The We NEED This Vacation / It's Now Or Never 9/18-9/27 PTR - COMPLETE!! 9/18 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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The We NEED This Vacation / It's Now Or Never 9/18-9/27 PTR - COMPLETE!! 9/18
Well, since we're just about 30 days out, I thought I'd attempt a PTR!!
Please bear with me because 1) I ramble and 2) I have a LOT of backstory to explain the importance of this vacation!
The Who:
Cast of Characters
Me: Amy, 24 (I'll be 25 by the time we're in WDW). I'm a Senior Pharmacy Technician and college student . I've loved Disney for as long as I could remember - I had a huge Mickey on my bedroom wall when I was young, Mickey came to my 3rd Birthday Party (although my dad mysteriously had a doctor's appointment that night...), the first movie I ever saw in a theater was The Little Mermaid, etc. And none of that has changed, I still love Disney ! I'm an obsessive planner , but it's more of a fun hobby than a chore . This will be my 5th trip to WDW. My main hobby outside of obsessing over Disney is dog training. I train and compete with my lovely Malamute, Layla (in my signature) in obedience, conformation (a regular dog show), agility, tracking, weight pulling, carting, and she's an active therapy dog . My favorite characters are Mickey and Eeyore, and my favorite movies are Little Mermaid and Robin Hood.
DBF: Pat, 37. He's a manager in retail. He loves Disney too (luckily! ). This will be our 3rd trip together, and either his 6th or 7th trip total. It's easy to tease him for that, because he has a 13 year head start on me Pat's biggest hobby is movies - collecting, watching, anything to do with movies . His favorite character is Donald Duck, and his favorite Disney movies are The Aristocats and 101 Dalmatians.
Pat and I
DB (dear brother?): Russ, 17. He'll be a senior in high school this year. This will be his first ever trip to Disney! This will also be his first plane ride, as well as a whole bunch of other firsts for him. He likes Disney too, but I don't think he has any way of comprehending how amazing WDW will be. I try to discuss some of it with him, but I don't want to give everything away. I want him to "get" the magic himself and see what the big deal really is. Russ's biggest hobby is baseball - he's absolutely incredible at baseball. His favorite character is Tinkerbell but he couldn't really give me a favorite movie.
Russ and his girlfriend Kasie
The When:
September 18th - September 27th
The Where:
Pop Century, Preferred Room. We requested the 60's building, 3rd or 4th floor on the quiet side of the building (facing away from the pool)
Coming Up...
Our plans, ADRs, itinerary and most important...WHYwe need this vacation so badly!!
Hey Amy, can't wait to read more, thanks for sharing, you are always such a loyal reader, I can't wait to hear all about your trip! My DH is a Pat too!
Love your cast of characters, and I'm anxious to see what your little bro thinks of Disney.
My girls and I have been admiring Layla's photo on your sig. She's gorgeous! We have a rough collie, Duncan, who I bought specifically to do agility and herding...but unfortunately, we've never had the opportunity to pursue that with him. I'd love to hear more about your dog training at some point in time.
Can't wait to hear why this upcoming trip is so needed - and darn, we'll miss you by ONE day...
Wonderful start, Amy. I am looking forward to reading your PTR with all the great photos you add. Now, please tell us why you need this vacation so much.
Sharon
P. S. you know Layla is such a beauty; she steals the show.
Hey Amy, can't wait to read more, thanks for sharing, you are always such a loyal reader, I can't wait to hear all about your trip! My DH is a Pat too!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lissybri
Great start Amy! Love the pictues. Your dog is beautiful. Can't wait to read more.
Thanks guys!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nimros
Great start, Amy!!!
Love your cast of characters, and I'm anxious to see what your little bro thinks of Disney.
My girls and I have been admiring Layla's photo on your sig. She's gorgeous! We have a rough collie, Duncan, who I bought specifically to do agility and herding...but unfortunately, we've never had the opportunity to pursue that with him. I'd love to hear more about your dog training at some point in time.
Can't wait to hear why this upcoming trip is so needed - and darn, we'll miss you by ONE day...
Aww, rough collies are AWESOME! And Duncah is such a cute name, too! It's incredibly time consuming to do all the training, so I understand not having the opportunity. I've had to cut back on some training here and there because it's just too much. I can talk about dog training forever, so whenever you want to discuss it, I'd love to!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
Great start, Amy!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great start Amy!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Great start!
Quote:
Originally Posted by bkwrm
Wonderful start, Amy. I am looking forward to reading your PTR with all the great photos you add. Now, please tell us why you need this vacation so much.
Sharon
P. S. you know Layla is such a beauty; she steals the show.
Thanks!! I'm used to Layla stealing the show , but the problem is, she knows it, too! She's like those little kids that if you tell them, "You're so cute!" they just say "I know."
Great start!
