Health and Happiness

DRAFT Approx. mid-late January, 2017 -- not completed

What has happened to those crazy RV-traveling Millers? Judging by the increasingly rare Facebook posts, they seem to be in California, but haven't they been there since, like, October??

Yup, that's right. We cruised back in to town in October to house sit for my parents while they took a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity two-week cruise and we found it was a great opportunity to also throw a belated first birthday party for Kailyn while we were here. We planned to hit the road again after Thanksgiving, thinking we'd make the sacrifice of not being home for Christmas this year, but boy were we clouded from reality. Really? Not have Christmas with our families? The first Christmas after Brent's dad's passing? We get pretty jaded and tunnel visioned sometimes, to say the least.

So, through October and most of November, we spent a lot of time making ourselves at home at my parents' house, where the girls have lots of room to roam and where Evelyn could play on her play-set and swing-set, both of which are planted in my parents' backyard until we find a permanent home again someday.

We lucked out by finding a two week reservation available at our favorite local-to-home campground, Rancho Jurupa, and we officially had a place to park and live for Christmas. This would make our grand total stay in California that of just over two months, and we were eager to keep our traveling spirits in check and get ourselves back out for what we figure would be our final six months in the RV.

Then, the flu hit.

Evelyn got it first, two days after Christmas. We were still parked in our site-for-two-weeks at Rancho Jurupa and had another week before we had to move to our other local campground, Prado Regional Park, for New Year weekend. Our plan was to leave town after the New Year, and this appeared to be an ordinary illness, but we couldn't ideally put her through the discomfort of moving feeling as awful as she was.

See, living in an RV, an important factor is considering where home will be. When someone gets sick in an ordinary house-- one that doesn't move-- people kind of take for granted the fact that someone can lie in bed and recover without having to go anywhere. In an RV, there is not only the discomfort involved in having to do anything BUT lie in bed, but there is the packing and cleaning involved in making that move. The worst part, though, is having to FIND a place to park. Finding a reservation that will take us through two weeks (the maximum period of time our two local campgrounds allow) is a difficult task. During the week, yes, most spots will lay empty in campgrounds, but weekends are another matter. Provided we find a spot that we can reserve for any period of time, the ultimate goal is being able to stay in that spot. Moving is not fun and is a lot of work.

That being said, Evelyn was pretty miserable and we were a day away from having to move to Prado. I watched the Rancho Jurupa reservation website and was thrilled to find a cancellation for New Year weekend in the site right behind the one we were in. I grabbed it as long as it was available, through January 2, and I cancelled the Prado reservation, taking a $57 hit for cancelling on short notice.

Evelyn was pretty miserable through the move, but she could stay in bed as long as we could let her and she stayed in the trailer while we moved. I found myself feeling a little drained and achy, myself, but I shrugged it off as fatigue (Kailyn is still not a great sleeper). Well, by that night, I was miserable, too. Evelyn and I were sick together, coughing, shivering, aching. New Year's Eve was a painful blur. While the campground erupted in celebration at midnight, I lay bundled in bed with a horrible headache, shivering and groaning.

Evelyn began feeling better, I was in the thick of the flue, but January 2nd was upon us. We had to move. Our destination: an auto paint and repair yard in Chino where our trailer's damage from the blowout we had had back in November. While we were grateful they allowed us to live on their property while they did the repairs, we would be living in their yard, packed in with other RVs in for repairs, listening to banging metal and breathing in paint and fiberglass fumes in the air. When we packed to go, I told Brent I didn't feel well enough to drive. Out of desperation, I took an allergy pill and that cleared my dizziness from congestion enough to change that at least slightly.

We planned to check in to Prado for two weeks starting January 5. We spent an uncomfortable four days, all-in-all, at the auto repair yard--a full day longer than we had hoped-- during which time Brent and Kailyn came down with the flu, as well. While I pushed myself-- sick, achy, and coughing-- to take Evelyn and Kailyn to their doctor for infections and complications from the flu, Brent was in the thick of his own misery but we were eager to get to Prado, where we could once again breathe fresh air and sit outside in the sunshine.

Brent managed to get us moved to Prado on January 6 through fever and coughing. We had booked 9 days, during which time Brent would recover from illness and then could help his mom with tasks needing attention since his dad had passed. We didn't know it, yet, but our plans would once again be thwarted, and health matters were about to get much worse.

The next morning, he woke in extreme pain. Every cough brought a seizing of muscles throughout his back and leg. His sciatic nerve was pinched, though we didn't know it at the time. All we knew was that his throat was so sore he couldn't talk and that every time he coughed, it absolutely killed him. He slept on the couch all day and all night, couldn't eat, and had to crawl his way to the restroom. Time was ticking on our nine days at Prado and he continued this path, making no improvement as the days wore on. I learned to fill and drain the tanks, I took care of the girls, I did the shopping, and I continued to work my job, staying up late at night to get things done. I enlisted help from my mom, who let me come over with the girls so I could work without having to tend to them, which was a huge blessing.

Brent had lost weight rapidly and couldn't make it to the car, let alone around the house. When he came to my parents' house one night to pick up some things we'd left there after house-sitting months back, my mom looked at me with dire concern across her face: "He should be in a hospital!"