Cara Brookins was left emotionally broken when her second abusive marriage ended. She got well by building her own house, which she did after seeing YouTube videos on how to do it.
The mother of four started looking for a new house in 2007 after being forced to sell the Bryant, Arkansas, home she and her soon-to-be ex shared. At the moment, though, anything the computer programmer analyst could afford was too tiny. Brookins too felt obliged to take action to bring her family back together. She admits, “But I had no idea what that should be.”
Brookins, therefore, came up with the idea to build her own house from the ground up. According to Brookins, 45, “If anyone was in our situation, they wouldn’t do this.” “No one else viewed it this way, and now that I think about it, I understand it sounds crazy.”
One acre of property cost Brookins $20,000, and she obtained a building credit for about $150,000. She then started watching YouTube tutorials to learn how to do things like run a gas line, build a wall, lay a foundation, and install plumbing.
Her children, ages 2 to 17, helped her throughout the nine-month construction of the 3,500-square-foot home. At the time, Drew, who was 15 years old, helped Brookins make the preparations. Jada, who was 11 at the time, transported water from a neighbor’s pond using buckets because there was no running water on the property. She then combined the water with 80-pound sacks of concrete to create the mortar for the foundation.
It felt impossible the entire time, according to Brookins, who worked when the kids were in school. After school, Brookins drove her family to the five-mile-away construction site where she worked late into the night on the new house.
YouTube videos previously were vague and provided numerous solutions to a task. Brookins employed a part-time firefighter with building experience for $25 per hour to help with some of the more challenging tasks. She remembers, “He was a step ahead of us in knowledge.”
On March 31, 2009, Brookins and her kids moved into the five-bedroom home. She gave it the name Inkwell Manor in recognition of her desire to become a writer.
In the years afterwards, Brookins has written numerous middle grade and young adult books. She has also written a biography titled Rise: How a House Built a Family, which will be released on January 24.
Building the house helped Brookins emerge from her depression. We were ashamed that our best option was to construct our own shelter, Brookins adds. “We weren’t really proud of it,” In the end, it proved to be the best thing I could have done for myself.
She says, “You can do anything you set your mind to if I, a 110 pound computer programmer, can build a complete house.” Choose one goal and stay with it. Find the big thing you want to do, move slowly in that direction, and take those who also need healing with you. That has a lot of influence.
Doctors Dismiss 8-Year-Old’s Pain as a Toothache—You Won’t Believe What They Missed
Sometimes, children find it hard to express their feelings. This means parents need to be more aware of what their child needs. These parents did just that, but sadly, it was beyond their control.
At the dentist, they found that he had some swelling in his teeth, likely due to a tooth infection. But instead of getting better, the swelling continued to grow.
When nothing seemed to help and his swelling got worse, his parents quickly took their upset child to a hospital. There, they received heartbreaking news: he had tumors on his brain and spine.
What was believed to be a tooth infection turned out to be a rare type of cancer called Rhabdomyosarcoma. This cancer is so rare that it affects only about 55 children in the UK each year.
The first signs of this diagnosis are swelling or lumps that can appear on the body.
“Our world fell apart,” said Ethan’s father, Mark, in an interview.
Doctors discovered that Ethan’s cancer had spread to his lungs and bone marrow. They decided to start a strong treatment plan that included chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
But after nine months of treatment, Ethan passed away at just 9 years old.
After his death, his parents were very upset and called the treatment methods used for their son “embarrassing” and outdated. The grieving parents started a fundraiser in Ethan’s name to help support research.
Mark, Ethan’s father, described the treatment methods as “embarrassing” and said they are very outdated. They set a goal of $62,000 for their fundraiser, and about half of that has already been raised.
“We don’t want other families to go through what we’ve experienced; it’s terrible,” said Ethan’s family.
After his death, the issue of funding research on childhood cancer has been discussed in parliament, which is an important step toward ensuring more money is directed to this area.
If you found this story interesting, check out the one below about a three-year-old who passed away after dental procedures.
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