It's almost been...

Well it has almost been 1 year since I last got to hold your sweet warm self...my mind keeps wanting to replay these last few days leading up to "that moment" but I keep trying to make myself stay busy so I can not relive those days.  The sad thing is I knew Saturday something was wrong, just didn't realize that the next day you would be leaving my arms forever. 
Life has gotten so messy...I keep wishing I had "my life back" I know that with every day things change and that nothing remains the same but my heart just aches to have simple...I thought I had problems before and now they all seem so simple and frivolous.  That I wish those "quality" problems were the only things I had to deal with.  People who have not been through something like this can begin to understand that your passing is merely the tip of a gigantic iceberg.  That so many things from fiances to relationships are continually effected by the loss of a child.  I keep telling myself to hang on just a little longer and things will start to get different.  That if I can just dig my nails in long enough something will change. My only issue is right now it seems that different only means worse. 
My skin is no longer thick....things where I know in my heart are not about me hurt my heart more then you can imagine.  I had a recent experience with a store owner whom I had bought hats for Ollie from back at the beginning of April.  I asked her a couple days ago if the hats had shipped...simple just said "have my hats shipped" and got back a message of how difficult I was and so on...and for some reason that ate my lunch.  I knew I was not in any way difficult but still was so hurt by it...  It is just these simple, silly things that are proving to me my disconnection with who I am in Him.  I have forgotten all these things I learned several years back.  I know how to armor up.. I just can't seem to find the ambition to do it.  I guess once I am broken down enough and the only way is up...is when I will start seeking my comfort from the one who can actually provide...
Things are getting harder..I feel like I have the same conversation with God over and over...you took them, you took her, now he is going, how much more God...how much more???  It seems like a never ending cycle of bad happenings..which I  know is why I have to get my rear end in gear and suit up so that I may be better equipped to deal with the hardships of life.  I hate feeling like all these tings that have happened in my life and they may all be in vein if I don't start seeking Him and His purpose.  I just keep wishing my heart would stop hurting long enough to catch a good fresh breath of air so that I can carry on without huffing and puffing, totally winded coming across the lone crippled, beaten, bruised and most definitely without grace.  But then He didn't ask us to finish without any scars...geez the puns of life. 

I so totally miss you, I miss me...I miss that feeling of gratefulness I had for every breath you took...I just keep trying to be gentle to myself and those around me..remembering we are all trying....
in the arms of an angel

I miss you..

So Mathieu had school this morning and I was supposed to stay for hie "in-school" field trip..or was supposed to attend a MOPS meeting..I choose to do neither of these things it has been some time since I just came home and had no other prior engagements. Being pregnant and tired today doing nothing was what I really needed to do so I came home to a quite empty house and have been able to get still for a little bit and reflect.. I miss my family. I have been so checked out for so long!  I realized after I left Mathieu in the school I hadn't said much of anything to him this morning other then the questions of what he wanted in his lunch box...no goodbye, no good morning, no simple words of "I love you"


How does a mom go through life without speaking to her kids...I do not want Sophee's death to define me as a mother. I sat listening to service Sunday and Pastor made it so simple...yes life can be hard, yes your circumstances are probably not pretty..but there is someone somewhere...who would trade their circumstances, their life for your hurts and pains! You mean someone would want to wear my shoes? Absolutely their is always someone, somewhere who has it worst then you.  It is all about perception...

My perception of life got so distorted after Sophee died I simply forgot... forgot about was was important, forgot who mattered, forgot what was real...it changed my being...I want to be better then I was before Sophee.  I want my life to reflect the blessing she truly was.  I suppose I think of it somewhat like this...its ok to be crippled...it just isn't ok to be crippled and choose to quit living due to a disability.  I have a disability...a broken heart! But I can not simply quit because I don't feel like participating, or that it is too hard! Not only am I missing the blessings God has provided...I am dismissing all of beautiful lessons (blessings)  Sophee has given and still gives.  I suppose that all this won't change over night and praise the Lord that He is patient and long suffering.  Hopefully with gentle reminders I can slow down..get back to basics and learn to love again....

