A Green Tomorrow

To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.

- Audrey Hepburn

I started my first vegetable garden 5 years ago, in pots that were much too small, outside my apartment's front door in a much too shady and busy walkway. Throughout the day I would move the pots holding my precious tomatoes and peppers to wherever the sun was filtering through the branches of an overgrown pine tree. It was the worst conceivable place to grow a garden, but that little potted garden that gave me a total of three tomatoes and two stunted bell peppers ignited a passion in my soul that I have never been able to shake.

Today, the first sight you will lay your eyes on when you go in my backyard is a large display of raised beds that is home to everything from asparagus to watermelon. My mornings and evening are spent tending to my garden and my kitchen is home to the rewards these plants offer in return for my care and attention. It seems at times my daughter was raised in the vegetable garden and the age of two can rattle off facts about garlic scapes, and the importance of ladybugs, and that melons have both female and male flowers.

I always found it funny that so much of my life is avoiding thoughts of the future, a future that statistics and doctors assure me won't be long. Yet, I spend my time on a hobby, a passion, an obsession that is all about forward thinking and constant planning for the future. The seeds I so careful sow in the ground in spring comes with so much hope of thick green vines heavy with melons that will fill my stomach and soul mid summer. I cover my strawberries today to protect them from tomorrows ravishing birds. Asparagus is planted with the hope that in three years time I will have spears to grace my dinner table.

If you ask me about the future of my garden you will grow bored and restless long before I stop chattering on about expansion, and artichokes, and aphids. If you ask my about my future, the future of my health and my life you will be greeted with a harrowing silence. You will see an empty vastness in my eyes so foreign in a woman still in the prime of her adulthood.

The garden is a way to plan for the future and put my hopes and dreams into a tomorrow that feels so uncertain. Somehow it feels safer to make plans for my plants than for myself. If I never get the harvest of cherries it is much less heartbreaking than never seeing my daughter get ready for prom.

So for now I carefully tuck seeds into the soil so that in two months from now the ground will be stuffed with plump carrots. And as for what lies in the future? The carrots are all I can be certain of.

Clean and Care Free

You know that feeling you get after filling your gas tank? The relief when that little voice that keeps nagging, "your tank is getting low" and "don't forget you need to fill your tank soon" is finally quiet? That voice that you didn't even consciously know was bothering you until it is finally gone?

Yeah, I get that same freeing relief times ten when I know all of my nebs are clean and dry!

Orkambi Troubles

I am not sure how one quantifies the value of a life. Apparently, some people know the secret equation, but I wasn't lucky enough to be one of them. Although, I do not know exactly what my life's value is I do know according to my insurance company my life is not worth $259,000/year. In other words, my insurance is not covering the new drug Orkambi for any of their Cystic Fibrosis sufferers.

I was actually really surprised, naïve as it was, because my insurance gladly covers the $300,000/year Kalydeco for patients with the correct mutation. I thought that if they would pay a higher dollar amount for one groups of CFers they would pay for a less expensive version for another. We all know life isn't fair and insurance companies rarely make sense so I guess thinking my insurance would cover this medication was faulty logic.

The really horrendous part of it is I am not sure I will be eligible for the Vertex patient assistance program for people who have insurance refusing to cover the cost of the drug. This could mean that unless I magically become extraordinary wealthy, an extra $20,000 a month wealthy, I may never have access to this medication.

The only aspect of this whole situation that is giving me hope is that CF doctors in my state are coming together to fight for their patients so that we can all access this medication. The CF community is full of doctors who genuinely care for their patients and for that we are lucky. The only other fiber of hope I have is that potentially my insurance company is negotiating price and may eventually strike a deal with Vertex. The part that is the most frustrating is that I am being left in the dark. The morning after I found out my insurance is refusing to cover Orkambi through another cyster I called my insurance company, my clinic (the CF nurse is on vacation), my pharmacy and vertex. I got zero response and no answers. Now that it is the weekend I have to wait until Monday to hope that someone will answer their phone to provide me with some answers on where we go from here.

