My Story: Part 6

This episode holds both the weight of survival and the beauty of breakthrough as I step into Part 6 of my story and share the health battle that quietly ran beneath so many years of my life. What looked like anxiety and scattered symptoms was actually something much deeper, and it led me through years of fear, doctor visits, painful treatments, and moments where I truly did not know what would happen next.

In this episode, I walk through my long journey with chronic iron deficiency, the terrifying reactions to treatments that were meant to help me, and the emotional toll of living in a body that felt unpredictable and unsafe. 

But woven into that struggle is also a powerful story of healing, faith, and what I can only describe as a miracle. I share the deeply personal moments happening within my family during this time, from Austin’s adoption and the beauty of becoming a family, to the heartbreak of loss when relationships could not be sustained.

This is a story about endurance, about learning that you cannot force change in others, and about what it means to keep choosing love and faith even when life feels uncertain. If you have ever carried something heavy in silence while still showing up for everyone around you, I hope this episode reminds you that healing can happen, that freedom is still available to you, and that your story is not over yet.

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Transcript

Welcome And Story Part Six

Heather 0:02

Hello friends and welcome back to the Free Advantage. I'm your host, Heather Davis, and I want to invite you into a new season of real stories, real recovery, and real freedom. This show has always been about self-discovery, authenticity, and recovering a life of freedom. And this year, we are taking that journey together in a deeper way. You're gonna hear raw, honest conversations with people walking this path in real time. Stories of growth, healing, purpose, and becoming whole. You'll also hear from me as I reflect on these themes that rise from the stories, answer your questions, and offer small, meaningful takeaways that you can carry back into your week. This is not just a podcast you listen to. It's a place you belong where you are part of the conversation. And we are back, friends. I just wanted to take a moment and thank all of you who have been watching over these past few weeks, who have been listening, sharing, commenting, and liking, and giving me your time and listening in on my story. If you are just joining in, I have been over the past few weeks sharing my own personal life story with everyone. Um this process has been truly transformational for me in a lot of ways. It has brought me a lot of healing, it has opened up um some awareness around some things that I still need to work on, and it has allowed me to be able to share with you guys. So everybody who's here, please pull up a seat, grab something to drink, and join me as I move into part six of my story. Um as I get started, I there were some things after I listened back to last last week's episode, there um were a few things that I wanted to go over. I know I've been I started sharing about mine and Sean's life, and and you know, my story became our story, but there are still a lot of things personally for me that I was dealing with during this time that I we didn't talk about last week and I wanted to bring up this week. But if you had listened back, um you know that I had been sick and I had caught parvovirus when I was pregnant with my second son, and then I caught it again right before I met Sean. And I had been very ill that second time. It sent me into an aplastic anemia crisis, and it took me a long time to recover. Excuse me, and I literally had just gotten better right when I met Sean. Literally, I had been suffering for the past like two months right before we met. And while I was feeling a lot better, my body during that time was still suffering from from the loss of blood and from the virus that I had, and I didn't really know it. And through that whole first year of our marriage, um, you know, we went through a big move and um all of those things were happening, and though life was going on, I was still suffering from some weird things that had started happening. I um was having a lot of trouble breathing, I had a lot of gut issues, um, you know, I was super foggy headed and was struggling with weird sensations in my head and my had really bad heart palpitations, anxiety was starting to flare up again. So I ended up going to all of these doctors during that time. I mean, I saw them all. It was endocrinologists, uh, cardiologists, pulmonologists, gastroentrinologists, I saw a neurologist. I I literally saw all of the allogists out there, and all but like one. And so I really wasn't being able to find an answer. Everybody was like, yeah, we can kind of see that some of these things were happening, but there's real they can find no real cause for it to happen. And of course, as it is in uh, you know, in healthcare, sometimes like you they don't really know what's wrong, and so they kind of send you on your way. And I had um scheduled another appointment with my primary care at the time because I mean I'm still just searching for answers and trying to figure out what's going on. My anxiety's getting a little worse, and I it's enough that I'm thinking I might need something um for that. And I went in and he he prescribed me something for like panic attacks. It was just something that I could take momentarily in the moment, um, but which you know, which is funny because I'm not big on taking medicine of any sort because I don't like things making me feel weird. Um, but also he had decided to do another blood panel. And during this visit, when he got the results back, he was like, I really want to go ahead and send you to another specialist. And I'm thinking, I've seen them all, like who could really be left? And he wanted to send me to an oncologist, hematologist. And I, you know, when I had gotten sick back in Texas before, I definitely recognized the term oncologist, you know, and those are the doctors they use for cancer. And I was like, Oh, am I really here again? And um, you know, I told