Hi! This is Arlen, Laura’s husband, sharing an update on Laura’s behalf about her health and what’s ahead for Ticket to Learning.
As you know if you’ve been following along, Laura has been facing significant health challenges over the past year, a worsening of symptoms related to a set of chronic health conditions (including EDS and ME/CFS). Over the past few months Laura’s baseline (the amount of activity she can sustain without a crash requiring bedrest) has continued to decrease. Essentially, her level of activity has not been reduced enough to prevent further decline in her baseline and symptoms.
So we’re now making a more formal, proactive attempt at complete rest for several weeks, and then we’ll re-evaluate. The expectation is not that she will bounce back, but we hope we can at least stop the erosion of her sustainable baseline. Then slowly, carefully start adding things back in bit by bit and see how that goes.
As always, we continue our research, learning, and experimenting, with support from Laura’s doctor. Most of her conditions have had limited research and treatment pathways, but that is beginning to change.
We are not giving up on Ticket to Learning and still believe it has a bright future ahead. Our first focus unit, Nellie Bly and Investigative Journalism, is still nearly ready to launch. But we won’t be able to launch until Laura’s health sees some improvement.
As it stands, I’m doing my best to take good care of Laura and help her improve, homeschooling the kids (essentials), and working as much as I’m able. It’s a really tough season for our family, but we’re weathering the best we can and very grateful for the love and support of family and friends.
While Laura has remained amazingly positive through all this, she also continues to face grief at the losses. She so misses homeschooling the kids and working on Ticket to Learning.
Laura really appreciates messages and texts, even if she’s not always able to respond. Thank you for caring!
Photo: Firefly, Laura’s faithful feline companion
