And yet, I feel conflicted.

One one hand there are times when I am SO ready to be done being pregnant. I’m done with the pain, discomfort, the crazy swelling, lack of sleep (believe it or not I really think I will sleep more soon after she is here than I do now!  that’s how bad it is!), inability to bend over and pick something up off the floor, and this cold is just making everything worse!

Tim CANNOT wait to meet this little girl!  I can’t wait to see what she looks like and hold her in my arms.  Caleb even keeps asking if the baby is here yet.

BUT…..

On the other hand, this is the last time I will be pregnant.  And that is kinda sad at times.  I sit and watch her roll and squirm in my belly and am in awe that there is a little person inside me.  And I know I am really going to miss that.  There is just a special magic, amidst the muck, of being pregnant.  The amazing miracle it is to hold and nurture a life and watch it grow in my belly is something I’m really going to miss.

With the joy and anticipation of meeting Baby Bubbles, I’m feeling a sadness at this all being over soon.  And this sleep deprivation and hormones are not helping me to keep any sort of emotional balance to all of these feelings.

Two weeks (or less) will bring our little girl into the world.  There is still a lot of cleaning to be done in these last two weeks.  I, sadly, have never gotten that surge of “nesting” energy.  I have a DESIRE for things to get done, but the ability and energy to get up and do them….not so much!

Sometimes I feel like Rachel from Friends when she was yelling at her belly, “Come out! Come out! Come out!!”  And other times I just want to hang on to every little kick, nudge, roll and hiccup in my belly and want them to never end.

Today I had my weekly ultrasound and my last growth scan of Baby Bubbles!  It went great.  She did everything they look for her to do and all looked well.  We even got to see lots of HAIR!  Caleb was born with a full head of hair and I was kinda hoping Bubbles would too…it looks like that is just about guaranteed!  They saw nothing that was any cause for alarm, and I got to see her cute chubby cheeks again!  She is measuring big….a whopping 8 pounds 1 ounce at 36 weeks!  At most I have 3 weeks to go which (if she follows the general growth curve) would put her at about 9.5 pounds when she’s born.  A little big?  Yes.  But we just make big babies!  And the ultrasound measurements can be off by up to 2 pounds!  As long as she’s healthy, I’m good with that!

So, that’s how I got to start my day….gazing at my little girl and wondering when we will get to hold her in our arms.

But 2 years ago today…..one of the worst if not the worst day of my life.

Two years ago today is when Tim confessed to me his affair and my world imploded.  I won’t rehash all the details.  It’s just simply not necessary.  But these past several weeks have been hard.  UGH!  SO many triggers!  Really out of nowhere things!  Dumb little things that should not even make me think of the affair just pop into my head!  Songs on the radio that have nothing to do with anything somehow get linked up to thoughts or questions I have about the affair, the whys, the memories.  It’s painful. And HORRIBLY frustrating.

It’s frustrating because Tim is doing so much better right now.  WE are doing better.  There are moments when I think there is no way THIS man could have had an affair.  And it’s so frustrating to be thrown back there for no good reason outside of Satan trying to drag me down again in my “fragile” {read exhausted and maybe slightly hormonal} state.

People like to say, “It’s time to put the past behind you.  Don’t let it bother you.  Don’t dwell on it.  It’s over.  Move on…” Those kinds of things.  If it were that easy, there would be little need for psychologists and counselors, right?!?  I PROMISE you, on a stack of Bibles, I DON’T dwell on it!  I am not kidding when I say these things pop into my head out of nowhere.  If it were a matter of flipping a switch so that these dumb little triggers would never prick my heart again I assure you I would do it!  But it doesn’t work like that.

The last few weeks Tim has been amazing!  The end of this pregnancy has been rough for me with lots of contractions, discomfort and down-right pain sometimes.  Tim has put me on “bed rest” a bit and is doing most everything around here!  He has been so supportive and encouraging.  I’m seeing him let God in and do some work on his heart.

And it’s wonderful!

And it’s scary!

Because I’m struggling to trust it.  I’m struggling to trust that this won’t be another roller coaster ride where we plummet again soon and this becomes just a foggy, distant memory that may or may not have been reality.

And I know that’s no way to live.  I can’t keep him and everything he does at arm’s length….JUST IN CASE.  That’s not how we heal.

So, I’ve been trying to let my guard down some.  I’m trying to let myself laugh more.  Let myself enjoy what we have right now, today.  And not worry so much about whether or not it will be the same tomorrow.  Because it’s here now.  And I’m trying not to miss it.  I’m trying not to compare it to the past, or worry about it’s presence in the future.

