a friends perspective

      My friend Amanda sent me something she wrote.  She said it was on her mind and she felt she needed to write it down.  She sent it to me to use however I saw fit.  I thought it would be a nice guest blog.  I don't think about how others are viewing me and this situation.  My family and I consider this our new normal.

            I have known Holly Lounder for 12 years.  Our families both started going to Family Bible Church around the same time, and we both had little girls in the nursery.  Our girls became fast friends, and since they spent a lot of time together when they were little, so did we parents.  Over the years of church functions, birthday parties, and general get-togethers, we all became friends.

            We really got to know both Scott and Holly much better after they opened their karate school and we signed our daughter up for classes.  Sure, around that same time, we worked together as Sunday School teachers for the middle schoolers, but Holly’s migraines kept her out of commission most weeks.  As Sherri got more involved in tae kwon do, she got her dad to start as well.  During this time, I would help out by taking the three Lounder children out of the studio a few hours every week, since they were all “stuck” there 4-5 hours a day, 4-5 days a week.  As the kids grew, and I started training as well, both my husband and I started helping out more with the TKD school stuff.  There were times when Holly couldn’t teach because her headaches were too bad, or she was too tired.  Then there was always the illness or injury that happened when she was about ready to do her next test.  Something always seemed to slow down her achievements more than she liked.

            Even still, the one thing that stands out to me is how much on the go Holly always was.  Besides running the school, very often she was holding down a job of her own or homeschooling her children.  There were tournaments every other month, or so it seemed.  She would travel for training with her instructor.  She was always trying to make it to the after school activities that her kids participated in.  There were the extra events for the TKD school, such as parties, sleepovers, or Kidz’n’Power training at least once a month.  And even when she was sitting, she was doing paperwork for the TKD school.  Sometimes, she had so much stuff to do, she’d task some of it to me - the joke being that I was her brain.

            The Lounders have reached out to the community through their TKD school.  Most years they can be seen demonstrating their skills in the Ellsworth Christmas parade.  Some years, they “show off” at Relay for Life or Autumn Gold Days.  They have started a yearly recital that supports a different local cause each year.  They teach kids not to be victims.  They have focused on bully prevention.  Each demonstration shows several different scenarios where the small person has to get away from a bigger “bad guy.”  They have helped improve the confidence, self-esteem, and self-control in many kids (and adults) in the area.

            I stopped training in TKD about 2 years ago now.  And because of how busy life gets, I lost touch with Holly.  Sure, I’d scroll through Facebook and see her posts, comment on them sometimes.  We’d chat occasionally, always planning on getting together sometime soon.  But, again, life gets busy.  Then I find out she’s been sick - sick enough that she’s spent a few days in the hospital.  No one knows what’s wrong with her, and they send her home, unable to work because of how sick she is. 

            That’s when I decide that I’m going to help out whenever and however I can.  It turns out that one visit a week is what is working right now.  In the beginning, we were doing paperwork, testing invitations, searching for papers....  I could tell that Holly wasn’t up to par, her usual self.  And what really was frustrating for me those first few weeks was that I knew how upsetting it was for her not to be able to do anything.  In the beginning, she did make it downstairs; but I could tell, coming back up after the little work we did down there wore her out.  Sometimes we just sit and visit together.  A few visits, talking would trigger “tyrannosaurus arms.”  Some visits, she tells me she has slept all day, only waking up because I was coming over and she had something to look forward to.  She recently started her new treatment, and that has taken an obvious toll on her.  Working on paperwork is taxing enough that it almost starts seizures.  Watching tv, it’s sometimes hard for her to follow what is going on.  By the end of my visits I can tell she’s ready to go back to sleep again.

            I don’t really know the purpose of writing this all down.  Holly’s been keeping her own blog of what’s going on, and that’s from her point of view.  I’m an outsider who has a different point of view, and really hasn’t been around all that much.  But I can see there’s something wrong with what’s going on with her.  She finally got a diagnosis of Lyme about a month ago.  With treatment, things seem to be going downhill right now.  It is so frustrating to see someone so sick, with the doctors in the area not able to help, and insurance not recognizing she really has a problem.  No treatment is covered, everything is out of pocket.