They say it's your birthday....

                                             well tomorrow is my birthday...32nd to to matter of fact...32...3 kids, 1 angel and one on the way...My only wish is too feel blessed every year... That I would be able to recognize the beauty around me, the joy the Lord has placed in my life and rejoice in that. I am blessed but instead of rejoicing...all I can think about is last year. Last year I know exactly where I was at and what I was doing for my birthday. I spent most of the day at in the Presbyterian Pediatric ICU preparing for Sophee to come home...We had a "care meeting that morning." I once again had to voice my care and love for my daughter...remind everyone I was anything but delusional and knew that my sweetest baby girl would not be with me for a life time.  My mother baked my favorite german chocolate cake cupcakes and we shared with all the staff (you want to know the way to medical care givers hearts..FOOD!) I made so many lovely friends and meet people who impacted my life in more then one way. I throughly enjoyed every moment of being in that hospital.  I never complained about being tired, showering in a hospital shower, eating hospital food...all that mattered was Sophee was warm and her body was there to snuggle. (I can hardly see to type the tears are falling like a faucet) It was a simple birthday.  Very few monetary gifts, a simple dinner with my mom at one of my favorite restraunts and then back to where I came from...Sophee's room in the ICU.  Oh how I would give anything to be back in that room!  I spent my birthday in the hospital with Sophee... getting ready for her to go home in a few days...learning her g-tube cares, her feeding routine...holding her on the cot under the window with a zebra patterned blanket..snuggling and sleeping....and that was all I needed. I FELT BLESSED and IN GOD"S FAVOR! ! SO much has changed in such a short amount of time, yet that short year feels like an eternity of punishment! I wish I could explain all the hard emotions and feelings and hurt and broken relationships but it is too much to pull together at once.  Last year I had dinner with my mother...this year I am not sure we will speak. Last year I had cake...this year I buy cakes to celebrate an "angelversary"  Last year I had a daughter...this year I have an angel! It is like living in some strange time warp.  You feel the eternity and yearning desire to return to where you have come from but then it seems like yesterday...I can remember thee clothes I wore last year on my birthday, I know exactly what blanket Sophee and i were snuggling.  Now days I can't even remember what day of the week it is.  I am grateful for the gift of this new life, my children and my husband, my daughtership in Him...but I hurt! I hurt so bad that my heart literally skips a beat every now and again.  I hurt and desire to be who I once was...a mom with 3 boys and a daughter..all here together on Earth, in a small city, in my little house...enjoying her last breath we took!  Don't you wish that special days were exclusive to no hurtful feelings?  I do...I wish something in the law of the universe written in His word said..on your birthday, Christmas (ect) you will feel no pain.  However I know His word says that I will face many trails of various kinds while here but to take heart because one day I going to His kingdom where "perfect" is for eternity...suppose that tomorrow means one more day closer to that place <3 and until then...baby you'll be...  Heaven got an angel <3

This was 4.4.2012 (5 days after my birthday last year when we were being released from the hospital. Sophee even brought joy to her Doctors in the PICU 

The Waiting Game...

I was searching for memorabilia for Trisomy over a year ago and ran across a shop on facebook called Hero On My Wrist... I contacted the owner of the shop and was informed I would have to be put on a waiting list and it could be close to a year.  Well with all that has occurred this past year...Sophee coming home 4 days before new years, heart surgery in February, g-tube surgery in March, HMV in May, and her death in June (June 12, 2011) plus the boys birthdays, holidays, and the news of our rainbow baby....I had long forgotten about my name on this waiting list.  I received an email a few weeks back asking me if I still wanted my place on the list! Of course and what a neat surprise!  Sabrina, the creator and owner of Hero on my Wrist is such an amazing talented woman.  I believe when she started this is was for military families only and now she serves so many different communities.  I ordered a fabric bracelet in Trisomy 18 colors so that I could carry it with my every where in a super stylish way!  I also ordered a necklace but have not seen it yet!  It was such a blessing to be able to create a sentimental stylish accessory.  When you order from Sabrina you get to choose fabric colors, charms, buttons, thread color....all of which I did around my precious Sophee and her Trisomy friends!  I love unique things...I have so many sweet trinkets to honor my sweet Sophee but most are made for the home and her cabinets and shelves..so it was nice to get the opportunity to order something I can wear...and hopefully people will ask...what is that...and there is a story behind each piece Hero On My Wrist creates.  Thank you Sabrina and Hero On My Wrist...

