Finding Hope Once More

Both kids are finally asleep. One day they will both be asleep in their own beds, that will be a glorious day. The sink is empt,  all dishes clean minus a  dish and fork that my husband ate dinner with. Our house has the floor vacuumed (though not upstairs, that’s a disaster if then downstairs is clean I can try to pretend we have an ounce of our lives organized and in order). Corners and surfaces above the floor are cluttered with mess and random junk I need to go through and put away properly or toss. In all actuality I should start to recycle at least the papers at the very least but that takes organization and effort. Both of which I feel I am desperately lacking lately. My patience is short and my temper is big. I’ve felt like I’ve been running on E and cuss words lately. No joke. This girl definitely hadn’t been looking to Jesus in the way that I know I should.

This past month we were blessed with both our washer and a part on our well breaking (water stopped when I had a few meager inches of water. That was fun). . Thankfully both are able to be fixed for under 350 combined. So thankful that both were simple. Oh and I figured out how to change the flusher on our toilet because that broke as well.

But the biggest thing that broke this month? My heart. Our fourteenth loss. I can’t even. I read back on my past 2 blog posts. I have decided I need to be all in for Jesus again. That’s the only way I can function with this pain that I carry in my heart. I talked to one of our providers at work. She asked if I needed to go to counseling and I told her blogging has been my therapy in the past. Blogging with the best wonderful counselor at my side. My father, my creator, my savior, and my hope for the future. The future where I get to finally one day see the beautiful babies that James and I have created but never met. My arms won’t be big enough to wrap around them all at the same time so it’s a good thing that heaven is for eternity.

I’ve been loving “The Water (Meant for me)” by I Am They lately. Here are the lyrics. They speak so much truth to my heavy heart.

This far, He has held us
Through the waters as they crash against
This far, He is with us, He is for us
Through the stormy depths
I will soar on wings like eagles
O God, You've carried me
This far, this far

There is power, victory
Hope for the broken-hearted
Healing meant for me
There is goodness, justice
Rest for the weak and weary
Love that's meant for me

This far, He has lead us
Through the darkness to the light of day
This far, He has shown us
Love and mercy and unfailing grace
When my hope is lost in the shadows
This promise, You have made
It's not far, not far

There is power, victory
Hope for the broken-hearted
Healing meant for me
There is goodness, justice
Rest for the weak and weary
Love that's meant for me

When the water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna save us
The water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna rescue us
When the water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna save us
The water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna rescue us
When the water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna save us
The water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna rescue us

There is power, victory
Hope for the broken-hearted
Healing meant for me
There is goodness, justice
Rest for the weak and weary
Love that's meant for me

When the water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna, He's gonna save us
The water, the water, the water is crashing over
He's gonna rescue us.

Golden Uteri

Uteruses. Uteri. Which is the plural? I seriously don't know but these are fabulous leggings from LuLaRoe. They have got to have good fertility mojo right?

I have a LuLaAddiction. It's bad.

I need to have an exercise addiction but instead I am over here....

8 months

It's been 8 months since my last update. A quick recap on my life during these past 8 months would include:

• We faced foreclosure on our house. But were saved by God's grace and an anonymous donor from our church. Eventually our bank was able to help and the money we had been given caught up all other bills and helped us feel like we were thriving instead of surviving for a little while. 
• If I didn't post about it prior...we were also given a car. For free. Have I mentioned God is good? It is my daily driver and I have no complaints. God is good all the time. 
• I grew close to God. I fell away from God. 
• I graduated from nursing school! Woot!
• I got fatter (240 lbs now).
• I accepted a job working in Labor and Delivery. 
• I wanted to strangle my husband and then later wanted to kiss him passionately. Rinse and repeat.
• We planted pumpkins among other produce. We now have 2 large patches of massive weeds in front of our house. No joke. I know the inside is a hot mess but the outside is fitting now as well. I don't know if any pumpkins survived. The weeds are taller than me in some areas.
• Matthew is now 3 1/2 and growing like a weed. He is smart, emotionally in tune with others, a lover, and has my husband's sense of humor. He is goofy and super cute. He loves music and will frequently give people a performance of  Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, or his newest addition a small part of a Christian song that he just sings over and over "Woaah I will never be shaken. Woooah I'll never be shaken." That made my heart sing him singing such things. His little voice singing along to the radio in the car or telling me, "Jesus is our good good friend." melt my heart. My house may be a disaster, and my body getting fatter. But my son knows about Jesus. 

That last bullet point was like a mini story book so I think I should be done with those. 

Where am I at now? Somewhere between feeling like I am in a dry valley spiritually and watching that rock waiting for the water to rise up from faith that God always provides. I'm somewhere between feeling lonely from not having a regular interactive friendship and feeling blessed to know the women I do. Maybe I am just kinda lost. 

