Meet The Parrotts

I'm not sure how to even begin this journey or how to start this blog, but I hope this will be a place I can write out some of what our family is going through.

Our family is myself, Crystal, my husband Danny and our four beautiful children: Jacob is 13, Kennedy is 9, Karaline is 5 and Jaxon is 3. Danny and I started dating when I was 15 and Danny was 16. We were high school sweethearts. We married when I was 23 and have been married for 14 years. We've been together for 22 years! :)

I'm a stay at home mom, at Danny's request. He thought it would be best for our children if I stayed home to take care of them. Plus, we couldn't afford daycare! I want to go back to college so I can get a teaching degree, in case something does happen to Danny and I need to be the provider for the family. Right now we just can't afford the tuition and books. I only have 12 hours under my belt, but at least it's something.

Danny is the sole provider for our family. He is a plumber and works for a wonderful and compassionate company. I describe his company this way because there have been many times when Danny needed to take off for doctor appointments or was in the hospital needing a blood or platelet (sp?) transfusion or most recently having a bacterial disease in his blood stream and they have been very gracious and helpful to us. Due to the economy now, Danny is only able to get paid for the hours he actually works. I imagine this is because we are all hurting financially from the economic situation. We really, really struggled over the summer because Danny was admitted to the hospital 5 times in a three month period. We could barely keep up with our bills, but God provided in ways that we just couldn't imagine.

At the end of August, beginning of September we decided that it would be in the best interest of our family financially if we moved from a nearly 3000 sq. ft. home on almost 4 acres to a 1200 sq. ft. 3 bedroom apartment. The girls also had to change schools, but thankfully not districts. They are adjusting just fine.

Jacob, however, has had a rough year. Back in January, his cousin, who was his very best friend passed away. The two of them had a bond greater than you could imagine. My nephew Stephen was diagnosed with a rare form of Muscular Dystrophy and wasn't supposed to live past the age of 5. He lived until he was almost 14! Jacob and Stephen were less than a year apart in age. Stephen was wheelchair bound and had a feeding tube and breathed on a vent, but he and Jacob were two peas in a pod. Jacob actually gave the eulogy at Stephen's funeral. It truly hurts my heart to think of how much Jacob, who is only 13, has had to take in just in this last year. The death of his best friend and the diagnosis of his dad's health. I've been seriously considering home schooling him, but I just don't know how we can afford that as well. I heard it can be very expensive. Plus, having the weight of my son's education on my shoulders is very scary.

Both of our girls and Jacob take dance classes. The owner and the other staff treat us like family. Kennedy is on one of their competition dance teams. She is a wonderful dancer, and I'm not just being the mother.:) Karaline is in a Daddy-Daughter dance class, at Danny's request. The dads in this class learn a dance routine that they perform with their daughters at our year end recital in June. Danny did this with Kennedy a few years back, before we knew of his transplant need and really had a great time dancing with her. He asked for me to specifically put Karaline in this same class to make sure that he got a chance to dance with her too, just in case something happened to him. Believe it or not, Jacob takes a Stompin' tap and hip-hop class there too. There are four boys in his hip-hop class. They've been named by the girls and their instructors the 'Funky Fresh Boys'.

You know, there isn't much I can say about Jaxon. He hangs out with me at home and tags along with me to my job as an assistant to two Mary Kay Directors. He even goes to Bible study with me and loves it. The one thing I know that he and Danny share a common love for is fishing. Jaxon loves to fish with Danny, and can tell really great fishing stories. Every boat he sees he wants to buy for his dad. He is the most outwardly lovey of all of my kiddos at this age. Out of the blue, all the time, he says that he loves us and gives the best juicy lip kisses in the world! All of our kids know that their dad is sick, but their knowledge of his illness is on different levels. Jacob is the only one of them all who knows the full diagnosis.

Our family also includes my brother-in-law. Two years ago my brother-in-law called us from the nursing home he was placed in and asked us to come and get him. This is Danny's half brother. He has suffered five strokes. He has lost his short term memory and his neurologist said that he has the brain of an unhealthy 90yr old man. He turned 50 this past April. We were able to move him into our home because we had plenty of space available, and I could be with him during the daytime. We were able to arrange physical therapy and home health care for him to come to our house to work with him. He moved with us into our three bedroom apartment. All four of the kids shared a room so their Uncle Bubba could have his own room, until recently when we were able to get my brother-in-law approved for a 1 bedroom apartment just two buildings away from our apartment. We can actually see his front door from our back patio, and he comes over every evening for supper. He has been awarded 21.5 hours a week by the state for someone to come in and take care of him and he likes to go to the Friendship Center on Monday's and Thursday's. We are trying to reach his state case manager to see about awarding him more hours but we haven't been able to get her to call us back. A social worker is hopefully going to come out next week for an evaluation and maybe she can reach the state worker.

We continue to live paycheck to paycheck and sometimes it seems like we will never get caught up. Danny's medicines cost us a lot each month now, pre-transplant. On top of that both Jacob and Kennedy take medicine that is a cost each month. Our insurance pays 80% but we have to pay the cost up front and then mail in our receipt for reimbursement. Danny was out of work for three days last week and didn't get paid for that. That has thrown us into the negative in our bank account and we have two car payments to make this Tuesday coming up. Plus, I need to refill Jacobs medicine by Wednesday. It leaves very little room for gas and groceries which adds up for a family of 7. Danny drives 120 miles round trip every day for work. Plus pays toll fees. He leaves at 5:00 each morning and gets home between 5:30 and 6:00 each evening. His body is so physically tired that when he gets home he showers eats and goes to bed. We spend very little time with him in the evenings because of this. Our weekends are very precious to us as a family. That is when we are able to spend time together the most. We really do cherish this time.

Danny went in about 4 yrs ago for a routine physical. They diagnosed him with Hep C and Type II Diabetes then. It was about 1 1/2 years ago when we found out about his liver disease and the need for a transplant. Danny contracted the Hep C from a tattoo he got when he was 21. In addition, He has blocked portal valves. His liver is re-routing blood flow through the tiny veins around the liver and also to his spleen, which is also very enlarged. He has esophigeal verasies and verasies in his stomach. He needs another endoscopy, which we'll need money for by the end of this month. On top of all this, he has a hernia that is really painful. The hernia is a work related injury that happened 1 1/2 years ago. During his pre-op work up is when they discovered that his liver enzymes were through the roof and thus began our long journey to the transplant list. Danny's liver doctor gave him a five year life expectancy without a transplant. That was nearly two years ago.

Praise God, about 4 weeks ago, Danny was placed on the transplant list and received his pager. Now we wait for the call.

There is lots and lots more, and I know I've already given you an ear full. I'll close for now.

Crystal:)