With a Little Help From Our Friends…
Saying hi to mom! 7.18.23
We are now at 32 gestational weeks for Cyrus and just got through our first week since losing Arthur. Cyrus is doing well, now 3lb 4oz, and getting through milestones in lung and metabolism development. He’s gradually needing less heat and oxygen support, and the next steps will be to get the CPAP mask off entirely and switch him to an open-air crib! This will probably take place over the next couple of weeks.
Taking a “breather” for a picture. 7.19.23
Laura and I are struggling through all this in different ways. I’ve been feeling mostly numb and a little frustrated that I’m not feeling more sad emotions. I’ve had a very strong physical response to all of this, feeling physically exhausted even after sleeping and then falling very sick over the weekend. Laura’s been living at the hospital for much of the last week and has so far avoided my illness. She’s also feeling physically exhausted and numb but has been able to work through some of the grief over the last week. Not much else to report on our progress.
A lot of the process is just trying to figure out how we’re feeling ourselves, so it’s difficult to describe to anyone else. Many people have been asking us how they can help, and we’ve been persuaded by close friends and family to put together some ideas to send out to people who’ve been praying for us and may be asking the same question about other ways to help.
I want to be completely transparent about this. We have good insurance and aren’t going to be in big financial trouble from all of this. Our biggest financial setback has been a result of Laura being unable to work much during this time. But I have been blessed with a great job, and we will be able to get through this.
With that being said, receiving help of all kinds has been serving as a collection of little lifelines to keep us from feeling alone. We really appreciate everyone’s interest in how we’re doing, so here are a few ideas for different ways to help us. We’ll have links to all of these here with more details soon.
First and foremost, we would like to receive any words of encouragement you’d like to send. We can’t handle getting them all as text messages, so we’ll have an email where we can read them at our own pace. We’re also getting a PO box set up for physical mail. We would love to see what Arthur’s life meant to you who were praying all this time, and find out what God has been doing as a result of our ordeal. We’d also like Bible verses, song lyrics, poems, etc. that have encouraged your that you think are relevant to our situation. Notes to Cyrus for later in life would be meaningful, as would encouragement for Oakley and Edee right now, or for later. Please let us know who’s sending the notes, and possibly the connection to our family if we don’t know you personally. If we get a handful of these from close friends and family, that would be encouraging. If it’s a lot more than that, the sheer number may be encouraging on its own and will give us encouragement over a long period of time as we gradually open them. Anything you send us will be for our use only and won’t be widely shared without specific permission from you.
Secondly, you can support some of the work Laura has continued throughout all of this craziness by checking out Zion International Film Festival. Living our faith in an honest way is very important to us, and the film festival was created to find ways to express elements of our faith without compromising a film’s artistic value. Laura started it last year with great reviews but low attendance, and we’d love for more people to check it out this year, either virtually or in person. It’s a nonprofit, but since we’re sponsoring it with our own funds, we’re hoping it isn’t a heavy loss either. Laura will continue spending hundreds of hours curating the independent films that were submitted this year, and the festival will take place the first weekend of November.
Another way to bless us is with food; our freezers are pretty full already, but working with the meal train to coordinate meals is really helpful and encouraging. For people who don’t live nearby, we’ve really enjoyed receiving meal delivery gift cards or Venmo cash to help with eating out between our house and the hospital.
Another thing we need is help around the house. From routine housekeeping and yard maintenance, car cleaning/detailing, helping to finish our office/shed and Cyrus’ room, to potentially painting our house exterior this summer, there are a lot of different things we were previously trying to do but now can’t do ourselves. We’re going to have a link where you can let us know what help your able to give, and we’ll have someone else coordinate things for us.
A quick family pic without his mask after his first bath! 7.19.23
The final way to help that we thought of involves financial support for a family vacation after all this is done. We’ve missed a lot of special family times, including our family vacation this year, and have only been able to spend about two days per week with our girls for what will probably end up being over five months. Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, our anniversary, Edee’s birthday, and my birthday were all heavily impacted as well. We have done our best to stay together as a family, but we desperately need a getaway to reset and reconnect when this is all over. Right now we’re planning a camping trip for late spring of next year, but doing something sooner would be really helpful.
I suppose the actual final way to help is what we’ve been asking for all along; please keep praying! Cyrus isn’t out of the woods yet, and quite frankly neither are we. Suffering only produces growth if it’s borne well.
