I’m Honored!

Look what Coco gave me! Thanks Coco!

As I think of who to pass this gift on to I can’t help but return it to Coco. Coco has been such a huge support for me as I have struggled through my emotions this past year. Not only does she help so many of us out in blogland, but she makes a difference out in the “real” world too! (I know! Isn’t blogland, the REAL world?!) I’d like to extend an EXTRA BIG THANK YOU to Coco for her letter to April. I think of this letter often. How hard it must have been for her, but she did it to help someone else, someone she simple heard about.

Which brings me to my next person, Paragraphein. She too, spoke to April about her experience. This just must have been so hard, but she did it, as Coco did…to help another. Her blog continues to amaze me.

I know Coco and Paragraphein have already receive this gift, however they are just so wonderful they deserve it twice.

I can’t forget Sandra, who also dug into her past to help April. Sandra parented at a young age. She told April her story, which also must have been hard. There were hardships for her and she put it right out there for all of us to read. (Sandra has posted in quite some time, I hope all is well in her life.)

I truly thank all three of these ladies, for helping me, with helping April.

HeatherS-my fav amommy! She just rocks. I am amazed with her heart towards her children’s birth/first mom and dad. She holds a dear spot in my heart for being so beautiful. 

And then there are a few nonbloggin people close to my heart I would like to share this with.

To my sister, Gayle. For your understanding and love upon learning about your new nephew, PooWee. You’r words bring me to tears as I type this. Oh and ESPECIALLY for that St*rbucks Gift Cert. For her curage through her breast cancer battle. Gayle also gives back  with her motorcycle club in Arizonia. They do many drives to benefit children and other charities.

 And of course MY MOM! Who never says no to watching the boys or picking them up. Who INSISTS on me bring them over verses taking them elsewhere at times. For all the assistance in getting the boys where they need to be when I’m needed in three places at once. For the handmade knit socks she’s given Eli’s teachers or the daycare teacher. AND ME!!! For the baking she does for school fundraisers. FOR BEING THE BEST DARN MOM/GRANDMOTHER A DAUGHTER/GRANDCHILD COULD ASK FOR!! I love you Mom!!

 

Sick of Being Sick

PooWee and I are ill AGAIN! I’m so sick of this!

PooWee man had poo-poo issues last Wednesday. I was changing him constantly. He was hanging on me and only wanted to nurse ALL DAY! Thursday he seemed much better. I took him to daycare Friday, he didn’t poo all day. Saturday he gave the sitter a HUGE blow out and didn’t eat.

Saturday is when it started for me…I ate lunch and my stomach began to turn. UUGH-I was so nauseaed, but couldn’t throw up. I kept thinking, “If only I would throw up, I would feel better!” Never happened. I had to stay home from work on Sunday. (UUGH, the work I have missed lately!)

PooWee and I have been hanging out in bed the past 2 days. Food? - What food, if we eat we just feel awful. PooWee is nursing so much, I am sore. He only nurses three times a day now, so believe me we are in OVERTIME here. I’ve been drinking as much fluids as possible.

I tossed the cloth diapers to the side for awhile. I think I’ve used more disposables these past few days then I have his whole 15 months. I’m feeling guilty, but man, they are just so much more convenient, seeing all I want to do is change him and lay right back down.  

Today, we both have gotten out of bed. Feeling better, well that is until we shared a piece of toast. PooWee had a fourth and I managed the rest. My gut is turning and he is once again whining and pulling at me and doing “milk” in sign language. (We use that for nursing.) It’s rather cute. Milk is done by opening and closing your fist. He chases me with his ands in the air, doing the sign. Yes, and I give in. It seems to be his comfort zone during this ill time of his.

Have I told you all how much my mom rocks yet? Well, G-MA MARCY ROCKS!!! She called Sunday evening asked if I needed anything and said she was picking up Elijah and would take him to school Monday morning. She brought over some ginger ale and Elijah headed to her place. She picked him up after school, took him to gymnastics and he spent the night again last night. He’s loving it too. G-Ma Marcy spoils him. He doesn’t have to do a thing there! I’m thinking it may be hard to get him to come home.

My weekend sitter didn’t have the kids this weekend because she has Influenza B. And when I took PooWee to daycare on Friday, a sign was hanging on the door. It said “There has been a confirmed case of Influenza B in this classroom” Oh YEAH-I’m loving the sound of all this! INFLUENZA B STAY AWAY FROM US. WE ALREADY HAD INFLUENZA A, WE DON’T NEED YOU!

