A few months back, my husband and I decided that we were ready to start trying for baby #4. We have 3 wonderful, amazing children that we love and adore, and we really enjoy being parents so we wanted to have another. My oldest has been praying for a baby sister for over 2 years, despite having 2 little brothers. Part of me was a little nervous about having a 4th baby- but overall just excited and happy. The first month we started trying a little late, but did not fall pregnant, and the 2nd month my husband had to leave for some Air Force training and we missed the fertile window. Month 3 was the winner. :) At 9 days past ovulation I told my husband I *really* wanted to test, and he of course told me to wait and not waste money taking early tests and I could wait until our 6th wedding anniversary and know for absolute sure. But... I did anyway. Haha!! Of course, I got a very faint positive. Due on November 30th. I was only 3weeks2days when we found out.
Between 4-5 weeks we went ahead and announced, and the pregnancy continued as good as it could be, At 7 weeks we found out that we could come back at 10 weeks and do blood tests to find out the gender!! Well our 10 week appointment got rescheduled to 11 weeks and my family and I all went. That is when we got the awful news.. I will spare all the details, but basically we couldn't find the heartbeat, got an abdominal ultrasound and then a vaginal one, proving that the baby had stopped growing at 7 weeks. We were all devastated as we had all planed and had dreams for this baby for months; and we have never lost a baby before so it was totally not on our radar. Because my baby had held on to the pregnancy a month, with no signs of miscarriage a D&C was strongly recommended. So I followed that recommendation. On May 12, 2016 I went in for surgery to remove my baby. It was awful, but none of the options were good ones. There really is no great answer in a situation like this. I am greatly bothered that I had the same procedure that women have who just don't want their babies and terminate. A D&C is a nice way of saying "abortion for babies who are already dead" And that just really... hurts. But we did have peace about it and I feel like it went as well as it could.
After that; we had SO much support and love. Prayers, Hugs, Meals, Messages, Visits from friends, Flowers, etc. We were overwhelmed which how much people surrounded us in our grief. We also decided to do some memorial things for the baby and we named her Jordyn Shalom Love. Through the whole thing heartbreak was intense, and real- but so was the peace that God has a plan for our family and there will be better days ahead. I am soooo thankful for this, it has carried me through the darkest of times.
Now; it has been less than 2 weeks, we have our D&C Follow up appointment on Friday. It is hard living in a stand-still it seems... where I am physically recovering and unable to do normal activities like laundry, walking long distances, being intimate with my husband, or lifting my own children. It is hard emotionally not knowing exactly what the future holds and feeling robbed of a child. I am anxious and excited for the follow-up appointment so we can get some answers, see if my levels went down, and resume normal activities. I have put on a lot of weight since this and eating habits have been awful. I am ready to exercise again and do better once I get the all-clear. I know there is good coming. I am just so strongly ready to move on and get back to enjoying my life and having full-health again.
Will we try for another baby? Yes. We strongly feel like there is at least 1 more child for our family. However, we don't know when. I want to be pregnant now, like I was supposed to be. Part of me wishes we could get pregnant right away. This weekend? Sure! But while I was planning and ready for a baby, now I have a whole other physical mess. I have gained weight. I have been unable to work out. My eating has been bad. These are not habits I want to have entering into a new pregnancy. Especially after a loss, being as healthy as I can starting a pregnancy seems super important. So I want to do that. I think it will happen fast once I can just do it and get back on track. My goal is to lose about 20lbs in about 2 months or so... and then maybe we can start trying. I also need to track my cycle and see how my hormone levels are doing after all of this. It is a process. I know that God has a perfect time for the next member of our family to arrive. Clearly November of 2016 is not going to be it. 2017 will hopefully be the year. But will it be February? March? April? May? I have no idea. I am just going to do all I can to be the best I can be and pray for a healthy pregnancy and full-term baby to be born when the time is right.
Tuesday, May 24, 2016
Saturday, February 20, 2016
Obedience and Reaching the Heart of my Children.
[[Woah This got long... but it has been on my heart. And it just comes from my experience being an Early childhood student, a parent, a teacher, and working with toddlers and young children on all different scales of development. Obviously I am just one person and I don't know everything, but I hope you can see my heart here and that no one takes this as some kind of attack... that is definitely not what it is. Just encouragement for us to maybe dig a little deeper when we are parenting or working with children.]]
