How I've Lost the last Three NaNoWriMo's (But I'm not quitting)

Tonight Priscilla June Slack Miller passed away in Berryville, Virginia. She was a woman who lived life passionately and will leave behind a world better for having had her in it. I love you Mom. Rest In Peace. Her funeral will be in Cody as she joins her parents and Husband out in Riverside Cemetery. I will be going back to the service. Thank you for being my sounding board 
I’m trying to write a novel in November for NaNoWriMo, and I’ve done it before four times, but this one I’ve tried since 2013 and it keeps getting blasted by outside forces. My story and my Novembers are cursed, but the story is good and deserves a chance. November 8, 2016 my mother in law died and I ended up driving 3,000 miles round trip for her funeral. End of November 2017 my Father-in-Law got sick and died Dec. 4 and my family and I took Amtrak back for his Funeral and a Family Christmas. So yesterday I dove into the story again, refreshing some research and writing 2,200 words. And my brother sent me the message that my Mom is comatose in hospice in Virginia. I’m staying home on November 16 when my husband leaves for two weeks in Europe. I know traveling has been really contributing to my muscle and joint deterioration that hasn’t quite gotten a diagnosis yet but the rheumatologist is at least eliminating some options. Not Lupus, probably not RA but maybe, IBM disease, a type of muscular dystrophy. But when my brother says, can you come to mom’s funeral in Wyoming, I just can’t explain that another 3,000 mile round trip will mean more stiffness and pain and lost abilities. He has been mom’s caretaker, and out brother with Down’s syndromes caretaker for five years now and fully deserves a hero award.
 It’s as good of a family relationship as things can be with three thousand miles between us. I love them all a bunch. My family all lived in Wyoming since my great grandparents moved there in the 1890's but my husband and I moved to Northern CA thirty years ago, my brother moved to Virginia about ten years ago, and when my Mom started developing Alzheimer’s in 2012 he moved her and our brother with Down’s syndrome out there. I’ve been there to visit but he has done all the heavy lifting, so to speak. Now he wants a funeral and to take her back to Wyoming. I’m glad to try to do things his way as much as I physically can, because he really has been our hero through this all.
So I am going to go to Wyoming for the funeral, and if I survive that, I'll do my mont of wild writing starting whenever I can. and this is what I posted about it on facebook when I thought that I'd be writing now
For five years I have researched and written on and off on a Novel that ties together the story of two boys, each living in the months leading up to a volcanic eruption but 1901 years apart. I've researched and researched some more, plotted out each boys story, along with their younger brothers and friends. What I have written is the beginning and end with a few scenes in the middle, but each time I try to write more, I get distracted. It's harder to write historical fiction than fantasy for me. So many little details to question, and in five years, the Pompeii history keeps changing as archaeologists discover new things and alter theories. A question of what I need now makes me realize I just need to flesh out the boys daily lives, similarities and differences, but show them clear enough that the readers care about how they end up since from the beginning the reader will know that bot Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Vesuvius erupted, eve though only one boy in my book knows and only about Mt. V.So here is a thing you might be able to help with, if you lived through the 79-80 school year, and remember things 15 (main Character) or 10 (Younger brother) year old boys would have been into, and not sex or drugs because the readers I'm aiming at are 5th grade on up a bit, tell me ideas, especially in the Portland, Oregon area. Wish me luck this #NationalNovelWritingMonth #NaNoWriMo