But it’s hard.  Today, it’s hard.

Today holds a weird collision of the past and the future.  What happened today two years ago colliding with  seeing the daughter of our future.

And it’s kinda messy.

But life is messy sometimes….most of the time.  God never promised us a perfect, clean, neat little life.  He promised us Himself.  IN the mess.  Never leaving, no matter how messy it gets.

I thought it was clever!  It made me giggle with all the talk of this year being the end of the world. (For the record, I don’t think the world will end in December)

I’ve been trying to get excited for the new year, fresh starts, putting the past behind, looking forward to what is to come.  But I don’t feel any fireworks for 2012.  It could be the pregnancy exhaustion, I won’t rule that out.  But I just don’t have it.

2011 was a hard year.  NOT as hard as 2010 was….PRAISE GOD!  But certainly not an easy year either.  Looking back, I think I kinda feel like we floated aimlessly through it, just surviving day by day.  Not that the year was wasted at all, just….aimless mush.

I don’t like being aimless!  It bothers me.  QUITE. A. BIT!!

I don’t necessarily have to have everything planned out, but I like to have a direction.  Even a vague goal to work toward, something to anchor to.

And it’s been a long time since I have felt like I/we have had that.

And I don’t feel like I have that for 2012 either.  I think that is part of my “new year’s funk”.  I still don’t feel any direction or goal we’re working towards.

Now, of course, BIG things are going to happen in 2012!  Baby Bubbles will be born in 5.5 weeks or less {GULP!}, she will have open heart surgery {DOUBLE GULP!}, Caleb will start school ALL day EVERY day in the fall {TRIPLE GULP!}…..but I don’t feel like any of that gives me the direction I feel like I’m missing.

And I know this just means more prayer, more listening, more waiting….but it leaves me in a bit of a “new year’s funk” I wasn’t anticipating.  When God is ready, and I’m ready for Him to show me what I am to do, I know He will do it.  And maybe, for now, it’s simply being a mom and that is the only direction or goal I am to have right now.

And that is quite a responsibility…one I don’t feel equipped for!  Hopefully this crazy love I have for Caleb and Bubbles will be enough to get us through until I can figure out how to do this mommy thing!

But I can’t shake this nagging longing for more.  Maybe I’m being selfish wanting more when I have so much right in my midst.  I don’t know.  I’ll have to figure that out I guess.

But, in the mean time, HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU!  Let’s see if those Mayans knew anything, or if the guy responsible for counting the days just got bored and stopped at 2012!! 

I. AM. SORE!!! Wow!  Nothing will make you feel old like lugging around a giant belly and it making every muscle, bone and tendon in your body ache!  I have been rocking the waddle for quite a while now.  Between the sciatic pain, back pain, braxton hicks contractions, and general pregnant-ness, I am quite a sight to behold.  Tim has a hard time not laughing as I try to get up off the couch or in and out of the car.  And if anything falls on the floor, chances are it will either stay there or I’m calling for Caleb to come pick it up for me.  He even says now “I’ll pick it up for you mommy because you can’t bend over.”  What did I do without him last time??

I don’t sleep anymore.  Haven’t slept much in the last couple months.  (See aforementioned pain description.  It is at full strength when I am trying to sleep, roll over in bed, get up for the zillionth time to go to the bathroom, etc.)  And I know it won’t get any better come February.  I think we should be able to bank up sleep so that when we need to make a withdrawal there would be some reserve we could pull from!  However, I think my reserve would be empty right now anyway!

I LOVE feeling her move!  Her movements are much different now….there isn’t much room in there anymore for her acrobatics.  And every now and then she does something that makes me gasp a little, but this is what I will miss most when she is born!  I love watching my belly bounce and seeing her roll under my skin.  It borders on creepy, but I think it is o so amazing!  It’s still hard to believe there is a little living PERSON inside me!  It’s just so amazing!

I’m much more concerned about things going wrong this time.  I think starting out the pregnancy thinking we had lost her got me started on a rocky road.  Once I had FINALLY stopped freaking out for every doctor and ultrasound appoint and relaxed and got used to enjoying them….then we find out she has the heart defect and will require open heart surgery.  This little life is so fragile.  All life is really!  I know at any moment God can decide to take her home and leave me here without her.  And sometimes I get so nervous that’s what’s going to happen.  I didn’t have so many fears with Caleb.  That was a pretty uneventful (for a type 1 diabetic anyway) pregnancy.

