Preparing to Fly & Jonah's First Video Log

Hello friends, family, and fellow travelers,

Justin - Time has flown since we started preparing to leave the house for the year ahead, but we’re ready to take flight this Sunday! It’s been a complicated process of planning and packing, complete with a matching set of complicated and ever-shifting emotions. Speaking for myself, I’ve finally been able to start setting aside the frustrations of dealing with the minutiae of preparation and have been able to enjoy a genuine feeling of excitement now looking ahead. At the same time, new worries make their way into my head on a daily basis - much of which is a variation on “Boy, I hope we have a good time and maintain our sanity.” But lately I’ve also been feeling a new type of concern based around hoping that we’re truly able to make the most of this experience. There’s so much to see and do, and we have to make choices about priorities, so the worries about making the right choices along the way have admittedly been bugging me somewhat.

However this “anticipatory FOMO” that I’ve self-diagnosed for me has a nice silver lining, which is that it’s making me more attuned to how important this year can be for us. I’ve done my best to remind myself what an incredible privilege it is to be able to embark on a journey like this, with four incredible travel companions.

Speaking of which, Jonah, Simon and Calla are joining us in this newsletter edition with their first video dispatch. In his role as lead videographer, Jonah shares some things he’s looking forward to on the trip and interviews his siblings for their thoughts. (Future videos will be uploaded to our official Formidable Five youtube channel, so feel free to subscribe to that one!)

From Sara - I officially closed my private practice on June 12th. It was an incredibly powerful emotional experience. When I talk to my clients about experiencing sadness, I often tell them "don't get sad about everything all at once," as it both feels too big and too vague. For months, when I thought about saying goodbye to all of my clients and my consultation team, it felt too amorphous and overwhelming. The process of sitting down, writing cards, and holding 1:1 space for each client and team member to say goodbye was immensely gratifying, and allowed me to experience sadness, joy, and pride about each individual relationship rather than the totality of what I am leaving behind. I'm looking forward to putting my full focus on my family for a while, though as those of us in my field know, DBT - and the individuals with whom we work - is always with us. 

Shifting gears --

It is utter chaos here as we gear up for our family sabbatical! In the last couple of weeks, we've volunteered at two end of year school carnivals, attended birthday parties, and shlepped everyone to multiple appointments (doctor, hair,  different doctor, still yet another doctor). I've triumphed over the corporate conglomerate that is the American Health Care System, and convinced Regence to pay for four glorious months of medication all at once. This only took approximately ten thousand hours to sort out. I've tried to see as many of my friends as possible, and thus have enjoyed several walks, meals, and drinks with the community we've built here over the past 9 years. We'll miss you all so much!

Over the weekend, we worked on our "practice pack," i.e., taking everything we've been putting aside to take on our trip, organizing it in our family room, adding and removing items as needed, and frantically ordering new things from Amazon. If you'd like to know how many dresses is too many dresses for a year abroad, sadly the answer is 7. Since all of the bags have now successfully closed, my hope is 5 will suffice. "But how will you look all fancy and colorful when you go to Morocco?" you may wonder. I don't know, you guys! I guess that will be a problem for September Sara to solve, probably by going shopping somewhere in Italy. In the last few days, we switched gears and started packing up our house so that our renters can move in a few days after we fly back east. We will stay in a hotel next to SeaTac tomorrow night, so tonight is our final one in our home until next summer. 

After their most recent vacations to Disney World and the Big Island, Hawaii, "Stealther" and "Baby" are looking forward to visiting some new countries. Jonah left on Sunday morning to spend time in Woodstock, NY, with his grandparents. If you're in town and want to say goodbye to us, we'll be hosting a drop in tonight (June 28th) from 4:30 - whenever the food is gone.

We can’t wait to see our east coast friends and family next week, and then we leave for Dubrovnik on July 6th!

xo,

Sara, Justin, Jonah, Simon, & Calla