When I was recapping the best things that happened to me in 2020, I left out the biggest one because… this story takes a little more space to tell.
In early 2016, Deanna got sick. Like, really sick. Her lung function dropped to 22% and we had to spend a week in the hospital. It was only our eighth month of being married, and it was scary. By later that year, she had recovered fairly well. She even ran a half-marathon with me a few months after being discharged.
Then in early 2018, she got a pretty bad lung infection that needed IV antibiotics. She recovered, then had another in October. In 2019, she had two infections that needed IV antibiotics while pregnant with Rhys.
This pattern was really concerning, and I tried to not worry about what would happen if it continued over the course of the next few years, but your mind goes there, especially when starting a family.
Then, on the very same week that Rhys was born, this new drug came out. It was the first of its kind, using genetic therapies to treat the underlying causes behind all the infections. The trial results and early testimonies from people who used it almost seemed too good to be true, so I tried not to get my hopes up. And we held off on taking it for a bit, not knowing if it was breastfeeding safe.
Then a pandemic broke out in the spring and being vulnerable to lung issues, we wanted every defense we could get. Deanna started taking it in April, and the effects have been a real game changer. I no longer hear the regular, everyday coughing I’d gotten used to over the past few years.
I can breathe more easily about my family’s future, and Deanna can, very literally, breathe more easily.
The two biggest prayers of my life were answered in October 2019.
I know everyone is doing their own version of grieving and healing after this year, and so many terrible things happened. But it was also a year where I got to see a health breakthrough, and my kid grow up. Here’s hoping our story has something in it that helps you with your own.