I don’t feel at all ready for her to come!  It’s very different this time.  She and Caleb will be sharing a room, so there’s really no “baby’s room” to get ready.  We had to rearrange things a bit, but there’s no decorating I can do.  There’s no “girlifying” the room or anything like that.  No showers this time.  Not nearly as much to buy or borrow since we kept everything from Caleb.  If it wasn’t for this giant belly, there would not be much evidence of a baby coming.  That is not to say I don’t think about her ALL. THE. TIME!  It’s just very different this time.  And I don’t feel ready!!

This is our last.  Unless God speaks very clearly to us, this is our last baby.  That is a very bitter sweet statement.  I’ve spent time thinking about this, and sometimes it makes me want to cry.  I am more than blessed!  REALLY!  A boy, then a girl, two kids who (presumably) will be healthy.  TWO kids?  REALLY?  I mean, how much better could it get?  But…..that means no more belly kicks.  No more flutters to feel in those early months.  No more watching that staticy garbled image on the ultrasound screen wondering who he/she will look like.  No more belly (well, not a cute belly anyway!  There will still be plenty of belly there!).  No more pregnancies.  And that is hard sometimes.  It’s sad to think there will be no more.  So, I REALLY don’t want to wish this pregnancy away.  Or rush it in any way.  I want to try to savor each of these last moments.  Hang on to them.  Not let them slip out of my memory.

BUT…..

It also means no more nausea, aches, restrictions, maternity jeans (I am REALLY hating these today!), swollen feel, ankles, hands, all of the aforementioned pain issues!

So, that is some random, miscellaneous-ness rolling around my sleepy, achey pregnant brain today.  And, due to my lack of any real rest as of late….I cannot guarantee the coherent-ness of any of these thoughts.

And, today’s post is brought to you by the number 2 and “-ness”.

So, we took him to this class and it was just TOO PRECIOUS!!  We had to borrow a baby doll from a friend for the class and he learned how to put on a diaper, swaddle her, feed her and burp her.  I don’t know how much of that he will actually be doing with baby girl right away, but he “knows” how to do it now and can be a great helper!

They talked about how the baby will cry a lot at first and why; that there will be times we need to do quiet activities when the baby is sleeping; and how important they are as the big sibling.

Caleb was SO into this class!!  My heart was just overwhelmed to watch him get so excited and into it!  He wanted to do everything for “his baby”.

We also got to go see a labor and delivery room and post-partum room so the kids knew where mommy and baby would be staying for a few days and where they would be visiting.  Caleb seemed to get quite a kick out of the big whirlpool tub in the labor and deliver room!

It’s still hard to wrap my head around the fact that I will have TWO kids in just a couple months!  But I know Caleb is going to be an AMAZING Big Brother!!

But, I did not expect it to go SO FAST this time!  I hit the third trimester already!  I only have 12 (or less) weeks to go!  Where did the time go??

All of a sudden I have this giant belly….which I am still wondering how in the world it’s going to get bigger and where she is going fit!

I think this is about 27.5 weeks (Sorry for the ugly bathroom shot - it's the only mirror we have in the house!)

And I have clothes like these hanging in the closet in Caleb’s room:

I STILL cannot believe I have GIRL clothes in my house!

With Caleb I was SO TERRIFIED of giving birth!  I ended up having a c-section with him, but I was so scared about going into labor and having to actually deliver a person!

With little girl, I just want to keep her inside as long as I can.  Not because I’m afraid of labor, but because she is safe there!  I can keep her safe.  She does not have to struggle for oxygen in my belly.  Her blood is pumping just fine right now.  I can give her warmth, she isn’t struggling to eat, I can feed her just fine (with lots of yummy holiday treats! 

But, I know, come February, I won’t be able to protect her as well.  She will struggle.  She may have a hard time eating.  She may get very exhausted when trying to eat and breathe.  I will have to watch every breath to make sure she is ok and getting enough oxygen.  I will have to give her heart medication so that she won’t suffer heart failure symptoms.

I won’t be able to protect her as much anymore.

And all I want to do is keep her close and safe.  And not suffering and struggling.  But once she is outside my body that job is going to be much harder.

And I don’t want Caleb to feel pushed aside by his little sister and all the attention and care that she will need.  I don’t want him to feel less loved.  He has been through SO MUCH these last two years as Tim and I deal with the affair, closing the church, jobs, etc, etc.  I don’t want anything else to harm him either!

I find myself struggling with so many fears.  There is so much that I can’t do anything about right now.  We won’t know exactly how much care or how many issues baby girl will have until she is here.  We won’t know how Caleb is going to react to having a baby sister around until she is here.  We don’t know much of anything until she is born and we figure things out one day at a time.

