 Good morning, my beautiful internet friends, and welcome back. I just realized, looking at the VFinder now, that I made a severe and lasting error in judgment, and that was that I decided to wear a gray shirt today, along with the gray bedsheets, the gray hope sign, and my gray walls. But my favorite color is purple, you would just never know it. It has been a T-minus two days until I have my second below-the-knee amputation. What about is a lot to deal with? I thought that we would take today's video to focus on the reason why I did this in the first place. Honestly, I think this will be helpful for me, and I thought it'd be fun to share this with you guys because I talked about the reason I had this amputation in the first place. I mean, I was tired of living in pain, and I wanted to live a more active life, because being active is a huge part of my identity, that I just haven't really been able to share with you guys a lot over the past 10 months. But there are so many things that I am ridiculously excited about. There are so many things that I am like, hardly even want to think about, because they get me so excited, like the possibility of them happening is simultaneously the most exciting thing and the most heartbreaking thing, because I can't hurt them just yet, but it could be coming, and it could be coming soon. So these are the things that I am looking forward to. These are the things that I would be taking you guys along with me to do, and the reason why I started down this road in the first place, as I headed to my second amputation, knowing how rough it's gonna be. Also, I found out a couple of days ago that it's gonna be a five-hour surgery. My first amputation was two and a half. Yeah, they're doing a lot of stuff this time. It's gonna be a complicated one with two surgeons and a surgeon in training, so I will be in good hands. With that being said, these are the things, big and small, that I cannot wait to do and to share with you guys when I get there. Let's start with a simple one. Walk my dogs around the block. On days when my ankle would allow me to, I used to get up in the morning and would take my three puppy dogs, because I could walk three dogs all by myself. I'm actually pretty proud of that, because they're big dogs. Like, two of them are 80-pound-journum shepherds, and one's like a 40-pound adorable mutt. I'd walk them around the neighborhood at like 5.30 or 6 in the morning. The sun's coming up in Colorado, and it's freaking gorgeous. And it's so peaceful, and I turn on some music or a good podcast and just walk. And those are like some of the most peaceful moments I can remember, and I haven't been able to do that in so long. And that is one of the most exciting, simple, ridiculously little things that I cannot wait to do, just take my dogs for a walk in the morning. Secondly, a little bit of a bigger goal. I want to go for a jog with my dad. When I was a kid, before any of this happened, before I fell off the horse, I shattered my ankle that led to all of this. I would go jogging with my dad sometimes when I was a kid. And I didn't like care about fitness or moving or anything like that. So it was kind of like a bore back then, but he's big into jogging, and it would be freaking incredible to be able to go jogging with my dad. Building on that, getting a little bit bigger with the vision. I want to run a 5K, but I think what I actually want to do is run a marathon for no other reason than saying that I can, but I could like actually run, that I could actually do that. I think that'd be amazing to accomplish. I'd probably like drag some friends along with me. And Brian said he would do it, so I'm gonna hold him to that. I live in Colorado, and if you don't know about Colorado, we have a ton of 14ers, which are mountains that are over 14,000 feet. They are intense to climb. You can get to the top of, I think all of them actually. And I would love to hike at 14 here. I did it once. We did the easiest one. It destroyed my ankle, but I could like say as a Colorado resident that I had done it, but I want to be able to do that again, and maybe again and again. Hike on the weekends with Brian and the puppies, just locally, we would take the dogs out on the weekend to local places in the area and let the dogs go swimming or just like find cool mountain places to go. And that's like what my heart is. I find so much joy in doing that, and we love doing that together. Swing dancing. So if you watched one of my videos that long ago, I used to go swing dancing every Sunday night in high school, and I love it. I love dancing. Zero skill, no skill. Unbelievably white in the stereotypical white people can't dance when it comes to dancing, but I love it. I love, I love, I love dancing. So I want to be able to go swing dancing again, and I want to be able to dance like an idiot at concerts. Like I'm going to a Lewis Capaldi concert in October, and you know, I'll still be recovering from surgery then for sure, but I want to be able to just like dance like an idiot at any concert that I go to because I love being able to like move with the music and not worry about my ankle hurting or falling over because I'm on crutches. Do the incline again. So the incline is this ridiculously difficult short hike in Colorado Springs. It used to be railroad tracks up to the Toppikes Peak. It's like a crazy elevation gain in a very short period of time. People have died on the incline. You have to be reasonably physically fit to do it. It's like a big accomplishment. And I'm going to do that with my carbon fiber rocket foot. Just you wait. I want to be able to wear high heels on a date with my husband, Brian. I've never been able to wear high heels ever. Like even a tiny little bit of the heel would