A Kink In Our Trip

**Edited - Removed identifying information for confidentiality**

We are encountering a kink in our trip.  We were supposed to start our drive to Knoxville tomorrow (Sunday) morning with the intention to stop one night in Indiana to visit a high school friend and her family.  We have decided to skip that and not leave tomorrow, and skip seeing my friend.  We may leave on Monday instead.

Babe's elderly grandma entered the hospice program.  She has heart failure and at her age, they will not be doing anything major to help with the heart failure.  Not sure you are familiar with the hospice program, but it is pretty much end of life care.  The goal is to keep a person as comfortable as possible until she is ready to leave this world.

Yesterday the nurse told us that he thinks Grandma only has a couple of days left to live.  We are saddened by this but also know that it is her time.  Grandpa also live a very long life, so they spent many many years together.  Grandpa passed away a few years ago and Grandma has been missing him terribly since.  Babe was very close to his grandparents.  He was probably the closest grandchild to them, not distance wise, but quality time wise.  He spent many many hours with them.  It's so funny to see how much of Grandma and Grandpa is ingrained in Babe.  So it is important for us to be there for Grandma.

With this latest development, we have decided to wait and see how things play out tonight and tomorrow.  We will most likely still leave for Knoxville on Monday.  It has been interesting because we told the family we are going through the Chicago area to visit some friends.  But now that there's a possibility that Grandma may be leaving us anytime, we have had to tell Babe's family that really we are driving all the way to TN for "adoption related" stuff.  We have never told Babe's family about embryo adoption, but just that we are adopting.   We only plan to tell them if it works, and only after we safely pass the first trimester.

I think for a while there, the family thought it was weird that we would still go out of town to visit friends at this critical time.  We have now told them that this visit is time sensitive and cannot really be changed.   Because my transfer is on Wednesday, and there is a 24-hour bed rest, we won't be able to leave until Thursday morning.  That means the earliest we can be home for a funeral would be Friday, with us driving 14 hours straight.  If worse comes to worse, we will just start driving home for the funeral after the transfer on Wednesday (and go against NEDC's policy) if we need to.

Right now, we have no idea how long Grandma will remain with us.  She could leave us tonight, or she could be here for another week.  I have spoken to Babe's aunt who is the primary care giver about our situation and she assures us that she understands.

For for now, we continue to wait and see how things play out.  If nothing changes tomorrow, we will plan on driving to Knoxville on Monday.

Please keep Grandma and Babe's family in prayer.  Also, pray for us as we figure out all this.  This is a difficult time for us as we want to be excited for the transfer, but at the same time, we are preparing ourselves to say good bye to Grandma.  Pray for God's perfect timing in all this.

Thanks everyone!