change translates to an element of trust. It’s an exercise in trust. I am at the gym, running sprints on the trust treadmill. I am performing trust tricep dips until I fall. I am sitting in the trust sauna until all my worries sweat out of me and fall onto the teak floor. In the past several months we essentially put all our eggs in one basket and changed our lives to fit into that basket. Trusting, that it would all work out. We moved 35 miles into town, rented our house, adopted out our dog, relinquished multiple days with our beloved E, ventured into night nursing, gave up our OG therapy team, ventured into new therapist territory, and put Elliott into school.

We had to trust that all this would fall into place, And while we are still making adjustments here and there, it essentially has. I must tell you I am still struggling with faith. What that word means and what I believe. But this has been a big leap of faith that we took despite having a finalized definition. Trusting others to take care of our Ellie. Trusting that we can afford it all and make it all happen. This big leap of faith is so far proving worth all the change and all the trust. It seems as though I should take leaps of faith more often.   

Until the NexT21,

Aubrey