We’re alive.
We’re having a great Summer.

As if life isn’t chaotic enough, I’ve added a whole other dimension to the craziness by going back to school.
And I haven’t even started classes yet!!!

I’ll be back when I can catch my breath.

Just keeping it simple.

I love you.
We love you.
I miss you.
We miss you.

It’s not the same without you and it never will be.

But we’re celebrating anyway.

Happy 33rd Birthday.

From the Fayetteville Observer:
by Kim Hasty

In life, Chad Lanford never failed to inspire emotion in his wife.

So much so that Skye Lanford started an online blog in 2006 to apprise friends and family about all the things, big and small, that touched her about life with Chad and their two young daughters.

“Because if I don’t write it down, it’s like it never happened,” she wrote back then, on a page punctuated with a photograph of a pair of pink Hello Kitty rain boots.

It seems fitting, then, that the words her husband inspired are proving to be, in his death, a source of comfort for Skye Lanford.

Chad Lanford died Nov. 10 after a three-year battle with brain cancer. He was 32.

But through his wife’s words, the spirit of his sweet personality lives on.

“You made me better. You made me stronger. You made me smarter. You helped shape me into the best person, wife, mother, friend, daughter and sister I could be.”

Chad and Skye Lanford grew up in the small, tight-knit community of Stedman, where they had known each other since they were children. Chad, salutatorian of the Cape Fear High School class of 1996, was a freshman at N.C. State when a cousin suggested he rekindle his longtime friendship with Skye, who was then a senior at Cape Fear.

And that was pretty much that.

“He was the friend that everybody wanted to have,” Skye said. “He was definitely one of a kind. He was exceptional. He never, ever wasted a moment. I used to beg him to sit down, but he couldn’t. He said he didn’t know what tomorrow would be like.”

In the early, more carefree days of her blog, Skye, who has a journalism degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, wrote of things like teething babies, the first day of school, coping with her own Type 1 diabetes and repetitive readings of “How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night?”

“Who knew … that my daughter would turn 3 and become a chef overnight? I think the new Play-Doh kitchen is her favorite! … (and) that I would enjoy making a Play-Doh low carb meal to pretend eat with my daughter?”

But then, in November of 2007, Skye and Chad had returned from the 40th anniversary celebration of his parents, Sandy and Bob Lanford. Exhausted, they had fallen asleep when Skye was jolted awake by Chad, who was having a seizure.

In the hospital, where Chad was taken by ambulance, the young couple waited long days for a diagnosis.

“But it’s a lot easier to wait when we know we’re going home today.

To our own bed. And our kids. And to a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal tomorrow.

We have so much to be thankful for.”

When it came, the diagnosis was grim. But Skye continued to chronicle the sometimes sad, but often sweet moments of their last years together in her ever-poetic, if occasionally shaken, fashion.

“We came home and decided to live life as normally as possible,” she said.

Chad, an engineering supervisor for the N.C. Department of Transportation, continued in his work. Skye took care of their family and kept writing.

“Everything was stable until March of 2010 and he felt pretty good,” she said. “But then the tumor had come back with a vengeance.”

Skye and Chad began to accept the inevitable. They jammed all the adventures they could into their last summer together. By the end of the summer, it was clear the cancer was overtaking Chad.

Still, Skye’s depiction in words of her husband’s final months would be a gift to her daughters that would endure.

“We decided we were going to share everything,” she said. “Maybe it could help somebody else. Also, our kids are so young. I was afraid they wouldn’t remember all the special things that made him him. One day they’ll need closure.”

Skye continues to write of the happy moments she still enjoys with her little girls and of the poignant moments, such as going through her husband’s belongings and finding the neck pillow that helped support his head.

“I think I sat there for a good fifteen minutes, crying and sniffing the pillow.”

Her writing, to be sure, will help her through those difficult moments. And it will ensure that the happy moments live on.

“It is a tribute,” she said. “And it’s a therapy.”