him I've I've already seen a oncologist before, you know, I they ruled out cancer, and he's like, Well, I'm not really exactly sure what's going on, but your blood is really low. And so that's why, you know, he also sent me to the hematologist. And most hematologists are also oncologists. It's something I learned along the way. And um, so I said, Okay, and I went and I'd scheduled my appointment for them, and I went and saw her, and they'd ran a bunch of tests, and Sean and I had just moved out of my brother's house during this time into our own home, and I ended up going and getting my test results, happened to be on my birthday that year. And I when I went in, she sat me down and she's like, Okay, so here's here's basically the deal. And I was grateful again that they did not find it wasn't cancer, but I was having really low like blood, but they came back and I had a really low iron. And so I was like, Okay, so I'm just iron deficient. And she's like, Well, it's a little bit more than iron deficiency. She goes, you know, iron, you have iron, you know, that works in your body, our working iron, and then you have what they call iron stores, which is where the body stores up the iron, so when it runs out of the working iron, it has something to pull from. And these stores are called ferritin. And usually you can have numbers like ranging from the hunt in the hundreds, but for me, my number was four. So that was a little concerning because that meant I had practically zero iron in my body. And she said this was a huge cause of why I was suffering from all of the other things. She's like, basically, your systems are really starting to suffer because there's no iron in your body and now you're losing blood. So she recommended for me that I have an iron infusion immediately. Like she wanted to keep me the same day, and I was like, ugh, you know. I really, after she kind of like explained what it was, and I said, I'm gonna need some time to go home and do some research and talk to my husband. So that's what I did. And um the the kind of iron that they were giving me was called iron dextrose, and this is actually a pretty dangerous iron for you to take. And uh later on I learned is kind of banned in every other country but America, but it is um for how bad I was, she said was the was the best thing to do for me at the time. And um, she, you know, she's like, hopefully you'll tolerate it well. But when you start researching and they tell you and then they send waivers home for you to sign, is that basically you could die or have anaphylactic reaction? And so I'm thinking, okay, so the risks are death, anaphylactic shock, you know, or you know, you'll be fine. And I really dealing with a lot of anxiety was just not about that. I was terrified. I didn't want to have anything to do with it, and I really didn't have any other options either. And I came home and you know, Sean, he was he was so good with me during that time, which is you know, we're we're newly married, um, you know, coming up a little bit against a health crisis again for myself that I'm scared and and then seeing that like it's not going away. Like I've had this issue once, it was really bad, and you know, less than a year later I'm dealing with it again and trying to figure out what is going on. You know, they tested me for parvo again, and I I did not test positive this time, but I eventually learned that a parvo kind of can stay chronically in your system. And basically eventually what it did was it really harmed the way that my body produces blood and the way that it absorbs iron. And so I struggled from that point on for years with this on and off, and it became such a thing in my life, and it was really difficult. So when we took the first iron infusion, which I did, it was about a week later before everybody convinced me, like there's no choice, you have to do it, or you're you could die, like you you could have a serious complication from this, and so you know, obviously the um the uh you know the reward was greater than the risk, I guess. And um, I remember going in and that was a little bit of a surreal moment because when um they they scheduled you to go in for your iron infusions, you go into the chemo center and you're in there with all of the patients having chemo and having blood transfusions. And I remember the the medicine that they were giving me, the iron they were giving me, you had to be heavily pre-medicated with all of these drugs um to try to keep you from having an allergic reaction to it. So, you know, that wasn't very comforting. But looking around and talking with some of the people that I was sitting next to in this space, realizing, oh, you know, they're in here because their life is at risk. And in what I at that moment for me felt like so much greater than where I was at. And I was grateful that I had the opportunity to get the iron and that it would help, you know. So the infusion was about eight hours long, and I remember after we were all done just trying to walk to the car. I mean, my body was wiped out. Um, immediately I started feeling the effects of the iron. I, you know, it's kind of funny because it's iron, it's um, but I my whole body felt so heavy from it. Um, it started immediately affecting my joints and my muscles, because that's what iron does. It can attack your joints. And and and I was exhausted. And I went home, you know, they put me in the bed and I rested for about two solid weeks before I could really get up and be a part of the world again. Um, I suffered from a lot of pain right afterwards because of it, and it just took me a while. But I mean, I remember looking back at pictures of me on my birthday that year, I was just white as a ghost. I was pale, I was super thin, it was underweight, and you could just see it in my eyes. And I learned over the years that when iron started becoming an issue, there's a look that I get to my eyes, and I'm like, mmm, I I always know that that's a a precursor to like something, something is shifted and I need to go get checked again. And um, but you know, within like four or five days, I went from that to looking like a noompa loompa. My whole body was orange. I, you know, absorbed that iron to