give my ankle a lot of problems, a lot of pain. So flats forever for me, but I want to be able to wear high heels and certain prosthetic legs. I could actually do that. And I think that that would be so cool to do. And this doesn't require a working prosthetic leg, but just get back to Jiu-Jitsu. I would love to get back to Jiu-Jitsu and even like go to a competition again without leg because Jiu-Jitsu was in my blood. It is like a part of who I am and I miss it so much. And soon I will return to the mats. So my family has this tradition that while my mom is like making food on Thanksgiving at the house, the boys or whoever's there will go out and play frisbee golf at this course near our house. And the last few years I haven't gone because my ankles were wreck. I want to go do that with them. Maybe even this Thanksgiving I want to be able to go and play frisbee golf with them. Run with the Bulls in Barcelona. Or is it Madrid? I'm not sure. I actually don't want to do either one of those things but it sounds cool. Go back to Ireland and walk around the streets of Dublin with Brian and or friends. Going to Ireland was amazing on the eye walk but there were a lot of restrictions or a lot of things that I couldn't do and it was a challenge. I would love to go back there because I freaking loved it there. Specifically like walk through the city. Just be able to walk because I love walking through the city. That's something that Brian and I love doing. And we weren't really able to do that at all last time. So that's what I'd like to do in the future. Last but not least, I'd like to be able to bike to a local coffee shop on like Sunday to do work with Brian because he's always studying something. I'm always working on like editing a video on the weekends and there's this adorable coffee shop that's not far from our house but if we had bikes and I had a working leg we could totally bike to and that just sounds dreamy and wonderful and yes. Along with that, I also made myself a list of things that don't involve a working prosthetic leg or even a working leg to do to look forward to these. I think putting all my eggs in one basket just looking forward to things after surgery that have to do with it working is maybe not the best idea because I know that setbacks happen. I know that things do happen. So here are five things that I am excited to do after surgery that don't require it working. First thing, the Louis Capaldi concert. I love him. I've loved him before he was popular. I've been dying for him to come to America for years and he's finally coming to Denver and we're gonna go see him sing and I'm really excited about that. Secondly, giving a TED talk. Gosh darn it, one day I will give my TED talk and yes, I do talk about it like it's mine. Like I've earned it, which I definitely haven't. I look forward to earning the privilege of being able to give a TED talk that is a huge goal of mine. Third, developing the art skills some more. I have not worked on my art in a really long time. I'd like to be able to take the time to actually do that, to focus and to let go some and to develop that skill. Fourth, see where this channel goes. I absolutely love doing YouTube. It is so much fun to me. It's like so much self-expression and connection with you guys and I am really excited to see where this goes regardless of how surgery goes. And fifth, last but not least, I'm excited to nurture new and old friendships. We've had a number of new friends that we've met this year that are just wonderful to be around and it's really cool to have that, especially as an adult having new friends. I feel super, super great for that. You guys know who you are. Thank you. And I'm incredibly blessed to have friends who are really good friends, who I have not had a lot of time to spend with lately. I've been super overwhelmed working full time, doing YouTube, trying to keep my mental health intact before surgery and now having surgery. And after that's over, I'm really looking forward to having more time to spend on my relationships, the relationships that matter in my life with my friends and with my family. Also, there was kind of a secret motive in making this video. See if I actually put it out in front of everybody, then I get to take this footage and play it back when I do those things. So like when I climb the incline, I'll pull a piece from this video and I'll be like, months ago, I said I was gonna do this and look, I did. And I think that'll be a really cool, exciting moment for me to probably make me sob, have tears because I cannot wait to start doing things. I cannot tell you how much I cannot wait to start doing things. And that's why I'm trying to keep in mind heading into the surgery that there's a reason I'm doing all this. I'm not just going through all of this for nothing. Whether or not it works, I have incredible things to look forward to. Yeah, it's really hard. Yeah, I'm not looking forward to this one bit, but it's worth it. It's absolutely worth it. I'm not sure if this is gonna be the last video before surgery. It's probably not, but it might be. I might not be around here for a few days. If that's the case, please check Instagram for any updates about my surgery. I'm sure I'll be fine. I'm sure to go well, but please check out my Instagram down below. If you wanna follow me there and see how things go. A huge thank you to my patrons, new and old, who have been sponsoring me and sponsoring this channel. You guys make all this possible. Thank you. And thank you watching this video right now for taking a few minutes of your day to spend a period with me. That makes the world team. I love you guys. I'm thanking you and I'll see you in the next video. Bye guys. 🎵 Hand her from the sky all about... 🎵