Community news editor Kim Hasty can be reached at hastyk@fayobserver.com or 486-3591.

Sunday was busy, too, of course.
I tried to catch up on sleep, but the girls were so excited and my plan to sleep in didn’t fare so well.
We had a late lunch and then my dad joined us to go pick up our Christmas tree.

The tree went up.
And then when I was bored after the girls went to bed and I was all by myself, I decided I needed to rearrange to furniture in the living room. The tree always sits in the same spot.
It needs to be different this year. Everything else is different, after all.

I snickered to myself almost deliriously because I so fondly recall Chad telling me multiple times that the couch could only go on one wall…
Well.
I moved it.
To the other wall.
And I moved the club chair.
And the tree is in a different spot than usual.

I like it.
It’s different.
And I’m learning to like different.
Or, at least, go with different.

The tree is not decorated yet.
But it’s there.
Kind of like me, I guess.
I’m here. In a different spot. No decorations. Just me.

–

Carys started complaining that her ear hurt last night.
Great timing – and I actually thought she was making up a fake pain to get out of school.
I had lunch with her at school today, along with Cailyn & Nana, where I learned that it was clearly not a ploy to get out of schoolwork.
Off to the pediatrician — with swimmer’s ear.
The doctor took one look at both girls’ braids and tan and said, “let me guess….you went to the Caribbean last week and did a lot of swimming?”
Um. Yes.
And then the plane ride did number on their little eardrums, too.
They seem to be feeling better already, thank goodness.
Mondays are always fun – especially a vacation-is-over-boo-Monday.

–

I was unpacking our suitcases this morning and had a little meltdown.
I found Chad’s id card in the smaller suitcase – I hadn’t noticed it before.
He had placed his business card in a small vinyl pocket and placed it in the interior pocket. He had handwritten his cell phone number and name on the back.
I haven’t seen his penmanship in so long that it sucker punched me.
Took my breath way for a few minutes.
And I just stared at it.
Then put it away with other things I’ve found around the house.

I’ve also been trying to put together my holiday shopping list…which is always a chore.
Chad’s name is always at the top, even though he begged me not to buy him gifts.
I always did, though. Something small, at least.
This year, I won’t be venturing to BestBuy or the sporting goods store. Or to NCSU’s campus to buy yet another jacket/shirt/pewter something that he would love.
And that really hurts.

I don’t mind the grief.
I don’t mind being sad.
It’s just the unexpected ways it hits me that I’m unprepared for.

I can pack up his side of the closet and leave it in boxes for later.
I can talk about him with the girls when they ask questions or need reassurance.
I can make phone calls to companies to close accounts in his name.

But I can’t walk by the dairy case at the grocery store and see egg nog without getting choked up because that particular brand was his favorite.
Ditto for produce — those blue and gold boxes of clementines are making their holiday comeback and I had to have them in the house for him at all times. Little stupid oranges without seeds.
I can’t watch our favorite television shows and smile or laugh at them anymore. They’re just not the same when he’s not here to watch with me.
I can’t handle the way the girls are using Chad as a way to guilt me into things – and they are using it a lot. I hate it.
I can’t see Wednesday approaching on the calendar and not think of him leaving nearly three weeks ago.
And I certainly can’t think about last Christmas as our last as a family.

I’m undecided on how to handle Christmas this year.
Part of me wants it to be as normal as possible for the girls (and for me).
And the other part wants to get far, far away…but not quite as far as Turks & Caicos, if you’re wondering.

Day by day.
It will get better.
I don’t think the hurt will ever go away, but I do hope the sting isn’t as numbing after a little time.
I’m told it will get better with time.

We’ll see…

Happy Thanksgiving, a few days early!
We will have a traditional turkey-day feast here at the resort and I’ve planned our day to be extremely busy Thursday.
Should be lots of fun!

The funeral home is located at 401 West Cumberland St, Dunn NC; exit 73 off I-95.

