How a Carnival Cruise Saved Me From Depression

After my last article, my cousin, Erin suggested that I take on a lighter subject and abandon my strong political passions, temporarily and write about something a little sweeter. Erin suggested that I write about French toast. I must say that I actually do feel pretty passionately about my ability to make fabulous French toast. While I was musing over the idea about writing on the subject of toast I couldn’t help but naturally think about the ingredients used to make my wonderful French toast. I thought about the Texas toast used to make my French toast, the eggs, milk, powdered sugar, strawberries and then I remembered the vanilla, the Mexican vanilla I had gotten in Cozumel less than two weeks ago. It’s hard to believe that I was just on a Carnival Cruise headed for Mexico.

This was a pretty significant event for me because my days mainly consists of television, napping, and doctors appointments. Strangely enough, Erin and I have the same auto-immune disease and our days, moans and groans are pretty much the same. Usually during all the television watching I am on the phone with Erin. Most times we opt for not talking and just sort of hold the phone occasionally making comments about whatever we are watching on TV or what happened to be flaring up that particular day. This is not to say that we never have lengthy conversations about really important issues but we are definitely not intimidated by silence.

It was during one of these conversations that we decided that we needed to do something, anything. Erin and I had both sort of put life on hold and thought once we got a little better we’d rejoin the world or at least start getting dressed every day. Whenever I start thinking about getting on track and going after my dreams, writing is never far off. I suggested to Erin that we start journaling about our journey with Lupus and then combine our thoughts and write a book together. Erin agreed that the journaling was a good idea and a book could be as well. The more we talked about writing the more encouraged we became about life. We soon decided that waiting to get better was a flawed idea because there was the real possibility that we might not get better in fact we could get worse.

After this jaw dropping realization, we started to talk about things we wanted to do but figured we were too sick to do them. Erin and I are cousins who have the same disease but we also have very different personalities and dreams. One thing that we did agree on is that we both wanted to travel. Then I suggested that we should try and take little trips and write about our experiences and having an auto –immune disease changes the way you live life and that includes the way you travel. Almost simultaneously we said that we wanted to go to Hawaii. We started researching plane tickets, cruises to Hawaii and hotels in Hawaii. We quickly realized that Hawaii was going to have to wait and we’d have to find some more economical excursion. Erin is a master search sensei when it comes to finding things, anything online. Shortly after the realization sunk in that Hawaii was not happening Erin suggested a cruise.

We both thought that a cruise was an ingenious idea for us. If we just got on the boat we had accomplished something. We knew we’d be happy if we did nothing else but get to our cabin and spend the few days just lying around and resting. Erin quickly found a cruise that was in our price range and the port was in Alabama which was not unreasonable for her living in Georgia and not impossible for me living in Tennessee. Within 24 hours we had contacted Carnival and booked our trip. The price of the cruise was so reasonable that we decided to take Erin’s children with us so that they’d get an opportunity to see Mexico and we decided to invite our mothers because they just needed vacations as well, Erin’s sister and my other cousin also decided to go with us. Erin and I felt very strongly that this trip was the beginning of us reclaiming our lives.

Finally the trip date arrived and Erin and her bunch met me and my best friend, Franchel in Mobile, Alabama. During the weeks leading up to the cruise various issues arose and so my mother was unable to go and Franchel had taken her place in the eleventh hour. We planned to spend two days in Mobile so that Erin and I would have time to recuperate from that drive before we boarded the ship. That ended up being one of the smartest things we have ever done. We enjoyed Mobile so much that we couldn’t believe that our real adventure had not even begun yet. Two days later we excitedly got in line and the Carnival cruise port in Mobile.

After about eight minutes waiting in the seemingly never ending line I started to feel that perhaps this was a bad idea. I gave Erin a look and she knew what I was thinking and she said, “suck it up we are going to make it. My feet hurt too, get over it.” I thought to myself if I had any energy left I’d roll my eyes at her. When we finally made it through the line and got to our cabin I admitted to myself that Erin had been right about sucking it up. As soon as we got in the cabins Erin and I went straight for our beds. It was heaven. We were so tired and beat down but we had made it. We made it. We relaxed for what felt like ten minutes and then we heard this announcement saying there was a mandatory safety training five floors up and we could not take the elevators! I tried my hardest to convince Erin that we should just shut our door as there was no way they would know we skipped the demonstration. Again, the overseer aka Erin told me to suck it up and we were going. After I made it up about four floors my legs started to shake uncontrollably and I felt like a baby doe trying to take its first steps. Finally I made it to the auditorium and was grateful to make it to a chair. After a brief demonstration, we were then instructed to go up one more flight of steps to the deck for further instructions. I looked at Erin with such pain in my eyes saying please don’t make me and as you probably guessed she made me. I mumbled to myself that this was no vacation - this was boot camp!

