Emily

I know that there are plenty of people I still owe a gratitude note, and some of you may remember that Emily has already received one a little over two years ago. But that was way back when she was Tony’s music therapist, with a very different role and significantly less time and involvement with his care and therapy programs. The truth is, most of the breathing room I currently have to do anything for myself I directly owe to Emily having taken on the role as Tony’s habilitative therapist a year and a half ago, and the extent of that debt can never hope to be settled even by a second gratitude note.

Emily, thank you for choosing to work with our family. We know you had many offers and other choices you could have made. Some of you may not be aware, but given where we live and the complexity of our little man’s circumstances, it is unlikely we could have found anybody else to take on that role for quite some time (if at all) had Emily chosen to do something different. For this alone we are profoundly appreciative. We know again, Emily, with recent circumstances that there are other choices you could have made, and I feel indescribably blessed that you have chosen to continue working with our family in these turbulent times.

Emily, your willingness to work with Tony by yourself so I can take naps on those days where sleep was more limited has saved my sanity on more than one occasion. You are cheerfully willing to try any therapy technique or target that I recommend. You patiently work with Tony while I assault your ears with my ukulele practices, write my posts, or clean things around the house. I wouldn’t have made any of my dental appointments over the past year if it weren’t for you. Thank you for seeing so much good in our little man and keeping him safe during those appointments. Thank you for being willing to cut his hair sometimes so we can help get him used to other people doing so. You have helped me keep our little man’s community and public therapy programs running as smoothly as possible, and we couldn’t have accomplished nearly so much without you.

And, you have listened to me with kindness and compassion when my heart has been ripping apart and breaking from other circumstances. I am ever grateful for every way you have supported Tony and our family. A note is not sufficient, I know it is not. I could chase after you with an infinitive number of “thank you’s” and I wouldn’t feel like the job of expressing the depths of my appreciation would be adequately done. But Emily, I will leave you with a couple still because it is, again, the best I can do on these pages: thank you. A trillion times over, thank you.

Some Doing To Consider

I had some reading that I thought I might discuss this month, but I decided to postpone it until August. The reason is that I feel like right now is a time where “doing” is more important in our communities, and for those of you who are able to spend money anywhere right now, I honestly would encourage you to do so in different ways than books if you can afford to do so.

These are unprecedented times within our communities. Many have lost their jobs, or have had their earning capacity limited in some way. Families have lost loved ones to COVID whose ability to work was providing the basic necessities of life for them. Food banks and other service organizations that help members of our community that have been impacted by these events need additional support right now from those of us who have been comparatively blessed during these difficult times. If you, in reading this, find that you and your family are in a luckier position, maybe take the money you might have spent on my reading recommendations and donate it rather to such an organization.

In Arizona, our numbers are dramatically on the rise. This rise cannot be attributed to more testing, as the percentage of positive cases has also been precipitously rising (currently 24% of tests are coming back positive in Arizona according to NPR). At this point studies have demonstrated mask wearing is an effective way of reducing and preventing spread with this virus, and I think it is fabulous that our state leaders are beginning to encourage mask wearing in public spaces- but I believe that alone is not enough.

If you scan the headlines, so many of the events where large numbers of people ended up getting infected originated from things like smaller surprise birthday parties, where one asymptomatic infected attendee infected other family members, who returned to those they lived, and the virus continued to spread that way to those individuals also. I have seen incidents detailed with anywhere from 18-80 infected individuals confirmed arose from one special family gathering. Some of those infected individuals have already died.

I know that many people will survive this, but the death rate is higher than the flu for almost every demographic, and dramatically higher for certain age groups or individuals with chronic conditions. I am going to borrow an analogy from Emily here: even if you had only a 5% chance of dying from this, comparatively speaking if someone told you 5% of the skittles were poisoned in a bag, would you still keep sticking your hand in and taking a chance you wouldn’t eat one of the poisoned ones?

My personal opinion, even if it is hard to hear for some, is that if we really want to preserve lives in a nation where nearly 130,000 have already died from COVID, we are going to need to wear masks when visiting friends or loved ones that don’t live with us. In Arizona, we’ve implemented our crisis care plan. That means as hospitals become overwhelmed, they will start deciding who they provide treatment to based on a number of factors, including how likely they are to survive 1-5 years post infection. Many of our younger citizens who are going out and becoming infected would probably fair pretty well under those special triage criteria…but their elderly loved ones that they are bringing this virus home to probably would not.

That means individuals who score poorly under crisis care triaging won’t get access to a ventilator even if it was their only hope of survival, and might not even get a room. So even if you can’t donate to help others right now, you can still do something amazing for your loved ones, the community, and our local healthcare providers. Mask up- wherever you are going, whatever you are doing. Mask up.