Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We hope that you are having a beautiful holiday. Sitting down to our respective meals today, we will both be giving thanks for those who have become friends of One, Unified. We are very grateful for all of them. In turn we have asked some of the folks that we've interviewed in our first 6 weeks to share with us what they themselves are most thankful for today. We hope you'll enjoy seeing them again. 

Wishing you a day filled with gratitude and joy...
Michelle, Noelle, & the many faces of One, Unified. 

-I am grateful that almost every night we sit down to eat as a family. I think this has been lost in many households. We say a prayer and thank God for our house, health, food, clothes, and pray for those who don't have (those things). Peace to all!

-I am grateful for family, friends and online shopping.

-On this Thanksgiving I am most thankful for Jah. I thought about this a lot. Of course when asked this question I think about my one and only daughter and how thankful I am for her-the amazing little person she is and that she's healthy. I think about all of the love and blessings I'm surrounded by and how thankful I am for them. But I know in my heart I wouldn't appreciate them and enjoy them and count those blessings if Jah hadn't touched my heart. I had spent my life searching, hoping wanting to feel something from the Creator. There were times I had given up. I was on my way and didn't know it. In 2011 I had a revelation and was touched by Jah. It was an intense and short experience but one that changed me forever. I'm not sure there's human words to explain but a lifetime of searching, questions, doubt and quite frankly living as kind of a lost soul came to an end instantly. From that day forth every aspect of my life has changed and I'm continually guided and led on the path and philosophies I know I'm meant to live. All of the many blessings I could list come from Jah and I'm so thankful he chose me and grateful for those blessings and the life I live and love and I'm blessed to share. Every day is Thanksgiving. Enjoy the Tofurkey. Jah Bless.

~I'm of course thankful to have survived being in combat. I'm thankful for my friend,  my wife, my rock, the person I could cry in front of about some of the bad things that still haunt me from that combat I survived.  
I am thankful for all the history I've seen in my lifetime. I was born just 2 or 3 weeks after WWII. I was 18 when President Kennedy was assignated.  I was 23 when RFK was killed, 24 when Dr. King was killed. There was Woodstock, man on the moon, the space shuttle,  the space station, landing a rover on Mars and sending back pictures of the Martian landscape. I'm thankful that in 1965, driving to Columbia, I got to see a motel that had water fountains that had "WHITE ONLY' and one marked "COLORED", and now we have an African American President. Most of all I'm thankful for the opportunity to actually think about all that I'm thankful for, and for someone that actually wants to know.

~I am thankful to be alive.  I survived a tour in Iraq.  I survived a ruptured appendix when I was a teenager.  I am thankful for my family and the support they give me. I am thankful for the men and women defending our country's freedom. Lastly, I am thankful for God, whom watches over me and provides me with the things I need.

~I am thankful for having so many things to be thankful for that I can't decide what I am most thankful for. 

I don't think we could have said it better ourselves. 

HOW DO YOU USUALLY SPEND THANKSGIVING?
"Normally we go over my husbands parents house and we all get together and have a nice Thanksgiving where both families contribute to a nice dinner. This year's gonna be a little different since they're in Arizona. I'm gonna be making dinner myself. It's my first time cooking Thanksgiving dinner. Nobody eats turkey (except my husband), so we're gonna start a new tradition. We're gonna make chicken breast for Thanksgiving dinner. 

SO IS IT JUST YOU AND YOUR HUSBAND AND CHILDREN THIS YEAR?
"Yep. Just us. It's kinda weird." 

ARE YOU EXCITED ABOUT THAT OR WILL YOU MISS THAT IT'S NOT THE WHOLE FAMILY?
"I'll kind of miss the whole family. You dread it and drag your feet getting ready and you're like, "I don't wanna do this".  But once you're there you're like, "Wow, this is nice", and it makes it feel like the holidays. Just being in my own house might make me a little sad, but I can be in my PJ's."

