tricia kurtzman photography {the blog}

Hello, blog. It’s me. I’m sorry I haven’t written in a while. You see, this little thing called life has gotten in the way. I’ve thought about you often – felt guilty for not keeping in touch. So much was happening in my personal life that I lost my motivation to keep you current.

I used to keep a different blog current. Well, not a blog, exactly, but a Caring Bridge site. A place to share, vent, cry, and scream when someone you love is going through something horrible. And a place to hear back from those that prayed and cried along with you. I’ve missed that. Not the misery, but the feeling of connectedness.

Last fall, when we went into quarantine to avoid getting the swine flu, Bill, our kind vicar called me to offer his support. When I fretted over all the “what ifs” his sage words of advise were “Don’t write the story.” So simple and so helpful. Words we often remind ourselves of. I shared some of the positives to quarantine – beautiful family moments of togetherness that we were able to appreciate in the moment. Time forced to slow down, as we removed ourselves from school, schedules, social life. Bill, somewhat hesitantly, suggested I blog again. He said he didn’t want to tell me what to do, but thought it would be good to share these stories. I had gone quiet for two years, as we adjusted to life after bringing Tobin home from the hospital. I didn’t really know where to begin again. I had a photography blog, but that didn’t seem the right place to share about our personal lives. I thought I might maintain a family blog, but that never seemed to materialize. And so, like many good intentions, I let it slip.

Since quarantine ended in November, I went back to work, bit off more than I could chew, and got burned out over the holidays. With the holidays came additional concerns about Tobin. For the first time he showed signs of “clamping down” while running around. His body cut down on blood supply to his extremities to reserve more blood and oxygen for his vital organs. This is a survival response; think hypothermia. But this was just a 2 year old boy running around chasing his siblings and friends on Christmas day. New symptoms. New worries. We rushed to doctors, processed new information, attempted to adjust again. Told ourselves that he’s bigger now, able to play harder, push his limits. That’s why we’re seeing signs of his heart failure. And I wondered – should I blog again? But there was no time.

Then Eva started to complain about her heart feeling funny, irregular heartbeats. At first I thought it was nothing, but she kept complaining, kept coming to me, always while at rest. So in she went for her own EKG, echocardiogram, 24 hour holter monitor. Probably hopefully harmless PACs or PVCs, but we don’t know yet. Still waiting on results that might only tell us she needs more monitoring. And again I thought: I should blog. This is weighing down on me. I need to share, to unload. But there was no time, never enough time.

Then we found out that a patch of scar tissue that Tobin has in his left ventricle is starting to thin out, causing that part of his heart’s wall to move in the wrong direction. The heart squeezes, that patch bulges out. The heart sucks in blood, that patch bulges in. Dyskinetic. Wrong direction. In time, this can turn into an aneurysm. Possible surgery, clots, arrhythmias. And we find out that the surface of the scar tissue has little fissures and crevices where clots like to form. And clots like to get bigger. And clots like to move. Form embolisms. Cause strokes.

This is about when I feel like I am going to break. I go to church. I pray. What else can I do? I bargain with God. I say I will do anything, just please, please let him be okay, let her be okay, let us all be okay. And it hits me, hard, during the silence at Grace: I need to blog. I don’t care anymore about keeping work and family separate. They aren’t separate. The mixing of the two is what draws me to capture, what inspires me, what sparks my creativity. This is what I need to do. Perhaps I am called to share our story. That sounds so egotistical, doesn’t it? But I can’t question. What if bad stuff keeps happening until I do this, until I get the message?

I started to write this, and worked a little on it here and there, in free quiet moments. Because you know I get so many of those. Then Tobin came down with croup. We didn’t know how bad his second night would be, and we didn’t know how much his difficulty breathing was stressing his heart. They wanted us to be close to Children’s, in case he needed to be monitored. Ronald McDonald House, bless them, couldn’t take us because of the croup. Understandable, of course. So Children’s put us up at the Silver Cloud, just around the corner. Bless them too, for oh so many reasons.

Tobin did well, no additional scares or new worries in the past week. Except for the double ear infection, but that’s standard kid stuff. And now I am finally finishing this first new post. I have always been an open book when it came to Tobin. I don’t mind sharing what our family was going through, and is still going through. It’s cathartic. So I will continue the story, starting with this post. To read the beginning of his story, click here. To see the beginning of his story, click here. The formatting is a little off, but the story is there. To continue the journey with us, keep checking this blog. Thank you Bill, for planting the seed.

That day at Grace, in a serendipitous moment while waiting for Lucas to come out of the men’s room, I noticed a framed quote hanging on the wall over the water fountains. It read: “The experiences of our lives, when we let God use them, become the mysterious and perfect preparation for the work He will give us to do. –Corrie Ten Boom.”

xo,
Tricia

These photos are from a trip to Tahuya, when we were in quarantine. Thank you Sonja, and Susan and Dean, for the use of your perfect getaway cabin. It was exactly what we needed.