my skin until like it could flush out all the extra. But after like two weeks, I just woke up one day and I got up and was like, I'm gonna clean the house. And my mom was warning me, she's like, be careful, don't overdo it. But I was like, Oh, there's nothing to overdo. I'm I felt great. I literally was a new human being. I before I was struggling with energy at all and not being able to like, I would be really tired all the time, wouldn't be able to really function a lot throughout the day and having all these pains and issues and and these struggles and having a lot of brain fog. And then I just woke up and I felt like a million bucks. And I was like, wow, this was incredible. This was amazing. I went back, had my levels checked, everything was going great. And and I was like, great, I'm home free, then you know, we're all good. And that lasted for about three years. And I constantly go back once a year and get checked just to make sure that my levels are doing good. But on that third year in 2015, I had went back and I realized at the time I had no thought that it could be not good. I mean, I've been back every time so far and everything has been great. But I went back this time, and when I got the news about my levels having dropped again, it really devastated me. I, I mean, it I was not prepared. It I remember just going and sitting in my bedroom uh up against the bed on the floor, just crying because I was like, how is this happening to me again? And knowing what I have to do. And at that point is when Sean's sister had moved in with us, and I'm dealing with her and her children and all the people in our home, and I'm like, I don't, I don't have time for this. Like, this is this is gonna debilitate me, and I don't know for how long. You know, last time it was two weeks, but you know, I don't know, like, why isn't it working and why is it continuing to go down? But I had literally not even just lost all some of it, I lost all of it again. It was just like I was fine, and then everything I had just dumped out, and I was back, and my numbers then were like a nine. So I'm like, okay, it's starting all over again. And but you know, there was no choice again. So I we made my appointment. I went back. We went through the whole iron infusion again, but this time I woke up the next morning thinking, okay, you know, I knew what to expect from the last time. There was some joint pain and some things like that, but this time I woke up and I could not move. My body hurt so bad. My joints felt like they were like swollen a hundred times their size. They weren't, but they felt like it, and my whole body was in pain and I did not know what to do. And we ended up having to be rushed back up to their center, and then they spent the whole day hooking me up to IVs trying to flush as much of the iron out of my system as they could because I was having a reaction to it. And I remember being so scared because, you know, they tell you all the things, like I said, there, you know, the the risks of it, and I didn't even know what that meant. But, you know, come to find out, it meant that I could not have that iron anymore. I would have to, if I had to have an infusion again, I would have to move to a separate iron. I couldn't continue to take the iron I had because I had already had a reaction to it. Um, they flushed as much of it out as my system as they could. And the rest, it was basically, you know, they put me on Benadryl and sent me home with pain medication because I was in so much pain. And it took uh, it took again a couple of weeks to get back on my feet to where I could get up and move around the house. But it literally took me almost an entire year to fully recover from the reaction to that iron infusion. I suffered greatly with my joints. It was kind of like once you're down, you're down. And then if I have to get back up to stand up, it was excruciating and it would take me a long time to move, I would be moving slowly and things like that. So it was just I wasn't right for a while. And, you know, what do you do? You know, that I luckily I had my body had been flooded with so much iron, you know, they can only flush so much out of your veins at the time after it's been uh almost 24 hours. So I absorbed enough for me to be well for a while, and you know, you just kind of hope for the best. And you know, I I I was so worried about when was that next time coming that I wasn't gonna be okay. Like I continued to have to go back and get checked every year, and from that point forward, um, you know, because I took the iron dextrose, they tend to last a lot longer. So I literally I went back, you know, I'll go back every year and get checked, and then I went back in 2016 at the end of the year to get checked. And that's when they informed me again that I would need an yet another infusion. You know, it just kind of became this thing over the period of my life where, you know, this is just a chronic situation that I was dealing with. I knew that it stemmed from the virus that I had caught a long time ago, and um, you know, there was not a lot anybody could really do about it. And there was no really fixing it, but just kind of maintaining um, you know, my my levels as much as and best as they could. I remember when I went back and got checked, and at the end of 2016, I was I I we were trying to figure out what we were gonna do because I could not continue on with the same iron. I switched hematologists and found a new doctor. Um they had they had told me that they wanted to give me something that they call um iron venefer this time, that it's a lot easier on the body. They can even give it to pregnant women, you know, making me trying to make me feel really comfortable about it, yet I still wasn't. I mean, I'm like the last time it devastated my life, what felt like almost a year. So I was very, very leery of it for sure. But we made arrangements to do this um at the beginning of February. I wanted to get through the Christmas holiday and get through New Year's, and I wanted to just wait a couple of months so I could kind of wrap my head around it. And they said, okay. And in the meantime, she was giving me, I was taking iron supplements, and I have taken iron