...April was a very busy month for me as I flew out to LA for the long Easter weekend and the following week returned to Stockton for their TBTN and to Penn for the Victimology course. I had also seen an interview on ESPN2 with the former prosecutor who ran the unit in the DA's office that worked on my case and thought it was a perfect opening to reach out and tell her what I was doing along with putting my speaking services out for additional opportunities. At this point I was beginning to consider speaking full-time but I had a lot to consider before making such a drastic leap. I was becoming more and more unsatisfied with my job as the responsibilities increased but my salary did not. I knew speaking out was doing some good for people and I felt good doing it. Getting up and going to my current job every day was causing me a great deal of unhealthy stress. I am though by nature a thinker who weighs all my options good and bad before doing anything not to mention practical. I was single and had a mortgage and bills to pay so I couldn't just quit my job to get into a new career without having some kind of financial backup so in the meantime I would keep doing what I was doing and try to figure out a way to promote my speaking further. I put the idea on the back burner but ultimately not for that long.
Except for my job everything else was going so well. My relationship with Steve was great and at this stage the long-distance thing was still fun, getting to travel back and forth, meeting each others friends and doing the things we were both interested in. We had a lot of common interests but I won't bore you with them all. I was busy signing up for wishes and a few months prior attended a volunteer appreciation luncheon where I received an award with several others for being one of New Jersey's top volunteers. This had been a surprise and it moved me to tears. Then Saturday of Memorial Day weekend my mom and I got on a plane for an amazing week long experience in Ireland.We had a suite in a beautiful boutique hotel in Dublin, toured the city visiting the usual tourist spots, some unusual spots and we ate great food in the not so touristy pubs with the locals. We took the train up to Belfast for a day to see the new Titanic museum and had a private bus tour (unintentional but no one else bought tickets that day). Then one day we felt brave and rented a car to drive down to see the Powerscourt Castle Gardens. You have not lived until you drive a manual transmission car on the narrowest roads in the world with the steering wheel on the wrong side of the car and the car on the wrong side of the road. It was fun to say the least.
Unfortunately the day after I returned home Steve would have to admit himself into the hospital. He had been feeling unwell the past 2 months and it slowly got worse. It started off with him being tired then his appetite decreased. During his visit Mother's Day weekend he couldn't even get off the couch as I left to meet my mom for brunch. The week I was on vacation he went to Urgent Care twice as he was so tired he couldn't get up and walk around yet had trouble sleeping. He was misdiagnosed on both visits and finally he called his friend that Sunday to take him to the hospital. Within 24 hours after multiple tests they diagnosed him with Congestive Heart Failure. He is lucky enough to have an excellent cardiologist. Thank goodness because now he could be treated. He had plans to get on a plane that Wednesday to visit me and the doctor told him that if he did there was a high percentage that would have killed him. I was 2,500 miles away feeling as helpless as ever. I would be unable to take care of him when he was released from the hospital that Wednesday and last minute flights to LA due to the Summer season were well over $1,000. I had to sit in NJ and do nothing but call him on the phone to check in on him. He had a slight relapse and returned to the hospital Thursday for an overnight visit but went home Friday with medications he has to take for the rest of his life and a new diet plan. This whole situation would not only change his life but mine too as it confirmed for me my feelings for him.
On a positive side we would begin cooking together a lot more because he was on a low-sodium diet. I had always loved to cook since I was in elementary school but it's not all that fun for one person but now we had a lot of new recipes to experiment with. He had also decided to start going to the gym. Like many he had a membership with good intentions but never made it mostly because he had never worked out before. This would be something else we could do together. I had been going to the gym and working out since I was 19 and as this was something unfamiliar to Steve I would help him get started once the doctor gave him the go ahead. This health scare would bring us closer together but wouldn't be the only challenge to our relationship that Summer...
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