The End To Summer

June 20, 2017 By

Do you remember that epic summer I was talking about? We really haven’t done much since we moved to Utah due to lack of time and money but I’m all about FREE fun. The last couple of weeks were off to a roaring start with hikes to Stewart Falls and Timpanogos Cave, The Dirty Dash mud run, The Kids Adventure Games,  redneck canal tubing, biking Provo Canyon, Monday Midway Cruiser Cruise, a Sunday drive to Strawberry Reservoir and exploring the W.O.W. Trail.

I was feeling exhausted yesterday. Hadley’s good friend, Maeve, has been visiting us from Colorado and I resolved after I dropped her off at the airport to just chill out and catch up on life before our trip to Colorado.

And then the Aqua X Zone happened.

We’re always in Canada for Bode’s birthday so I told him he could invite a few friends to this awesome obstacle course located ON Jordanelle Reservoir. Hadley brought Maeve and besides her complaints about being required to wear a life jacket, everyone was in good spirits!

My friend Sarah brought all three of her boys  so we setup a picnic area on the beach and set them loose. About 45 minutes into their adventures, Maeve came over. “Hadley is hurt!” Jamie raced to meet her and she was in an excruciating amount of pain. She and Maeve had climbed up the white iceberg wall and just as Hadley was egging Maeve to jump, she slipped and crash-landed 12 feet, landing on her shoulder on the bottom step, Hard.

Hadley has a pretty high pain tolerance but we knew it was bad from the start. Jamie and I knowingly looked at each other. Summer is my slow season for work, money is tight and expenses are high. We’ve been praying for more business opportunities (one of the joys of being self-employed) and a major injury is not the answer we needed.

Sure enough, she fractured her humerus (upper arm). It occurred right beneath her growth plate so we need to take her to a pediatric orthopedic specialist…because apparently God doesn’t was us to ever afford grass on our lawn.

So, in addition to being in a lot of pain, we had a lot of rescheduling and cancellations to do. I’m working on a campaign with the renowned Keystone Science School (KSS) and Hadley was THRILLED to go to their Steamboat Voyagers next week with whitewater kayaking, rodeoing and backpacking while learning Aquatic Ecology, one of her passions. I withdrew her from that and also a volleyball clinic at the high school this week. Jamie and I were planning to take a second honeymoon in Colorado’s backcountry while the kids were in KSS so we didn’t know if we’d have to bring her, which would have been kind of a boring nightmare for her because she can’t do anything.

Thankfully, Jamie’s mom, Linda, offered to take her for the week and we found a $42 airline ticket for her to join us at the end of the trip when we hit The Broadmoor for a few days.

Still up in the air: Young Women’s Girl’s Camp mid-July, whether she’ll be able to surf at the lake in Canada and BYU volleyball camp late-July.

So, now we wait and hope and pray for healing, realizing other families are dealing with much more sobering prognosis with their children. I’m not really the type to ask “why” bad things happen because who can ever really know? Maybe she’s supposed to learn patience from this ordeal. Maybe something more serious might have happened to her at KSS and this is keeping her safe.

Several years ago, Jamie and I were assigned to lead the fourth year Girl’s Camp Young Women into the backcountry for a few days. I did a lot of training hikes with the girls, thoroughly scouted the area and had arranged for Linda to watch the kids. And then the night before the trip, I become sicker than I’ve ever been. There was no way I could lead the girls but fortunately there was another couple who were already planning to go. Linda ended up still taking Hadley and Bode because I was too sick to get out of bed and it lasted the duration of that trip.

I was upset and pretty heartbroken. Why was I called upon to lead the girls, only to have this happen at the last-minute? I asked Jamie for a priesthood blessing of healing and in that blessing, I was given the guidance that I would become better with time and that the Lord had his reasons for why it happened.

And that was my answer. Sometimes when bad things happen, we later look back and can see the wisdom in it. That never happened in this particular instance and it was such a minor thing–getting sick–but with a major lesson. Some things happen and we often never know why but it is within our power to have faith in knowing that sometimes we’re not supposed to know the “whys” and we just need to learn the “hows” to make it through.

Here’s to hoping Hadley is given the same directive this summer.

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Filed Under: Hadley, LDS