supplements before orally. They're just, they're not, they don't, one, they don't work, and they're not good and they're not easy on on my body. But, you know, nothing I was taking was really working. I started doing a lot of um research and things, so I started taking this liquid iron that I found. Um, you know, if anybody is interested in it, it's called Floridex. I took it um for a long time. It's you drink it, and it's it is not pleasant to drink, to be honest. But um before I could get my infusions, that's what I took. And those are the things that I would take on the in-betweens after this. And um, you know, I when we went in for my next round, it was right before his sister was actually moving out um on her own. And we uh we went in and these infusions were a lot different. So instead of having like one long infusion for eight hours, I was gonna have five over a period of two weeks. So basically every other day or so um for the next two weeks, however they have it set up in their scheduling, is I went in and I got an infusion for about two hours. And um, you know, this was hard because I'm having to get stuck every other every time I go in. I'm, you know, I'm having to go through this whole process and wondering after every little infusion, is this gonna be the next thing that makes me sick or I'm having a lot of problems? And I was very happy to learn that this time the infusion went really well. I recovered well, I recovered quickly, I didn't get sick, I wasn't having a lot of pain, I had some joint pain, but it was nothing that I couldn't handle. It wasn't unbearable, and I would be tired, and then I would get up and be able to move about my life, and I was very, very grateful. But the caveat to that was that these won't last as long as the other iron. So I was going in every three months getting checked at this point, and that continued on, and I was literally at that point after that, I was getting iron infusions once a year. Once a year, and um they became something that you know you'd think you'd get used to certain things, but uh, you know, I've had it at that point I'd started having problems. I'd been having them for years at that point, but as time went on, um, it didn't get easier for me. The error every time that I learned I needed another infusion, it got harder and harder. And all the way up until my very last infusion. And that actually happened in 2021. Um, I went in in December, my iron was dropping and it wasn't super low, so she didn't want to give me like the full five. Um, thank God that didn't happen at the time. Um, but she wanted to give me like a little bit more than like almost like maybe a bag and a half, two bags, something like that. And so we had gone in and this was right before Christmas time. And I was like, okay, it's not that big of a deal, it's not that much, we'll be fine. But they gave me the bag. I was there for about two and a half, three hours. We left and we probably had about a 30-minute drive home from where we were. And by the time I got to the house, I couldn't move. I couldn't move my body at all. I started feeling very, very, very strange. I could not move my body. Um, I started getting this weird rash on me, and I was in excruciating pain. Like I remember sitting in the car because I was so tired after the infusion, and I remember when he woke me up and he's like, We're home. I went to go move my hands and I couldn't. And I started freaking out. He immediately just turned around and we went straight back to the hospital. Now, this was after COVID. This had happened after COVID. So they were still not letting people in the hospital. So when we got to the emergency room, he wasn't allowed to go in with me. So I was terrified yet again. And I went in by myself and they were immediately putting me up. They put me on all these kinds of medications because I was having yet again another reaction to this iron. And, you know, luckily I was okay. Um this did not take me a whole year to recover from, thankfully. But it did um, it did take a couple of months. It did take a couple of months, and um, you know, I still was dealing with the issue that my my iron was really low, and this bag really didn't do much, much to help. So I was when I went back to my hematologist a couple of days later after to follow up with what happened, you know, I think this is for me what is so sad about our, you know, the state of our medical care in this country, because when I went in, she she was like, Well, you've had a reaction to this iron. And she goes, There's really not much else I can give you. Um, and she goes, but I can't give you any more infusions. You know, she told me that because I had had two separate types of iron and I've had really bad reactions to them already, that it was extremely dangerous for me to continue getting infusions and that I could not do it, and she would not give them to me. And that the best course of action for me was to find whatever I could take over the counter and basically hope for the best. And she released me from her care. And, you know, she no longer wanted to be my doctor, which is crazy to me because I'm like, this is your job. I pay you to do this. But at this point for her, I had become a liability, and she literally sent me walking. And I was, I mean, honestly, I was freaking out. One, I didn't even know a doctor could do that. And two, what am I gonna do? I can't take iron infusions anymore. Nothing that I can take over the counter works. I I have been even in between these other infusions throughout the years, I've been taking this liquid iron and it's doing its best. Like it works enough to keep the working iron in my body every day going, but it's not enough that my body will actually build the stores from it. And we really didn't know what was going on. We didn't know why my body could not store the iron from the things that I was taking unless it had an infusion. And really, it was only basically the infusions were flooding my body until it all ran out, and then that was it. It really wasn't storing it then and not doing it continually. So, you know, I went on, Sean and I both went on this mission to kind of figure out like why and what we were gonna do. And