To me, 'empty nest' means something so much more. It means evenings spent enjoying a good movie, or reading a good book. It means playing board games with your partner and enjoying a rare sweet victory. It also means watching your favorite TV shows, which might include PBS News Hour, but that's an entirely different blog post..
I'll be honest, my feelings were mixed at first, until last night.
I'll give you a little back story to set the stage. My husband and I married very young, I was 18, he was 19. We were high school sweethearts who began dating at 15 and 16. For us, marriage immediately following high school graduation was obvious. He was 2 years ahead of me in school so by the time I finished, he had 2 years of college under his belt. He had made the decision to finish his education at Mississippi State University in Starkville Mississippi.
Plans were set, we would marry then move 8 hours from family and friends to begin our lives. We had a wonderful wedding and our move went smoothly. We were adjusting to newlywed live beautifully! Our apartment was basic, at best, and very affordable since we were in married housing on campus. We didn't care, we had each other and for us, it was a new exciting adventure.
I worked full time at the local Wal-Mart while Andrew went to school full time and things were going great. We had made new friends and we were truly finding our niche in our new little life and community in Mississippi.
It's amazing how things can change in an instant.
It was March and I had come home to visit Missouri while Andrew was on a school trip for spring break. I was staying at my mom's house when I woke up with a terrible stomach ache. I've always had a sensitive stomach but this was different. I couldn't get the pain to subside. It was a sharp pain like I had never experienced. My mom decided to take me to the local ER and they gave me some antacid and said it was a possible stomach ulcer and for me to continue the prescription.
Fast forward to May, we were visiting Missouri again for my sister-in-law's graduation. By this point, my stomach pain hadn't fully gone away, it had gotten worse and I had lost noticeable weight because I was starting to have trouble keeping food down. We hadn't mentioned much to our family because we were still unsure of what was happening. While we were in Missouri, our family had planned a trip to a Cardinals baseball game. After the game, my stomach had begun acting up and I got sick and I was unable to keep any food down. Once we finally got back home, things had calmed down but Andrew's family were all so worried about my health and what could be wrong. We promised that as soon as we returned to Mississippi, I would find a doctor and get to the bottom of this.
I found a doctor and after hearing my issues, his diagnosis was severe anxiety and obsessive control disorder. He prescribed heavy anti-anxiety medicine and advised that I get a fish....
Well, to say that diagnosis missed the mark is a complete understatement. While I was stressed because we were so far from family and friends, it was NOT making me sick. I knew in my bones that was an incorrect diagnosis. BUT, I got a fish, took my meds, lived in a haze for a month or so... and still got sick. I got worse.
By the time July rolled around, I was barely 90lbs and struggling to work. I was so weak and in so much pain that I had to go back to the doctor to see if they could run tests and see if we could get to the bottom of this. In all of the times at various doctors, I had already had upper/lower GI tests run, x-rays, sonograms, endoscopy tests and they all showed nothing wrong.
I finally had a doctor's appointment to see the same doctor and tell him his previous diagnosis was glaringly wrong. As luck would have it, he was on vacation so I was seen by his father, who was in practice with him. I'll never forget that appointment. I was so weak that I passed out trying to walk to the scales so they could get a weight, a whopping 89 pounds at this point. The nurses tried at least two times to get a blood pressure reading on both arms and couldn't pick anything up. When the doctor finally came in to see me, I was describing what was wrong and he had his back turned looking at my chart and when he turned to look at me, he said, "You are a very sick young lady". Immediately, he had me admitted to the hospital where they did a CT Scan of my abdomen and FINALLY found what was wrong with me and two days later, I was in surgery to clear an intestinal blockage.
Throughout all of this scary sick time, Andrew was incredible. When I would get sick in the night, he would get up and change the trash bag and help me get cleaned up. He would draw me up the hottest baths to help me relax for a few minutes. He was thrown into this situation and handled it with so much love, grace and patience.
Last night I was reminded of how carefree our first six months of marriage was. We played games, played video games, watched our favorite movies and ate ice cream straight from the carton. As Andrew grabbed his carton of ice cream and a spoon, we were gearing up to play Dominoes and I had to smile because here we were, 22 years later, feeling that same carefree feeling.
So, an empty nest for us is a reminder of all we have been through and the excitement knowing that its just us two carefree kids again enjoying the simple things like a game of Dominoes and ice cream.
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