Mimi

I read Stephanie's post yesterday- There are no coincidences and it got me thinking about a couple of  things that have happened with Emily and I wanted to get them down on the blog so I don't forget, although I'm sure I will never forget these stories.

When Emily was younger, I'd say about a year old, Steve and I were out for the day.  Jeanne (my mother in law) was watching Emily and they were the only ones home.  They were sitting on the floor playing and Jeanne said to her, "hand that to Grandma".  Emily proceeded to turn around in the opposite direction and hold the toy up in the air with a big smile on her face. Jeanne told us the story when we got home and I immediately got goose bumps. 

And about a month ago Emily started saying 'Mimi' a lot.  No one in our family goes by Mimi and I didn't know what she was talking about.  I asked her one night, "what is Mimi sweetie?" she gave me a questioning look and went over to the shelf where I keep family picture books and pointed at them.  I asked her if she wanted to look at the family book and she said yes.  She flipped through the pages naming her aunts, uncles & cousins.  Then she got to the pages with pictures of her grandparents and she named them, "Grampa Mark, Gramma Gina, Grandpa, Grandma", and then....she turned the page and pointed at my mom and said "Mimi!" My heart jumped.  I asked Steve to come in the room and I pointed at my mom's picture and asked Emily "who is that?" and sure enough she said Mimi again.  Steve just looked at me, eyes wide. I asked her where Mimi was and she pointed up and said, "her house is up there".  I just said ok sweetie and left it at that.

She hasn't said much about Mimi lately, but we all know she is here watching over us.

My mom had a disease called Multiple Systems Atrophy.  Right now the American Brain Foundation is having a Neuro Film Festival. The Neuro Film Festival aims to raise awareness about the need for more funding for research into the prevention, treatment, and cure of brain diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, stroke, autism, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, & multiple systems atrophy (MSA). Many people submitted videos telling their stories or the stories of their loved ones.  

If you have time, please click HERE to sign up and vote for the video called 'My Hero an MSA Angel'.  Although it's not my mom's story, watching it brought back a lot of memories of the time that she was sick.  MSA is a truly horrible disease and any awareness that can be brought to it would be very beneficial.