Spring Break Part 1- The VERY Rough Start

As we all know, 2020 was kind of a bummer year for travel. It has been a good, long while since we have gone anywhere (even before the shut downs), and we wanted to take advantage of our school Spring Break and really enjoy a trip as a family.

Unfortunately, even our best laid plans started to unravel before we began our trip. Now…the funny thing about this situation is that Theo and I tried THREE times to have a couples weekend in the past year, and each time the weekend has been CRUSHED the day before by things completely outside of our control. Needless to say, I was optimistically hopeful that this vacation would still happen, but as we began to approach the Friday that we were to leave, things were not looking good.

First, we were going to visit family in the basic vicinity of where we were going. But that family started to not feel well and we decided to skip spending the weekend with them. Instead, we would stay home for a few more days. Then, our cat got sick. Not just sick. But we were pretty sure she was dying. It was very traumatic and we were so sad. We also weren’t about to leave a dying cat by herself while we went on vacation. So instead we made arrangements at the vet and took her in. They thankfully were able to help her and ruled out the most serious diagnosis. But they also gave us a nice, hefty bill to start off our vacation. HA!

We decided to delay our trip once again just to make sure that the cat had a good 48 hours of wellness before we left her.

That Friday both Theo and I were in a MOOD. We should have left that day for our first family vacation in nearly three years, but instead we were at home. With a sick cat. Have you ever seen those cartoon pictures where there is a dark cloud over the characters heads? Yeah, that was Theo and I that day. I don’t think we’ve ever simultaneously had such bad moods. It was almost comical how grumpy we both were.

That night, Ezra woke up with a fever and breathing difficulties. It was a very mild fever and we weren’t even sure if it was a fever or just being a little too hot in the night. But the breathing difficulties came out of NOWHERE. He was up all night and therefore so was I. In the morning, he seemed ok, so we wanted to make a better day of Saturday than we had Friday (honestly, we had basically poured Friday down the toilet. It was bad).

It was a beautiful day, so we saddled up for our favorite bike ride- to the downtown Dayton river area and back home. It’s at least a 12 mile round trip, but we have done it before, so we didn’t even think twice about it. We figured that since Ezra was just riding, he would be fine, and the fresh air would do him some good.

We returned home for Ezra’s nap while keeping an eye on his breathing difficulties. We had won free tickets to a drive in movie and wanted to go do that as a family. We pulled in, got all settled, waited in line for the concession stand, and got ready to watch the Lego movie!

Unfortunately, Ezra was just not doing well. We waffled between staying and leaving, but his breathing kept getting worse and finally got to the point that we knew we needed to get him home immediately for a breathing treatment. Anyone with asthma knows that it can go from just fine to NOT FINE AT ALL in minutes. Needless to say, I about died from embarrassment as we had to pull out of the front row of the drive-in 25 minutes into the movie. I literally hid under my seat as we were leaving so no one could see me. HAHAHA. I was mortified.

The next day we were supposed to leave for out vacation (the postponed departure, btw). We waffled back and forth all night long about leaving. Ezra was sick, but we had paid for the nights at the Airbnb and it was too late to get a refund.

In the morning, we decided to take Ezra in to an urgent care. We weren’t about to travel if he had flu or covid, but if he was cleared from those things, we felt more comfortable about travel, but assumed we would have to lay low at the cabin for most of the vacation. Poor kid had his brain tickled by the swabs but thankfully was both flu and covid negative, so we decided to go ahead and hit the road!

We left right around lunch time, which meant we were going to get some fast food right as we left. And what restaurant did we pick? Chick-fil-a, of course! But I’m guessing you can see where this story is going…..

IT WAS A SUNDAY.