Harvey

Hurricane Harvey hit Texas the same time reality was hitting here with Avery's seizures.

I just wanted to escape.  I wanted to run away, far away, as fast as I could, and leave it all behind.

I saw Harvey as a quick 'out.'  I didn't say it was realistic.

The kids were upstairs doing chores and playing. I sat on my kitchen floor in tears.  Okay, so it was more like a mini breakdown.  I told my friend I was going to pack the kids up and head out. I could throw Ezra in a backpack, put the older two to work, and we'd be of some use.  We've done it before!  I have valuable training and some skills, surely they'd find someplace to put us ("Right?" I heard myself trying to convince myself.).  Shawn could hold the fort down here.  I had no idea where we'd stay (Our car?  Like everyone else in Houston?), but I'd figure it out once we got there.  Thankfully, my dear friend had me talked down from my ledge before Shawn got home.  Seizures would follow us.  Autism would follow us.  It would alllllllll follow us.

She was right.  Thank God for those good, practical friends who speak with love, huh?

It was silly, anyway.

The next day I was able to help organize rescue efforts for a dog rescue when a levee broke.  This group hadn't been effected by the original flooding, but when the levee broke, they needed to leave, and leave fast.  For safety reasons, the sheriff's department wouldn't let them back into the rescue facility, and it was a mess. They did not have enough boats, crates and trucks for all the dogs; through social media, connections were made, word spread, and the dogs were saved.

A few weeks later our church sent a box truck sort of thing of donations to Houston.  Shawn and I did our part, and my help was enlisted with some other things for the donations.

I figured that was the extent of my help. Grateful for the opportunities, I closed the book on Harvey, took off my Disaster Responder hat, and put my Mom hat back on.

A few weeks after that, it was announced that our church was taking a group to Corpus Christi to work with the group I trained with when I was pregnant with Avery.  I tell him disaster response is in his blood.  

Shawn and I looked at each other.

"You're going."
"I'm going."

I signed up, paid my airfare, and I leave with my team on Monday.  I'm excited (intimidated, scared out of my mind), humbled, honored and blessed.  I can't believe I get to do this!

Yes, seizures will be here when I get back.  Autism will be here when I get back.  It will alllllll still be here when I get back.  And I'm sure I will be happy to be back to my own problems.  But I'm humbled to be able to serve God and His people in the meantime, and maybe talk another mama down from her ledge, too.