Dad's perspective

For those of you expecting something from Amanda, sorry to disappoint you. This is about me. :0) I don't keep a journal and this is as close as it will probably get but I wanted to record my thoughts and feelings during the week of Yolanda. Liz suggested that I post it here.

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Wednesday November 6 we heard of a tyhpoon headed toward the Philippines. Looking at the trajectory of the storm it seemed it would pass right through Leyte island near Tacloban where Amanda was assigned. Being the map freak that I am I looked up as much information as I could on where the storm was and where it would go, not really worrying about Amanda's safety as I was just collecting information. But as the storm got closer to her I heard more about it being a super storm and the biggest storm on earth so far this year and winds reaching incredible speeds. Then I started watching as a concerned parent. Where would the strongest part of the storm hit?

Thursday morning I tracked the storm and watched it get closer and closer to land. The eye wall was supposed to hit land at 2pm our time in Guiuan and then Tacloban by 4pm. I watched on the radar as the eye passed just south of Tacloban which means that the eye wall where the strongest winds would be was right in the middle of Tacloban city. I didn't know anything about storm surges or what that meant or what to expect. Liz and I went to a Relief Society dinner that night not worrying very much. We felt she was ok.

Friday morning Liz heard from another missionary mom that the news reported that all missionaries in the Philippines were accounted for. So we relaxed. But later in the day we started to wonder because we didn't see the same story on the LDS news room site. There was nothing at all. So we started to worry and wonder. Later that day we saw the church post that all missionaries were accounted for except those in the Tacloban mission. Ok. Time to worry.

We heard nothing from the church or anybody that day. There were facebook groups for missionary families for the Philippines so we joined a couple of those to see what news people had.

Saturday morning one of the people in the facebook group mentioned finding an email address of an Elder Ferrin and that they sent him an email and he called them with information. We needed to drive down to Moab to take Alex to his race so before we left we sent an email to Elder Ferrin asking what he might know about Amanda and left my cell phone number. He called within 20 minutes while we were driving into Spanish Fork canyon. He told us that Amanda was safe and with the mission president. That was all the information he had. Nothing about her health or conditions or whereabouts or what resources she had available to her. We just knew she was alive and under the care of her priesthood leader. This helped the rest of the drive to Moab and the rest of the day go by very much more relaxed.

We still trolled the facebook groups looking for additional news or information. We saw pictures of missionaries in downtown Tacloban handing out food and water to people.One of the sisters looked like she could be Amanda but we realized it wasn't her. Saturday night we got a call from what must have been Sister Ardern (with a NZ accent) telling us that Amanda was safe. They were just double checking that we had been contacted. Sunday afternoon we got another phone call from the missionary department in SLC saying that Amanda was safe and her needs were being met regarding food and water, etc. That helped a little bit more but it was still just generic information, no details or knowledge about her.

Tuesday morning I woke up one minute before my alarm and checked my phone to see what time it was and saw a missed call from 1 minute earlier that was a Philippines number. Right then the home phone started to ring and we bounced out of bed to grab it. Liz ran faster than me and got to the phone and it was Amanda! It was 9pm her time, they had just arrived in Manila an hour before. We talked for about an hour and then she skyped with us that night from 11pm to 1am. It was such a joy to see her and hear her and know for sure that she was ok. After talking with her that morning the song "My Kindness" came to mind and it was in my head all day and I listened to it in the car and looked up the scripture in 3 Nephi that part of it comes from. I could imagine Amanda having that song go through her head while she was up on the roof in the storm.

Wednesday we talked with Amanda again and she told us she was having a hard time with other missionaries that had been really traumatized by the whole experience. Some of them couldn't stand to be around Amanda anymore because every time they saw her they got flooded with the feelings and emotions of the storm and aftermath. Of course this made Amanda really upset to be shunned by those she loved so much. This broke our hearts and made us feel even more worried at that point than we had through the whole storm and the waiting to hear from her.

Thursday morning I got up and went to look at facebook and saw another missionary parent saying how excited they were they got to talk to their missionary. For some reason I just couldn't take it anymore. I didn't want to see any of it anymore. I think maybe I was finally having the emotions break through to the surface that had come from the previous week and from feeling so badly for Amanda and her current trial. I quit the facebook groups I had been following for information on the missionaries. I didn't want to see any more happy posts or sad posts, just wanted to get away from all of it. I was near tears off and on at work throughout the morning and just feeling emotionally drained. At the end of the day I told my boss I was going to leave early for a mental health break. I took my camera and drove down to the dike that surrounds the Provo airport and took pictures just south of the runway. There's a nice marshy, reedy area with open water and the sunset reflects in it very nicely. I listened to Utah Valley Children's Choir music the whole time and on the way home was finally able to break down crying. Though it's difficult to full on sob while driving on the freeway it was good to get it out. Kinda like throwing up I guess. I felt better after that and have since.

Since then it's been a slow coming down off the emotions and intensity of the previous week. Seeing Amanda on the news and the internet in various forms, Liz getting together things for Amanda to replace what was lost, etc.

With Amanda starting a new day in a new place and a new assignment we are also able to begin to move on and get back to a normal life. Though there are so many thousands of others whose lives will not be normal for months or years to come.