Maui here we come

After a great weekend in Duluth with my family we awoke yesterday morning on our excursion back to Minneapolis. When I started the car that we have been using the temperature read -24 for the outside temp. I closed my eyes and just imagined myself sitting on my lanai with just a pair of boardshorts on. In my mind I knew I had only 48 hours left to deal. So we headed to Minneapolis. Normally the drive will take us abot 2.5 hours, yestarday because of the cold and blowing snow it took us 4 hours. Tara and I split the driving because frankly Im still not 100%. Thank god I married a Canadian and not somebody from Hawaii because she is a champion winter driver!!

We then got to the doctor for some routine tests and to get final clearance to fly out. Of course my blood levels came back abnormal. The creatine is back up to 1.86 which didnt seem huge but they dont know why. So the sent me home because it was too late in the day to do anything anyway and they said come back on Wednesday and we'll go from there. I asked if I should be making arrangements to change tickets to fly back later and they said probably, but wait. So here we were back to square one, so close to palm trees and sand but it was starting to feel like we would never be home. We headed back to our hotel for night #25 in a Marriott and tried to keep our minds occupied so we weren't thinking about Wednesday. It was too cold to go anywhere so we stayed in and Tara made me watch Rock of Love, the worst show on TV.

We woke up this morning and headed to the doctors office. They took my blood and sent me off to have breakfast. As I was walking back from breakfast I saw my nurse who has been with me since day one of this whole thing and I could tell the moment I saw her it was good news. The creatinine is down to 1.7! Im outta here!! I truly now believe in the power of positive thinking. I talked to Erica yesterday and to say the least we were both pretty bummed about the roller coaster ride this has become. She kept telling me that we should be thinking positive and it was all going to be fine and its just another bump in the road. At the time it kind of went in one ear and out the other. But when I woke up this morning I really felt positive and tried to maintain that attitude when I got to the doctor. It worked.

It has been a long journey for the last five weeks, we have met so many good people and have been constantly reminded of the love that our friends have for us. This whole experience has been something that has reminded us of how important health is, how valuable family and friends are, and how to never take things for granted. We look forward to seeing all the Maui people very soon and we are excited to come back to normality. For now, Aloha.

Lee, Tara, and Karen