There’s a pigeon sitting on the lamp post just outside our lounge window. He is grooming himself and has fluffed his feathers up a little. He knows, I think, that autumn is nearly here, and the tree nearby agrees with him, sedately waving to him with the tips of its leaves which are just beginning to change colour.

It’s a new season for our family too in so many ways. Coming out of Covid, getting back to school after the summer, our first child going to high school and our last child starting school. And it’s not just new for the kids – it’s quite novel being at home alone during the day, with no pre-schoolers for company too.

Our new starters have impressed us. Beth (who now likes to be called Bee, this week at least) has approached High School with all her usual optimism and energy, and barely a hint of nerves. Where that girl gets her confidence from I do not know, but it appears that bounding into a new situation assuming you’re going to be absolutely awesome in it actually makes it much more likely that you are. She has thoroughly taken in her stride the early starts, a VERY complicated timetable structure, regular Covid tests and a vast school campus, and although it’s only week 2 we are already very proud of her.

Ben was a little unsure in the run up to starting Primary School. He confessed he was excited about it but also a bit nervous, and several times he said he thought he’d really rather stay at home with Mum and do baking instead of starting school. When the day came though, he was ready in his tiny uniform about 3 hours earlier than necessary and absolutely bounced through the classroom door. He came home proud and excited and has more or less run all the way back there each morning ever since. We’re so grateful that he’s well enough to go to school and that, at this point at least, his condition doesn’t look like it’s going to hold his education back very much at all.

Matt continues with his community outreach work for our lovely church, focussing on relationship with a growing handful of people and offering support where possible through a variety of events and connection points. The Food Pantry project he was working on until a few months ago sadly didn’t work out owing to a lack of available premises to hold it in, but he has found a certain amount of relief in letting it go, along with a new capacity to focus on a more diverse range of ways to support vulnerable local people. And of course he gets out on his new bike wherever possible.

Joe felt rather underwhelmed at not having a major school transition to celebrate like his siblings – just ‘boring old’ going up to P4 – but he got the fun male teacher he was hoping for, and was pleased to be back with his old friends. He seems to be making his mark at football, playing for his team Edinburgh South at weekends and training a few times during the week. The coaches are very complimentary about both his football skills and his easygoing nature, which was a nice surprise (the latter not always being evident at home!).

As for me, it’s rather quiet in the house and I miss my babies, BUT I must confess I have been quite enjoying the time and space to get things done and focus on my own priorities! I have been pushing on with my online TEFL course (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) which a local carer support charity very kindly funded for me. My studies got a bit neglected over the summer, but I’ve got until the end of September to finish it so hopefully I’ll get it all done now there’s a bit of peace and quiet.

When I’m TEFL qualified I’m hoping to get some part time work teaching English (either online or in person) to get some experience. It’s something that is likely to prove useful in the future too. I’ve also heard that volunteer English teachers are needed in work among new arrivals to Edinburgh (asylum seekers, refugees, New Scots) so I’m going to check that out as well.

In breaking news, another work opportunity has also arisen, rather to my surprise. I’m still adjusting to the idea as I haven’t worked outside the home since having children (nearly 12 years ago!). However: yesterday I was offered a job as a shift worker for a charity called Bethany Christian Trust in their Winter Welcome Centre – seasonal emergency accommodation for people who would otherwise be sleeping rough. After a week of training I’ll be working part time from October to early May, and the interviewers have primed me to expect a series of emergencies, conflicting priorities, difficulties, aggressive behaviour and grim menial work. “And,” they added, ‘you’re gonna LOVE it!” Terrified and excited in equal measure!

Ben’s treatment continues to go well. He is still in remission and outwardly looks like any other healthy 5 year old most of the time. The only negative now is that the ongoing chemo is starting to affect him more as time goes on. He’ll be into his final year of treatment from November onwards, and we’ve been warned to expect more illnesses and hospital visits as the chemo drugs have a more marked cumulative effect on his little body. Yay.

