"He needs a pump and camp!"

It's 3:00 a.m. and a bright flashlight shines inside a cabin full of kids. "Who's going low???" a sleepy teenage counselor asks as he goes through the kids in the cabin, one by one, to locate the source of the alarm that sounded just seconds ago.

A year ago, when Shulamith's son Swen was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, I immediately contacted my friend Teresa, whose son and daughter both have T1. Her son (the younger of the two) was diagnosed first, when he was only three, and her daughter when she was 14. Teresa was an immediate source of knowledge and support as Shulamith, Matt, and Swen began the diabetes journey that would last Swen's entire life. We will always be grateful to her, along with a college friend of Shulamith's with T1 and others within the diabetes community, who reached out in support of the Webster-Monsons as they learned to navigate this stupid disease.

When Teresa told her son, now grown with a wife and children of his own, about Swen's diagnosis, his response was, "He needs a pump and camp! That's what he needs."

Swen got a pump (no more shots!) six months after diagnosis, but all camps were canceled last summer due to COVID restrictions. This year, diabetes camps in Utah were back in session, and Shulamith was quick to register Swen. Swen was both nervous and excited. We were both nervous and excited for him. Before this past week, Swen had never been away from his parents overnight, other than to sleep at my house. But he braved right up and went to camp with high hopes and an awesome attitude.

It was a long four days for those of us left at home. We couldn't even monitor his glucose numbers because the goal of camp is to help diabetic kids become self reliant, teaching them to manage the disease on their own AND to give parents a much-needed break from all of it. Shulamith barely slept the three nights Swen was away. "What if he goes low at night and sleeps through his alarm? What if no one notices? What if he dies?" This is not typical of Shulamith, about whom I often comment that she's never had an anxious thought in her life. But with diabetes, the hard truth is all of those concerns are realistic. I worried more about Swen's emotional health. I figured a camp for diabetic kids that's been in existence for 60+ years probably has its shit together; they probably know how to take care of these kids. My anxiety was more along the lines of "What if he gets scared at night? Would he tell someone? What if he hates all the food there? What if he doesn't make friends and feels lonely? What if no one else understands his obsession with car washes?"

All our worries disappeared yesterday at 5:30 p.m., when Shulamith drove up to camp to pick him up. He was alive and well, and he LOVED camp!! He was so happy! They evidently structure these camps to give diabetic kids a fun-filled week to meet and make friends with other kids with T1. It's such a rare disease that kids can feel pretty isolated. No one else has to check glucose levels all day, every day or bolus insulin prior to eating almost anything. No one else has two pieces of apparatus attached to his or her body 24/7, a glucose monitor to track highs and lows and a pump to dispense insulin. Swen was the only T1 kid in his entire school last year; it's hard to always feel different.

At camp, T1 Diabetes is the norm. Everyone has it. Swen loved that they all checked their numbers together throughout the day and that other kids' alarms sounded periodically alerting them of highs and lows. That's possibly the part Swen hates most about diabetes; he gets super embarrassed when his alarm sounds right in the middle of school. But at camp, that happens to everyone! He made friends, got "crazy," went on hikes, watched movies, saw a snake (he was quick to tell me all about that), and enjoyed lots of unstructured time (his favorite!) The only part he wasn't fond of were the education classes, you know, where they teach kids how to manage diabetes. My guess is it felt too much like school. 

I asked Swen what he liked best about camp. In addition to the things noted above, he mentioned staying up until 11:45 p.m every night, all the free stuff they gave him (note: no one loves to collect free crap as much as Swen), getting to buy stuff every day at the camp store, no siblings around, and not showering even ONCE the entire week.

So there you have it. 

P.S. Swen loved diabetes camp so much that he's considering going again next week when the theme will be Pokemon. Jurassic Park was cool, but POKEMON!!

Summer highs and lows

I know I'm untypical, but summer is not my favorite. I find the sun to be highly overrated, and I'd prefer rain every single day. Feeling a bit meh this evening, I decided to acknowledge both the highs and lows of the summer of 2022. Just keepin' it real.

Highs

1. Frequent thunderstorms bringing lovely rain and the misty, gray skies I adore. And sometimes, I'm even free to enjoy this. Sometimes. Other times I'm stuck in a windowless classroom on the campus of UVU, helping students learn to write rhetorical analysis essays (but that would put this in the "lows" column, so let's focus on the times I'm not at school). Someone on our family group text will message everyone: "Rain!" If I'm not in class or asleep, I book it outside to feel the rain on my skin and to breathe in the cool, moist air.

2. A visit from one of my closest friends from Billings, Montana. Trudy was my walking partner the whole seven years we lived in Billings, and fortunately, she comes to Utah semi frequently to visit family. Last weekend, she and her husband were here for just 36 hours, but she still spent three of those hours with me Saturday morning, as we took a long and much overdue walk through the streets of Daybreak. Yes, we got lost. We always get lost. Keep in mind our walking trail in Billings was one, distinct path with no turns. We literally walked one direction for two miles and then turned around and walked the two miles home. No way to get lost. Daybreak, in contrast, has twists and turns, hills and valleys, little bridges, a big lake (pond?), and neither of us is familiar with any of it. But Trudy handled it like a boss, pulling up a map on her phone, leading us right back to our cars.

