Football Season = A Happy, Happy, Happy Husband!

IF  anything can help Kevin McCormick feel better, it's the start of the college football season; Carolina Football.  (He had a much better night last night and a good day tonight. So maybe he's on the right track now.)

Our Cheerleader

 

 

 

 

I told her to say "cheese" and I would give her a Popsicle. I forgot to say and look at the camera too. :0)

 

 

 

I know Madalyn is blurry in this picture, but she was really getting into the start of the game. She got really excited and hyper when Cocky was being born and during 2001.

 

 

Watching the game with Daddy and eating her Popsicle.

 

 

This is what Madalyn really thinks about this outfit.

 

 

 

Madalyn was so upset that I put her in this awful outfit that she started to cry. She kept asking to see the "purple".  Meaning Clemson...and when I was taking her picture she kept on "roaring" at me...I think I'll make a tiger out of her yet! :0)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kevin

Let's see I guess the best place to start is the beginning....

Saturday, August 24th: 
Madalyn and I were enjoying playing outside and Kevin was working. He had a business luncheon and then he worked until 5:00 that day. It was a typical Saturday for us.

When Kevin got home at 5:00, he came in saying that he had horrible heartburn, at least that was what he thought it was, since about 1:00 that day and it had gradually gotten worse.  He normally doesn't get heartburn and so this was unusual for him, but he figured it was what he had eaten for lunch. So I gave him some Tums.  Kevin's parents came over to eat dinner with us, and Kevin was still continuing to complain about his "heartburn".  So after dinner, his mom gave him something else. He said that he felt like something was stuck in the middle of his chest and it wouldn't go up or down.  By 8:00 that night, he was still having trouble with the "heartburn" and now he was having trouble taking in deep breaths. It was also painful for him to sit all the way back against the chair.  By 9:00 his breathing trouble had really increased. Being an asthmatic, Kevin used his inhaler and his breathing machine, but he was still unable to catch his breath.  If he would get up and walk, he would have to stop.  By this time he was also running a low fever and complaining about being cold.  We thought maybe he had an infection setting in due to his procedure of removing the polyp from Friday.  I told him that if he felt like he needed to go to the ER, then we would.  At 9:30, Kevin said "if you want to go to the ER, then we can."  I knew at this point, something was really wrong with him.  I called his parents and they came to stay with Madalyn because she was already asleep and we didn't want to have to wake her up.

10:00pm-we arrived at the ER in Barnwell, and we didn't wait too long, they got him in pretty quickly.  They put oxygen on him, which really helped him because he wasn't struggling to breath now.  They did an EKG on him, and the next thing we are being told is that they are going to fly Kevin to Providence hospital in Columbia to see a cardiologist.  Kevin and I were both thinking "are you serious?" You are going to do what? Then they did some blood work on him.  His EKG showed that he was having a heart attack.  By this time my sister-in-law, Tori, had come to stay with Madalyn, and Kevin's parents came to the hospital, along with his other sisters and brothers.

Sunday, August 25th:
12:00am-After getting the lab results back, we find out that Kevin is still going to be admitted to Providence hospital, but he will go by ground.  He isn't having a heart attack, but he had what is called "Pericarditis"which is when the sac around your heart becomes inflamed due to an infection.  Kevin's mom drove me home to get a bag of clothes and things together because we had some time before they would transmit him.

2:00am (or a little after)-The ambulance takes Kevin to Columbia, and Mrs. Katie and I follow. Or well we tried to follow, we lost sight of the ambulance once we made our way back through Blackville to head to Columbia and we didn't catch it again until we meet the men coming out of the hospital after they had dropped Kevin off.

3:00 am (or a little after)-We get to the hospital and my parents are there and they start drawing blood on Kevin. (It's amazing that he has any left as much blood as they drew).  They took 6 vials along with 4 Tabasco Sauce looking bottles full. (Not to mention the blood that they took in Barnwell).

5:00am-My parents were headed to our house to take care of Madalyn and Kevin's mom headed home. Things started to calm down then.  As I tried to close my eyes and rest, it was finally hitting me what all had happened and what all was going on with Kevin.  Realizing that he was very, very sick right now; it was a scary thing.  I looked at my phone to see what the verse of the day was on my Bible app and it said "So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand", Isaiah 40:10.


6:15 am-they started coming in again and it was a crazy day with doctors and nurses coming in.  The blood work showed that it was definitely the Pericarditis and not a heart attack.  They did a echo cardiogram (ultrasound) of his heart and there was some fluid around is heart.  They were testing his blood to find out if he had a bacteria or fungi infection.  If it was bacteria, then it would be easy to treat. If it was fungi, meaning a fungus had started growing on his heart, then he would be in the hospital for weeks.  The day continued with them drawing blood, etc.  My uncle Keith came down to visit for the day and be there for moral support.

