I've had a nagging thought on my mind lately.  It's been discussed before, so it's not a new revelation or anything, but lately it's bothering me more than usual.

A couple months before my sister collapsed, she was complaining of sharp pains when she'd take a deep breath.  She said it was worse when she was laying down and it was painful enough that she didn't want to take deep breaths.

I encouraged her to go to the doctor, because the nurse in me was thinking it could possibly be a pulmonary embolism (clot in her lung).  Of course, how often do normally healthy 29 year olds get a PE?  Probably not often, but my motto is always better safe than sorry.  She made an appointment, and saw the physicians assistant.  After explaining her symptoms, the PA sent her for a chest x-ray.  I think she was assuming broken ribs.  When the x-ray came back normal but Leslie was still having pain, the PA told her to "take Motrin."  I remember Leslie telling me this, and I remember thinking "Huh?"  Wouldn't you want to get to the bottom of why she is having severe pain?

What if it WAS a pulmonary embolism, just sitting there waiting to make it's move.  Literally.  We will never know. 

I wish I had something profound to blog about, but I just don't right now!  My brain is pretty empty, and I am okay with that :) 

I was totally dreading Ethan starting school up again, because we had gotten on a really lazy summer schedule, but I have found just one week in to school that I love being back to our routine.  Both kids love it, in fact.  It's going really, really well, and Ethan is loving second grade.

Allison has become my shadow.  Ethan was never really shy, but Allison panics when someone she doesn't know approaches her.  Like take today, for instance.  We were waiting outside the doors Ethan comes out of after class.  There were two other ladies standing around, but apparently Allison didn't feel threatened by them.  But then!  Oh, but then!  A MAN comes!  And my sweet, quiet little angle who has one of her arms wrapped around my leg looks up at me and says, "Oh, WOOK, Mama!  A man!  Carry you, Mama, Carry you!" (Carry you is her way of actually saying carry ME)  Yes, it was loud.  And yes, the poor man probably wondered what the heck he did wrong.  But he scared her!

I taught Ethan how to play REAL hopscotch today and we had a blast.  Did you know hopscotch is a really good form of cardio?  Especially when your son makes the numbers go past 30.  I was huffing and puffing and toppling over and stubbing my toe right and left.  And I also learned how thankful I am to have two legs, because playing hopscotch today made it very clear that one leg should not have to bear the weight of the rest of me.  My knees were trembling!  We had lots of laughs, though.  Daddy even joined in!

On a more serious note, this year has been the worst, and we are nearing the one year anniversary of my sister's incident.  Since that horrible time, more bad things have happened:

• My Uncle Jim was killed in a car accident
• I was diagnosed with early congestive heart failure
• My grandma was hospitalized and has since had to move out of her apartment and into a nursing home
• My Uncle Archie has bleeding on the brain and is having some cognitive struggles right now
• As with any family crisis, our marriage has taken a hit as we both deal with stress differently

I'm sure there is more, but it just feels like a really rough year.  I remember back in the early days of my sisters incident realizing when people say they can feel the weight of the stress on them.  I get that.  You literally CAN feel it.  And it hurts, and it's heavy, and it's hard to carry around but you literally have NO choice.

September 20 is going to be a HARD day for me.  But I am also using September 20 as the day I move forward.  Making more changes.  Rejuvenating my marriage, breaking out of this funk, make plans, set goals, cut back so I can give more.  You have choices in life.  Leslie's incident has left me living in fear and anger.  Fear that something could happen again to her or to someone else I love, and anger that it even happened at all.  Anger that our lives were changed without our consent.  I have lived with those emotions now for nearly a year, and while I won't say it's wrong to feel that way, it's not helping me.  I need positive changes.  I need to let go of the fear and just LIVE.  I need to let go of the anger and just ACCEPT.

We will get there.  Just like Leslie, baby steps.

