Where to go From Here....

It seems several months have once again gone by since my last post.  I cannot blame this completely on the sleep deprivation and adjustment to two kids, though that is certainly part of it.  But the truth is, I am just not sure where to go with this blog from here.  There was a time when I needed this outlet.  I needed to scream from the roof tops as loud as I could to anyone who would listen, to anyone who was brave enough to go to the deep dark place with me, I needed to pour my pain out.  I wanted to share my journey because I wanted to make a difference for others going through the same pain, because I wanted to help end the silence that surrounds miscarriage but more than anything I wanted to share it because I just needed to get it out for my own healing.  I needed it to matter.  I needed my babies to be real to someone other than just me.  And the only way I knew to make them real was to talk about them, to write about them, to share the intense pain I felt when I lost them.  I needed this blog for my own healing.  But not so much now.  I don't so much feel the need to scream it, but maybe just perhaps to whisper it now and then.  This blog was a journey through our attempt to have another baby.  We had our baby....so what now?  I have just not been sure where to take it from here.

The most natural place to take it is to where my life is now...mother to two young children.  I have not wanted to take it there.  Because I know there are people who read this who find it incredibly painful to read about mothers and babies.  Because they long to be mothers of babies, the kind of babies that survive long enough to be held in their arms.  For many of my followers their babies did not make it that far.  So how can I possibly write and share about my two healthy, living children when I know the pain that causes a mother who has recently miscarried and is still struggling to have a baby.  But tonight it occurred to me that maybe I can do both, write about my life as it is now and also continue to write about the pain of miscarriage and maybe sharing my life as mother to two rainbow babies will offer hope to women still aspiring to have their own rainbow baby.  Maybe I am just not sure where or what this blog will be now.  But if I just keep writing maybe it will just evolve into what it is meant to evolve into, of which I am not even sure yet.  So if you are still willing to journey with me, let's see where we end up....

My miracle rainbow baby is six months old today.  I feel such an intense love for her.  I am elated that our little baby is growing and changing every day.  I am sad that our little baby is already half way through her first year. This is my last baby.  I will never again rock a baby in the wee hours of the morning.  I will never again fall in love with chubby thighs and the giggle that comes when I tickle them.  I will never again feel the pride and joy a mother feels when her baby smiles, rolls over, crawls or does a dozen other things for the first time.  I will never hold her little body against mine swaying back and forth to lull her to sleep.  I will never nurse again.  I will never look into baby eyes so bright with wonder and excitement at this new world she learns more about every day.  And it is all flying by so fast.  I vow to cherish every moment.  But the moments come in the midst of every day life, hectic, busy and frazzled.  I cherish many of them, but I want to stop time and savor them even more.  I found a book that I gave to my girls for Easter this year.  It is called "If I Could Keep You Little".  It talks about all the things we mothers love about our kids when they are little, but all the things we would miss if they didn't grow up.  It is both a joy and a heart breaker to watch our children grow.  But oh how blessed we are to watch these little people grow up.  I once again remind myself that this time of getting up with a baby three and four times a night will soon end and I feel new resolve to just love these next six months of Vivienne's life, her last six months as a baby. 

And as for our little Riley.  What a stinker she has been the last two days!  Battles over clothes, hair, shoes, what cup to drink out of, everything...everything is a battle lately.  Today she refused to stay in time out and she kept getting out of the chair and running away from me when I would follow her to put her back in the chair.  She called me "yucky", told me she didn't love me anymore and informed we were not friends anymore.  Then she scratched me.  All this right after returning home from the Disney store where she spent her birthday money on new toys.  So a mere 30 minutes after returning home from our shopping trip, we were back in the car headed back to the store to return her new toys because girls who behave like that do not get new toys.  She handed the toys back to the cashier and told her what she had done and why she could not keep them.  We headed back home and she went straight to bed.  I then retreated to my patio to de-stress over a beautiful Spring evening and a glass of wine....only to have a little four year old join me before even one sip of wine had crossed my lips.  And what did I do when this little one who had pushed me to my breaking point showed up?  I decided another battle was the last thing she or I needed.  I cuddled her up in my lap, told her I was sorry we had such a bad day, told her we would try to have a better day tomorrow.  I then sent her to the trampoline to jump with her daddy.  I sat back, sipped my wine, and marveled at my beautiful girl and amazing husband playing together and I thanked God that even on our hardest days I can still hear the voice in my heart telling me that the best way to handle this feisty little girl is with love. 

I love you always and forever and no matter what.

Life After a Miracle

After years of disappointment, years of heartache and loss, years of unending doctors appointments, endless tests, searching for answers, years of hoping and praying, years of refusing to give up, after all this, on October 23, 2013 Vivienne Faith was born.  She is healthy and perfect.  I remember the moment she was born.  I covered my eyes, too scared to look at her.  It was so unbelievable to me that my baby had survived 9 months inside me and could really be here.  It was so unbelievable that I couldn't look, because if it was true and she was finally here, then it would be the culmination of years and years of sadness, grief, hope, faith and fight all wrapped up in one little miracle life.  If it was true and she was really here I would be unequivocally, unconditionally, head over heals in love with her and that terrified me.  Because I know that great risk comes with loving someone that much.  I heard my doctor firmly say my name, "Morgan".  I looked up at her through exhausted and hot tears.  She looked me right in the eyes and said, "Morgan, look at your baby."  And I did.  And I fell unequivocally, unconditionally, head over heals in love with her.  They laid her on my chest and in an instant I knew I would die for her, my sweet, precious, miracle, rainbow baby.  Were those tears I saw in my doctor's eyes as she hugged me, congratulated me and then slipped out of the room to see her next patient?