Cystic fibrosis patients wake up every morning from the moment they are born until they die ready to fight. It is the only way to ensure we wake up every single day. I am ready to fight my insurance in any way possible, my life is on the line!

Anticipation

There is a flurry of emotions whirling through my mind. I feel as if I am teeter tottering between every emotion that a human can possible feel throughout each and every day. Why all this emotional instability? The newest Vertex drug, Orkambi, is the culprit of all this emotional confusion.

The two years of utter free falling into a dark abyss from this disease made me wish with every fiber of my being for Orkambi to be approved. Every wish my heart held so dearly revolved around something, anything that could pull me up, even just a little, from this bottomless well. Now that Orakmbi is here I feel such a mix of emotions I feel I may go crazy with uncertainty.

The optimistic side of me is feeling excitement so strongly that I can feel it buzzing in my bones. The optimistic side of me wants to scream and shout and jump up and down that there is something, anything that may help me maintain the last 5 months of stability for the next several years. The optimistic side of me want to believe that this drug will work well for me and I will gain 4% lung function or more! I want to have more energy to chase and swim and bike with my daughter. I want to gain weight easily, and have fewer aches, and have more stability in my day to day life when it comes to health.

And then a voice, just as loud and adamant as my optimistic voice, comes bursting into my mind. The voice is my realistic (pessimistic?) side and it is reminding me that not ALL people experienced increased lung function and there were a few that experienced side effects that required them to stop the medication (mainly elevated liver levels). Some felt nothing and others had symptoms that were troublesome and even a bit scary like extreme shortness of breath.

To add icing to my troublesome cake I feel paralyzed with fear that my insurance, which has been reviewing my case for over a week now, will deny my ability to even try this medication.

So much of life with Cystic Fibrosis is luck. What mutations you have, how the disease presents itself, what bugs you catch and how much havoc they wreak on your body, how well you respond to meds and if you are allergic to them. Here is just another example of luck. I have heard this drug has been a life saving miracle for some people and for others it is a nuisance not worth their time. How I feel about this medication is anyone's guess and sheer luck just as most things with CF. And of course, luck will determine if my insurance will even cover this $259,000 a year medication.

I just hope that this time, lady luck is on my side!

Toddler Talk Part 7

" I like to put boogers on the fence by my bed (bed railing)". To my horror I ran to her bed (the crib converted to toddler bed type) and found a booger carefully placed behind each post on her bed railing.

"Can you buy me all these books because I am obsessed with bears." Since when did she say obsessed?

In a busy public restroom, "Did you remember to wipe?
"Yes, I did."
"Oh because I thought maybe you didn't because you just had a PENIS" Because seriously the only time she talks about genitalia is in public.

She cried when I started talking up her third birthday. She didn't want to be three. I thought the idea would grow on her, but a week later she is adamant she is still two.

She believes being three means you are a grown up which makes the paragraph above make a little more sense.

"Okay today we are going to..." before she does any art project. I guess the teacher in me rubbed off on her a touch.

Never Growing Old

My husband and I went away for several days without the little one. There is something so renewing so refreshing about skipping town with the man you chose to marry all those years ago. The man who made a younger version of yourself nervous and giggly, but now makes you feel safe and content.. The man who in the past would make your face light up when you would talk about his warm eyes, strong arms, and addictive smile, but now fills your heart with a sense of home and belonging as you talk to your friends about the adventures the two of you, husband and wife, have recently experienced. The man that would make your heart flutter and your palms sweat when you saw his name on your caller ID, but is now the very first person you want to call with news, both good and bad.

After three years of parenting together it was nice to be able to focus on just the two of us for more than an overnight here and there. We spent our days hiking through the forest and our evenings laying in the warm sand listening to the ocean waves crash near our feet. We got tipsy at lunch and ran while bursting into fits of giggles because we almost missed our steam train ride back to the hotel. We had good wine, the freshest seafood, and amazing conversation.