Ethan started 2nd grade this week!  It is very bittersweet for me.  I love watching him grow and learn new things (he loves to learn!) but at the same time, it feels like just yesterday he was a tiny baby.  Where does the time go?

He was excited for his first day.  I was able to take him to school, but I had to work and I couldn't pick him up, so I was a little sad about that.  When I called to talk to him after the day was done, he seemed very tired.  His voice was monotone and he was just giving me one word answers to my questions.  This worried me, because I thought he'd have a lot more to say.  When I got home that night, we talked some more and it turns out that his teacher took away his erasers because they were in the shape of a car and it was too "toy-like".  I totally understand this, but it made him sad and I'm sure he was a little embarrassed, considering he was so excited to use his new school supplies. 

Also, as I was reading through the information his teacher sent home, I realized this year was going to be quite different from last year.  He's officially NOT a "baby" anymore, and things are going to be more challenging.  Less play time, more work.  His work will actually be graded now (no more stickers and smiley faces!) and he has to do weekly book reports.  Just reading it made me feel overwhelmed so I can only imagine how he felt hearing all this within a couple hours then being sent home.  That, and the fact that his two best friends are not in his class, he was just feeling stressed.  We talked about it a lot last night, though, and by bedtime, he seemed a lot more at ease.  Jay and I are very involved in his school life, so we will be right there with him throughout everything.  We take school very seriously, and we hope he does, too.

Today was his second day of school.  It was a full day and when I picked him up and asked how his day was, he said "It was great!"  He was happy and had lots to say.  I know this year is going to be great.  He has been blessed with wonderful teachers from preschool until now, so we know we are very, very lucky.

That is his nervous face.  And that is Allison's binky face (and yes, I realize the binky has got. to. go.  That'll be for another day, though!)

So while at work, I was still having the crazy palpitations, so one of the nurses suggested I go to the telemetry floor and have them run a strip on me.  Sounds like a great idea!  I caught the Ventricular Bigeneny within just a few minutes and I'll take it with me to my next cardiologist appointment which isn't until NOVEMBER!  ACK!  Oh well, though, at least I have an appointment and I am a little more sure that I won't be dying anytime soon from this :)

Ethan's first day of second grade was today but that deserves a post of it's own, so with that said, I'll leave you with pictures of my beautiful, jacked up heart rhythm.  (Altogether now:  Awwwww!)

What the heck, heart.  Get your act together and stop messing around!  You have a big job here, don't mess it up!

Leslie collapsed September 20, 2010.  We never really figured out what happened, we just know she was pulseless and not breathing on the scene.  We know she was found to have blood clots in her left leg and her lungs a few days later, after she had been nonresponsive and on the vent.  We know she had a few bouts of an arrhythmia while she was in the ICU.  But that's pretty much the only facts we KNOW.

In January 2011, I started having a lot of chest palpitations,  It would feel like my heart was skipping beats and I would feel light headed and kind of dizzy.  I saw my primary who referred me to a cardiologist, who just happened to be the same cardiologist who saw Leslie.  He did some testing on me, and came to the conclusion that I have nonischemic cardiomyopathy.  He DOES believe my sisters incident and mine are related.  He believes these cardiac issues are genetic.  Our problems are not the same, but we both have heart issues.

I was prescribed 2 drugs to take to help my heart perform more efficiently.  I started taking them and learned very fast that they knocked me out.  They are usually given for hypertension, and I do not have high blood pressure AT ALL.  They also lower your heart rate, and I am ALWAYS told I am bradycardic.  So basically, I am taking meds that make me want to just go into a coma, yet still function.  It sucks and it's hard!