We took our little Vivienne Faith home a few days later.  She had a pretty serious case of jaundice and we spent the weekend holding her all wrapped up in a photo therapy blanket hoping she would not have to be readmitted to the hospital for treatment.  The jaundice got better over the next few days and those days turned into weeks and weeks into months...

Many quiet nights spent peacefully rocking her as I marvel at her perfectness, first smiles and first giggles and first times rolling over, cuddling up together for afternoon naps, nursing sessions that forge a bond between mother and baby like no other.  It is a fairy tale ending...a little bit.  But let me be the first to tell you that mothering a rainbow baby, two rainbow babies, is hard work.  It is the reason for my three month hiatus from blogging.  I didn't mean to take that long of a break but I am tired, no, exhausted.   I am adjusting to two children which I have learned does not double the work, it triples it.  I stay home with my girls so most days I am in sweats all day long.  I don't get to take showers or even brush my teeth a lot of days.  And it is all so complicated when you are the mother of a rainbow baby....you don't have the luxury of feeling overwhelmed by your baby....she is a miracle after all.  A miracle who you wanted more than anything in the world.  How can you possibly complain when your prayers have finally been answered?  The guilt of feeling so tired and overwhelmed was eating me up.  So back to my therapist I went.  And she tells me this is oh so common among mothers of rainbow babies.  Our babies are miracles.  Our babies were wanted and fought for more than most.  But they are still babies.  Babies who are fussy.  Babies who don't sleep.  Babies who spit up and poop all over you all day long.  Babies who generate an inordinate amount of never ending laundry.  Babies who change your whole life and leave you dreaming of just one night of uninterrupted sleep, just one hour at the gym, just one night out where I get to dress up and talk about something other than breastfeeding, diaper brands and sleep training, dreaming of the day I can drink just one cup of coffee all the way through before it gets cold, wondering if the day I will fit back into my skinny jeans is ever coming.  They are miracles but they are still babies.  We are incredibly thankful for and in love with our baby, but we are still just human.  We are still mothers of newborns and face all the same challenges all mothers of newborns face, but we face it with the knowledge that all this craziness almost wasn't and so we add guilt to our list of challenges.  The books tell you to let your baby cry it out if they aren't sleeping but you can't imagine doing that.  I didn't fight for years for this baby just to leave her alone in her crib crying.  The books tell you not to hold them while they sleep and not to nurse them to sleep.  But you can't imagine not doing the things that feel the most natural to you, holding and nursing your baby until she is peacefully asleep in your arms, especially after you worked so hard to get her here.  And you wonder if you are setting up bad habits and ruining her for life.  You treasure this baby so much and you want to break all the rules.  You find yourself doing a delicate dance between breaking the rules and just loving your baby to pieces and trying to still follow the rules a little and have a baby who the books define as "good".  

And it doesn't help that Vivienne was born into an atmosphere of chaos.  That's what happens when you are born 6 days after your Mimi passes away...it's a bit chaotic when you get here.  Your daddy is sad and grieving,  your mommy is trying to hold it together for the both of you, your big sister is adjusting to losing her Mimi and having a new sibling all at once...chaos.  This is the reality of life since Vivienne got here.  In many ways it is just like life when I was pregnant with her, a mess, but a beautiful mess.  Vivienne has terrible acid reflux (which is why she does not sleep well) but even so, she is the happiest little baby.  She smiles and laughs all the time, sometimes at nothing.  She is such a joy to mother.  Riley has adjusted and is turning into such a sweet big sister.  The days are a mixture of feeling tired, feeling overwhelmed, feeling like I'm never going to be the "all-together" mom I once was when I was mothering just one child and feeling my heart melt when Vivienne smiles at me, thanking God when Riley says something cute and then kisses her baby sister on the head and runs off to play, feeling like I just conquered the world when I take a shower and make dinner all in the same day and as of recently deciding to throw the books, the rules and the guilt out the window.  I nurse my baby to sleep, I hold her for naps sometimes, I go get her when she wakes up crying after she has been put to bed for the night and I let her sleep in my arms while Jason and I talk or watch a movie.  I put her in her car seat and we drive around while she sleeps and I drink my Starbucks, I slip her in bed with me in the wee hours of the morning and let her cuddle right up next to me.  It is pure heaven when you disobey all the rules and enjoy it and don't feel guilty about it.  A sweet little baby sleeping on your chest is always heaven.  This is so different from the way I parented Riley.  I followed all the rules with her (I broke them a little here and there :) but I tried to do what the books told me for the most part.  Maybe I will pay for all this cuddling later when Vivienne is two and still doesn't sleep through the night.  Or maybe it won't bother me, because that's the thing about rainbow babies, they change who you are as a parent and as a person.  They change your perspective.  They make you break all the rules and just love them.  Love them always and forever and no matter what.  Welcome to the world miss Vivienne Faith.  You were born into a family who is sad and grieving and messy right now.  You were born into a family that loves you more than you could ever imagine.  Thank you God for this crazy season of my life and the two sweet little girls who make it all possible.
  

Because pictures are worth a thousand words, Vivienne's birth story probably says it better than anything I could write. A link to it is below. My epidural did not work with her at all, not one bit.  So I went through pitocin induced labor with no pain meds what so ever.  It seems a fitting end to her journey into this world.  I had to fight to get her here for years, might as well keep fighting through the labor part of her journey too :)  And a word on birth photography.  This is a relatively new type of photography and we were skeptical to hire a birth photographer at first.  But ultimately I decided that our journey to have her (our story begins here if you don't know) was big enough that I wanted it captured.  It was the best decision we ever made.  I highly recommend birth photography.  You will never regret your decision when you see the precious moments that are captured when you have your baby's birth photographed.  I highly recommend Grassroots Photography

Vivienne's Birth Story