Lost For Words.

   I have been at such a loss for words recently, hence the very few blogs I have posted.  I quit posting because the pain was so intense and the judgement that kept coming from the most unexpected places, the harshness from mankind, and the pure pain from being totally raw and completely depleted: physically, emotionally and spiritually.
   I am a woman of great faith.  I have believed in Jesus for my entire 31 years. I have never questioned His being.  Questioned His authority absolutely but question His being... never.  I have began to start letting whatever was festering surface and recently I have faced a few adversities.  I was afraid to be sad and angry at God for everything that happened with Sophee for fear of Him being angry with me.  Also fearful to say the how I was feeling fearing that others might loose their faith in Him...and if their is one thing I know God does not like...is causing another man to fall.  So I try to say "we were blessed with 201 days with Sophee" but lets get real here is what I want to say 9 months later.. "You, God, gave me the one thing I have desired for as long as I can remember..a daughter.  Then the dreaded day of a phone call to tell me how incompatible with life my daughter was. So I prayed to you, I begged of you to spare her life...to just let us get a chance to love her after birth...so the cruel joke was you would let me have her for 201 days then take her back.  How dare you, a God of miracles, mercy, grace and wonder take my baby (or any other baby at that matter)"
Let me pause on the conversation with God and say this...people come up with all kinds of cute and corny little things such as "an angel with a book of life wrote down _________'s birth, He mentioned as the angel closed the book...too  beautiful for Earth"  or they say that God needs little children in heaven for the nursery....I have heard so many things.  I know that these things are made up and said out of looking for a place of comfort.  I tried to find solace in them, I really did, but at the end of the day...there is no place I want Sophee to be rather then in my arms, at my house, with me and my family!  Yes, yes I know as a woman of faith that heaven is a magnificent and beautiful place but it wasn't time for my baby to go to heaven!
   Then I think to myself...all these momma's who go through 1 child loss, and then He doesn't stop there He allows another tragedy and the mother must suffer the loss of another child.  Seems so cruel.
    Back to the conversation..."So I know saying this you may choose to teach me another lesson and take another child from me...hey why wouldn't I expect you to keep taking.  I know you say you won't let any circumstance come without a way out of the situation and that great old saying of how you will never give me more then I can handle...but God I am broken...totally broken.  I have no idea when the healing begins or what healing actually means...all I know is I am stuck! and had You just made things a little different I wouldn't be stuck.  I walk around so angry, so very angry at you God...that I take it out on my husband, and my children...I have withdrawn from anything familiar and for the life of me, I can not understand who You are! and God..WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"
  Expecting another baby....let's start with "It's a boy...and I have a lot of feelings and emotions around having another baby after the loss of Sophee, as well as having a baby that isn't a girl..but lord forbid if I mention these feelings...or in comes the harsh judgement from everyone on the outside! Who has never come close to experiencing the pain I have in this lifetime! Having a baby after the loss of Sophee brings up so many things!  First I don't want people getting overly excited and think I am over the death of Sophee...or shouldn't I just focus on the blessing I have...all I can say is if you even so much think this thought to yourself...don't read my blog and remove yourself from my friends list!  I know I am blessed.  Yet, none of the fear, sadness, anxiety, or grief go away from having a new baby!  If anything it brings up more!  First of all, I am jaded, I never knew all the terrible things that could go wrong right at birth! I didn't know...I just didn't know...sad thing is now I do! Now I carry the weight of every chromosomal abnormality, every virus, disease, pre-term labor, placental issues, cord accidents around on my shoulders...so you think I can just relax..be grateful...feel blessed and enjoy my pregnancy! Well all I can say to you is I carry this baggage around and I think I have earned the right with a 1 in 1 million chance of Sophee having Trisomy 18 and she was the 1! Then once the baby is born healthy I worry about sids, childhood disease....Sure I could drop the baggage but my motherly instincts and my broken heart do not allow this to happen! This world is cruel...it is defiling and it is hard to survive somedays! I so miss Sophee...that no matter how many babies I have all I am ever going to want is her! I hate the "my forever child" saying because that means exactly what it says...Sophee is my forever baby...she stopped growing the day she died...leaving her my baby in my heart forever.
   I know there is hope in Jesus and He is big enough to heal me and that He values me enough to heal my heart but what I want to know is why did He have to break my heart in the first place! I guess the only thing that makes sense to me today is the saying "my heart misses who I used to be when you were here"
   I can't begin to tell you how hard this journey is.  I know I see women who lost their child 20plus years ago and still have that small part of grief in their heart.  I have to say I keep thinking with time its going to get better but what I recognize today on Sophee's 9 months angelversary is.. it just got a little worse.  As the time goes by....the reality of forever continues to set in and the pain in my chest because of how much I yearn to hold her again is so overwhelming it feels like it is strangling the very breath out of me.

