Hurricane Ike, My Personal Experience

I have been up for thirty seven hours! (forgive this post if it does not make sense)

We boarded up the windows, packed the car, and headed to my parents for safety. As expected, Henry did not do well on the trip over. He hid under pillows for four hours. I really do not think he could have made a long evacuation trip.

As you know...I WANTED to EVACUATE for Hurricane Ike--but my husband, Josh refused. I cried. Cried some more. And guess what...Josh won. He made me realize that Henry would have a difficult time in the car, and he reminded me of the LONG TWENTY TWO HOUR (non-stop)trip we made while evacuating for Hurricane Rita, and I (in the end) let Josh talk me into staying.

When we arrived at my moms--the weather reports kept changing. Changing for the worse. We discussed leaving--and at one point we almost did leave. BUT...we didn't.

So...we made the best of a horrible situation. We all enjoyed the wonderful meal my mother prepared. We watched two movies. AND we watched the news, and watched the news and watched the news. At 1:05 a.m. we lost power and the generator kicked in.

I fretted on where the safest place was in the house. I wondered if the roof fell on me--would I survive. My heart broke when hearing the news of the ten year old that was killed by a falling limb and the ten individuals tied together stranded on top of a church roof.

We started to really feel winds around 9:45 p.m. It sounded like you were at the beach listing to the ocean waves. About 11:30 p.m. we started having the strong gust of winds. By 1:00 a.m. I was terrified.

The sounds of trees failing. Looking outside seeing the horrible damage that was happening around us. And all we could do was have faith that God would see us through the storm.

I made a pallet on the floor in the hall--and laid there until I heard a tree fall. I then moved my pallet into the living room. Josh and I laid there--wide awake, watching the news and wondering if this storm would ever end.

Seriously...waiting for the storm to pass seemed like forever!

I prayed for my family, friends and everyone who was going through the misery of "the unknown." I prayed, prayed some more,

The sounds. The sights. The unknown made me sick! I was hot. I was sick to my stomach. I just wanted to throw up. I was miserable!

I kept watching the news thinking...PLEASE say it is over! PLEASE say we have a happy ending.

By 6:45 a.m. daylight started illuminating the damages! WOW--!!!

(I lost power last night and I am on DIAL-UP--I was too tired to post--I will finish this post later) but people are wanting to see pictures---

Hope everyone is safe! Much love--I will write more tonight.

(NOTE--I was finishing last night and the generator quit--I was too tired to re-post (due to this SLOW DIAL UP!) Friends are wanting to see pictures--

Will post more later tonight (IF we can find gas to keep running the generator)