Imitation: the highest form of flattery!

My children, like all children, like to pretend that they are other people. Christin is a fan of pretending to be religious characters. This sounds like a great thing but rarely does it end well. Recently the girls were taking a bath when I noticed I hadn't yelled, "Stop splashing," "Don't touch anyone!", or "Why is she crying?" for awhile. As always, when it is quiet I worry that there is trouble. A quick peek in the bathroom assured me no one was hurt yet, and Christin is retaining the Bible stories we tell her. Lindsey was sitting in the tub crosslegged facing Christin, eyes closed. Christin had handfuls of bubbles which she was spreading on Lindsey's closed eyes. When Lindsey started to protest (due largely in part to the pain, I'm sure) I heard Christin say, "This is the mud! I have to put it on your eyes so you won't be blind anymore!" I don't believe the Bible story says that Jesus first blinded the man with mud but whatever:)
Now for Lindsey. Lindsey is a shape shifter. She becomes whomever she is around. I often feel like I live in a cave. Everything Christin says is echoed by Lindsey in words, tone, and gesture. It doesn't have to make sense, she just repeats. She has two things she has picked up from me saying "darn it!" and putting on makeup. Fortunatly she cannot get into my makeup, unfortunatly she can get into mom's. On a recent trip over there she covered herself in make up (lipstick and foundation) and pulled apart some stuff in mom's room that mom was just telling me how proud she was of herself for putting together (oops). When Lindsey came strolling into the piano room thoroughly proud of herself Mom and I both scolded her as we went to survey the damage. Lindsey just carefully smacked her lips together to make sure her lipstick was even, it wasn't.
We are hoping that Nana will let Lindsey come over again sometime in the next couple of years.

What Not To Say

First let me say that this is not an angry blog. Sometimes it amuses me the things people say to me. I know that no one is being heartless, however, in the effort to say the "right thing" people often say the wrong thing. Sometimes it makes me angry but usually I just nod my head and later laugh about it. So here it goes, a list of things not to say to someone grieving:

1. "I know how you feel" You don't, no one does, grief is such an individual process that unless I have told you how I feel there is no way you can know. No two people feel the same way. You can only know if I tell you, and even then my feelings can change in an instant. Which brings me to

2. "How are you doing?" Talk about a loaded question. I feel this is the question people use to test out their rusty Psych 101 skills. Good=Denial Bad=Depression or Anger. I've decided "We're OK" is the only appropriate answer, it keeps people guessing (unless of course the took more than one psych class:)

3. "Are things back to normal?" I'm not sure I even understand this question. There is no way to go "back" and I'm not even sure what "normal" is. I believe what people are trying to ask is if we are moving on but for some reason people are afraid to ask us that.

4. "Are you going to try again?" Ok, many of you whom I LOVE have asked me this but can we stop and think about this. I feel the connotation with this question is you failed, don't give up. We didn't fall of a horse people. There is no getting back on. Jack's death is not a failure, we had a successful pregnancy that resulted in a baby. I believe what you mean is, "Do you think you will have any more children?" (we don't have an anwer to that question yet)

So if you ever come across a person in grief here is my suggestion:
Give them hug. Tell them you love them and are praying for them. Ask them how they feel they are coping. And if you are really close to them ask them if they have any plans for the future. Lastly, gage their mood and make a suggestion to do something to either allow them to cry or give them the freedom to laugh (or both:)

I hope this post is informative and at least a little amusing. As painful as Jack's death have been there have certainly been times of laughter (admittedly sometimes at the expense of others ie: laughing at peoples' "I feel sorry for you face":)

As a side note: Jack continues to make an impression on our girls. Lindsey still prays for him and Christin will still get sad and miss him, she is however, not above getting fake sad at bedtime in order to stay up later and talk and we are seeing fewer real tears everyday!

We still appreciate everyones prayers and thoughts!

