Attacks of the enemy

It’s currently 2:48 am and anyone with littles knows I’m awake for a couple reasons.. either the babies aren’t sleeping or someone is sick. Yep you guessed it.. my little man has a tummy ache. This is the first time in his 3 years he’s ever thrown up and if it was a normal night I wouldn’t be think too much of it but tomorrow well actually later today haha… is court for the twins.

Second permanency hearing where they may change goal to non-relative adoption with the possibility that if mom finishes her things she could get them back.. my heart has already been so conflicted about this because we love them so much and it’s like a dangling carrot that we may never be able to have and that hurts but honestly we are praying so hard that Gods will be done and they end up in a stable loving safe home! That’s the most important thing even if it means our hearts get broken in the process.. and our prayer is also that everything be decided soon so that the babies don’t stay in the system forever waiting on mom to complete those last few things…

Oh and the new attorney is supposed to come by in the morning before court to meet us… yay first impression sick family… and the twins allergies are so bad baby boy has had some nasty diapers which I thought was due to drainage but maybe he has a had the stomach bug too… hmm maybe not tho cause he’s still had plenty of an appetite and the only issue is his tushy is really sore.. sorry my mom brain is rambling tonight!

It’s crazy to me how when there are important things going on and you’ve been taking all of this to prayer that the enemy comes in and wrecks havoc! But I am declaring that he will not defeat me! I will keep my eyes on my Heavenly Father! I will praise Him for the last 9 months with the twins! Praise Him for us not having had a stomach bug before now! Praise Him that our new baby hasn’t been born yet and can’t get sick from this! Praise Him that I’m almost 37 weeks with our surprise miracle baby! Praise Him that the night little man gets sick Disney plus launches and we can watch the Lion King! Praise Him for essential oils to help us get better and hopefully avoid getting the little ones sick!! So many things to be thankful for.. it would be so easy to focus on the negative but I’m choosing to focus on our blessings instead!

Prayers for our day for healing and for the judge to make a good decision today that will help move the twins towards permanency in whatever that’s supposed to look like!

Joy comes in the morning

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Hello my readers.. I am so sorry once again that I have not been present on here. I took some time to just be with family and really focus on healing after the crazy year we’ve had. I am so blessed to have such an amazing support system both with my family and friends that I don’t think I would be who I am today or where I’m at in my process that I am. Miscarriages are extremely hard..they are brutal…thwy take a toll on not just your physical health but also your mental and spiritual health. I was in a really dark place where honestly I spent a lot of time watching tv and sitting in the floor watching my two and half-year old play with his toys. I’m not sure who all reads my posts but if you have been or are going through this I promise it will get better. And its ok to feel all the feelings and to let yourself go but don’t forget to get back up!

God has been so good to me and never left me and He is there for you too! I have come to this amazing place where I’m ok not having another baby right now and I’m ok if I can’t get pregnant and carry another baby to term. I have been so blessed to have my little miracle boy and I know I am called for much more than what I originally believed. All my life I believed this little truth that I was to be a mom but what I am just now seeing is that God has a much a bigger plan for me. And I am so excited about this journey. I have mentioned how adoption has been on our hearts since the beginning of our relationship but what i didn’t anticipate was Fostering/fostering to adopt. In fact I was firm against it for a long time.

Heres a little back story… Easter we went to a family gathering of my husband’s side and his cousin who had adopted from the foster care system was there and we visited with her. She gave us a look into how it was and all that came with it and my husband was intrigued.. I on the other hand was scared to death… I knew there was a need but my fear was so crippling that was all I could see. I kept saying the lies the enemy was feeding me keeping me from obeying the call. “I couldn’t do that love on a kid and then give them back” “I would get too attached ” and so many more.. But when God has called you to do something He will not let it go lol! All was quiet for a while and I thought my firm no was all there was to it. Then July I miscarried my second and then August came another one which due to it being an ectopic and it leaving a mass in my left fallopian tube I had to have surgery.. Things were really hard and I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to get pregnant again because of my fear. And then I had a dream.