WHAT ARE YOU MOST THANKFUL FOR THIS THANKSGIVING?
"Of course I'd have to say my Madelyn (one of her twin daughters). That she's healthy and with us after her battle with HUS (Hemolytic-Uremic Syndrome). It's usually associated with an E coli infection and it destroys your red blood cells. If you looked under a microscope it would look like sickle cell anemia. They're broken (the cells) and it clogs up all your organs, clogs your brain, everything shuts down. Madelyn had a rare form of that from strep, it's called Strep Pneumococci HUS, and if you Google it, you'll get a lot of Dr.'s stuff, but not Web MD type of stuff (for patients to read). You'll find stuff on E coli HUS, but not this one. It's a much rarer form and more aggressive. It shut her kidneys down, she was on life support, in the blink of an eye, from a germ. We struggled for seven weeks in the hospital with her. She came out of it and we're very blessed for that. She does have permanent kidney disease, stage 3. She's still on a feeding tube. She has developmental delays due to all this, but you'd never know 'cause she has a smile on her face and runs around like a happy four year old.  I'm very thankful for that. This experience has taught us life lessons. Your really don't realize your every day life is, "I gotta get this done. I gotta go pay this." None of it matters. It's all stupid and dumb. This focused us on what was important in life." 

WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?
"When she was 2 years old, November 7, 2012. She was admitted with pneumonia and in the middle of the night, a rapid response team came into the room and rushed us out. They were real calm. I have to give it to the nurses and staff. They didn't say, "Oh my God, there's something terribly wrong!". They just said "We're just gonna keep a closer eye on her" and they were smiling. You gotta give it to them for not panicking a parent and they calmly took me into the ICU with her. Her kidneys shut down, so she blew up very quickly. She had 8 blood transfusions, 5 days of plasma transfusions. The Red Cross came in with volunteers to do that. It's not a service a regular hospital does, the Red Cross is the only one that does that. They volunteer their time, the nurses and everything and it's amazing." 

THAT'S SOMETHING ELSE TO BE THANKFUL FOR, ISN'T IT?
"Absolutely. And Dr. Connelly (Nephrologist at St. Christopher's Hospital), who diagnosed her. A lot of times, what kills children from HUS is not being diagnosed quickly enough. Thankfully, she (the Dr.) was on call when this came down. I'm part of an HUS support group and a lot of parents didn't have their children make it through this. There's one in particular: she was three when she was diagnosed. I'm good friends with her mom in our support group. She was one that didn't make it. She died during the symptomatic phase. She had the E coli type. But because of what she went through, the doctors learned from it. As horrible as it is that they learned from her what they SHOULDN'T do, they have learned so much more than they knew 12 years ago. It's heartbreaking. She was a groundbreaker for the kids today. 
Madelyn did recover, we were very blessed with that."

HOW WILL THIS AFFECT HER IN THE FUTURE?
"She still has a very bad food aversion, she was left with a sensory dysfunction in her mouth from being intubated for so long. She doesn't like food in her mouth, so she has a very adverse reaction to certain textures. She has a G tube ( in her stomach) to give her nutrients and medicines. She has high blood pressure. She'll have that for life.  She has iron, vitamin D, and electrolyte deficiencies. So every two hours she has fluids pumped into her. The only time there's a break is at bedtime. She's going to pre-k right now and I have to send a nurse to school since there's no nursing staff at the school. She's immune-compromised as well. A few weeks ago, both of them (twins) had bronchitis. The doctors said it was viral and that Allison's will pass on it's own, but Maddy we needed to take to the ER for a nebulizer treatment and she was on those for two weeks, every four hours because she also has scarring on her lungs from the pneumonia she had two years ago.  And because she has stage 3 kidney disease and her kidneys are scarred and aren't growing with her,  she'll eventually need a kidney transplant." 

WHEN WILL THEY DO THAT?
"It's a guessing game.  It could be ten years from now, it could be five years from now. As she grows, it's just gonna get worse. We wanna hold on to the kidneys she she has for as long as we can." 

