This Happened Yesterday

Nick has an official statement of life goals and dreams - it's called his Person Directed Plan.  For the last four years, that document has contained the following words: "My long term goal is to travel to a far destination where an overnight sleep is required."  Nick's pain management or technical problems with the handicap bus made us too nervous to travel.... until yesterday.

Yesterday we took a giant step forward in helping Nick make his dream come true.  We knew that if Nick ever went away on holiday for a sleepover, we would have to try shorter trips first.  Pain management is very tricky, making longer journeys intolerable, especially if the road is bumpy.  So, we planned the day carefully. With extra muscle relaxants and morphine in Nick's bag, we hit the road and drove to Montreal - a journey of almost two hours from his home each way.  We went to visit Grandma.  Speaking of dreams, my Mom always wants to visit Nick, but her health always gets in the way.  She pines for 'her treasure' as she calls our son.  So yesterday, we 'brought the mountain to Mohammed' and arrived in a wheelchair bus at her door.

My sister Karen arrived from a holiday up north, while the rest of her family came from different parts of Montreal to see Nick.

It wasn't the sleepover trip that's in Nick's Person Directed Plan, but it's a start.  And his next goal of overnight travel doesn't look so much like a pipe dream anymore.