Layla is such a beautiful dog.
I was a pharmacy technician 10 years ago and I absolutely loved it. I am kicking myself today that I didn't continue on and go to pharmacy school. Are you planning on becoming a pharmacist?
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Great start Amy, how exciting! I can't wait to hear how DB loves WDW!
Back in 2005, I went for a quick 4 night trip with 3 coworkers because one of them was in her mid-50s and had NEVER been to Disney It was also during free dining so that was the incentive.
This could also be called The Trip That Almost Never Was, but two titles are enough for now!
Last year, DBF and I stayed at WDW for 11 days. It was our second trip together, and we received a Bounce Back offer in our room for free dining, plus a pretty decent room rate.
We were kind of hesitant to book it because, frankly, we shouldn't have spent the money to go last year. But then logic (or addiction? ) stepped in and said, we could always cancel and get the deposit back, plus it's a whole 10 months to try and get the money together.
We added Russ to the reservation since he's never been, and I'd love the opportunity to show him everything. I just had a bad feeling that if he went down with his baseball team or school or something, they'd be wandering around figuring out what to do and would miss out on a lot of the experience.
We live pretty close to a Six Flags, so I kind of think that's what Russ is expecting, just a big cool theme park. Which it is, really, but you guys know it's so much more. I started to explain about the different lands, theming, how each ride has their own uniform, but I think he'll have to see it to really get it.
But anyway. We booked the bounce back with free dining for the 3 of us, and started to figure out the budget of how much we'd have to put aside each week/month/whatever to meet the deadline.
As they say, the best laid plans... but I'll get to that later, in part 2
Plus the fact that Russ is graduating this spring and will be going away to college . Pat and I could always go ourselves, but I'd miss the opportunity to introduce Russ to all the magic.
The combination of needing to use the bounce back because we really can't afford it unless there's free dining (and our schedules don't permit us to go during the regular Free Dining in the summer months), plus this is Russ's last year where he'd be able to go with us in September made us realize that we really need to make this work. If we don't go now, it will be a loooong time before we're able to go back
All a whole bunch of justifying what we knew all along - we need Disney!
Why We NEED This Trip Part 2: What. A. Year.
This year (2010) has been one thing after another after another.
January:
- Russ had hernia surgery
March:
- I had shoulder surgery to repair a torn labrum. Your labrum is a ball or ring of cartilage that holds your shoulder in place. I'm STILL out of work on disability for this because I'm just not healing properly. I now have "frozen shoulder", and less movement and range of motion than I did before and after the surgery . I desperately need to get back to work because the disability just ain't cutting it. I'm way behind on my bills, but I just can't make ends meet . Plus, I don't know how it works in your state, but it was a nightmare and a half trying to get disability in the first place. It took nine weeks to get my first check . The part about that that upset me the most is, I had all my paperwork prepared and ready to go beforehand! You can't submit it until you actually leave on disability, but I dropped it in the mail on the way to the surgery center, and it still didn't matter.
- Ironically, Russ had the same exact surgery as me! He tore the labrum in his right arm playing baseball. He's all done with therapy though and is totally back to normal.
May:
- Pat and I were in the yard with the dogs (we also have a black lab). He was running with them. Not super fast, just chasing them. All of a sudden he dropped to the ground and asked what I threw at him. I told him nothing: why would I throw something at him? I really didn't though. He said it felt like someone took a hard rubber ball and threw it at the back of his calf as hard as they could.
Well, after 6 hours of saying, "No, I don't need to go to the hospital, it'll go away on it's own" he started screaming uncontrollably. I took him to the ER and, long story short, he'd ruptured his calf muscle. Since it took him six hours to get to the hospital, the blood wasn't circulating properly - it was just whirling around between the scraps of muscle. They had to do emergency surgery to try and save his leg, and they found a blood clot the size of a baseball in his calf. If he waited a bit longer to get to the hospital, he would've died from the blood clot .
They did save his leg, and he's back to normal (back to work already). But from May through August, he also was out of work, fighting to get disability.
It was a bad summer for bills getting paid
June part 1:
My grandmother had been sick for a long time. She went on at-home hospice care in January. Although she's my grandmother, I lived with her more than half my life, and she was more like a mother than a grandmother. She's the only mother figure I've had, so we were much more like mother/daughter than grandmother/granddaughter .
She had the end stages of Alzheimer's. One day in June, the hospice nurses said that they couldn't find her pulse so they didn't think she'd make it through the night. Since hospice had an automatic DNR (do not resuscitate), they would not give her any IV's after she lost her ability to swallow.
Well, I don't know about you, but I remember learning in health class that you could go 3 days without water and 7 days without food. My grandma went nine days with no food or hydration. Her medications were liquid, but they weren't very plentiful or nutritious. I don't know how she did it. She wasn't really conscious during those 9 days (when she was, she was extremely distressed and screaming), but she finally passed away. I suppose it would be called peacefully, but I'm still very upset about it .