We have had so much sickness in this house this year - it’s crazy. Typically we end up having one cold go through the house and then we are done! I would say we are done for a few years now.

I’m hoping to find enough energy today to wash the dishes that have been piling up for days. Pick up the living room floor, which has toys, clothes and a deck of cards thrown all over. My bathroom has a pile of dirty clothes. Speaking of clothes, I have like 3 loads that have been patiently waiting since Thursday to be folded. I think I may have to get the iron out. We’re not even going to mention my bedroom. OH HOW I WISH I COULD HIRE A MAID - JUST THIS ONCE!!!

I must find the energy! Things NEED to get done around here. I think I may just bust butt, get stuff done no matter how I feel and then hit the bed…once again. Oh and yes I will be skipping my meeting at work today. PPSSST-like I feel like going anyways!

****UPDATE****

My mom…she’s the cherry on top of the sundae…the extra pickle in a bloody mary…SHE’S THE BEST!!

Just as I finished up this post, she comes walking in carrying bananas for PooWee. (She has this thing for the bananas at a local gas station. She says they are the best. PooWee loves bananas, so of course G-ma has to buy him the good ones.) She then starts taking off her jacket. I asked her what she was doing and she stated that my dishes need to get done. She said she was here to get some of my work done. I told her she couldn’t do my dishes and that I am making myself work today NO MATTER WHAT. She wouldn’t hear it. She said I needed to rest yet, cause I looked like sh*t! (THANX MA!) I still wouldn’t let her do my dirty dishes so, I offered her to fold the laundry instead. She sat down and folded ALL OF IT! I got the living room picked up and a start on the dishes so far.              I LOVE YOU MA!!!!!

On My Mind..

I never can seem to post on just one thing. Again today, I basically have a bunch of ranting to do. So, stick with me as I run through all that is going through my head.

-My blog stats are going crazy! Why? If you ask me, this blog is the world to me, but I can’t figure out how others find it interesting. Well, someone linked to My Days Without PooWeepost. Then another linked to it on her Mysp*ce account.

I ended up going back and reading the post again myself. Once again I hit a low, I cried, I was happy I had PooWee and then I also had anger.

In my head I kept thinking of so many moments that tear my heart apart. One moment was when Eli and I returned after yet another walk around the hospital to get away from all the visitors. As I opened the door to my room I was hoping nobody would be there. I was wrong! Lets see…there’s J & P, both of their mothers, there is J’s brother, his wife and two kids, and then there’s J’s sister and her son. So that’s 10 people, all here for J & P.

Eli was driving me nuts. He kept whining that he wanted to hold PooWee. I didn’t have the courage to speak up and get PooWee for him. I too wanted to hold PooWee, but of course said nothing. Finally, J got PooWee for Eli, I think she just wanted him to be quiet.

Eli and I were sitting on my bed. Eli was touching Poowee’s cheek. I had my arm around Eli and we just stared a our lil baby in ah. Eli began asking who he looked like. I so thought he looked like Eli. Eli liked that idea. I wish I had a picture of this moment. I think it would be beautiful.

Then there were arms pulling PooWee away. They were J’s, she said it was her niece’s turn to hold my son. I doubt Eli even had PooWee for 3 minutes. J’s neice had PooWee about 4 times already. J was jealous, she didn’t like us referring to PooWee as part of our family. She didn’t like us interacting with him and took him away from us. I can’t stand her for this. But I also need to blame myself. For it was ME that couldn’t speak my words.

Why was my voice so weak! Why didn’t I say, “NO! In-fact, EVERYONE LEAVE! Just leave and let us be!” That’s what I was thinking, but the words never came out! This happened to me SO MANY times! I never spoke what I was thinking.

I know I can’t dwell on the past, the past comes back to haunt me though. I want so much to now have a voice. A strong voice, that may help other mothers, or maybe even PAPs. I’ve come to realize that though I choose not to sign TPR, adoption HAS become apart of my life. I can’t change that. I hope to atleast make adoption better for others.

I know…no matter what, there is pain in adoption. But, if I can put warning signs out there for others, maybe I can help them make the best choices. LIKE NO PRE-MATCHING, or NO PAPs AT THE HOSPITAL. Take my pain and shield themselves from it. It’s hope, it’s my hope!

-On the brighter side, Eli is doing better. He is using his visual aids.

Actually, when his VI teacher walked in his classroom the other day, he was on his CCTV and she was super excited. They talked and he told her about his email pals, who are visually impaired (VI) as well. He is really excited about them. His teacher is setting up a bowling/pizza party for the VI kids in our area. She said there are two boys that she can’t wait to introduce to Eli.