While having a child obey is important; I believe what is most important is their heart. You can have a child that struggles with being obedient because of different things in their life, personality, even developmental delays... but they are still trying to learn and their heart is right- they just mentally / emotionally / physically cannot meet the same expectations as the next child... and you could also have an obedient child that is obedient only because they have been harshly forced to do things and they are in survival mode.... but their hearts are empty and they are still not getting anything, even though on the outside it seems as all is wonderful. There almost ALWAYS more to a child, than what meets the eye.
Controversially to some, I prefer to lead my children to obedience gently so that they obey out of love and not fear or force. (Although I am not perfect and serious circumstances call for a little different plans, but this is my general goal) That does not mean there are not rules, boundaries, and consequences. But it does mean that when a child is clearly emotionally struggling- I am not going to use harsh words, physically force them to do something, yell at them, make fun of them, humiliate them in front of their friends or other adults, call them names, etc. I will let them know if the behavior is unacceptable. I will get firm. I might end up having to help them make the right choice or give them a consequence, but before I jump in with harshness and anger- I want to try and reach the heart. Why is this hard for them? Is my attitude towards the child loving and respectful? Am I expecting too much for this age? Is there something I am missing? Can I compromise and have a child work on one aspect until they are ready for the next level in this area of development? How does the Lord lead me? All good questions to consider. I have found that most of the time if you take 10 seconds to talk to a child before it goes too far, that the solution is simple and acceptable to both parties... but instead, a lot of times we fall into power struggles that do nothing more than break trust and exasperate our children. The last thing I want is my child to do everything "perfect" growing up, but have a broken spirit and then when I cannot control them any longer they go out scared, lost and confused.
Further, when you are working with a more 'challenging' child, and they are making progress- we should be praising them for that progress made, and then slowly transition them to go further with something that is already hard for them to do. If you can appreciate the progress and tell them that, chances are they will be more willing and excited to master the next thing!!!
This being said, I am still working on this myself, and sometimes I fail miserably and have to ask God and my children to forgive me for my own behavior... I am still learning and growing, And every single child is completely different and also learning and growing, too so you cannot ever fully figure it out! But it is WORTH TRYING!!!
Okay. Stepping of the soapbox now.
While having a child obey is important; I believe what is most important is their heart. You can have a child that struggles with being obedient because of different things in their life, personality, even developmental delays... but they are still trying to learn and their heart is right- they just mentally / emotionally / physically cannot meet the same expectations as the next child... and you could also have an obedient child that is obedient only because they have been harshly forced to do things and they are in survival mode.... but their hearts are empty and they are still not getting anything, even though on the outside it seems as all is wonderful. There almost ALWAYS more to a child, than what meets the eye.
Controversially to some, I prefer to lead my children to obedience gently so that they obey out of love and not fear or force. (Although I am not perfect and serious circumstances call for a little different plans, but this is my general goal) That does not mean there are not rules, boundaries, and consequences. But it does mean that when a child is clearly emotionally struggling- I am not going to use harsh words, physically force them to do something, yell at them, make fun of them, humiliate them in front of their friends or other adults, call them names, etc. I will let them know if the behavior is unacceptable. I will get firm. I might end up having to help them make the right choice or give them a consequence, but before I jump in with harshness and anger- I want to try and reach the heart. Why is this hard for them? Is my attitude towards the child loving and respectful? Am I expecting too much for this age? Is there something I am missing? Can I compromise and have a child work on one aspect until they are ready for the next level in this area of development? How does the Lord lead me? All good questions to consider. I have found that most of the time if you take 10 seconds to talk to a child before it goes too far, that the solution is simple and acceptable to both parties... but instead, a lot of times we fall into power struggles that do nothing more than break trust and exasperate our children. The last thing I want is my child to do everything "perfect" growing up, but have a broken spirit and then when I cannot control them any longer they go out scared, lost and confused.
Further, when you are working with a more 'challenging' child, and they are making progress- we should be praising them for that progress made, and then slowly transition them to go further with something that is already hard for them to do. If you can appreciate the progress and tell them that, chances are they will be more willing and excited to master the next thing!!!
This being said, I am still working on this myself, and sometimes I fail miserably and have to ask God and my children to forgive me for my own behavior... I am still learning and growing, And every single child is completely different and also learning and growing, too so you cannot ever fully figure it out! But it is WORTH TRYING!!!
Okay. Stepping of the soapbox now.
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