These past 2 months working OB has been a blessing. Most days are filled with joy and happiness and baby cuddles. But the bad days are bad, as many of my readers can imagine. From being present for a resuscitation, a postpartum hemorrhage, and being present for a stillborn delivery.

That one rocked my world and I think I still feel the effects from the wakes sometimes. I have a book I have been meaning to send to this momma. Immediately afterwards I had to learn how to move forward without carrying her pain on my shoulders. I asked for prayers to be able to be receptive to the Holy Spirit's prayers but also to be able to compartmentalize tragic situations so my family didn't suffer. 

I cried my 40 minute drive home a couple of days afterwards. Especially after discharge. Imagining being sent home without my baby felt a little too real after the pain and sadness of all of my miscarriages. I knew a glimpse of the life that was waiting for her at home. After signing the discharge paperwork I grew quiet and said to her, "In the dark of the night you are going to play the what if game and wonder if there was anything you could have done or could have not done to prevent the death of your little one. Do NOT go there. There is nothing that you could have done to prevent or cause this to happen. A death of a baby sucks no matter how you spin it. Do NOT blame yourself." She cried. I cried. It was hard to keep it together that day. The tears felt so good to fall on my way home while phoning a friend.

The memories of my first several losses pained my heart. The ache for that momma and the yearning to have a baby grew. I have told my story of losses to a handful of women at work. Many don't know my full story yet and ask me if we hope to have more kids. Depending the situation I just lay it all out for them to see and hear my story and my heart in the moment. I would love to have another healthy pregnancy. The ache of wanting another baby is growing bigger and bigger. 

So here I am 8 months later, fatter than I have ever been. Slowly trying to find motivation to lower my BMI so I can try for a baby once more. 

Sleep is calling me, and if I fight it I will be up much later. Welcome me back to the dark-side of the work force. Where I find quiet time to blog and hopefully reconnect with God a little bit. Where sleep is a little bit more sporadic but my heart is much happier. 

Forgive me for being absent for so long, if I even have any readers left out there! :-)

I miss you

I miss my little blogging family. My sisters that I could go to with every simple or complex struggle and bare my soul without judgement and often time compassion and virtual hugs.

I miss friendship. I miss not sitting in the drivers seat of the struggle bus.

If I was honest with myself I would tell you I am struggling with negative self talk and I miss my strong optimistic faith in God and things working out for good.

If I wrote on her candidly like I used to I would tell you I am on CD 11 and as of yesterday I still had some brown spotting. My body has gone crazy and my ass has gone fat. Seriously probably a good thing our scale battery died because last time I stepped on it....it mooed at me and popped up reading 224.

And most importantly I miss me. The me I used to be before infertility and loss ravaged me.

The holidays are wicked hard. I have had so many losses and bad news around the holidays. And now my hubby's back is hurting and what was supposed to be me working my butt off to get us sitting better financially has turned into maybe he will need to be on short term disability and leaving me feeling quite hopeless and helpless.

The small voice in me says every little things gonna be alright. But the larger part of me says What the fuck are we going to do? I don't usually swear but hell just didn't seem fitting in that sentence.

It's just the place I am at right now.

Update on 50 in 2015

1) Get under pre-pregnancy weight (192...currently 212.8  fat, so that means I need to lose 20.8 lbs  22+ lbs, haven't stepped on the scale recently.)
2) Finish reading the bible (so I can say I have read every book in the Bible) (so I can walk closer to God)
3) Go to the zoo  We took Matthew this summer and he LOVED the tigers.
4) Go to Boulder Ridge

5) Spend a night with James, away from Matthew (Any volunteers to baby-sit?)

6) Read 10 books for fun. So far I have read 8: Divergent, Insurgent, Alligance, Eragon, Eldest, Inheritance, Brisingr, This Present Darkness, The Circle Maker, Every Bitter Thing is Sweet, Piercing the Darkness, all 12 Left Behind books, working on Crazy Love and about to start Jen Hatmaker's For the Love

7) Have a plan for when I will start nursing school back up. I started this Fall! Eeek.

8) Have all 3 credit cards paid off
9) Be 100% caught up on behind bills from my knee/life.
10) Put downpayment on a cruise for March 2016 with my family (including my sisters, mom, and possibly others! <<   We decided that this one was not practicle for us where we are in life right now. :-( Bummer! But we went to the aquarium together and this weekend we are going to spend the night in a hotel and do something fun together.

11) Pay off all of my medical bills from my Knee

12) Make a business plan for James...for his produce business.

13) Get Matthew into his own room. 

14) Organize our basement

15) Get the shelves hung up in our bathrooms James finally did this, minus the one for downstairs but I am counting this as a win!