3. The opportunity to teach Gospel Doctrine to the coolest Sunday School class ever! I've taught adult Sunday School several times, but never in a year that we were reading the Old Testament. I'm seriously in love with the Old Testament. Like I'm actively looking for some way to get to the Holy Land and see these places in person. The stories, so rich in covenant language and messianic symbolism, are delighting my soul. The people in my class have brilliant insights and do a fabulous job applying the text to their own lives and to our common goals as followers of Christ. Thank you, Bluffdale 16th Ward Gospel Doctrine class!

4. The next four days! Yep, in the middle of the arduous summer session, I get a 4-day break. I never teach on Fridays, the temple is closed this Saturday for Utah's pretend holiday, Sunday is a Relief Society/Priesthood lesson (no Sunday School), and Monday is the day they actually observe the fake holiday, so schools are closed. Hallelujah! My plan? Thoroughly clean my super dirty house, make progress on my current Netflix binge, go see Where the Crawdads Sing, and read! Too many essays have cut my reading time way too short recently, and Imma kick ball-change that situation real soon.

Lows

1. Summer session. Is crazy exhausting. We condense a normal 16-week semester into just eight weeks, which means double the workload for students and double the time in class for both them and me. It's hard. What I get in return is all of May and half of June completely off, which makes it worth it but still not easy. As of this moment, there are two weeks left of class. I'm trying to remember the advice of Tony Horton, the P90X trainer on the videos I used once upon a time to work out in preparation for Shulamith's wedding: "Finish strong!" he would always say in the final 10 minutes, when I was dripping in sweat and about to die, kinda like how I feel right now.

Come to think of it, that's really the only summer "low." But it's a pretty low low. I'm tired of this schedule; I'm tired of essays; I'm tired of students who plagiarize (well, I only have one who did that, but he's causing me way too much angst and anger); and I'm really tired of my dirty, disorderly house.

That said, I get the next four days off to catch up, and then just two more weeks till done. Will I make it? 

What do you think?

Fourth, tonsils, and embracing change

Change. Have I mentioned I'm not a fan? I had a close friend when we lived in Washington who loved change. She embraced it with all her might. I remember once when we had a bishopric change, followed by what seemed like total reorganization of the ward, my friend's response was "Change is always good!" while my anxiety brain was busy imagining all the horrible "what ifs."

So you can pretty much guess my reaction when I received a call a couple months ago from the coordinator of my lovely Friday afternoon shift at the Jordan River Temple. "Hello my friend, I have to ask you a question, and I'm really hoping for a particular answer. Your address on file with the church says you live in Bluffdale. Is that right?"

"Yes!" I replied, which was not the answer she was hoping for. When I began working in the temple, we lived in Sandy, which is part of the Jordan River Temple district. A year and a half ago we moved to Bluffdale, which is in the Oquirrh Mountain district.

"Really? Because I was crossing my fingers you'd tell me Bluffdale was an old address, somewhere you used to live."

My dear friend Trina proceeded to tell me that I could not continue to serve in the Jordan Temple because I live outside its district, and I would be released the following day. I wouldn't even be allowed to come to my Friday shift one more time to say goodbye. 

Silence. 

Eeeek, this was hard for me. I didn't cry, but I was close. Blindsided, mostly. And so, so sad. Goodness, I loved my Jordan River Temple, my Friday afternoon shift, and all the people there. Sensing my distress, Trina instructed me as follows: "When we hang up, I want you to text your bishop immediately. Don't wait until tomorrow. Tell him what happened, and ask him to begin the process for you to become an ordinance worker at Oquirrh Mountain." That I did, and my wonderful bishop expedited that process, so I only missed one week of temple service. Thank you, Bishop Auna!

And now? Now I'm determined to be like Joanne and embrace change. I will adjust to this new temple, and I will love it! All will be well. Most importantly, I still get to serve in the temple.

On the heels of this big change came birthday season in our family, soooo many birthdays, and then the 4th of July. Right in the middle of that, Shulamith's daughter Kennedy needed to get her giant tonsils removed. The night before, Shulamith and I took her out shopping and for dinner.

Kennedy is actually intrigued by medical procedures, loves to get shots, and especially likes to go to the dentist, so she wasn't scared at all, but true to form, when the day came, she was entirely running the show. Because they knew it was her birthday weekend, the nurses who were with her just before surgery asked if they could sing "Happy Birthday" as the anesthetist put her to sleep. Now Kennedy is a bit of an introvert, much like her dad, and doesn't like to be the center of attention, especially around people she doesn't know.

"NOOOOOO!!" was her reply to the nurses, so they just said "goodnight" and she was out.

Her recovery has been relatively easy: lots of rest, low-key activities, and a diet of ice cream, yogurt, and eggs. Our Fourth celebration was also fairly low key; Mathew smoked pork all day, and it was so yummy! Matt should be a chef. For real. Recently, he baked Shulamith and me some sourdough bread, filled with white chocolate and pecans, just like they make at Harmon's only better because we got to eat it right out of the oven. Picture fresh, chewy sourdough bread, with white chocolate melting through it, together with crunchy pecans. Mmmmmmm. (Uh, total food digression right there. Sorry. Back to the Fourth.) We all enjoyed delicious pork tacos as we played a rousing game of "What Do You Meme?" and ended the evening watching the neighborhood kids light a few, smaller fireworks. Lighting fireworks is illegal in the zone where we live, so they couldn't do any big ones. Not one bit disappointed here. Those things scare the heck out of me, though I've never been able to win that battle with my three pyromanic sons.

July will end the birthday season in our family (hooray!), and we'll be good until October, which is of course, the very best month to have a birthday. 

Am I right, Jane?