      "SOPHEE...I LOVE YOU!"

trust...a little short on this

I have tried to write this blog 3 times and each time I have hit the wrong button and it has erased so last go round...

I went to the doctor last Friday for a procedure and was supposed to receive preliminary results back by Wednesday of this week. Well when I called for the results the office informed me that the sample collected was not large enough to do the preliminary testing and I would have to wait until Friday. I called yesterday and never received a phone call back. First off I have never prayed for patience because I know that the lessons that usually come with the request of patience is often very trying and to be honest I am not up for any trials right now. I know that the saying goes "god will never give you more then you can handle" but come on...I can't get with that! You could preach that to me all day long but I am telling you when you are the one going through it...you could care less how strong God thinks you are! I am at this place in this not so pleasant journey where I am struggling with "letting go and letting God!" Here is how I can break it down to you...fact: my father and brother died in a horrific plane crash (coming up on 10 years in March) God did not spare their lives, they were here then they were gone! Fact: Sophee was not healed before birth...people from one end of this Earth to the other prayed for this child to be healed and she wasn't! Fact: Sophee's life was not spared even though many prayed and claimed healing over her when she was sick. Fact: I have suffered more traumatic losses in a lifetime then most will ever experience. These are not peaceful deaths where a loved one lived 90 something years then passed in their sleep...these were horrifying, terrifying life shaking events! These people were here one day and gone the next...no one ready to let go, no one ready to say good bye, no one could even say well at least they lived a full life! My father was 43, my brother was 20, my daughter 201 days old! I have gone through valleys and then been at the top of the mountain during this lesson and right now I am back in the valley. The lesson...I have many times asked God "why?" and have not understood why! Why would the God of the Universe, who is capable of miracles not have spared us any pain? I have come to the place where I know it is not my place to question our God and surrender and praise Him for who He is! and now...now I sit in a place of this very conversation...
"God why have you not spared my family any pain? God you knew how much I loved that baby..why did you take her? God you know my hearts desire...it is not much but why God, why would I expect a God who couldn't even preform a miracle in the time of need listen to my hearts desire? Oh that's right I don't expect you too."
I keep hoping my faith would have triumphed these feelings but today they are raw and on my shoulders...I know God knew when Sophee died that I was going to struggle and I was going to hurt and I was going to have a tough time rounding up my faith somedays...I know He understands...but today I just want Him to listen..I want God in a box that I can understand. That makes some sense. That doesn't feel like I am fighting for every last breath of air. I know that I am really grateful that God works in ways I can't comprehend but some days I wish there was a glimpse of understanding why what has happened in my 32 years has happened. I have given God al the glory and really grateful for Sophee's life, and really have no desire for anyone to place any judgement here or even remotely tell me what blog may help me heal...all of this is my healing! The pain is part of healing, this crazy ride I am on is all leading to "healing" for whatever healing is? I just need to have a real conversation, a real dialogue with God! One that may not look pretty or say in your name I pray...I need Him to help me surrender. feelings are not pretty, they aren't easy...and I am pretty sure that when God created "will" He was very aware that feelings would come with it and that not all feelings were pretty or graceful. That is something that has amazed me along this journey...people have spoken things to me about healing but honestly have no grasp on what I am healing from...God knew that my grief wasn't going to be graceful...that their would be a lot of stumbling and fighting... so what is it about the stumbling and the fighting..whether it be with my own feelings, with my faith...God gets it...you don't think God grieved Jesus wen He died? Come on people we were created in His image! Break that down...break it down all the way to grief! God was sad, He was angry, if God is real and we were created in His likeness then why do you think God didn't grieve? Would you tell God to hurry and heal over Jesus being crucified? Over the pain of His sacrifice? I think not...so why say it to a momma hurting...a momma wrestling with her faith. I keep going back and forth...I hate that Sophee had Trisomy 18 and that it eventually lead to her death but I am grateful for the friendships and the some of the lessons...in the same breath I resent those relationships because of what formed them and I resent the lessons because they were not lessons I ever wanted to learn. I want to be so personal with God that I can trust Him, that it is not this supernatural weird "oh heavenly father" in king james version talk but just a real conversation with a real God. Someone who I can come to, who I know will be there and after you have had a child die...you don't always feel that...and why wouldn't you not always feel like God was for you when you have this sweet innocent being that has never hurt anyone or anything taken from you yet the man who abused his wife for many years is healed from cancer? This is what I am saying...sometimes I wish God worked inside a box so I could understand! My small world consist of a very small amount of people, places and things when you get down to the fact that God knows everyone and every hair on their heads. My world is small! Real small...and I don't always understand what is going on in my small world!