DOES SHE UNDERSTAND WHAT'S HAPPENED TO HER?
"She does to an extent. She has a lot of developmental delays and autism (high functioning) so there's a lot of stuff she doesn't understand. She knows she has to get medicine. She'll pull her shirt up and say "Mommy, medicine." She knows she has to get her temperature, blood pressure, pulse-ox. She knows it's a routine we do every day and she's really good about it. As far as cognitively, I don't think she understands. Her twin sister does though.  She'll say "Maddy is sick" or "Maddy, are you ok today?".  
But through everything, we have her. We physically have her here. We have her smiling, saying "I love today. Today's the best day ever!". Or she'll be looking at a cross and saying "Look there's Jesus!  Jesus smiles at me!"  She's with us.  I've learned so much more about her in two years than probably any parent might know about their child in a lifetime. Two years ago, holding her hand, I thought, "I don't know her favorite color". I was worried about going to work at my new job. It really put stuff in perspective.  My family is my job. That made me focus better. Now I know her favorite color(s). They're purple and red. Everything has to be purple and red, and she loves smily faces." 

WHY DO YOU THINK YOU DIDN'T KNOW THESE THINGS THEN?
"Some of it was her age, but also, I wasn't as focused on them. It was more, "Okay, they're (her children) situated, I got a babysitter, let me get to my job. I have to prove myself since I've only been here (her job at the time) for 6 weeks. I have to put myself out there. I have to be the star." That drive, you start something, you move forward, you get tunnel vision. Something like this will push you back and you look at the full picture. 
But, she's wonderful. And for us to make it through....a lot of parents don't get the opportunity to get that second chance. On our HUS support group, there's articles that parents can stuffer PTSD because it's such a horrendous disease. Last year on the one year anniversary, I just collapsed and I didn't wanna go anywhere, didn't want anyone near the house, near Madelyn. And this year, I said you know what, I'm not gonna feel like that victim anymore. I'm not gonna let her be a victim anymore. We're not victims, we're surviviors. We're gonna stand a little straighter, a little taller and we're gonna share and let people know that bad stuff happens, but it's how we move on from it. I'm very thankful for the little smile, the little giggle and her running down the hallway saying "Mommy, guess what!? I farted-ed." It's those little things. I look over at my husband and go "This is why it's ok. We're grateful to hear that little voice."

Thanksgiving is a very unique time of year. While it lacks some of the modern fanfare and commercialism that pepper so many of the other holidays throughout the year, it still holds a very unique place within our holiday spectrum. For some people that is the draw. Family... friends... food. No presents to buy. No spending hours putting up the perfect lights and decorations… For others Thanksgiving is something of a forgotten holiday. Nestled between the fun and adventure of Halloween, and the gift bearing winter holidays (Christmas, Hanukkah etc), it's thought of by some as nothing more than a day to stuff your face until you are full. 
Thanksgiving has taken on different connotations throughout the years than those which were originally intended. And I think it's important to note that despite any historical or cultural implications of the holiday, for many, Thanksgiving has simply become a day to be proud of, to be thankful for, and to honor what you have.
While we all may enjoy the rituals and traditions that we have made with our friends and family surrounding the holiday, this also an excellent time to think about the every day things that we take for granted. It's an excellent time to think about those who are less fortunate than ourselves. It is an excellent time for gratitude. Through all the ups and downs, the hardships, the truly significant and even tragic moments of life, one thing has always stood true; even in the darkest hours, seated in the darkest depths of despair, there is always, always something to be thankful for.
While we are both individually thankful for our families, our children, our friends, and the many blessings that we have in our lives, we are also thankful for you. We are thankful for every person who is reading this right now. We are thankful for everyone who has stopped by to support us. We are thankful for everyone who has read our blog, liked our Facebook page, followed us on Twitter, shared our photos and posts and so much more. We are grateful for the support that we have found in this endeavor. We are grateful that our friends and those closest to us supported us through the start of this project and continue to do so today. We are both honored and appreciative of everyone who has answered questions, been the subject of photos, participated in interviews, all in the interest of helping us get this project off the ground.
Whatever it is that you are thankful for this year, whatever it is that fills you with the most gratitude and joy, embrace it. Because at the end of the day those things are all that really matter.
Happy Thanksgiving!
 From One, Unified.

*Please join us all week for stories of gratitude and thanks. And share your own in the comments!*