And I need to be ok with that.  I need to increase my trust and belief that God DOES know ALL of that….and SO much more!  I need to trust Caleb in God’s Hands.  I need to trust baby girl in His Hands.  Because my hands are incredibly incapable.  My hands can do so little compared to His.  And we desperately need His Hands wrapped around our family, guiding us, holding us, strengthening us.

And I know He will.  I know He IS.

I just forget…..OFTEN.  It’s hard to give up control, especially of this tiny little life I love to feel kicking my belly!  And the not as tiny life who smiles at me and hugs me and is currently singing “Frosty the Snowman” without ceasing!  I want to hang on to them.  TIGHTLY.

So, we take it one step at a time.

And tomorrow I have another ultrasound with the perinatologist.  And I’m planning to go in asking them to give me GOOD news.  Even just the mundane things.  I want to hear things like, “She has two arms, two legs, and one head.”  THAT is good news!  And I will take it!  THAT will make me happy tomorrow!

AND, we still need to pick a name for this sweet little fighter girl!

25 weeks 4 days

I have been putting off writing this update for about a week now.  (Well 8 days since we met with the pediatric cardiologist….but who’s counting, right??) I wanted to be able to write when I would be more calm and not super emotional.

The only “exposure” I’ve had to Children’s Hospital is stories Tim tells me of his experiences there when he had cancer as a 13 year old.  Those stories are awesome to hear now because he beat cancer.  He survived.  He is living today.  And he certainly feels a connection with any Children’s Hospital.

But tonight I’m having a hard time getting to sleep.  I want to hear what the doctor has to say tomorrow so I know what we’re dealing with…..but I don’t want to hear what the doctor has to say because I don’t want to know what we’re dealing with.

I keep thinking of about 20ish weeks ago when we were waiting for our ultrasound at a radiology clinic to “confirm” that our little girl was gone.  My OB didn’t see that little grain of rice on the ultrasound like she was supposed to, and my hormone levels were concerning, so we had to get a more sophisticated ultrasound.  I remember crying in the waiting room, unable to hold back the tears because I knew when we walked into that room there was a high probability that we would not see our little baby.

But God gave us a miracle.  There was a sweet, tiny little heartbeat on that screen!  I started bawling again!  God let us keep our little girl!

And now, tomorrow, we are going to be staring at that little heart again.  Waiting for the doctor to tell us what he/she is seeing.  Is there a hole?  How big is it?  What is the damage?  Is the aorta in fact in the wrong spot?  Will she need surgery?  When?  Will I be able to hold her when she is born?  SO MANY QUESTIONS.

I have been hearing so many wonderful stories of people who have given birth to babies with heart issues, needing heart surgery, holes. etc.  People are asking me who our doctor will be to see if we will have the same doctor they had/have.  And the stories are great!  They give us hope!

But I’m tired of joining these clubs.  I don’t want to be part of the “our-marriage-is-working-through-an-affair-club” or the “I-was-a-pastor-but-had-to-close-my-church-club” or the “my-child-has-a-heart-defect-and-is-joining-the-Children’s-Hospital-club”, or the numerous other not fun clubs I’ve been initiated into against my will.

Why can’t I be part of the “I-got-to-go-to-Disneyland-club” or the “I-lost-100-pounds-club” or the “I-won-an-Oscar-club”?  (Ok, I know the last one is next to impossible, but it’s something I REALLY would love to do!!!)

I know, I’m being selfish and having a little pity party.

I’m just so scared.  There’s just so much going on in life right now I don’t feel like I can face this too.

We are praying for a miracle, but I have so many doubts that God will give it to us.  I don’t know why.  Maybe it’s because life just keeps getting harder and harder for us lately.  Maybe it’s because I know that God likes to teach us things in our hardships, through pain, growing our faith when we have to trust Him because there is nowhere else to go.

This time though.  I guess I want the easy way out.  I want to see God’s amazing, miraculous Hand at work again.

I want to be part of the “the-doctors-can’t-explain-it-but-there-is-nothing-wrong-with-her-anymore-but-I-know-exactly-what-happened-and-God-gets-all-the-credit-for-healing-my-little-girl-club”!

[Forgive my rambling...it's very late and I'm very tired.  I just thought if I got this out it would help me to sleep tonight.}

25 weeks 4 days, 1 pound 13 ounces

She just looks so peaceful and beautiful to me.  And after yesterday’s ultrasound news, my heart just aches to hold her.