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I know you are probably thinking I am crazy and I would too if it this wasn’t my story lol.. In my dream was three dreams (almost like I woke up between each one) and in each one I would go out to my car and in the backseat /back trunk area was a baby or toddler with a note saying “Please find me a good home”. I woke up feeling heartbroken over the situations but also feeling inspired but I couldn’t understand. I thought maybe it was because I never got to meet my three little angel babies but I soon realized it was so much more than that. I was praying and asking for clarity and my eyes were opened to the dire need in our country for children to have loving homes. And I knew without a doubt that this was what I was called to. I sat my hubby down and brought everything to his attention and guess what guys?!? He was feeling the same thing and had been thinking foster care was the route we were supposed to go but he didn’t want to bring it up because I had been so fragile.

God is so good. His timing is so perfect! I am still shocked at how blind I was to what God wanted for us. My mother in law has said on many occasions that I was meant to be a mother of many and I had a friend recently say almost the exact same thing and now it has so much more meaning!!

 

We are so close to being finalized and active in the system to welcome a placement. We have finished all our training and home visits and will be signing this week!! We are opening up our home to 2 & under and are willing to take a sibling pair. I would love to connect with other foster parents for the good the bad and the ugly of it all.

Please join us in this exciting adventure and pray for our family as we trust God and jump into to this amazing new adventure!

Here we go again

Hello dear readers. Its been awhile again and I’m sorry… Id like to think it will get better but life happens. I am currently on bedrest til my doctors appointment tomorrow but i will tell you more about that in a minute. So end of May we did a round of Provera and Clomid. We got pregnant but I miscarried again on July 8… I didn’t really mourn that one because I was angry. So angry at everything. I never thought it would happen to begin with but for sure not twice.. I had to put on my big girl panties and focus on my little man because the next week was his 2nd birthday and then the weekend after that was his party. I got a referral from my PCM to go to San Antonio military medical facility to see a specialist for infertility and endocrinology which was super amazing because they told me originally that the wait list was long so not to expect to get in for at least 6 months. But praise Jesus they got me in the first week of August!! I was so excited! We drove the 4 hours there with my 2 year old and my almost 11 year old brother (who was staying with us for the weekend) They ran lots of blood work and did an ultrasound. They also sent us home with orders to get other testing done. Mine is the HSG which I’ve had before but they think I might have scarring or endometriosis that has grown up preventing me from staying pregnant. They are also concerned that i may have some blockage in my tubes. Which brings me to this past weekend. I started spotting and immediately I’m concerned. Normal women would just think that its their period coming but thats not my normal so i took a pregnancy test because i had been feeling off… It was positive. I knew i was miscarrying again so i just went about my business. I volunteered at the food and clothing pantry with my church and then went to a birthday party of one of my 2 year olds friends. Saturday night was horrible. Lots of cramping and bleeding and clots and tissue… I knew for sure it was happening. Sunday comes and I’m still having all the symptoms but i still went on with normal things. Church and then a fall festival. Monday morning I called my doctor and told them what was going on. Since I was still bleeding they sent me to the ER which i was irritated by.. I was frustrated thinking there was nothing they could do to help me… They ran blood work and did an ultrasound and we found out I have an ectopic pregancy…. I was shocked. Its in my left fallopian tube but it looks like I’m already miscarrying so they gave me a shot to help it pass. I am on bed rest until they make sure it has passed because they don’t want my tube to rupture…if it hasn’t i may have to have surgery…

I am still shocked… It would have been a miracle pregnancy because I ovulated on my own but instead of feeling joy my heart is breaking again.. I just keep asking why and trying to find out answers. Im also trying to focus on leaning on my heavenly Father. I know I’m not alone.. even tho this feels so lonely. I know He isn’t punishing me because thats not His way but i keep wondering what I’ve done wrong. Am i a horrible mom to my 2 year old that He isn’t going to let me have any more babies? I just wish I understood why this is happening…  Praying for clarity and leaning on Christ for my strength because i can’t do this on my own!

Long couple months

I’m sorry that I haven’t been writing in a while.. my life seems to have gotten crazier over the last couple months and my blog slipped through the cracks unfortunately. Here’s a recap on what’s been going on with me.

My great grandfather (pawpaw) was hospitalized and his dementia got so much worse.. that week was the worst I’ve had probably ever because he didn’t know any of us and was angry all the time.. he’s doing better now but we had to put him in a nursing home. He still has bad days but his pt is going well and some days he’s more with it than others.. my great grandmother (nanny) still lives in their home and can only go see him like once a week.. so that’s been extremely hard on both of them:( we have family fighting for their name in the will and my dad is struggling to take care of everyone. I just wish this awful thing didn’t exist.. I hate dementia.. I hate seeing the strong incredible man that I love so much withering away to someone who doesn’t know what’s happening or where he is most of the time.. prayers for our family and of anyone had any words of advice for us during this time please send them to us!