Matt had a frank discussion with Ben’s consultant recently, and asked him to be up front about exactly how much medical attention Ben will need once he finishes chemo in November 2022, because – you guessed it – we are still hoping to move to Mexico, and we want to know what is a realistic time frame in which to plan to our departure. Details of what to expect in the future are rarely discussed ahead of time during treatment but our consultant was helpful enough to lay it all out. We weren’t exactly surprised to hear that Ben will still need to be checked and assessed regularly until 6 years after his treatment finishes, but we weren’t delighted either.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that we’ll stay in the UK for the whole 6 years, the idea of which makes us feel quite despairing, if we’re truly honest. We are keen to get out to Mexico and get settled as soon as is safely possible, to establish a permanent family base that our children live in with us for long enough that it feels like home for them too before they grow up and leave us for good. We’re keen to find the work that is ours to carry out and get stuck into, sowing seeds and investing in it for long term fruit. We feel the pressure that we’re not there yet with every passing month, especially when the children are in a mutinous mood and declare that they’re not coming with us, because they’re getting to like it better here.

We do believe that what all 5 of us are doing in Edinburgh right now is valuable and important too so we certainly don’t wish to disparage Scotland or the notion of living and working in the UK. So many people are doing so many wonderful things right here. What we have right now is good, and we try to make the most of it. On empty or frustrating days we can feel we’re ‘wasting time’ because we’re not where we chose to be, but in reality we’re not wasting anything – we’re doing our best to make the most of every opportunity. Plus we are really enjoying spending time with the people we’ve crossed paths with, it’s a huge privilege to be involved with their lives and we’re grateful we’ve had a chance to meet.

However…somehow we just can’t shake the longing to be living a more international, adventurous, cross-cultural, multi-lingual life, however unorthodox – to do many of the same things we’re doing now, but in a very different context. To engage personally with some of the big global issues, to get to know the names of some of the world’s poorest people – and commit to being their neighbours and supporters for the long term. It’s been a dream and a calling (we think) for so long now that we feel we just need to give it a go very soon or regret it forever.

We think it’s still Mexico that we are called to and want to aim for. Inevitably though, things have changed quite a bit in the location we visited in Christmas 2018, and more change is likely to come before we are free to travel, so we feel it would be wise to go through the process of visiting, reflecting, and deciding all over again before we commit for sure. We’re wondering about planning a Mexico visit for Matt and I next year sometime with this in mind, seeing as Ben can’t leave the UK and surely it would be unfair to take his siblings but leave him behind. A child-free trip overseas, what a dreadful prospect!

So, that leaves us, eventually, with the difficult decision about when is a safe time to leave the country and transfer Ben’s treatment overseas. Our first job is to try and research the medical services that would be available in the area we’re looking at, and to get some realistic costings of how much a decent healthcare package would actually cost on a yearly basis. (Any help or suggestions regarding this would be gratefully received – we’re pretty clueless and haven’t got very far in our research yet!)

After treatment finishes, Ben needs to wait at least 6 months for his system to recover before he can be re-immunised with childhood vaccinations, as chemo has destroyed all previous immunity. Only after this is he considered safe for international travel. So unless something changes with Ben’s treatment plan, we definitely wouldn’t leave the UK before June 2023.

After that though, the decision is ours, and it is of course a huge one. Ben’s medical team already think we are a bit foolhardy and overly willing to court risk (eg. because we take him to play parks, forests and don’t peel every grape he ever eats) when they themselves always err heavily on the side of extreme risk aversion. Their preference would be that Ben stays within an hour of the hospital in Edinburgh until he’s at least 12. But although that possibility is unacceptable to us, we are not in fact foolhardy. The responsibility for Ben’s health weighs on us heavily, it’s just that all the other life priorities weigh on us too. It’s actually really hard to balance risk and safety when it’s all based on guess work, bare snippets of information, other people’s knowledge and concerns, and so, so many unknowns.

We are led to understand that necessary contact with Ben’s medical team after treatment will decrease over time, so to begin with he’ll be seen every few months, but by the last few years, check ups are annual. This projected plan though all depends on how he is, how his last year of treatment goes, whether or not the leukaemia comes back, what’s going on with his blood counts and so on. Planning ahead is very difficult.

So. Those of you who pray, we’d appreciate your prayer for:

1. getting accurate information in our research about health care available in Mexico
2. our second round of seeking God, to confirm whether our calling is still to Mexico/will still be in a few years’ time
3. for our decision-making about when to aim to go

We’re incredibly grateful for your continued interest in our story, and for the support you all offer us in so many different ways. Thank you!