we were praying, and Sean had been praying relentlessly, you know, for God to heal me and or to show or just show us what was going on. And um, you know, I found this one doctor through my chiropractor, and I went and saw her, and she is um, but she calls herself kind of like a blood detective where she um takes a lot of labs and she can kind of see what really is going on underneath the surface from what people see, even when your levels can sometimes be normal. But when I came in and I told her, you know, my story about my iron stuff, and then she, you know, read all my blood work. She was like, okay. And she's like, I have something for you. So she had the supplement that she wanted me to take, and I'm thinking, oh my gosh, like again, like I've had I've taken them. They don't work. And she was like swearing to me. She's like, I s like, please take it. She's like, this stuff is like a miracle. She's like, I have helped so many women who have had so many iron or blood issues. She's like, please take this. And it she was, I swear to you, it's going to work. And I honestly I didn't believe her. I I didn't. I she sent me home. She was telling me exactly how many to take. She's like, take four pills a day for three months. And then after three months, you know, I want you to come back and get checked, and then you can take two pills a day after that for maintenance. And and I was just like, okay, you know, I know I spent a lot of money to go see her, but I went home and was just like, I didn't do it. I didn't take them, to be honest, at all. I ended up just continuing taking my liquid iron and hoping for the best. And I wasn't doing really well because I already knew my iron was really low. And that was at the end of 21. And I didn't see her until like, I think it was like February or the beginning of March of 2022. And so I already knew that I was gonna have to do something soon or figure out something, but that whole process became a whole other thing because we ended up having a big move. So I I kind of just put it on the back burner. But my whole life I've been dealing with these infusions and these iron issues and these underlying health problems, all because of it and not understanding or knowing why really. I mean, I knew the virus had caused this, but there's no really cure anything they could do for it. And we had actually moved to Florida, and when we did, and I know that if you've been listening in, you know that we were living in Florida for a while. Um, but when I got there, I didn't healthcare's a little different in Florida than it is everywhere else. This, the kind of the way that they do things there is a little bit different. And so getting a doctor is not easy, and you have to wait a really long time to see somebody. And I was getting a little concerned because I know what it means if I lose all of my iron. Like there's not gonna be a hope to just like take some vitamins and it's just gonna be okay. And so because I was waiting to get into somebody to get some blood work done, um, I started taking the iron pills that she gave me. I was like, well, I mean, I gotta do something. And so I took them. And I was like, I was really leery about taking four. To me, that just felt like a lot. I mean, I don't know why it did, but it just for me felt like a lot. So I was like, I'm only gonna take two a day and we'll just see what happens. And and I already already known what my blood levels were before. So, you know, I took those for three months. I took two a day for three months before I got in and I got my um blood work done with the doctor. And when my blood work came back, I I still have that blood work and I keep it out. I used at the time, I used to keep it on my refrigerator until we moved here to Texas, and now I just keep it up on my bulletin board. But I keep up those those test results because it was I remember when I got them, I just kept staring at them and thinking, this can't be right. But I remember just sitting in my car crying, and I called Sean, and of course I'm always called Sean after every iron um blood work that I had done, and I was always crying because it was always just bad news. And he, as soon as he answered the phone, he's like, baby, I'm he's like, it's gonna be okay. Like he was already expecting it, and I was like, No, like you don't understand. This is the first time in like 15 years that my body has stored iron on its own. I was in pure shock. My ferritin levels outside of having an iron infusion have never been above a nine on their own ever. You know, even with the lighter infusions that I were taking, my my ferritin stores would only be like a 30, maybe a 50 was the most that it had ever been. And this time I'm taking two pills, just these two supplement pills that I swallow every morning. And for the first time, my body has taken those supplements and has learned how to store the iron on its own. And my stores were at a 25. Now, for me, this was huge. Huge. And for all intents and purposes for everybody else, that would still be pretty low. But for me, it was giant. This was like, I mean, I'm living healthily and well on 25 stores of iron. Like it was, it was just wild. And from that point forward, I kept getting um getting tested, and it was literally by the grace of God, miraculously, he I know that he touched my body because I have it's never happened, and I have never had a problem since. I have not ever needed another infusion. Um, every time I had gotten checked, up until the past two years, where I haven't been checked at all. I have never had an issue. In fact, I my numbers actually have gone up to like 26 or 27. Um, and but I've never I've not been anemic since 2021 anymore. I have not had low iron anymore, and all of my levels have just been normalized. Like, yes, it's a miracle, even in my body, but the, you know, it was such a miracle to find something that would help and do this kind of work in my body. And I take them religiously. I take two a day, every day, and I have ever since um, you know, 2022. Um, you know, and if there's anybody out there that ever suffered from iron deficiency or suffers from iron deficiency anemia, um, you know, I will put up the the stuff that I take just