In lieu of flowers, we request a donation in Chad’s honor to Hospice of Wake County.
Options of giving can be found here: Gifts to Hospice

Carys & I got away for the weekend – to Camp Mary Atkinson here in JoCo. It was a weekend for moms and daughters only – no boys allowed!
Although it was HOT!, we had a good time and I so appreciated the opportunity to hang out with other Scout moms (and their spunky girls) from our troop. We made a lot of memories and I feel so blessed to have each of these ladies in my life! Carys & I needed this time together; it was definitely nice to just hang out with her and watch her play with her Scout friends.
We are still trying to catch up on sleep, and Carys is enjoying Girl Scout day camp at CMA this week, too.

Here are some pictures from our weekend.
We made tie-dye t-shirts, had a mommy & me yoga session, facials, went swimming & made s’mores by the campfire (with tons of little bug friends – yuck!). We really did have fun, although I am still trying to catch up on sleep.

While we were away, my mom held down the fort at the Lanford homestead.
She & Cailyn had some good bonding time, too!
Chad didn’t have a great weekend, and I felt terrible that my mom was there to handle it by herself.

Chad fell a lot over the weekend and has so many bruises — it makes me wince to see the black & blue marks all over his right side.

When we were in a Beaufort a few weeks ago, he had his first fall. When that happened, he noticed that his right hand felt tingly. Gradually, over the following week or two, he lost all motor control in his right arm and hand.
And now he states that his left hand in starting to feel tingly. Not a good thing, for sure.

His best time of day seems to be first thing in the morning, before he gets any of his medications. He is confused and doesn’t string together sentences very well, but he’s a little more like himself in the mornings. When his headache creeps in and he receives his first dose of medications, things seem to go downhill for the rest of the day.
I asked the hospice nurse about this, fearing that we are giving him too much medication at this point — but she assures me that he needs it. And the falling is not from the medication; the steroids strip away his thigh muscles and he just has a hard time with his balance. He HAS to have the steroids, even though they have some wicked side effects (agitation, muscle wasting, hunger, etc.). If he didn’t have them, he would likely be having seizures (from the swelling and tumor growth) and more intense pain.

We have increased one medication to help with the agitation and aggressiveness; it seems to help.
He gets very upset when I try to help him do routine things; he wants to be independent. He just doesn’t understand that he can’t be at this point. He actually took a swing at me late last week, which is when we decided to increase the meds. Our goal is to make him safe and comfortable, but everyone else (especially my girls) need to be safe, too.
With that in mind, it was recommended that I not leave him alone for any length of time — and that I need to have someone here with me all the time. When he falls, it is increasingly more difficult to get him up. It’s like dead weight. And he can’t always help right himself; sometimes he can. There is a schedule where our family members are signing up for shifts and there is always someone here. It’s nice to have help; and I’m ready to accept all that I can get.

He actually used the wheelchair for a bit Sunday, which was a sigh of relief for me. I know he didn’t want to use it, but I think he scared himself this weekend by falling so much. He even told my mom to go get help at one point, which is a sign to me that he knows he needs help sometimes.

He sleeps a lot during the day and is sleeping better at night, which is good for me.

When the hospice nurse was here yesterday (Monday), she told me that she is fairly certain Chad’s falls are seizures. Due to the amount of medication he is on, they cannot fully manifest themselves – but they are there.
She also told me that I need to prepare myself for what’s coming — a move to the Hospice Home. At some point, I am not going to be able to keep him at home. I have so many mixed emotions about this, but that’s for another post.

He had a pretty good day yesterday; he didn’t fall at all. But he was in bed for a majority of the day. His appetite is waning and his is just exhausted.

He is not up for visitors right now and probably won’t be from this point forward; please understand.
If you’d like to visit me or the girls, that’s fine. Just shoot me an email or call – and please understand if we’re not up to it or if we have to cancel at the last minute.

Thank you, as always, for your support.