The last evening after several days of rekindling the zest for our love that was ignited so many years before, we sat down to a romantic Italian dinner. As we were discussing what our evening plans entailed an elderly man was seated at a table across from us. He had trouble lowering his tired old body into the seat and his hands were shaky as he reached for the menu. He pulled out a magnifying glass to look at the menu and carefully sipped his wine while waiting to eat. My husband kept glancing at the man and would whisper, "that makes me so sad." Although, the man dining alone filled my heart with a sad loneliness as well I was surprised at how fixated my husband was on this gentlemen. As we finished out own meal the elderly man had finished his and left. My husband, now safe to speak freely, looked at me and so quietly so heartbreakingly in a voice barely above a whisper said, "That will be me someday." I instantly had clarity as to why my husband was so transfixed by this older man dining alone. I quickly felt my heart shatter with sadness for the man I love so very much because we both knew that realistically CF will take me long before either of us sees old age. I was reminded again how heartbreaking this disease is and that even though we live each day as if life were normal there is always the looming knowledge, the heavy sadness that this disease is killing me and leaves me little chance of ever growing old with my husband. It reminded me how angry I was at this disease for what it does to me, how it destroys my body and my life, but most of all that it takes all those who I love the most in the world and drags them down with it.

We had a moment of understanding and acknowledgment of how this disease can break our hearts and then in true fashion to my husband he followed it quickly with, "at least I won't have to argue with anyone about what kind of wine to order." And just like that we pushed the fear behind us and moved in with life because we know our days are numbered and our moments precious so we can't dwell in the what ifs and sadness.

3 Years Old

My Sweet Baby Girl,
You are three years old today! Although when people ask how old you are you are adamant you're still two. You have grown fond of being two and it may take a while to accept the fact that you are officially three, but that is okay you have a whole year to get used to the idea.

When I look back over the years I am amazed at how much has changed, but I am even more amazed at how much has stayed the same. So much of who you were as an infant is still exactly who you are as a toddler.

You still are extremely expressive and it is almost impossible to get a picture of you without some strange or goofy expression. When you were an infant I was envious of all my friend's who had sweet smiling pictures of their sweet babies when all of my pictures of you were with a furrowed brow, or a shocked expression, mouth agape. Now as a three year old your expressions are just as wacky, but I no longer long for sweet smiling pics because baby girl you have too much personality to contain and it shows with those wild pictures.

You have always been an artistic spirit even from a very young age. The arts move your soul and fill you with joy. I have set up an art station in our home where you frequent up to a dozen times a day. You spent the majority of the day coloring, drawing, cutting with your kid scissors. I have never seen a child so passionate about being creative. When we blew up balloons for your party you asked if you could draw on them to make them more special, when you are in the bath you spend your time with bath crayons coloring the walls, outside you spend most of your time drawing with chalk. You even started bringing a notepad and colored pencils in the car so you can draw while I drive. All the practice has made for some pretty impressive art and a huge mess in my house! Oh, but to watch you create brings me as much joy as it brings you to be the one creating and so I don't mind the mess and I love the creations.

You were an early and constant talker. The amount of talking has only increased and it is rarely quiet in our home. You always have something to say and you often get mistaken for much older because of your ability to talk, and talk, and talk! Your understanding of Spanish is continuing to develop, but at a much slower pace than English. You understand everything that your daddy and some of our Spanish speaking friends say, but you still prefer to answer in English or Spanglish.

When you were a baby I often felt sadness when I thought of the days passing and you growing older. I wanted to keep you as my little baby snuggled in my arms forever. But as you grow older I get more excited for the future seeing glimpses who you will become. Our mommy daughter dates are full of conversation across the dinner table (although that of a three year old variety) and we are starting to have many of the same interests which makes for such a beautiful relationship. I like to think that we will grow closer and closer as we both age and that our mother daughter relationship will someday be that of two best friends, drinking coffee in the early evenings, eating brunch on Sunday mornings, chatting on the phone and enjoying all the beauty life has to offer with one another.

Our future looks bright together, kiddo.