But now lately, the palpitations are back with a vengence.  They are making me feel like I am going to pass out.  I'm scared.  I'm taking my meds just as they are prescribed (and I have for a couple weeks now when it started) ...but did I mention I was scared?  Every time I feel my heart go into this crazy rhythm, I want to take myself to the ER, but they won't be able to do anything.  I don't know.  I am calling the cardiologist tomorrow and hopefully I can get an appointment very, very soon (I was due to see him in September anyways,)

To elaborate more on what I said yesterday, once my sister came home from rehab, the care for her was pretty intense.  She would be dropped off at my house before the sun came up and she'd hang out with me until dinner time.  It was then that I realized, truly realized, that this was the "new" Leslie, and that's when I stopped accepting it.  When she was in the hospital, I had the hope that she was improving.  At home, it felt like it was God's way of saying, "Okay, she's home now, this is it!" ...and I didn't like it.  She couldn't remember anything.  She needed to even be reminded to shower.  I had to do everything for her.  It wa so strange, and so not what I wanted.  Sure, I would walk to the ends of the Earth for her if it meant she stayed on this Earth longer, but it was hard to accept.  It was like a light switched and I got a new, different sister.  She was like a stranger to me.

As the weeks and months went on, my method of coping with my "new" sister, was to simply avoid being around her.  That way in my head, I could remember her as best as possible how she used to be.  But of course there were times I would see her, and those times I would get so angry.  I wanted to say "Just stop it!  You remember this!  Why are you asking this again?  Why aren't you trying?"  I hated it.  I hated the constant reminders of what I was being forced to accept.

Of course, this method of coping doesn't work well AT ALL.  By pushing my sister away, it wasn't bringing me any closer to what she once was, because that Leslie was gone.  This knowledge pushed me into a very very deep depression.  The worst depressive episode I have ever had.  Where just getting out of bed was a huge task.  It put strains on ALL of my relationships.  I was either crying or bitterly angry.  The bottom line was, there was NOTHING I could do, think, or say that would make things go back to how they used to be, and I hated not having that control.  I hated having that ripped away from us with no warning. 

Lately, the Leslie I know is coming back.  Her real smile is there and she says things she used to say.  Sure, she repeats herself, but she also remembers A LOT.  When I think of how far she has come this past year, it's just unreal.

Today, since my husband and kids are out of town, we went to lunch at the Oak.  Later in the day, we met for dinner at Angelina's (SOOO GOOD!) and then went back to my house.  We turned my kitchen, living room, and bedroom into Leslie's personal spa and we pampered her :)  It was so much fun.  Lots of laughing and giggling ensued.  We ended it with an ice cream at Twist and Shout.  Part of me leaves a night like that thinking, "Man, that was fun!" and part of my mind flashes back to the night of September 20, 2010, as I walked out of Henry Ford Main, sobbing to my mom saying "She CAN'T die!  She just CAN'T!  I need her!"

....I'm so happy I HAVE her.

Yesterday was my daughter's second birthday!  I can't believe she is already 2.  Where does the time go?  Following tradition, we had our parents and my sister and her husband over for pizza and cake to celebrate her birth.  It was a wonderful evening.

Now it is no secret that I handled (and am handling) my sister's condition very, very poorly.  We are 3 weeks shy of it being a year since the initial incident happened, and I think I can finally say that I am turning a corner with coping.  I noticed this as my parents, sister, and I sat in my backyard yesterday and just chatted.

My mom made the comment of how she wishes we had video tape of how Leslie was when she first came home and how she is now to compare.  I told them that my mind holds very vivid memories of all the different "phases of Leslie" and I can tell them that the Leslie today and the Leslie 11 months ago is a HUGE difference.  Huge.  For instance, we were talking about what my kids would be for Halloween this year.  None of us could remember what Allison was, but LESLIE did!  And last Halloween she wasn't even home yet...she was still a patient in the rehab facility.

Her memories are coming back and her personality is coming back.  She still repeats things, but she is more like the sister I had before the nightmare happened, and it just fills my heart with SO much happiness.

I can imagine September 20 is going to be a very difficult day, rethinking about the events as they occurred, and I do intend to allow myself to be sad during that particular day.  But there on out, September 21 and for the rest of our lives, I will celebrate the fact that SHE DID IT.  She is a survivor. 

I love you so much, Leslie.