Three weeks ago I had a routine ultrasound.  I get a lot of ultrasounds because of being Type 1 diabetic.  They like to keep a close eye on baby to make sure everything is as it should be.  Three weeks ago they saw an “artifact” on her heart.  The perinatologist said there may be a small hole in her heart.  But he told me to not worry, IF there is one there it is the kind that will close up on its own after she is born.  He also said all the other structures of the heart: the chambers, ventricles, veins, arteries, etc. looked good.  He asked me to come back in three weeks to see if they could get a better look to be more sure of what was going on.

Yesterday was three weeks later.  I really didn’t worry for those three weeks.  I’ve heard of plenty of people who were born with small holes in their heart that closed up soon after birth and caused no harm or need for extra care at all.  And, the doctor said not to worry, so I really didn’t think about it all that much.  Plus, there may not have even been a hole there after all!

Until I was laying down getting the ultrasound.  Then it hit me, “What if there IS a hole?  What if things aren’t all ok today?”  I started getting a little worried, but really not too much.  I tried to pray to calm myself and just remember the words of the doctor three weeks ago, “don’t worry!”

The ultrasound tech did her thing.  She briefly measured everything, we got to see her moving around, squirming, her profile, her hands, her legs, all those lovely little parts!  There is just something SO amazing about being able to see this little being that I feel moving all around inside my belly!  She flipped on the 3-D view for just a few seconds for us and got us the picture above.  She said there’s really no medical reason to use it, it’s just a special little treat we get sometimes.  I LOVE IT!!! 

So, after she did all her things, the perinatologist comes in to look for himself and tell us what he saw.  This peri was different than my regular guy, I had never seen him before.  It took forever for him to come in!!  He reviews all the images the tech took and then comes in.  We waited so long!  Which gave me more time for the anxiety to start building.  I even mentioned to Tim, “do you think the ultrasound tech gave us the 3-D picture because she knows bad news is coming and wanted to give us a treat??” (The tech is not allowed to tell us anything, of course.)

So the peri comes in and starts doing his ultrasound.  The room was SILENT!!  He didn’t say anything, the tech didn’t say anything, I was too scared to say anything…..it felt like an eternity of SILENCE.

When he was all done he finally gave us the news.

He is 98% sure there is a hole in her heart that could require surgery.  It is on the septum between the ventricles.  It’s called a VSD.  ALSO, it appears that the aorta has grown in the wrong place and has grown over the hole which is very bad.  This would mean that the aorta is getting blood from BOTH chambers of the heart and that is not the way it is supposed to work.  He said this means it would be pumping both oxygenated and non-oxygenated blood to vital organs like the brain.  If this is the case, it will certainly require surgery.  This surgery would have to be done very soon after birth….within a couple months if not sooner.

He said it shouldn’t affect the rest of the pregnancy and that she is fine right now.  Fortunately her body does not get most of it’s oxygen from her blood so this aorta issue won’t be a problem for her until after she’s born.  Unfortunately, he also said there’s nothing I can do about it now.  There’s no diet change or bed rest or anything I can do to affect the outcome.

So, now I go to Children’s Hospital on Monday to see a pediatric cardiologist.  They will also do an ultrasound but have different equipment to see the heart better and will be able to give us more definite information and an idea of what will be needed and what will likely happen after she’s born.  There is a chance, depending on the severity of the issues, that I may need to deliver at Children’s Hospital if there is a need for immediate care.

I’m having a hard time with all this.  I’m having a hard time processing this.  I keep hearing stories of people who had kids, or they themselves, had to have heart surgery soon after birth and have gone on to play sports and lead totally normal lives.  And those are great to hear.

BUT……

She’s still MY baby!  I just CANNOT envision myself handing over this tiny, little, fragile baby to be put under anesthesia, cut open and operated on…..on her HEART!  The thought of surgery TERRIFIES me!  The thought of something being bad enough that she is taken from me immediately after birth and I can’t hold her TERRIFIES me!

I know I need to NOT worry about things that haven’t happened yet….I know I need to wait and see what actually happens……I know I need to pray and ask God for strength to get through this and for the miracle of HIS healing of her heart…..but every time I feel her kick (which is obsessive with me now!  Like, if she’s not kicking every moment of the day I’m worrying something happened to her!) it reminds me there is something wrong with my little girl.  And there’s nothing I can do about it!  We thought we lost her once already, I can’t bear that again!

So, here we sit.  Praying.  And, thankfully, there are SO many praying for her!  Waiting for Monday when we should have more information.

I just want her to be ok.  Healthy.  Whole.  I just want her to be ok!

You think that works for life too?

Cuz if it does, then our family of coal, I think, is under enough pressure to turn it into diamonds.

At least I HOPE this turns into diamonds!  Because the pressure is really starting to get to be too much.

And I sure hope it doesn’t take as long to turn into diamonds as coal does!