{"id":56,"date":"2008-12-24T18:29:04","date_gmt":"2008-12-24T22:29:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/?p=56"},"modified":"2008-12-24T18:29:04","modified_gmt":"2008-12-24T22:29:04","slug":"our-2008-christmas-letter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/our-2008-christmas-letter\/","title":{"rendered":"Our 2008 Christmas Letter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Also posted on Living On The Edge<\/a> and Bohica<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Dear Friends and Family,<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>I hope this finds you well.\u00a0 <\/span>It has been a very challenging time for us since we moved to St. Petersburg, FL.\u00a0 <\/span>Wil was hired in October, 2006 to relocate here and work for Freedom Scientific, a company that makes a screen reader, JAWS, and other blind and low vision products.\u00a0 <\/span>I left my job of twenty years with Richmond County DFCS at the end of March 2007 to move the house down here.\u00a0 <\/span>It took almost a year and Congressman Young\u2019s assistance to get my Social Security disability started; but it finally did.\u00a0 <\/span>Wil was laid off from his job in May, and thank God, is receiving Unemployment. \u00a0<\/span>It is very hard for a blind man to find a job in today\u2019s economy; but he looks every day.\u00a0 <\/span>We went to Albany, NY to help friends, Kristen and Jeff, while she had and recuperated from reconstructive foot surgery.\u00a0 <\/span>They have an eight year old and a seventeen month old.\u00a0 <\/span>We were able to check out the area and were impressed.\u00a0 <\/span>Going from Florida days of 90 degrees to New York days of 60 degrees was a nice change.\u00a0 <\/span>Wil has been approved for 55b employment in New York State; but there are no open positions at this time.\u00a0 <\/span>Wil thinks he will love the cold weather up there; but I don\u2019t think I will like that at all.<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Wil had some digestive problems in New York that got progressively worse.\u00a0 <\/span>He refused to go to the ER up there as we have no medical insurance.\u00a0 <\/span>The day after we arrived home, we went to our doctor; and he was sent straight to the hospital as he had lost 23 pounds in September.\u00a0 <\/span>On October 3rd<\/sup>, his colon perforated and he had emergency surgery (6pm) to totally remove his colon and perform and ileostomy.\u00a0 <\/span>He remained hospitalized until the 14th<\/sup>.\u00a0 <\/span>He bled out on the 17th<\/sup>, had to go to the hospital by ambulance, and was released again on the 23rd<\/sup>.\u00a0 <\/span>A repeat occurred again on October 30th<\/sup> and he was released on November 3rd<\/sup> (for good this time).\u00a0 <\/span>By God\u2019s grace and much support, love, and prayers from everyone, he survived the whole ordeal.\u00a0 <\/span>It was a very scary time not knowing if I was going to loose him.\u00a0 <\/span>He lost from 209 to 160 pounds; but now has gained 21 and will be able to weight train again after the New Year.\u00a0 <\/span>We have not been able to have children, so I tease him about delivering a baby stoma.\u00a0 <\/span>Therefore, he named it Jake.<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>There has been some good here.\u00a0 <\/span>We like the St. Petersburg area as it has an excellent bus system.\u00a0 <\/span>Despite the summer heat, between November and May, it is awesome to have the windows open and be outside.\u00a0 <\/span>I enjoy swimming for 9 months out of the year.\u00a0 <\/span>We have everything we need in walking or bus distance.\u00a0 <\/span>It is tops for blindness independence.\u00a0 <\/span>I would have to say that the best thing that has happened here is that we introduce Theresa to Wil\u2019s previous co-worker, John; and they married on November 28th<\/sup>.\u00a0 <\/span>It is nice having her living here.<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Titan and Max (Golden Retriever Leader Dogs) are doing great!!\u00a0 <\/span>They are happy as long as they are with us.\u00a0 <\/span>Max missed Wil badly while he was in the hospital.\u00a0 <\/span>Wil was so sick that Max only got to visit a couple of times.\u00a0 <\/span>This is the only time I have ever known Max to act out by pooping on the carpet (always after he heard his daddy\u2019s voice over the phone).\u00a0 <\/span>Poor boy!\u00a0 <\/span>He couldn\u2019t find him.\u00a0 <\/span>Both boys worked very little during the whole ordeal; but neither forgot how to work.\u00a0 <\/span>Titan turned 8 this year and Max will turn 6 later this month.\u00a0 <\/span>The time sure does fly!<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>We wish you all the best this Christmas and a great New Year to come.<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Love,<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Denise, Wil, Titan, & Max<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Also posted on Living On The Edge and Bohica \u00a0 Dear Friends and Family, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I hope this finds you well.\u00a0 It has been a very challenging time for us since we moved to St. Petersburg, FL.\u00a0 Wil was hired in October, 2006 to relocate here and work for Freedom Scientific, a company that makes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-56","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-life-and-times","7":"h-entry","8":"hentry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Dh6V-U","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions\/57"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wilanddenise.com\/jobina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}