We are still trying for baby number two or would it be weird to call it baby number 3 because in my heart I have another baby that I just haven’t met yet… I did a round of provera and clomid and now am waiting to see if it worked. None of the ovulation strips showed anything except a faint line(which the box says is negative..) today was the day (according to a due date calculator) that I might get a positive test.. I didnt tho:(( praying it’s just too early and maybe in a couple weeks it will be bfp!! I’m super hopeful especially since I have lost 22 pounds since my miscarriage!!:)) that’s huge for me since my pcos /hormone issues have prevented me from losing any weight!!

I’m still working hard trying to build my business! If any young living business friends or network marketing friends have any tips please help me!! My circle is so small and I don’t know where to go from here. I am super excited about some new things coming out from young living that I will share about soon and I’m so ready for next years convention!

Toddler life is an interesting roller coaster and every day is bringing me new challenges! We are going through a picky food stage and a clingy stage. But little man is so adventurous and is learning so much he starting to talk more and I’m so excited about the future!:) he turns two next month and we are doing a dinosaur themed party and I’m attempting to make cute sugar cookies! I will blog about how it all turns out!:)

I have this desire to garden but I seem to kill everything I touch.. is there such a thing as having a black thumb? Lol I’m going to start over again here soon with an indoor potted garden! Maybe I won’t kill them that way lol!!

Anyways til next time 🙂 I will work on writing more 🙂

Overcoming Pain..

I had every intentions to write for a while but things have just been hard lately. I have been struggling really bad with my depression.. I’ve been so irritable and short with my poor hubby! I feel bad I know I’ve been hard to put up with lately and he’s been so good to me and such a rock! I’ve been in a lot of pain mostly physically but I had a realization this weekend at church that I’m in pain on a deeper level… I’ve been angry and hurt because of my miscarriage and I really thought that I had moved forward and past it but I must have squashed it and tried to not feel… I’m not sure when I will feel like me again and I hate it… my endometriosis cramping has come back with a vengeance and I’m so over it… I go to the doctor in the morning and I’m really struggling with what to do. I’m honestly not sure what I will do yet I’m still praying for God to show me what the best thing for me and my family is!!

I will say despite the pain I had a great morning with my little man! We went to the zoo and chick-fil-a with friends and he ran and laughed and babbled and I loved every minute of it! I love being a momma and my goal to get pregnant again I’m putting on hold for now to focus on getting healthy and out of pain and to be able to enjoy life with my little guy! Prayers for my family during this time of uncertainty would be greatly appreciated!

Oh some good news! I made rank in Young Living!! I’m a star! This is a huge accomplishment for me and I’m so excited to be able to share what I’m passionate about and to be able to help my family out not only in health but in financial!! I’m on a great team that is constantly supporting each other! If you have been interested in oils and wanting to see what they can do in your life message me and I will walk you through things and send you a roller!! Also if you are interested in making money to help your family out talk to me and we will get you signed up! Who knew that an investment of less than $200 could change your whole life! To get you away from doctors and prescriptions but also to bring in financial aid to help support you! I know for me everything changed when I joined Young Living and this amazing team I’m on! I’m so excited to see what the future holds!!!

In a weeks time..

Hey y’all I’m sorry I haven’t written in a little while… A LOT has been happening in my neck of the woods starting with I OVULATED!!!! AGAIN!!! This is only the second time ever that my body has done the natural thing eekkk!!!! I’m so excited! I thought about writing about it when it happened but …… that felt awkward to me haha.. I am all about transparency but I didn’t want to cross the awkward fine line. I should be able to test soonish to see if we are pregnant again. So please be praying that we will be able to get pregnant naturally in Gods timing. I can’t even begin to express my joy in ovulating on my own! I doubt myself so often and even when I don’t mean to I put myself down… This journey is giving me a different perspective of who I am. I am NOT broken! I am NOT a failure! I am NOT letting anyone down! But I AM strong! I AM exactly who God made me to be! I AM NOT alone!! I AM SO BLESSED!!! I hope that if someone is reading this and is struggling like I am , that they know they aren’t alone! I know this journey feels so secluded but we are all in this together and I would love to be apart of your story like you are in mine!!!!

This week I have been fighting allergies so bad… Oh and did I mention that my 18 month old figured out how to climb out of his pack and play? I know you are probably wondering why he was sleeping in it to begin with. Well he learned how to climb out of his crib at 12 months and I was terrified of him getting hurt so I moved him to the play pen… Until this week that it… You see he kept getting out and I would put him back in and the last time he gave me a lot of grief. So I decided to watch the baby monitor to see how he was escaping.. Only to see him hike his little leg over the side and topple onto his head…. Welp no more playpen for us… I still had his mattress from the crib but we haven’t gotten him a toddler bed yet because we thought we still had time. Silly us! haha

We bought a baby gate for his doorway so he wouldn’t escape in the middle of the night and he is sleeping on the mattress on the floor. The first couple nights he was so scared. He made a crying noise I had never heard before and I knew that he was terrified of being in this bed. So I laid on the floor beside him until he fell asleep. I won’t do this all the time but every now and then giving in to little things like this are so important. He knew that momma wasn’t going to let anything bad happen to him. And I absolutely loved when he would reach his little hands over and touch my face to make sure I was still there. My heart is beaming and breaking as I write this. I love that little boy so much and as much as one watching him grow up I hate it too.. He becomes more independent and grows so much character every day. He is so sweet but has a stinker side to him haha. He does this thing where he will give all of my family ( my dad and two brothers and one sister) all “sugars” aka kisses and then when it comes to my mom he will scrunch up his nose and laugh and purposefully not kiss her at that moment. He is such a hoot! Later when “it doesn’t seem like a game” he will give her a bunch of sugars. Sorry for the rabbit trail there.. I can’t help it I’m a crazy mom obsessed with her kid!! Anywho we are on day 5 of sleeping in the big boy bed and he has no trouble at night ( nap time is a different story) . Yay to toddler bed! Next stop is potty training… Oh Lord please give me strength!!

Today is hubby and my 5 year wedding anniversary!! My parents kept little man ( such a blessing to live near them during this time!) and we went to dinner at Olive Garden. That is our special dinner place that we always go for anniversaries and sometimes birthdays. I thought I would share a little bit of our story! We met on  a blind date on Christmas Eve Eve (or Christmas Adam as my hubby calls it) His dad set up the whole thing and I wasn’t interested at the time in dating. My friend that i took with me didn’t like him so I trusted her instincts and didnt pursue the relationship. Haha who knows what would have happened if our story ended there. We stayed in touch but I let him know that I was very content being single at this time and we could only be friends. Future hubby was/is in the Navy and was leaving on a deployment that next June and asked if I would email him. I agreed not thinking anything of it. But over the next 6 months of consistent emails we fell in love. He came home for 2 months and we spent time together with his family and mine. I knew in my heart that this was the man I was going to spend my life with! 21 days of spending time together in person, he proposed over FaceTime. He was at that time in Norfolk VA and I was in West Texas. His family helped him set it all up and I was completely clueless!!! I obviously said yes lol. And exactly a week later we were married. 5 days after that he left again for a 4 month deployment. I know you probably are thinking we are crazy and we are haha. But when you know something you just know. And there is no reason to delay the inevitable. So here we are 5 years, 4 houses (2 rent 2   owned) 1 kid ,1 miscarriage, 2 different states, 1 deployment, many many detatchments, infertility, so many hobbies, 3 dogs ,  and all kinds of every day life stuff later plus hubby being a Navy recruiter now and I have started my own business  and we are still going strong by the Grace of God!!! There is no way we could have survived any of this if we hadn’t stayed focused on him!!!

 

My journey with Infertility

This is my second take at writing this post because someone who shall not be named aka “Hubby” accidentally closed out my window and all of my writing was gone… Note to self always save before walking away from the computer haha. Who knows this take might be so much better so here it goes.

Ever since I was a little girl I wanted to be a mama and have a big family. Infertility was never on my radar and I honestly never thought it would be me that was struggling with this.. It’s crazy how the struggles we go through make us so much stronger in the end though. I can honestly say that My hubby and I are not the same people we were when we started out on this journey to have children. We had only been married a year and half but we knew that kids were a huge part of what we felt God was calling for our lives. We just had no idea how difficult it would be.

When we wanted to get started I was on depression and anxiety meds as well as birth control ; which I had been on since I was 15 for ovarian cysts. Unfortunately my cycles never returned and 6 months later I made an appointment to see a doctor. I was then diagnosed with PCOS. They put me on Provera to induce the cycle and it worked! We were so excited but then we discovered my body didn’t ovulate either… We waited to see if the Provera had jump started my system but my period didn’t come again. The next couple months were consistent with taking the Provera and then later they introduced Femara to help me ovulate. We did 3 rounds of that and only had one ovulation cycle out of them. My doctors decided my body needed a break from all the meds and honestly I needed a break mentally as well as physically. My depression was bad at this point. I wasn’t taking medication for it because we were actively trying to conceive but the strain of feeling like an absolute failure was taking over. The next couple of months were really good for me and good for my marriage because we had an opportunity to focus on one another without the pressure of trying. My doctors still had me regularly test to see if i was pregnant and/or ovulating but all tests were negative. November came along and we started another round of Provera.. But nothing happened . I waited the 2 weeks and called my doctor concerned. They told me to take a pregnancy test the next morning (they also informed me that they didn’t believe i was pregnant but that something else was going on) and I would go in later that week for more tests. So feeling confused about what was possibly wrong I got up the next day and took a pregnancy test. IT WAS POSITIVE!!! I didn’t believe it. I must have gotten a bad test so i took 2 more.. all were positive! I sat crying uncontrollably for a good 30 minutes on the bathroom floor in shock! After I told Hubby and we started to grasp what was happening I called my doctor and told them. They were also very shocked and had me come in for an ultrasound to determine how far along we were. There on the screen you could see our little peanut and we heard the heartbeat!( We were 6 weeks 5 days.. But later we were told we were actually a week a head of that) Whats crazy is that due to all of my tests saying I didn’t ovulate my doctors called it a spontaneous conception!

Our world has changed so drastically and we thank God every day for our precious little blessing. He brings us so much light and joy into our lives, and I’m in awe of Gods goodness to us! We were told that more than likely we wouldn’t have anymore issues and the next time around would be super easy. So after Little Man I waited for my cycle to come back thinking that maybe this next time I would be “Normal” …. But since I was nursing him I would really have to wait until a weaned him to see if they would return. They did not unfortunately. I weaned him at 14 months and at that same time I had laparoscopic surgery to look for endometriosis. You see I had been in so much pain since Little Man was born and I was having an extreme amount of cramping, topped onto a family history my doctor was concerned that I did have endometriosis. Turns out that I did and they removed what they could. I had some bleeding after the surgery but no real cycle. My doctor knowing our history and knowing that I was choosing pregnancy over preventing the endometriosis from growing back  got me started on Provera and Femara right away. Unfortunately the Femara made me cuckoo for cocoa puffs and that was the last round I did. On top of the side effects from the medications I had been having horrible hot flashes from my PCOS, like 30 minute long-lasting hot flashes. I was having to put ice packs on my face to cool down and yes I looked like a crazy person haha. My husband and I have been feeling that the Lord is calling us to go a more natural way of life. He hunts deer and we eat tons of that. We are working on having a huge garden and aquaponics system this spring. And I was already getting us more natural with using essential oils vs over the counter meds. So we took some time and prayed over it and decided that I would just use the oils this time and see if it would work for us. I began using Progessence Plus and within 2 weeks my hot flashes were completely gone! My emotional rollercoaster that I felt like I was always on was over! It’s like a miracle in a bottle and I’m so thankful that God brought Young Living into my life! But my story doesn’t end there! Within a month we ended up pregnant , it was a Christmas Miracle unfortunately we lost our little baby 2 weeks later…

I am so amazed how when you feel Gods call on your life and you follow Him despite the scariness of the situation He blesses you for your faith! This miscarriage has been really hard on our family but we have something we had lost. And that’s Hope. Hope that we can do this naturally. We will continue to use the oils as we try for this next baby and pray that we will be patient as it will be in Gods timing not ours when it does happen! I know that so many have struggled with infertility or are still struggling , and my heart goes out to y’all. I know that my journey hasn’t been as long as others but I do understand and know the pain of the heartache that goes with it. My prayers are for those that long to be parents that God will one day, hopefully soon; fulfill those dreams.  I would love to hear your stories about infertility and all that goes with it.