CareAline: A mother’s road to SXSW and how she is impacting pediatric health

Kezia sums it up in a guest blog post she did for VectorBlog.org , a Boston Children’s Hospital blog. The past week has been stressful for her – she needed a way to process our wins at Impact Pediatric Health and on top of that managing her health. She needs sleep and I will get that arranged. She needs a couple of days off to reboot. Anyone have a condo in the mountains they want to donate for a weekend? Sometimes I am not a good person to process with.. I had been so focused on making sure we are prepared for growth, meetings, follow up, number crunching to show just how much of an impact we can have. Ug… Its a lot, however this is what we signed up for and we shall deliver. We are excited for our project with the Dallas Mavericks; Its a good feeling watching our products get the recognition, and its rewarding watching Kezia become a known advocate and leader in pediatric innovation arena. The bottom line is, we are helping more kids and adults with CVC’s and PICC Lines. PICC Line care is a major concern for caregivers and patients. Central Line protection and infection control is a big deal and we have walked in the shoes of a parent taking care of our chid’s PICC Line and Broviac. For me, my experience during this event and after has been good. Its what we asked for, this is what we have been working for for the last couple of years. I just really enjoy watching Kezia lead the way on shaking up pediatric health. Kezia is a wonderful writer .. follow the link to Vector – Please share on your Facebook & Twitter.. thank you

vectorblog.org/2015/03/carealine-a-mothers-road-to-sxsw

We are off to Austin.. keep fingers crossed

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We spent a couple of days with family in NOLA.. My mom hasn’t been well, however she looks great and seems to be getting better. Congestive heart failure, kidney and liver failure all take their toll on a person. She is strong, motivated and has lived for over 10 years with the heart failure. She and my dad inspire us to keep going and stay strong.. and tell us that under any circumstance, do not let anyone stop us and never take “NO” for an answer.

Kezia still has back pain. I fear its from her own cancer. Of course, I tend to worry to much. Lochlan still isn’t feeling well. His appetite has been low, upset stomach and just a bit clingy. As a parent of a child who died of cancer, Neuroblastoma, you always worry about your other children; I wonder, does he have early stages and we don’t know it? No, its such a low probability – like almost 0% chance. But its still a fear and most other parents in our support circle and beyond have the same fears. The reality is, the travel and not having his regular diet takes a tole. Plus, we feel the largest factor to him not feeling well is he is cutting a tooth.

In about half an hour we are setting off for Austin. Its about 8 hours.. 10 with Lochlan. This is ok because we want to make sure he gets some exercise and a chance to get out and run around a bit during the trip.

We have a lot of work to do while driving. We are still preparing for this pitch coming up Monday. We are nervous, however not that much. The bottom line is, its our pitch, our company, our product and design – we know it and we got this!

Kezia has done a great job writing the pitch and working with our coaches to refine it to be the most impactful. We will write more tonight or later today..

CareAline’s Trip to Austin for Impact Pediatric Health at SXSW – Day 1.. Finally, the day is over and sleep time is near..

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Today has had its ups and downs. It started down. I had to set a limit on how long we were going to work on the camper this morning; For u to find a short in the wiring inside the camper meant that we would need to either remove the fake wood paneling in hopes of finding the wiring.. or pulling the entire harness and replacing it. Neither option worked for us at this time. We needed to get on the road regardless. We started working on it at 8 am.. we stopped at 11’ish am. Making the decision This was a small blow to us financially. We planned the drive and camping to save money.. I (mike) was so frustrated and really getting down on myself for not testing that wiring a week ago..My father in law Craig and I replaced the wiring harness that goes from trailer to car and it worked fine hooked up to his truck.. so we assumed it would work on mine..

I want to clarify what I mean by camping i this situation.. In the summer we camp for fun.. to hike, sight see, explore, teach our son about nature, campfires, marshmallows and the occasional craft beer.. Sleeping out in nature – we tent camp in the summer. In this instance and for this trip, what I mean by camping is – we drive all day, pull into a campground at night, not even unhook.. we pop up the camper, turn the heater on and go to sleep. Then get up early in the morning, like 5am, crank the camper down, get in the car and hit the road aging.. on average, it would have cost us anywhere from $15 – $30 per night -vs- $100-$140 a night in a hotel.

Although the morning was a drag.. once we got on the road we felt much better. I was getting pretty nervous because we need to go see Mikes family in Louisiana first (its on the way). Mike’s mom has not been feeling well and was just released from the ICU.. She has congestive heart failure.. She is strong and not willing to let things bring her down and keeps moving forward.. We will spend a couple of days with them and then head off to Austin.

When we started raising money on the Indigogo site to help with this trip, it was budgeted for camping.. not hotels.. Although we are stressed out.. we have a mission and we try hard to keep that mission in focus…

Lochlan is ready for bed, which means all lights out.. Good night, thanks for reading and we will have much more on our story tomorrow..

Cheers

http://igg.me/at/CareAlineRoadTrip

Mike & Kezia

Finally on our way to Texas for the Impact Pediatric Health Competition at SXSW

We told Lochlan we were going to texas, he got dressed for it… oops..

Our trip to Austin, TX.. the beginning. Not so fast. …..

Posted by CareAline® Products

I decided to blog our trip. CareAline Products chosen as finalist in a very important competition at this years SXSW Impact Pediatric Health. As mentioned in my last post, this is a pretty big deal; and getting there and pitching could mean a very important step in the growth of our business. Getting there is proving to be an issue. Our grand plan is to drive (to expensive to fly) and camp to save money. On top of it all, my mother is not well and I need to see her. So we are going to stop by New Orleans on the way to SXSW. We were suppose to leave today (thursday). However due to storms moving through the south, we postponed until tomorrow. Today we get the camper packed and the car packed. It was all hitched up and ready to go.

Oooppps , the running lights do not work on the camper. I was freezing. I had been outside for an hour and a half already… I called Craig, my paw-in-law, and he came over. We troubleshooted and it came down to this: There seems to be a short in the wiring deep inside the frame of the trailer. So we need to pop up the camper, empty it and try to find the wiring short. We will try to do this first thing in the AM…craig said it could take an hour, or a few hours to figure out. If we need a part, that puts us back another day. I am frustrated, however keeping focus. Our back up plan is to scrape our pennies and stay in hotels. It will ad about $800 to our budget, which we don’t have. We are a start up with a very tight and lean budget. Why is it so difficult to leave and see my mom and pitch our company in a competition? I feel bad for Kezia.. she needs a break. I worry that the stress is bad for her cancer. It will need to work out. We are on a mission.

http://igg.me/at/CareAlineRoadTrip

Last night trying to figure out wiring.. 5 below 0 degrees – it sucks…