so you know, because I want anybody who suffers from this who can't find anything that helps them to know that there is help out there, that there are things that you can take. And um, they're a plant-based, plant-based uh supplement called Ferro Food by standard process. And it is uh an amazing, an amazing company, and it's an amazing thing to take. And it has just really it's changed and shifted my life. And I don't live in fear every day of being sick and having to go to the hospital and take infusions and wonder what is gonna happen if I didn't have these pills. So, you know, outside of the life that I was living, you know, and the stories that you are hearing, like this is this huge underlying uh thing that I've been dealing with on top of all of the other stuff that had been going on. And truthfully, looking back and knowing I've really been dealing with this underlying issue since 20, well, honestly, not 20, since the year 2000 is when I had my middle son and when I really caught Parvo the first time. And so it was kind of always this underlying issue where I suffered from anemia a little bit, and as I went on until I caught it the second time, you know. My goal now is to never try to never catch Parvo again and um and to just keep on with my iron maintenance, you know, and also you know, wanting to be well, not just for myself, but you know, I was taking care of so many people in our home and you know, to be well for my husband and our family and and our my children, you know, and also during this whole time that all of these things that you heard last week that are going on, you know, Austin's growing up. He's living with us, he's in the home with us, you know. Andrew, you know, lives with his dad and he does come back and forth for his visits and stuff, but Austin is living there and he is a part of all of this. He has been with me from the beginning of my life and the beginning of this crazy story that is my life, and he has seen it all. He has seen it all, and during all this time, he's growing up, he's becoming his own own little man during this time. He's in high school, but I I would definitely say that once we moved Sean's sister in, that there really a toll started to like he really a toll just it was just taken on Austin. It you know, we're the focus you can only focus on so much, right, at one time. So we have all these people living in the home, we're taking care of them, and you know, we don't have as much focus and time and energy for just him, had it just been him alone. And so it it it definitely took its toll. Austin struggled a lot in school. It wasn't easy for him. He suffered really bad with dyslexia. Um, we did the best that we could. I mean, he had we had so many meetings at the school. We struggled with teachers that were not doing well. We went to online learning, we went to homeschooling, and eventually um wanting to put him back in school because just I want him to have the education that he needs. And this all happened between like his sophomore and junior year. And uh once he got in back in school in his junior year, he did really well. It's it's where he met Anna, you know, our our daughter that we adopted. Um it's it's where he started really to figure out that it school just really wasn't for him. And mind you, so Austin had, when he was young, he had gotten really sick during his uh kindergarten year. He'd missed a lot of school. So we ended up having to repeat kindergarten. So he's a little bit older. And when we had taken him out of school to do online learning, and then he did some homeschooling. When he went back, because Austin really suffered educationally, when he tested, they wanted to hold him back again and put him in in uh sophomore year when he should have been a junior. And so when it came to that, he spent about a year there before he was in his mind, he was just over it. And by this time, Austin is turning, he's fixing to turn 18. And he as soon as he turned 18, he dropped out. And this was devastating to me. I I didn't know what that meant for him to not finish high school. I myself had not finished high school and had to get my GED. So I I knew what that meant for me, and I didn't want that for him, but you know, he was an adult and there was really no stopping it. I I couldn't stop it. But, you know, he decided he was gonna quit and he was gonna go to work, and he did. He worked honestly, he worked three jobs. He worked really hard, he's a very hard worker, but we were constantly worried about, you know, what where his life was gonna go, if he was gonna finish his education and trying to help maybe if we could get him it somewhere else to, or an alternative way for him to be able to get his um high school diploma, but it just was not something he was interested in. And, you know, and it feels you can feel your children as they grow, you can feel them pull away in a lot of ways because, you know, he's becoming an adult and he's not a kid anymore. But also during this time, whilst we're going through all of that, you know, him and Sean had become closer and closer as father and son. And Austin, Austin had loved Sean obviously, like I'd said last week from the very beginning, and they were very, very close. And it got to eventually to a place where Sean wanted to adopt Austin. And they had brought up the conversation and it had been had, but Sean was like, I have to wait until Austin comes to me because this has to be Austin's decision, not mine. And eventually Austin did come and he did request, and he goes, Yes, I want Sean to adopt me. I want him to be my dad. And so in 2015, Sean um adopted Austin as his legal son, and it was a very, very what they would call legendary day. Um they bought t-shirts that said like legend on the front and dairy on the back, and and they wore them together at to the courthouse. You know, our whole family was there. It was it was a it was a really beautiful moment for all of us to watch to watch them really come together and unite as father and son. And for me, it was uh it was a dream come true. You know, I had waited what felt like Austin's whole life for him to find his place as a son with a father even after Sean came into our life, you know, it still