16) Get prices for re-doing our Kitchen and Living Room 

17) Organize our office

18) Clean up the garage

19) Work on keeping the house clean on a regular basis (I now have an actual chore list for the week, sadly, I am a terrible housekeeper, and my husband is just messy)

20) Take Matthew to see a movie at the movie theater  We went to see Inside Out, it was super cute!

21) Take Matthew swimming When we went to the hotel before the aquarium Matthew went swimming and was having a blast, a little unsure of it but enjoyed it just the same, we also went to Lake Michigan and he was definitely unsure of the waves!

22) Take a trip to Frankenmuth/Birch Run

23) Go camping at least one weekend.

24) Go to Catch Air with Matthew 

25) Have a thousand dollars in an emergency fund.

26) Have a month's worth of money in an emergency fund

27) Get pregnant with a healthy sticky baby OR have an appointment set up with Kwak-Kim
28) Go on 12 date nights with James  I have went on 2! This has went on the wayside, sadly. Still at only 2 I believe.

29) Take a weekend trip to either Chicago or Washington DC - I think this might be a next year goal as well, it is getting to be busy season for James and with school starting back up it is not ideal.

30) Purchase set of essential oils

31) Make a prayer picture book for Matthew.

32) Attend a small group on a regular basis.  I started to go to my women's small group on a regular weekly basis and then it ended for the summer. I am starting a prayer small group! I am a little anxious but excited about it.  I failed at my own small group, but am very excited for small group to start up next month.

33) Blog at least 4x a month (that = 48 posts in 2015) So far I have posted 34 times but it is random and sporadic and not all are spread out to once a week.

34) Go out for a girl's night out.

35) Go to one of those canvas panting places.

36) Give up McDonald's for at least a month (though I would be okay with water, ice cream, and coffee from here ;-) haha)

37) Host 6 game nights with friends and/or family.

38) Have family photos taken this summer or fall.

39) Look more closely at foster care classes and their guidelines

40) Fence in our backyard

41) Have 5 bonfires  1 - James, Matthew and I had one bonfire with just the three of us. 2 - We went to a bonfire at Jenny's

42) Have a swing set or other play thing in the backyard for Matthew.  Mom and my sisters went in on a swing set for Matthew, he loves it!

43) Run or walk a 5K

44) Order wedding photos (Finally!...we have been married for 5 years already...)

45) Go to a shooting range with James

46) Have the money for James to purchase the rifle he wants.

47) Tithe on a regular basis (feel like this should be closer to the top!)

48) Swimming lessons for Matthew

49) Build a cube organizer for Matthew's room

50) Organize all the closets (there are 4 in our house)

So far 9 are completed, and I have progress on 3 that seem obtainable.

A lot of these dreams that include finances will not be able to be realized this year, but that is okay. This is where we are financially, even if it is sucky. This week I was reminded how rich we truly are, even though we feel ridiculously broke all the time. Tithing really needs to happen, I keep not making it a priority and I think our lives show it right now. It is the one thing that God says test me on in the Bible. At this point I would be supper happy if we made 25 of these in 2015. Cannot wait to see what the rest of the year and 2016 bring! 

A Moment of Disbelief

So I haven't been doing so great lately (horrid actually) at praying, reading Bible, and having a conversation all day with God. I am tired of feeling so disheartened and separated from Him. There I was doing dishes, listening to a podcast by Nancy Leigh DeMoss.

It was on really knowing Jesus. I felt overcome by the holiness, goodness, and mercy of Him. Tears began to stream from my eyes. God bumps formed on my arms. And suddenly I noticed the front of my shirt was wet.

My milk had let down. Something that hasn't happened since Matthew was a newborn. Granted I had a day of a barely there faint test and now nothing...leaving me wondering if I had been pregnant or if it had been a fluke. But for my milk to let down?

I stood there in disbelief staring at the 50 cent piece spot on my left breast and nickel sized spot on my right. Praising Jesus made my milk let down? What did that mean? All I could do was shake my head a little bit. Because seriously, what in the world do I make of such a thing? Maybe a promise of another baby some day? That's what I am hoping. ♡

Rough Times

Things have definitely been rough lately in our household. We are struggling pretty badly with finances. And right when I think we are going to be back on track something happens. Two weeks ago-ish the dryer broke. Completely out of the blue. The following Monday I got a flat tire when I got out of work at midnight. Which resulted in two new tires needed. Then my washer decided it would be best to just disperse sand among all clothing instead of washing it out.

Then this week Tuesday I smelled something nasty from the fridge...and it was chicken I brought home Friday night. And the ham I had gotten out of the freezer. Rotten.

Our fridge is dying officially. I am over it.

Our house payment is ridiculously behind. I have anxiety. Feel depressed.

And then get an email from school that I might not be getting financial aid. If that is the case I will not be going back to school this fall.

Insert deep sighs and a few tears. And a little boy that keeps telling me "I want a baby momma"

I am so tired of riding the struggle bus.