My last 4th of July

4 years ago today, I was certain it was going to be my last 4^th of July. My last holiday, period. I wanted it to be amazing, 4^th of July is like my families Christmas after all. So my brother and I made a trip to Wyoming to buy fireworks to make it AWESOME. I remember the day, it was the day Michael Jackson died. Goodness the drive was horrible because they played all the crappy MJ songs and none of the good ones I knew! And we had no CDs! It was a good day though, I was slowly ticking off things on my bucket list. No one really knew what I was doing. I never let anyone know I was going to die.

Everyone felt HORRIBLE about surgery being done at Primary Children's. Everyone, my mom had a bad feeling, my grandpa. On the 4th of July even my best friend knew something wasn't right. She called my crying telling me "You can't die on me!" It tore me apart that this was hurting everyone so much. I even wrote goodbye letters and hid them under my computer keyboard so they would be found when they packed up my stuff.

So, we did a big 4th of July, bottle rocket wars and all. It was so much fun. I didn't really participate in the war because I couldn't run. I was in heart failure, and my heart was dilated and up against my breast bone. I was in so much pain and so tired. But I had fun. It lasted well into the night. The next morning we got up early and headed to Utah.

One of my bucket list items was making a road trip with my brother. Utah wasn't a big road trip like I really wanted, BUT, it was a road trip. I couldn't do any other kind, I was to sick. So on the 5th of July we headed to SLC, we stopped at Lagoon on the way. Spending the day with my brother was awesome. Riding rides was awesome. I didn't last very long, we only stayed a couple of hours, but it was worth it.

Things happened, surgery was changed, want to know how? Read here and here

After surgery was changed, I felt so much better. I met with the new surgeon and I just knew, I would be okay.

My brother worked so hard to make my "last" 4th of July  an amazing one. I'm so happy I won my disability case and got paid so I could make this 4th of July and amazing one for him. I couldn't do a lot, but I was able to do some.

I'm so grateful for my life and family. I'm such a blessed person.
I'm glad I have many more 4ths to come.