life lately ✨ (happy summer is over)

I’m not going to sugarcoat it, our summer sucked. I feel like I’ve been holding my breath all summer, waiting for Fall’s crisp wind to blow through.

My summer started with an intense sinus infection that started in the spring and took WEEKS to clear up. I was in so much pain and was so anxious because I HAD to take medication for it to clear up— and you know, when you’re pregnant, you really shouldn’t be taking anything. Especially when the baby is that small and developing all of her organs, etc. My sinus infection got worse on a business trip to Las Vegas where the air was dry and arid. That trip nearly killed me. I powered through, pregnant through it all, but when I got back I was physically drained.

When I got back from my business trip, I learned that Daisy (my 12 year old dog) had mast cell cancer. She had a surgery before my trip to remove a tumor, and when I got back the tumor grew back aggressively. She was losing a lot of weight, had labored breathing, and in consulting with our vet, it was decided that it was going to be time to say good-bye.

This one hurts to talk about. I don’t think I realized how painful it was going to be. In between all of this, we had Archie’s 3rd birthday party. I remember not being able to truly enjoy his parties (we had two: a kids party and an adult party for family) because Daisy’s death was looming over me.

The week that we had planned for the vet to come and euthanize her was excruciating. I’m so lucky my team at work was so accommodating. I could hardly get through a meeting without crying and my boss let me take it easy that week. There were feelings of guilt, pity, stress, emptiness, and a deep sadness that I’ve never felt before. It was like a pit opened up inside of me, a pit of depression that seemed to have no bottom.

The evening that we euthanized her, I had to take medication so I didn’t have a panic attack. We had family come over to watch Archie while we did it, and that in itself was a disaster as sadly the family member couldn’t keep Archie satiated so I had to keep running back and forth— dirt between my finger nails from burying her. I feel like I didn’t get a peaceful chance to truly say good-bye.

The following day, in-between puffy crying eyes and grieving, some close family sadly chose to create drama and be inappropriate towards our grieving and Daisy’s death. If “blood is thicker than water” then bleed me out.

I think one of the hardest parts of Daisy’s death was not just the 12 years of memories but also having Archie ask about her constantly. Having to explain death to a 3 year old isn’t easy. It’s hard to do it in an age appropriate way. What really helped was a little flower memorial where we buried her in our yard and being able to tell him that we miss her too and we can remember her by planting beautiful flowers and honoring her memory.

Anyway, so all of that was heartbreaking and completely put a damper on our summer. Baby girl in my belly was literally a glimmer of light that I held onto when I felt that pit of depression. I feel like it’s getting easier to breathe now and talk about everything.

The only “good” thing about Daisy’s death is that it brought John and I closer on another level of trust and vulnerability. We did some things as a family which also helped highlight the summer with sparks of happiness. We went to Florida to see my parents and we went to a kid theme park called Knobels in Pennsylvania.

The good news is, my career has been going well and I’ve been seeing professional growth. I got a 135% in my performance review and leadership is thrilled with my work. My podcast has 160k downloads and I was recently mentioned in LA Weekly, and my talent management business, FCMGMT, has been seeing a steady pace of work. All of this is important to me as it allows me to support my family and get the work done on our house that will allow this place to be a sanctuary for when baby girl arrives.

Thanks for reading!