Kayson Strong as an Eagle ~ One year later

Wow!  A year ago yesterday we brought our baby home!  What a day that was!  I've been planning on writing this blog for weeks, at a year from the stroke, a year from getting out of ICU, a year from entering inpatient rehab but I kept not.  Honestly, its been a rough year for me.  I don't always talk about it but I have been dealing with depression and high anxiety since we brought baby boy home from Dallas.  Everytime I would think oh I'll write this blog, I would just feel so down and overwhelmed that I couldn't form my thoughts well.  This year has had a surgery for baby boy, an autism diagnoses for another, everyone in school and no more homeschooling, an oral surgery for me, sadness at church, Derr Zoo's first broken bone and plenty of other drama.  The trips to and from Dallas have put a strain on our finances and now Silver (Our big SUV, the only vehicle we own that will fit all of us in it!) is sick sick!  But this week we are camping at Baby boy's request!  I just hope that we can find our way back to a better togetherness, that we can get a bit closer to God, that we can remember the good in our lives and each other this week.  Camping has always been grounding for our family.  A year and a few weeks ago the bottom fell out to our world.  I will never ever forget that feeling as the NP came in the ER room and baby boy just laying there and she said they were flying him to Dallas ASAP bc he had a mass in his brain.  That feeling of just looking at your precious child and your heart breaking in two or more pieces, the phone calls that needed to be made, people showing up, the waiting, the uncertainty, the numbness, so numb and scared.  Then we learn that its not a mass but a stroke, a stroke!  Our seven year old red head had a STROKE!  He shouldn't have lived to even get to a hospital but he did!  They aren't sure (medically, we know it was GOD!!!) how he survived the stroke, they said he shouldn't have bc it was so very massive but it had not touched his brainstem so as long as they could keep the swelling managed and as long as he didn't have seizures that would cause further damage, the prognosis was good, so they said he needed to be put in a coma to allow his brain to rest and eventually start to heal.  My baby boy just laying there, unresponsive for days, the waiting to see his eyes, to see any glimpse of him, would he remember us, would he be scared, I didn't know it would take forever for him to really wakeup, I didn't realize just how long before he would talk again, if he would talk again, would he walk again, would he be able to learn and live, would he be able to use the restroom on his own or remain in diapers, what did our future hold???  It would be seven weeks before we would be able to take him home, walking and talking.  Now a year later, he is learning to read and he is counting to 100.  He is so silly and its so amazing to watch him continue to heal and grow.  He has been cleared to play baseball this spring and he is so excited but oh he looks so small out there and it scares me to pieces, honestly I kinda just want to put him in a bubble, which his doctors assure me I cannot do!  LOL! So here we are a year later, still trying to  process what all has happened, trying to learn what our family looks like in all this new, trying to stay a solid family unit when it feels like so much is trying to tear us apart.  Your prayers are still much appreciated!  But we are grateful, so thankful for our boy's life, so glad God decided to spare his life and let us keep him!  As I watch him run and play and learn and I am just in awe of how far he has come and how close we came to losing him.  Thank you all for your support and sharing this journey with us.