HAP Program Granted!

Given up on the blog yet? I have gotten a few emails of very loving friends to remind me to post. Things have been busy for Elizabeth and I. Right after Mike's birthday, we decided to take a trip to visit our friend Wendy in Germany. We then convinced her to plan a trip with us to Greece. I think she is still recovering from our visit! We were able to escape the summer heat here, enjoy the beautiful country side in Germany, see my dear friend Dawn, and do back to school shopping in Heidelberg. The trip was surreal. I do love to travel and experience things. It is bittersweet, because Mike would have loved every minute of it. He would have really loved Greece. Now, he would have hated the heat there, but absolutely loved the history, archeology, and the food! Actually, I am still dreaming about the wonderful food especially in Crete. I have never had fresher food in my life.

I have had thought of blogging over the past weeks, but I admit that my emotions are all tangled up and I know by now people are wanting me to post that life is a bed of roses. As I told a friend of mine, sometimes I feel like such a fraud. I am struggling to come to grips with Mike being in heaven every day. I really want him to come home, but I swear I hear him saying I AM home. It is so insane sometimes. As many know, Elizabeth and I are reading through the Bible and I was reading Job. Right after Job loses everything, he is in such turmoil. I was reading that to Elizabeth and flat out bawling. It was if they were my words and I was pleading with God to make sense of everything. Yet, then there are days when I am on my knees thanking God for the blessings in my life. Thanking God that I have loved someone so much and that I had the opportunity to be loved and married to a man like Mike. Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde all the way baby!

My really big news is that our HAP appeal went all the way to Washington DC and by God's grace it was approved. So Mike and I are eligible to re coop some costs on our Florida house. Best of all, I pray that we have paved the way for others in our situation. So many of our military are being hit by cancer. I just know that at some point, there will be a link between cancer and exposures in the line of duty. I do have to tell you that I cry every time someone calls about it. When I found out, I just cried. It is the first time in so long that something has gone right. I just couldn't understand how we didn't qualify. But Mike finally did under the Wounded Warrior clause.

The flip side to that is the VA. I am still waiting on the Burial reimbursement and even though I have started receiving DIC, they are not giving Elizabeth her benefit under that program. I have called and then I got a call that they are still processing and there are others in front of us, which I do understand. What I am confused about is how I started receiving it (for me) and yet my claim is still processing for Elizabeth. You would think that would be a one processing deal.

Other than that, Elizabeth started school this week and I have faxed over my transcripts to the local college to start the process of going back to school in January to earn a teaching certificate.
I will do better at posting...

Please continue to pray for our hearts, the grief, and our future. Please pray for Elizabeth's friend Lindy who lost her dad recently. Please pray for Eric and Earl as they battle Satan's Cancer.

Happy Birthday Mike...

Elizabeth and I have spent some time with friends and family on a vacation this week. Something went haywire with the blog and I have tried to do a temporary fix. This is one of my favorite pictures of Mike. It was taken by Beetle on a cross country flight from Tucson to New England. Mike found pure joy in the air and it shows in this picture.

We have yet another milestone this week... Mike's birthday. I don't know if it will be as hard as say Father's Day or our Wedding Anniversary. He hated celebrating his birthday. When you asked him what he wanted he would say an airplane. That was it. I wish we would have just taken the plunge and done it. When you asked him how old he was he would say, "27." I asked him once why 27? Seems like as odd age. He told me he always thought he would only live to age 27. There are so many questions now that he has gone home that I would love to sit down and know the answer too like Mike's thought that he would die young.

So I have been wondering if people celebrate their birthdays in Heaven? I float back and forth between the earthly birth celebration or do they celebrate the earthly re-birth day (Salvation Day) or do they celebrate the Heavenly Birthday (day when you walk into heaven and see Jesus?). In my heart of hearts, I believe celebrations exist in heaven. I mean if Jesus will one day say "well done my good and faithful servant" that statement alone indicates celebration right? I ponder stuff like this all the time.

Finally, please continue to pray for Eric Schmidt at Barksdale AFB and his cancer battle. I would love to contact him somehow especially now that from his last posting it seems like they will be retiring him to just give him some advice/lessons learned from our process.

Mike, we miss you so much. Life is so different without you. Happy, Happy Birthday.... I hope the celebration in Heaven is tremendous. Elizabeth and I plan to honor it here with a trip to one of your favorites... Waffle House!