Today has been hard. Yesterday was hard too. The kind of hard that doesn’t reset overnight, the kind that carries forward, stacking one heavy moment on top of another. This season was supposed to feel different. It was supposed to feel like relief, like progress, like a long-awaited turning point. Instead, it feels complicated, confusing, and deeply painful.
After more than ten years of Landon relying on a tracheostomy to breathe, having it removed and surgically closed is, by every medical definition, a huge victory. It marks survival, progress, and resilience beyond what many ever imagined possible. For years, that trach was his lifeline. It kept him breathing through countless challenges. Saying goodbye to it should feel like freedom.
But watching him struggle now makes that victory feel bittersweet.
Landon had his own expectations for what this surgery would mean. We all did. He imagined breathing easier, feeling stronger, moving forward. Instead, he’s hurting. And watching him realize that reality doesn’t match what he hoped for is heartbreaking in a way that words barely touch.
One tube has finally been removed—but two more have taken its place. Tubes that run through his nose, creating obstruction rather than relief. Tubes meant to help, yet causing discomfort, pain, and frustration. Trying to understand how something intended to heal can simultaneously make things feel worse is an impossible concept to grasp when you’re watching your child suffer.
Right now, Landon can’t eat. He’s struggling with basic bodily functions. His fluid output is low. He can barely talk because the nasal tube passes through his vocal cords. His lungs are congested, and every cough hurts. He feels like something is lodged deep inside his chest, and he’s being suctioned every five minutes—a process that feels less like progress and more like defeat to him.
And when he feels defeated, so do we.
I’ve barely left the hospital, except to shower. We have a hotel room nearby—just a place to clean up and change clothes—but neither Matt nor I have slept there. Leaving feels wrong. Rest feels impossible. The hospital room has become our entire world again, shrinking life down to monitors, breathing sounds, and waiting.
This experience has reopened wounds we thought had healed.
It brings back memories from ten years ago, when Landon had brain surgery and struggled so desperately to breathe that a tracheostomy became necessary. Back then, watching him fight for air was terrifying. Today feels painfully similar—only now, instead of a trach, he’s intubated nasally. Different equipment. Same fear. Same helplessness.
We are trying to stay cautiously optimistic. We truly are. But optimism is fragile when your child is uncomfortable, exhausted, and hurting. We want so badly to go home. To be together with our other three children. To celebrate Christmas Eve and Christmas Day as a family, the way we always have. But right now, that doesn’t feel likely.
We won’t know more until Monday, when doctors plan to remove his nasal tube and assess his breathing, oxygen needs, and pressure support on BiPAP. Monday is only days before Christmas. Time feels rushed and uncertain, like everything is hanging in the balance.
What we do know is this: no matter what, we will spend Christmas with all four of our children. If that means bringing the other three to the hospital, then that’s what we’ll do. And if we don’t make it home by the 25th, we will create our own Christmas Eve and Christmas Day later—because love doesn’t follow a calendar.
I’ve told the girls that this year might look different. That Santa knows what he’s doing. That Christmas can happen anytime. I know that’s hard for younger hearts to fully understand. Traditions matter to kids. Consistency matters. And this year, so much of that has been disrupted.
This holiday season has been painful in quiet ways. We didn’t sit by the fire with hot chocolate. We didn’t watch Christmas movies curled up together under the glow of the tree. We didn’t drive through neighborhoods admiring lights or wander through displays like we always do. The traditions we’ve built together—the ones that bring comfort and stability—have all been altered.
As a mother, it’s devastating to see how deeply each of my children is affected by this. Even when they don’t say it, you can feel it in the air, in the silences, in the questions they don’t know how to ask.
I am incredibly grateful for my parents and for my dear friend Neeva-Randy Mitchell, who have stepped in to care for the kids at home, keeping them busy, safe, and loved while our world revolves around hospital walls.
Right now, we are living in uncertainty. There are no clear answers, no neat timelines. Just hope, patience, and the strength it takes to keep showing up.
Please continue to keep Landon—and our entire family—in your thoughts and prayers. We are navigating something heavy, complicated, and deeply emotional. And we are doing our best to hold on, one breath, one day, one uncertain moment at a time.
