As the time neared for Lexi to come home the medical foster home she was at was also going through a transition. The RN and her husband would be moving out of country because her husband was continuing his career in the army. The two sisters that were left were Gayle and Kathy. They sat down with us and told us they had found a house in Estacada and asked what we thought about having them continue to care for Lexi after Daniel got home from the academy. It would be just Lexi and another little girl of about 9 who also had cerebral palsy but could talk and walk with crutches. Her nickname was Moogy and she was a sweet, easy little girl to love. She also went to school all day so there was a lot of time that it would be just Lexi at home.
This was HUGE! Even though there would only be two caregivers now they had already gone through the transition of getting to know Lexi and understood what they were entering into. Also, we would be close enough to go over there if they had concerns. They cared for Lexi well and she was bonding with them. She would smile very big when we would bring her back to their house on Mondays. This was painful for me and happy at the same time. I wanted Lexi to be loved when we were away from her but it also felt wrong to be away from her and need help at all. We decided to split our time halfway through the week. She would spend Daniel's 4 work days with the ladies and his 3 day weekends at home with us.
I still had a lot of guilt feeling like I failed Daniel and Lexi but I also saw this as God's provision for our beautiful girl. I was overwhelmingly thankful. I can't even put into words what having their help did for our family and me. It didn't feel like we were settling for an option that was horrible to us because we had no good choices. We knew we couldn't have asked for a better situation if Lexi had to be away from us. I can't imagine what our family or lives would look like if we didn't have Gayle and Kathy. I'm pretty confident though that I would not have the physical or mental health that I enjoy today.
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