I think this is so good for him. He will be will other kids like him and hopefully this will encourage him to stay strong.

His doctor appointment went real well. He actually broke down and cried. I realized he never really cried about his disease. Dr. W was AWESOME with him. He got down in front of him and spoke to him at his level. He reassure Eli he would never be completely blind. He told him he would retain some vision. Eli will see “fuzzy” in his central line of vision. Dr. W told Eli is vision will not deteriorate fast, but so slow that throughout life he really wouldn’t notice. He encouraged him to use his aids and expressed how important they were for him. Eli needed to hear all this from Dr. W.

Dr. W wsn’t concerned with the floaters. Eli’s retina is not detaching anywhere and everything else looked fine. He explained that Eli’s eyes could be stressed and the brain reacts this way.

We will be heading back down to the UW hospital at some point, for more testing. Basically, Dr. W would like to do two more tests that will give us  a more specific diagnosis. However, we will hold off until Eli is comfortable.

I will also have to take PooWee in for an exam to see if he is carrying this as well. We are going to wait until he is about 2 or even 3 years old. If PooWee has it, it means it’s in my family. We currently don’t have anybody with visual difficulties like Eli, so we just figured it came from his dad’s side.

Hopefully, Eli and I get to his blog this week. So far he had picked out his theme. He went with one that has a black background. He actually sees words better when they are white and the background is black. It’s hard on my eyes, but it’s not my blog!

-Andrew is headed to Spain on Fri. Lucky kid!!! His father, Mike, is getting married. She’s a sweet thing! She’s from Spain and wants to get married in her mother’s home town. Mike is so funny…I mentioned to him, on having more kids. (he only has Andrew.) He said OH NO!!! I reminded him how much his fiance LOVES kids. Then he replies, “Well, it better happen in the next two years then!” Mike and his lady have just bought a house and Mike is “allowing” his fiance ONE room for a kid!

I’m happy for him. He’s a good guy and I only want to see him happy as well. His fiance is very nice and excepts Andrew. She is even fine with Mike and mine relationship. We have a son together, we will be communicating and she realizes this.

-OH ALMOST FORGOT!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY G-MA MARCY!!!!

Today is my mom’s birthday! She’s 73 years young! We will probably do supper tonight. HHMMM-where should we take her? Eli will want to go someplace that will sing to her and embarrass the bageebeez out of her. We’ll see what we all decide on!

-Monday! Monday is cleaning day,and I must get to it! There’s dishes and laundry and not to mention all the toys that have spread through out the apartment. I loathe cleaning! I’l find anything to stay away from it……like babbling on in my posts!

OK-off to clean!

-WAIT! One more thing…hop over to Judy and send her your words of encouragement as she goes through chemo. She has breast cancer. Her posts show her strength with this battle and I’m sure hearing encouraging words from others will only make her stronger! Thoughts and prayers go out to her from me!

Yesturday Was a BAD Day - Here’s to a Better One Today

Yesterday didn’t turn out all too great.

My car has decided to not to go over 10 mph. It jerks. Oh what am I going to do? G-ma to the rescue once again. She got the boys from school, and got Elijah to gymnastics. I can’t even think of where I will come up with the money to fix it. My brother told me to check the transmission fluid. Even though I figured that wasn’t it, I did-it was fine. BUT, when I went to do that I have a flat tire! Yeah! LOVE MY CAR! It’s actually a pretty nice car—–when it works!

With my car broke down I missed Eli’s play at school. “Opera for the Young” he’s been talking all about it forever and signing the songs. I feel horrible. He was/is REALLY upset that I didn’t make it too. And of course today was the only time. SUCKS - JUST SUCKS!!!

One of Elijah’s guinea pigs died. Muffy, she was just laying in her cage. So, now she’s in a box in our garage and we will need to bury her. I wish I knew how/why she died, is something we did. I don’t think so. So now it’s really sad because Fluffy is just crying like crazy “looking” for Muffy.

Today Eli has another one of his karate lessons. G-MA!!!!! Can we use your car??? I hate not having a car. OH YEAH-Never told ya, so Eli got those free karate lessons, right? Well, the dude got $30 out of me! He took Eli off to the side and when they came back Eli was all suited up in a uniform. At the end the instructor says, “That’ll be $30 for the uniform.” Tricky he was -ah?

Elijah and I decided that seeing our day yesterday was kinda crappy, I didn’t have to make supper!! I liked that thought. So, instead we had one of our favorite, pickle and onion pizza. