During Abbie’s stay in the hospital, I posted on Facebook occasionally and kept friends and family up to date on what was going on with her. I was overwhelmed by the response I got from one of my posts about Abbie having to have surgery. I had over 70 responses to that post, plus another 6-8 people sending me private messages, plus another 8-10 people writing on my wall and that was just on Facebook. My friends here were texting me, we had people bringing us meals while we were in the hospital, a couple people brought Abbie presents and I had many offers from friends to take Ben for us. After we got back home, a friend in the squadron arranged for people to bring us meals for the next week and she said she had quite a few people respond to her email requesting meals for us. The commander of the base’s wife even emailed me telling me she was thinking of Abbie and hoped she felt better soon. I’m on a few committees with her, which is how I know her, but it made me feel special that she’d take time out of her busy day to write me a note.
I truly can’t describe how loved and cared for I felt during that whole ordeal. I HATE that Abbie had to go through that, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, or their kiddos, but I don’t think I realized how much I am surrounded by truly good, kind-hearted and caring people until it happened. I still have people asking me how Abbie is doing.
My mom and dad just moved to MO, but my mom had to call her old bank in northern IL to get some information. One of my high school classmates mom works at the bank in northern IL and she answered the phone when my mom called. She immediately asked how Abbie was doing and said the whole bank staff had been praying for Abbie’s quick recovery since my classmate had told her mom what had happened. People from on the other side of the world were praying for Abbie, all because of a post on Facebook.
The whole situation really humbled me. Our friends here really stepped up and made us feel like everything would be taken care of, and our friends and family at home were sending all the prayers they could from afar.
It is no secret that I’m ready to move back to the States, but there are definitely things I will miss about living overseas. One is obviously the traveling, but we can still travel in the States. Even more so, is the tight-knit community this base has. I sat at a table in the food court by the BX, trying to get volunteers for our upcoming bazaar, and I knew over half of the people that walked by. It was like 2 hours of socializing because I’d get done talking to one friend, and another one would walk up. You just don’t get that sense of community at most bases in the States as you do over here. And I also think it helps a lot that I am blessed to be a part of a squadron that is pretty tight-knit and even more so that I’ve volunteered on committees that have helped me meet many people outside of our squadron.
And for those of you that are wondering, Abbie is 100% better. She still talks, quite frequently, about not wanting to “feed the butterfly” (her hep-lock) and how she didn’t like the doctors and going to the hospital, but she’s back to her spunky self!
Thanks again to everyone who prayed for Abbie and was concerned about her. You really made us feel loved.
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