took five years. Austin was 18 when Sean adopted him, but it even though they were close and there was that connection, you know, Austin Austin put Sean through his paces and Austin put me through mine. You know, he put me through my paces to make sure he could trust not only Sean, but that he could trust me and that that I wasn't gonna walk away, that I wasn't going to run away from the situation. You know, I remember when Sean and I would have little arguments, you know, Austin would be so worried. He'd be so worried that I was just gonna pack everything up and run out and leave. And um while that was not always the way that it had happened when he was younger, I know to him that it did feel that way. Right, you know, a child doesn't understand the things that are happening and why they're happening, and it just kind of looks like mama bails at every second she can. And I I know that during this time he was definitely testing. He was definitely testing me, he was testing Sean to to feel us out, but he finally came to that place of trust and faith within all of us and within our family unit. And um yeah, and now he's Austin Davis. It's uh it's it's a really it was a really beautiful moment and a really beautiful time in our life, and one I am so ever grateful for. But you know, your kids your kids can they you know, they they grow you up, they you learn a lot. Austin taught me so much my whole life. There's so much more that I've learned because of him about myself, um and things that I've had to come to terms with and things I've had to learn how to change and grow and you know it's just um they are your greatest teacher. Your children definitely are your greatest teacher. And during the time that the adoption happened, that was if you listened last week, it was during the time we had just decided to buy our new home or buy our first home. Deshaun and I had never owned a house before, and we bought our first home and we had moved out of a rental, and this was a huge, huge thing because up to this point, and if you'd listened back to the to my the part one of my story, when as growing up, I had moved so much. I had moved so many times. I know I mentioned like 33 homes in my first story, but that doesn't include all the other times that I've been moving from, you know, when I was married before and and moving back and forth to all these different places. So when we moved in to our new home, that was my 76th house. It was my 76th move. Saying it out loud, the number feels unreal. And I know it can feel unreal to a lot of people when I say it, but but it's true. I have moved so much in my life, so many times. You know, Sean and I were talking before we made the move here to Texas, because when we moved here, by the time we got to here, this was my 81st move. So you think about 76, I still had that many more moves after that to where I am at now. And I, you know, knowing now, I know that like we're not done. You know, we're not done. But I struggled a lot. So when we moved into the house, I was like, oh, I'm settling in. Like I'm never moving again. This is my forever home. Never moving again. And I had a lot of Of reconciling to do with myself when we did move into that home because of that. Like, you know, you think you don't think about at least I didn't. I didn't think about how many times at that point I had not really thought that much about how many times I'd moved. All I knew, I mean, that actually came later, but I actually knew that I had just moved a lot and that I wanted to settle down for the first time. I I didn't feel the need to change my environment, to jump up and move everywhere. In fact, I really struggled even moving out of the rental home that we were in. But, you know, we knew that this would be ours and that, you know, nobody could take it from us. So, you know, and have somewhere that was ours, that our family could be, and that, you know the rest of our kids could just kind of grow up and have this kind of stable home that they had roots in, you know. I mean, it was kind of weird because they're already grown, but it's how we felt at the time. And that if they ever were to leave, they would always have somewhere to come back to. So when we moved into this place and I wanted to create this space and make it a home for our family, you know, when I left off last week, we were talking about how we were preparing for his sister to move out and that that would be a temporary move for her and went into our new home. And, you know, Sean had gone on the mission trip and come home, and all of these things were happening. And um, at the beginning of 2017, we had been in the house for about six months. We had decided we wanted to remodel. We were, you know, we were because the house for what we thought was was perfect, like all of these things were great. And so we're like, okay, because we started doing yard work, we started remodeling things in the kitchen. Basically, let's be clear, I was demolishing things, really. I was tearing stuff out and, you know, trying to aesthetically start making this what we wanted. And in the meantime, we were preparing for his sister to move out. So we had helped her and her family get on their own, get their place, get them set up. You know, we helped furnish their apartment. We we did all of the things to set them up for success. And in the process, I had just gone through the iron infusion. So we're doing the best that we can. And right after they had moved out, Sean had ended up switching jobs. He had got offered another job, making more money. And this job was based out of Florida. So he would be traveling a lot. But the money was really good, so we decided that that was the better option for us. And we had been he we had undertaken a lot with his sister, so you know, we could have actually used the money to help kind of do the things we wanted to do in our new home. And when we started traveling, I mean, he got the his sister moved out in February, and we started traveling at the very beginning of April. It was the first week of April. And we had been going back and forth with his sister a lot. As soon as they moved out, there there was a lot of tensions, there was a lot of problems. Um, you