After the Carnival staff explained to us the emergency procedures for exiting the boat to board the unsinkable lifeboats. I thought while waiting for the demo to stop “why isn’t the ship made of the same material as the lifeboats?” No sooner did that cross my mind and we were off. As soon as I realized we were sailing all of my negativity dissipated and I felt happy. In the weeks leading up to the cruise, I had promised Erin’s children that I would be in the same cabin with them. When the plans changed and Franchel not my mother went with us I decided that the same sleeping arrangements should apply and I bunked with Erin and the kids and Franchel with my aunt and cousin. Initially, I was nervous feeling that I’d be torn between friend and family. I was also worried that Franchel would feel awkward with her bunking arrangement. I soon realized that all was well and Franchel fit in perfectly with my aunt and cousin and all of my worries left me and I just enjoyed my trip.

The staff on the Carnival Holiday were wonderful. The children were treated like rock stars and there was something for everyone. Erin and I took our fair share of naps, the kids went to camp on the ship, my aunt and cousin just spent countless hours on the deck looking out into the sea and Franchel played games, sang karaoke and became one of the crews’ photographers' favorite muses. We had all found our niche and were content. Our first day in Mexico was eye opening for Erin and me. Between the heat and the expectation to stay awake all day was a rude awakening. I don’t know how we did it but we managed to take a tour at "Discover Mexico" and do some shopping in Cozumel. I think we all bought blankets, rugs, bags, maracas and were given free bottles of tequila.

I think between the seven of us we took over a thousand pictures not to mention all the glossy beautiful Lola Falana pictures that were taken of Franchel by the ship photographers. Francki was the supermodel of the trip. We took a group picture before the start of our day in Mexico and then there was one taken of us all after the day in Mexico. Everyone in the after picture, with the exception of Francki, looked beat down like we had been ridden hard and put up wet and then there is Francki looking like she had been photo shopped in wearing her slinky Ginger from Gilligan’s Island dress. The rest of us are dripping wet with sweat while Franchel is smiling big and looking flawless but despite our appearance Erin and I had done what we set out to do and then some.

Again it must be said that the staff on the Carnival Holiday were awesome. The dinner staff in the four winds dining room were incredible they were the nicest and sweetest people. By the last night we felt as if we were with family. I cannot end this without mentioning the plethora of food that was on the ship. There was always something to eat and I was always ready to eat. The first day on the ship, I ate breakfast three times. That was not a mistake I ate breakfast three times. The first time I ate breakfast it was with my family in the dining room. The food was good but the portions weren’t exactly what we needed that particular morning and so after we ate there we hit the lido deck for a buffet style breakfast. After this meal, I parted ways with my family and went to retrieve Franchel who was sleeping late. When I caught up with her she then wanted me to go to the lido deck with her so that she could get breakfast. Who could resist eating again??? This was a food paradise. Later that day I went back to the room to take a nap. As soon as I got to the room I started to feel horrible. The pain and nausea that I felt was unlike anything I have ever known and I have had chemo. I had eaten myself silly. I grabbed the trash can and lay on my bed with my head in the pail. After what felt like hours I finally was relieved by vomiting. No sooner than I finished Erin entered the room and immediately made a face because the smell of my vomit hit her hard. She asked me, “What did you eat?” I thought what I didn’t I eat. I started listing my gluttony to Erin. She just stood staring at me with disbelief as I tried to justify the four ice cream cones I had eaten with Franchel and the kids. Finally she looked at her watch and said “it’s not even 4:00 yet.” And yes later that same evening I ate again and I had another ice cream cone for the fifth time that day.

The last night on the ship was bitter sweet for us all. We were anxious for home but didn’t want to leave the ship. Erin and I felt that we had accomplished our goals. We had made it to the ship and had even managed to get off the ship two days in a row to explore Mexico and we got up and dressed every day. We had taken our trip and had done it our way.

*some names have been substituted*

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