June part 2:
One day at Agility class, Layla swallowed a toy. One of those stupid furry mouse cat toys. She's played with them forever - usually she'd just carry them around like nothing. This particular mouse was 2 inches LARGER than the ones that she'd usually carry. I tossed it to her at the end of an agility run, we started walking back to her crate - and then I see her take a huge gulp.
I used to be a vet tech, and the trainer and vet all agreed that as long as she kept eating/drinking/bathrooming/acting normal, she'd probably pass it on her own. I kept a close eye on her .
A few days later, she started vomiting blood . I rushed her to the emergency vet. They did x-rays and ultrasounds and said that although there isn't a clear image of a blockage, they wanted to do exploratory surgery just to be sure. The surgery would have been $5000, on top of the $1700 that the little 1 day stay already cost.
I was still out of work, Pat just had his surgery and was out of work and didn't get his checks yet either, and there was no way we had $5000 - or even the $1700. They wouldn't work out any payment plan (they have CareCredit, but my credit is shot from having to wait so long for the &*($^ disability!), and suggested finding a local vet who might work out a payment plan.
I did find a local vet, they took their own x-rays, and had the opposite, more conservative perspective - since there isn't an obvious blockage, they'd rather wait and do surgery when it's necessary. They had me take her home, give her very small amounts of bland food every few hours, and see how she kept it down.
She did vomit a few more times, but she kept eating and drinking and bathrooming. She ended up not needing the surgery, but it was easily the most stressful few days of my life. It was the worst feeling in the world thinking that she could die simply because I don't have money to save her .
It's hard to explain how much an important part of my life Layla is. It's not a normal owner-dog relationship, since we spend all day every day together doing something. Not just playing ball or something, but actually working. I won't bother trying to explain it, because I just can't, but take my word for it - she's everything. It was the worst few days of my life thinking she might die from me not having money to fix her from a stupid $3 cat toy.
She's back to normal now though!
July:
The orthopedist's office was looking at the wrong chart and wrote down on my disability forms that I was fit to return back to work. They canceled my claim, I had to re-apply, and wait another 8 weeks for checks again.
All these things combined made it very difficult to figure out how in the world we could afford to go, but also how desperately we needed to relax and get away! Disney isn't a relaxing vacation compared to camping or a resort, but it's relaxing to us since it's planned to the nth degree and we know what we enjoy and don't enjoy.
After 4 surgeries, 1 almost surgery, 1 death and unimaginable financial problems (which I'm still dealing with, and will keep dealing with until well after I finally return to work), we need some Disney magic!!!
Coming up....how did we manage to pay off the balance?
__________________
Last edited by Wolfy6688; 08-21-2010 at 05:32 PM..
About This Page: 
and 2) I have a LOT of backstory to explain the importance of this vacation!
. I've loved 
Disney for as long as I could remember - I had a huge Mickey on my bedroom wall when I was young, Mickey came to my 3rd Birthday Party (although my dad mysteriously had a doctor's appointment that night...
), the first movie I ever saw in a theater was The Little Mermaid, etc. And none of that has changed, I still love Disney 
! I'm an obsessive planner 
, but it's more of a fun hobby than a chore 
. This will be my 5th trip to WDW. My main hobby outside of obsessing over Disney is dog training. I train and compete with my lovely Malamute, Layla (in my signature) in obedience, conformation (a regular dog show), agility, tracking, weight pulling, carting, and she's an active therapy dog 
. My favorite characters are Mickey and Eeyore, and my favorite movies are Little Mermaid and Robin Hood. 
). This will be our 3rd trip together, and either his 6th or 7th trip total. It's easy to tease him for that, because he has a 13 year head start on me 
Pat's biggest hobby is movies - collecting, watching, anything to do with movies 
. His favorite character is Donald Duck, and his favorite Disney movies are The Aristocats and 101 Dalmatians.
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Pixie Dust
Susan
Cassie
![[SIGPIC]](signaturepics/sigpic27594_7.gif)
Now, please tell us why you need this vacation so much. 
PassPorter Guide Author
, but the problem is, she knows it, too! She's like those little kids that if you tell them, "You're so cute!" they just say "I know." 
Liz 
for the 3 of us, and started to figure out the budget of how much we'd have to put aside each week/month/whatever to meet the deadline.
but I'll get to that later, in part 2 
. Plus, I don't know how it works in your state, but it was a nightmare and a half trying to get disability in the first place. It took nine weeks to get my first check 
. The part about that that upset me the most is, I had all my paperwork prepared and ready to go beforehand! You can't submit it until you actually leave on disability, but I dropped it in the mail on the way to the surgery center, and it still didn't matter. 
.
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