Last day of a family of 5
November 3, 2019
It was about midnight and I still hadn’t fallen asleep that first night we were in Belize. Although our first day went well, that night lying in bed I started to feel extremely anxious. I have realized anxiety for me comes with a fixation on something and all I can think about over and over in my head is that one thing. I just can’t seem to shake it. When I went into labor with Charlee six weeks early, it was socks…ha! That night in Belize it was the stairs in our Airbnb. I could not stop thinking about them and the million different scenarios of harm they could cause. The house was absolutely beautiful. The backyard was incredible. However, code enforcement in Belize is not a thing. The front door to the house was facing the side yard. To enter you walked up a couple of stairs through the door to a raised landing spanning the length of the house. The entry, half bath, storage closet and kitchen were up on this landing and to get to the dining room and living room you walked down three or four concrete stairs to the lower level floor. There was no separation between the upper and lower floors and although Matt could basically step down, the floors were concrete.
The house had two rooms downstairs and a big master bedroom and bathroom upstairs. All 5 of us were upstairs, Mia being in a pack-n-play in the walk-in closet. The staircase was to the right as you walked in the front door, right past the hallway leading to the two lower rooms. Again, there is no railing the entire way up the stairs! One slip of a footy pajama, my kid would fall right off onto the hard concrete floor.
As I lie there, knowing many emotions contributed to the anxiousness I was feeling, all I could think about was how one of my kids were going to wake up in the middle of the night, walk down those stairs and fall off busting their head open! I quietly got up, making sure not to wake anyone, walked down the stairs and pushed all the couches and pillows I could find up under the cliff. I walked back upstairs and fell asleep.
We woke up that next morning to a beautiful Sunday. We spent that last day as a family of 5 swimming, a quick trip to the grocery store and the shrimp farm, learning new fishing techniques from Rene (the property manager) and hanging out with our iguana friend Debbie. Matt and I spent that day trying to not overly anticipate the day to come and just soaking up the moments with Charlee, Levi and Mia. Life as we knew it would never be the same.
When we were planning this trip, we went back and forth on the schedule. Of course we wanted to see the three big kids as soon as we stepped foot in Belize, but we also had to take into account the three little ones. We decided to build in some time at the beginning of the trip so the littles could get settled in, process the travel and new place while spending some last minute time together. Those two days we had prior to “gotcha day” were imperative. We were all rested and ready to meet them the following afternoon.
I remember standing in the clear glass shower that opened right into the room looking out the window at the sea thinking, get it together…here we go! I walked downstairs, poured a glass of Belizean whiskey and watched the kids swim. Cheers to the rest of our lives!