As you can see he's starting to feel better.

Monday, August 26th:

The cardiologist that I saw a few weeks ago was Kevin's doctor and he told us that Kevin's infection was viral and he caught it just like catching the common cold.  It wasn't related to anything else nor there wasn't a high odds of someone else getting it either.  We spent Monday in the hospital.  Kevin was started to feel better.  He had a few visitors: his Uncle Jim, his cousin Brandon, and his cousin Brantley.

Tuesday, August 27th:

They took Kevin to do another echo cardiogram and he still had fluid around his heart, well its actually at the back of his heart, but it hadn't gotten any worse.  So the cardiologist told us we could go home.  Kevin goes back next Wednesday afternoon to get another scan and hopefully it will show that the inflammation is going down and the the fluid is going down.  Kevin is on some medicine and light duty for work. He can't do any heavy lifting.  The doctor said it would take several weeks for this to go away.  Kevin will also for the next few months have to go and see him and get a scan done to ensure that things are progressing like they are suppose to.  The doctor also said that they caught this in time and there shouldn't be any long term damage done to his heart.  He was so happy that he got to go home, which I was too.

As you can see, he was ready to leave. He had to wait on them to wheel him out.

Madalyn was happy to have her Daddy home and they spent some "quiet" time coloring.

Madalyn had a few of her Daddy's favorite treats for him when he got home.

Last night it was a rough night, Madalyn didn't go to bed until 11:00 and Kevin was in a good bit of discomfort.  He still couldn't lay down flat and so he spent most of his time in the recliner dozing off and on.


Wednesday, August 28th:
This morning, Kevin wasn't feeling too good. I had his mom call the doctor for me since I went to school to see what we could do for him. He was pretty sore in his chest and shoulders. They told us we could up one of his medicines and for him to not do anything until he sees the doctor next week. In other words, he is allowed to go to the chicken houses to look at things, but he's not even to pick up eggs. Which honestly, he doesn't feel like doing anything. He's been sitting most of the day and if you know Kevin, you know that's not him. But he's sick and has a lot of recovering to do.

Thank you so much to all of our family and friends for all that you did for Kevin, Madalyn and myself. We so greatly appreciate it! Thank to family and friends who visited, taking care of Madalyn, sending me text messages to let me know you were praying for Kevin, cleaning, cooking, and even cutting our grass.  We are so humbled and blessed by all the out pouring of love that we have received over the last few days.  Most of all we thank everyone so much for their prayers and for continuing to pray.  Kevin is better, he got to come home, but he's not well yet. So please continue to pray for him and that his body will be healed.

Madalyn had some fun while we were in the hospital.  She got to ride a horse with Pop.  The whole time I was taking her picture on Saturday, she kept asking to ride the horse. So Sunday, Pop gave her a short ride.

Our Lil' Farm Diva

Saturday, after Madalyn and I finished stomping mushrooms, Madalyn and I went around the farm and took some pictures.  I haven't made pictures of her in awhile so it was time for a mini-photo shoot.  (I had planned to post these Saturday evening, but most of you know how my Saturday evening went. I will post that later).

This was a pretty fun photo shoot of our little farm diva.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stomping Mushrooms

This morning it was cloudy and a little cool, but instead of staying inside, Madalyn and I went out on a golf cart ride.  We decided to go on a mushroom hunt (we found lots of them, thank you rain) and she would jump off and stomp on the mushroom. Then we would go look for more.

 

Stomping mushrooms is so much fun!

 

 

 

What a fun way to spend our Saturday morning!

 

 

 

 

A New Found Favorite

Yesterday when I was picking up a few things for Kevin, I found a new favorite snack. I have always loved peanut butter with Nilla wafers. Now....I have a new favorite and it's sooooo good! :0)

Kevin's Road to Recovery

With all the trouble that Kevin has had with his stomach, etc. there was one more issue that Kevin had to get taken care of. We thought that Kevin had external hemorrhoids, but when he went to the doctor two weeks ago, we found out it wasn't hemorrhoids, but a polyp.  Which is good, because if it was hemorrhoids he would be down for a few weeks. So yesterday, Kevin went to have his polyp removed.  Since it was the first week back at school I didn't feel that I should take the first Friday off, since it was something minor, so Kevin's mom went with him.  He did well and is up and going. He said the only thing he has noticed is that getting in and out of his truck is a little more difficult.  Here's some pictures of Kevin after his procedure.

He looks thrilled, right? Bless his heart, he was starving, he hadn't eaten since dinner Thursday and it was about 1:30pm on Friday. Don't worry as soon as they left, he got some food.

