The Schlipp Journey - 2019

Have you ever just sat back and thought, “Wow, what a year that was?” Well, that is how it felt as 2018 came to a close. How could we expect what 2019 had in store for us? January 2019 was exciting; we got married with friends as our best man and matron of honor! We weren't able to have all five of our children present, so we opted to have a family celebration that summer.

Over the next few months, Mike and I prepared for Mikaela's high school graduation. We celebrated her graduation, and first job. Connor also started his first job that summer. Mike and I made frequent trips to El Dorado, AR to check on my grandma's property. She had passed and we were working on going through her belongings and preparing to selling the house. It was difficult to make regular trips over 350 miles one way to make much progress.

In June we had our family and friends together to help us celebrate our marriage! We had a wonderful meal, a rope braiding ceremony, and a beautiful paint pouring event to honor the blending of our family.

In early August we made another trip south and while there decided we would move to El Dorado. Of course, this was sudden and caused a flurry of things to be worked out. Mikaela did not want to move south and had planned to start college that month. So, we decide to wait on the move until the end of the year. That would give us time to find a place to move.

We planned to update my grandma's house to make it a rental property. In September we got an unexpected call that my grandma's house had burned the night before. The next couple of months were spent trying to prepare for our move south and prepare for Mikaela to move out on her own. I also began searching for employment in El Dorado. Rachel would be graduating from nursing school in December, and the holidays were coming. Oh my, what a year 2019 was turning out to be. 

More to come for the Schlipp Journey! 

To Be Continued…

The Schlipp Journey - 2018

Mike, a retired Army Staff Sergeant, and I met online in the summer of 2017.  We lived about an hour and a half apart, but we visited each other regularly. Thanks to technology, we were able to communicate daily via calls and texts. We would watch movies together via Facetime and would fall asleep talking to each other every night.

In January of 2018, I was laid off from Walmart Corporate offices in Bentonville, AR where I had worked for just shy of eleven years. I was shocked, to say the least. I was so thankful for my six-month relationship with Mike. He helped me keep my sanity, listened as I vented, and encouraged me while I struggled.  I spent the next few months working through the tiring process of updating a resume, applying for unemployment, changing all my doctors since I no longer had insurance, trying to live on a small fraction of the income I was used to receiving, and seeking employment that could sustain my household.

As the unemployment ended in the late spring, Mike and I had continued to grow closer. He decided he would move that summer from Springfield, MO to Bella Vista, AR where I lived. We had both been independent and heads of our households for years. We had several growing pains over the rest of the year. But we stayed strong and supported each other as we worked on blending our families.

Together we are a beautiful blended family of seven. Mike, myself and five children between 23 and 14: Joshua, Jason, Rachel, Mikaela, and Connor. Late that summer, Mikaela moved to Arkansas and began her senior year that fall. Joshua had recently moved to Seattle, WA.  Rachel was in nursing school in Fort Smith, AR while Jason and Connor were still in Springfield, MO.

Mike and I worked daily on learning how to better understand and support each other and our children. I had never been close to anyone suffering from PTSD, so I had a lot to learn. Mike had struggled opening up and allowing others much insight into his inner struggles. Mike's fellow veterans and their wives were very helpful and supportive as we moved through those months.

We had so much to be thankful for that Thanksgiving season!  We had grown closer to each other’s families and friends. Our children were taking advantage of the time spent together.  Mike and I were now engaged! That Christmas was special as we celebrated our first Christmas together. So much changed in one year and we had come so far in learning to support and understand each other. We had made it through 2018!

Stay tuned for what happened in 2019!  Any guesses?

There is Room

On Sunday, January 26, the NBA, the sports world, and the entire globe experienced a tragedy that rocked most down to their very core. Kobe Bryant, his daughter, and seven others were involved in a helicopter crash that left no survivors. With the exception of a few, the whole nation seems to be mourning his loss.

In a few recent Facebook posts that I have opened to read the comments, I have seen all types of emotions. In particular, there were a couple of comments about how we lost a helicopter full of military personnel the same day that carried 3x’s the amount of lives on it. Some commented that it was five years ago, and people need to get their facts straight, others stated they agreed and our military needs to be honored more, and others just proceeded to honor or attack at Kobe.

Several thoughts flooded my mind. Each and every life of the aforementioned mattered. Period. Everyone in this world trying to do better and make the world a better place deserves to be honored in a respectful manner. The world wouldn’t run if everyone had the same job. We can mourn both. We really can. I do. 

Kobe lived his life in the spotlight, so his death will be in the spotlight as well. Our military are the type of people who care about protecting and making our world a better place, no matter the spotlight or sacrifice. It’s how the cookie crumbles. 

Some seemed to write the military crash off because it was five years ago. I did not agree with that and it doesn’t make this day any easier for those mourning the loss of their soldiers. Vanessa Bryant will tell you in five years it hasn’t gotten any easier. They are all mourning; she just has to do it in the public eye; this is just fresher.

I do wish the loss of each and every one of our military members was mourned more as a nation, and our wounded had more support upon their arrival from overseas. It is still happening every day. That’s why I love what I do so much at the Coalition to Salute America’s Heroes.

Anyways, my point is we all need to soften our hearts. It shouldn’t be a competition over whose life was more important. As a nation, we should protect, lift up, and support one another. Just because Kobe was high-profile and in the public eye doesn’t mean he should be criticized for a high-profile death. I just thought I would take the opportunity to give a gentle reminder of those working and giving their lives behind the scenes. We have room to mourn the both.

Still Standing

Every family has its strengths and struggles. Having a spouse or parent who has to travel brings its challenges as well as benefits.  Same statement applies to those families who are a part of the military. There are families around the world that have a family member living away from the home in order to provide.

            However, the extra stress that comes from knowing a loved one is overseas and in constant danger weighs heavy.  After they come back, new challenges present.   If your soldier comes back severely injured, well… the realization that you have to adjust to a new normal is a whole different ball game. 

            Our family has been through the ringer.  But we are still standing.  We are prospering, actually.  It is still very easy to look at other families and think they are normal, while we have the “burden” of living in the new normal. It’s frustrating, relentless, and rewarding all in the same. 

The reason I chose to write about this is because earlier this week I had to work out of the house for a day. When I passed the house to pick my baby up from the neighbor, my husband’s truck was still in the driveway. He was supposed to be at work.  My heart dropped, and I panicked, “Is everything okay? Is he okay? I need to go check on him -but my daughter was with me.” I was praying that he just overslept his alarm because I was not there to make sure he was awake.  It was like a flashback to 10 years ago when he was first injured. So, I picked up the baby and left my daughter at the neighbor’s house. I went to check on him. Phew, he had just overslept.  Then I was almost embarrassed.  I had to take a step back and realize that I didn’t care what the situation looked like because we have come so far in the last 10 years to be where we are today. My husband wakes up every day in pain and continues to tread forward with such grace. 

            Anyways, I had to take a step back and realize that it’s easy to judge from the outside.  Nobody knows what we’ve had to go through to get to where we are.  The daily struggles one faces just to get through the day may be enough to drop some to their knees. Sometimes it can be easy to feel like someone is judging our situation, but they have no idea how hard we have worked just to get to where we are. Still standing.