Broken...

I have been feeling really broken for a while now but fearful of saying much because I get the response  "you don't have the luxury of falling apart you have kids,"  or "see that is exactly what I was afraid of"  I have gone months now without crying about Sophee.  After the people who called themselves friends told me that I needed to heal at God Speed, I let that bother my heart in enormous ways.  I had thought I had shook it off but all that happened was it got stuck in the back of my mind that I wasn't honoring Sophee or God by hurting and have tried holding things back.  And now I am feeling completely lost and overloaded. My emotions are explosive right now. We have something gigantic happening in our life.  It is exciting yet in the same breath terrifying. . I am feeling very alone and extremely abnormal for all the feelings it is bringing up. I also feel very unsupported.  Why can't people (especially those I love)  support something that is a blessing, why can't you try to help process and stand by my side and work through this fear.  I feel so jaded.  Everything that happened with Sophee has jaded me. It has made me have more insight and given me a much deeper love but it has also let a whole lot of anger in my heart.  I miss my baby girl and I am afraid to to say it out loud because of the fear of being judged.  And I am so mad at God, I can't stand it.  I want to honor and love Him but I can't even open up the lines of communication again because I am so heart broken.  Logically I know all the right answers, I know God is big enough to handle me being mad at him but for crying out loud why can't my heart get on board.  I feel like someone has taken a baseball bat to my kneecaps crushed and crippled, hit in the gut and my breath knocked out from under me. I am so angry!!!!  I just want my old life back, not this stupid life, but my life that was manageable. With my kids and joy and the things that bothered me were trivial...not Earth shaking, glass shattering PAIN!  I want all our broken hearts to not exist.  The brokenness is leaking out all over the place...it is seeping from all of our pores.  I just want "normal" to happen again.  But I now a new normal is what is going to have to happen. If only I could figure out how to get there.