 

Kevin's recovery room was decorated with Disney's Cars

 

Back to School with a Big Change

I had mentioned in earlier posts, that I would go into more detail about school later.  This will be my ninth year of teaching that I am getting ready to go into; however, this year will be very different from the past 8 years.  I'm not going to be a regular classroom teacher. I am going to be the computer lab teacher this year.  I taught second grade for five years and third grade for three years.  Last year was the best school year I have ever had. I really mean that. I had the best group of students and parents.  It was a wonderful year.

However, ever since I began teaching I knew that at some point I wanted to come out of the classroom but I didn't know what I would do.  For at least the past four years, I have been praying for something other than a regular classroom position for many reasons that I can't go into on this post.  Teaching can be a wonderful job and you have a chance to make a difference in so many children's lives; however it's a very demanding and stressful job.  My daily schedule for the past 8 years has been this: Get to school at 7:00 am, stay at school until 4:30-5:00pm. Come home, then continue to do school work for another 2-3 hours during the week and spend most of my weekend working too; grading papers and working on lesson plans for the following week.  And the past two years, with Madalyn, I couldn't continue to work until after she went to bed. Well, by that time I was ready to go to bed too.  My job didn't end at 2:45 when the kids left, it was almost 24/7. You may think that's an exaggeration, and probably at times it is, but that's what it felt like many days.  On top of that, I have the job of being a wife and a mom.  Those are two demanding and stressful; yet rewarding jobs also. You know the saying "you don't know what someone else's life is like until you have walked a mile in their shoes".  If you are an elementary school teacher, or you were one, then you know exactly what I am talking about.  If you know an elementary teacher, just ask, they will be more than happy to share with you what a "day in the life of a teacher is like".   I know there are plenty of jobs that are just as time consuming, especially if you own your own business. Kevin's job really is 24/7; he can never escape it. It's hard. For me, I have always put my job before my family, mostly, because it demanded it. But then I would give to my family a hundred percent too, and then have nothing left or the energy left for myself.  So, I've been praying for the last four years, especially the last two, that I could find something (and it didn't have to be teaching) to where I could go to work at the time I was suppose to...leave work at the time I was suppose to...and not bring home any work.

WELL............... God has finally answered my prayer! I know it's in His right time, not mine, because if it was my time it would have happened at least three years ago.  I know that God always gives us what we need at the right time we need it; however, at times I was not very patient waiting on His timing.  I felt the nudge from God, I guess you should say when I found out this summer during the week long training I did that we were going to have a computer lab teacher.  We haven't had one for the past three years at the school due to budget issues.  After Kevin and I got back from Florida, I emailed the principal and asked her if they had hired someone for that position yet and they hadn't. So we started talking and a week later, I signed a new contract saying I would be the computer lab teacher.  I am excited about my new position and a bit nervous, it will be something completely new to me. But after eight years (even though I have taught two different grades during that time), it was time for a change. This new job brings what I wanted: I don't have to do weekly lesson plans, I don't give out grades, so no grading papers, no making copies or other paper work, no parent/teacher conferences, and best of all I get to leave at 2:45 and have my afternoons, evenings, and weekends school free! YEA! And I still get my holidays off plus my summer. So what will I be doing now? Teaching K-4 through 5th graders, how to type and basic computer skills.  I will have five to six classes a day for an hour each, once a week.  Except for the classes that I have on Monday I will also have on Friday for the first nine weeks, then it will change each nine weeks.  We only have four activity teachers, so we get some classes twice a week instead of once.

Even though I know this is the move that God wanted me to make for myself and my family, it was still a leap of faith for various reasons, which I won't go into detail right now.  Please pray for me this year as I embark on a new adventure.  Here are some pictures of my new classroom.  Thank you so much to everyone who played a part in this classroom coming together for a new school year! :0)

 

 

 

 

 

The inspiration for my classroom came from this piece of stripped fabric.

 

Which was a part of this wreath that Kevin's cousin Brantley made for me. (She was selling wreaths to raise money to go back to Uganda on a mission trip this fall.  If you are interested in wreath or Brantley's story, you can visit her blog to find out more: http://forthisjourneywereon.com/ )

 

 

 

I found this border at The School Spot when I was in Greenville back in July. I thought the red paper would really make it "pop".

 

The computer lab was remodeled this summer and so I wanted some tennis balls for the chairs. I didn't want the kids to mess up the floor and after while that scrapping sound gets old. :0)

So my parents got a tennis club to donate like close to 300 tennis balls. I only needed 94, so I passed along to other teacher what I didn't need. Kevin cut all the balls to fit the chairs.

 

My area, at the front of the class

 

 

 

 

My mom made my curtains and my dad met Mrs. Katie and Mr. Tim when they were in Greenville this weekend to pass them along to me.  They are made from the same striped fabric that's in the wreath.

 

 

 

 

 

Student area