know, it's not easy after being in a place where somebody's been helping take care of you the entire time for the past three years, and then moving out in a space that they they weren't really wanting to move out. It was something we really had to push them to do. And, you know, though they had money and they were making money, it wasn't necessarily the way that they had necessarily lived while they were with us. And so there was a lot of expectations on us for us to continue to provide things that we had been providing, and we were no longer in a place where we were willing to continue to do that. You know, we did some things, but we weren't gonna continue to pay the rent, we weren't gonna continue to, you know, buy all the things that you want. You know, you those are things that you're gonna have to start picking up, and they are quite capable of doing so. And while she was with us, we made sure of it before she ever left our home. And eventually all of that just became a little bit too much for her, and hearing the word no became something she just was not happy about. And there ended up being another loss in their family, and there was a lot of expectation on Sean to provide for things for that situation, and when he said no, um, it just it became something that became too much. She became a little bit hostile about it, and uh she chose to sever the relationship with our family. And after all the work and all the time and the effort that we had put in, she ended up leaving and moving right back to the place where we had gone and got her from. And it was an extremely devastating time for us. It was an extreme loss for us. We didn't know even how to handle it because there was nothing we could do. You know, she was very much a block block us on Facebook, block us on everything, you know, never spoke to us again, never called again. And from that day forward, we've never heard from her again, and it's been, you know, 10 years. And or almost 10 years now, and it's just it was a big it was a big hit for the both of us. I know that it hurt me so bad because I had poured my life. I mean, I had poured my life, my heart and my soul into her and those children. Every single day I was with them, taking care of them, doing all of the things for them and for her to to help them get where they needed to be. And, you know, God had told me to bring them here, had told me to do these things, and I willingly wanted to do it and gave of my life and my time and my home and my money to do so, and to be rewarded with this behavior was really something that I just could not handle. I could not handle it. It was it was a lot for me to deal with. And with Sean, he just it was just unacceptable. It was unacceptable. And we dealt with yet another loss with her and her children in our life and learning how to navigate that. And it was it was a very trying time because we were excited about having our own home. We were excited about, you know, remodeling and doing those fun things in our own life, we're excited about this new job and this new opportunity that he was starting in Florida because we were getting the opportunity to travel. And I had never been to Florida at that point. Excuse me, and I was excited to go and see what that was all about. So it kind of put a you know, it tainted it a little bit. It tainted our joy and our excitement for the things we were we were we were we were experiencing, but it was it was out of our control. It was completely out of our control. It didn't matter what we had done or or w what we had helped with or it didn't matter. It's a hard thing when you want to help someone. And I know that I I keep saying it over and over again and these episodes, but it's true. You really cannot make people change, no matter how much you want them to, no matter how much love you have for them, no matter how much desire you have for them, no matter how much effort or work you put into it, that you cannot make people change. They have to want it for themselves. It has to be something that comes from within. And with you know, with his sister, it was it was a hard lesson I had to learn there. It was a hard lesson we both had to learn there. You know, we didn't want to continue to be enablers and we wanted to truly be able to to help and we knew that we did help. We did help in a lot of ways, but you have to give people enough space that they have to come to the end of themselves just like I did. Just like I did. And you know, suffering the loss of people in your life that don't want that for themselves is it's a hard, it's a hard thing to to deal with. It's a hard thing to deal with. And it all it that all came on, you know the it all we that our life changing into this new thing was all on the heels of that. So us moving into Florida and this new life and this new job and and stuff, it was all tainted a little bit, and the joy of it was a little bit dampened because of what we had just lost. It was was a big loss for us. So I I I wanna I'm gonna stop there and then you guys can come back next week, and I am gonna finish up. I have a surprise for you. Um, not next week, but the next week I'm gonna have Sean on. He has agreed to come on here and say hello and be a guest, and we can have uh conversations um about some of the things that you know I've been talking about on here. So I'm very excited to have him on. Um, I look forward to it and I hope you do too. But I just want you to know that, you know, all of the things that that we do in life, all the things that we experience and we go through, I say it every week. That it doesn't matter what we've done, it doesn't matter where we've been, what we've seen, what we've experienced, is that freedom is the advantage we already own. Freedom belongs to us. It is ours for the taking if we just are willing to do it. And I wish you all the best. I pray for your own willingness, I pray for my continued willingness to do the things that I do and to continue to make the changes in my own life. And I I cannot wait till next week. I hope you come back and you join me. Thank you for listening in. Thank you for letting me share. Thank you for letting me be vulnerable. I love you guys, and I will see you next week.