Normal Weird

I've decided to try and start blogging a little bit about my own thoughts and feelings about Jack's hospital stay. I've realized that while I never thought of myself as a "journaler" it is therapeutic for me to blog my thoughts. I'll leave the medical updates to Tara and Mom and my blog will continue to be what it has always been: my emotional and mental place to vent. Sometimes it will be spiritual (God is teaching George and I soooooo much) and sometimes just my wandering thoughts.
So for the past day or so I have been thinking about the question, "How do you do it?" in reference to living in a hospital 24/7 for a week now (Happy One Week Birthday Jack!!!!). Obviously so much of it is God and prayer, which I will get into another time, but there is a very weird "normal" feeling to this. So here is our daily schedule: Everyday I get up at 6:45am because we need to be out of our room by 7 (it's a consultation room during the day), we pack up all our possessions and take them to our 5 drawers and locker size closet in Jack's "room" (really a cubicle, one of 6 in a room). Then I pump, which I could go into way more details about but I will spare you, for now:) While I do that George takes care of getting my meal vouchers (breastfeeding/pumping moms get meal vouchers) and puts in our names to try and get another room tonight. We spend some time with Jack, go eat breakfast, pump again, wait for the drs. to make their "rounds", listen to what the plan for Jack is for the day, spend some time at Jack's bedside reading the Bible (Thanks Gideons!), praying, singing/talking to Jack, pump again, then lunch. After lunch usually one of us takes a nap (usually me) while the other prays for Jack and sits with him, then pump again, catch up with each other, pray together. Around 6 the girls, my parents, Tara, and George's family come by. Everyone visits Jack, the girls play, we all eat dinner together, everyone comes up to say goodnight to Jack. By 8 or so it's usually just us again, I pump (are you getting how often I'm pumping I might even be leaving some out:) we spend some time praying for Jack, we find out where (if) we have a room tonight, one of us showers, pump again, say goodnight to Jack, tell the nurses three times what our phone numbers are and which room we are sleeping in. Finally we fall into bed exhausted and sleep for 6-7 hours until we get up and do it again.
So that is how we do it. It's so bizarre and yet has become normal for us. I never would have thought that such a weird thing could be feel so normal, but it does.

"God is good all the time! All the time God is good!"

A short story about a PK

So I realize I just posted but I had to share this story with you all. Yesterday Christin was eating some goldfish. I heard her playing with them, making them talk and got closer to hear what she was saying. Here is what was going on.. .
Goldfish 1: Who would like to be next?
Goldfish 2: I would
Goldfish 1: Ok, I baptize you in the name of the Lord.
Goldfish 2 is then dunked in a glass of water and eaten and the process begins again.

I tried to catch her in the act but she was embarrassed once she realized she'd been caught.

Soon and Very Soon

So it appears our little boy is anxious to meet us. I had finally adjusted to the fact that he was going to be 2 weeks early giving me about 4 weeks to prepare. Then on Tuesday I started to bled. My doctors had told me this could happen so I wasn't shocked. They had also told me to go right to Our Lady of Lourdes and that the hospital would expect me and know all about my case. I have to say while the facilities at Lourdes leave something to be desired the people were awesome. When I walked in they knew exactly who I was and why I was there. Everyone from the Lady who cleaned the bed next to mine to the doctor (whom I'd never meet) was so sweet and wonderful that I actually look forward to seeing them again:)
The seeing them again is, however, coming much sooner than I expected. My doctors decided that the best thing for my and the babies health was to give me sterroids for his lungs (which they did in the hospital) and plan the C-Section for the 36 week mark, May 5th (that's right Cinco de Mayo!)
While I am so excited to meet this little trouble maker I am no where near ready! I now have 10 days to get my home, and self ready. Can I get AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH! Normally I am the kind of person who will throw myself into cleaning and preparing in the days before my due date. This time I face a delicate balance of getting it all done without over doing it and sending myself back to the hospital. So what can you my friends and loyal readers do? 1. PRAY: for him, for me, for all of us. 2. If you happen to have an extra Merry Maid laying around (which frankly is weird but whatever) send her my way!

This may be my last post until after the baby is born!!!!!

PS. We have a name (we think) but we figure at this point we might as well keep you in suspense until May 5th;)