adrenaline

so my day didn't go as planned today.

this is what i wanted to do:

1. go to the grocery store

2. take gma to lunch

3. pick up dry-cleaning

4. visit "crazy aunt Darleen" at the rehab center

5. figure out all the crazy admin stuff to get ready to take her home tomorrow so that i'm finally free

6. go home and catch the end of the BYU vs Wofford basketball game

7. fix dinner for gram and gramps

8. curl up in my room and finish the fifth and final book of Fablehaven (fantastic, by the way... highly recommended. five KaRynn stars).

it would have been a fantastically uneventful, rather stress-free day.

but, NO.

here's what happened.

1. slept through my alarm. (not such a bad thing considering i didn't have a busy day, but i mean i slept. man oh man. i didn't wake up until 10:30am--that rarely happens to me anymore).

2. hence, i didn't make it to the grocery store. (no matter, i can go after visiting Darleen, right?)

3. was ready to go visit Darleen after lunch (which we had at home) and ended up waiting for Grandma to get back from her walk around the neighborhood.

4. visited Darleen and found out she's staying. which is good. for her. but that also means.... i'm not free. at least not for another month or so...

5. came home to a full-on adrenaline rush. my grandpa called me over to ask me to look at his eye because it was watering like crazy and buggin' the heck out of him. so i walk over to him and look at his eye. it's not swollen or red, but his eye is tearing up. then i take a step back to look at his face and notice that the left side of his face doesn't look quite right. so i asked him to smile. and sure enough--the left side of his face is paralyzed.

first thought? bells palsy. and then the alarms go off in my brain. and the adrenaline starts pumping. because my next though? stroke. so i said, "ok. i'm calling your doctor, but we're getting in the car to go to the ER." his doctor verified that immediately. but i had to fight both grandparents to get him to go. he kept saying things like, "oh no. it's nothing like that. i'd know it if i'd had a stroke." and "oh no. dr. nagata just wants to make money off of me." and "oh no. they'll keep me there for 3 days and it's going to be nothing." and i kept stressing that it could be a stroke. finally, i said, "i don't care what you think. i'm driving you. we're leaving right now."

don't worry. he didn't have a stroke. it really was bells palsy. but we didn't know that until after waiting 2 hours in the ER...

i cannot tell you how scared i was when i thought he was having a stroke. besides being scared, i was frustrated at both my grandparents lack of interest. although on the bright side, my grandma didn't think it was serious, so she was calm throughout the entire crisis. i definitely count my blessings. i seriously was barely holding myself together. and i think that if my grandma had started to panic, i would have burst into tears. the Lord is awesome. He definitely knows how much stress i can take. it's amazing to see how well He balances the stresses in my life. when i was totally stressed about my great aunt Darleen-- becoming basically the representative of the family and responsible for her-- the Lord broke my grandparent's car and made my grandma forget about her desire to renew her license (at least for a little while). when my grandpa appears to have had a stroke, i've just found out that i won't have to be constantly worrying about my great aunt 24/7 for the next few weeks because she would have been living alone and barely being able to take care of herself. and when i find out that it's just bells palsy, i can now focus on the other major stresses in my life pertaining to my grandmother's illnesses.

as you can see... i'm busy.

but despite the major stresses in my life, i always have things to look forward to:

1. march madness (which officially started today--also St. Patrick's Day--didn't wear green, by the way). 

2. there's a ward party on saturday at FHB's house to watch some basketball games and have a BBQ. excited. might even ask FHB out on a date to go to Disneyland (still need to find some courage. i know it's hiding somewhere in my body).

3. Disneyland next week. it's the happiest place on earth. how can it not make me smile?

4. trip to Utah in April. please please PLEEEEASE let this happen. I don't want anything to stop it from happening. I'm planning to leave April 1st. And I will stay until April 9th, at which point i'm driving back to LA-- with JBaum, Mac-attack and Sandi. it will be the best.roadtrip.ever.

5. week in LA with JBaum, Mac-attack, Sandi and Melissa. the only thing that would make it better would be JSchro ditching her second-to-last week of law school (this semester) to play with us too.

but even though my day didn't go as planned, and i missed the BYU vs Wofford game, my adrenaline rush was cleansing.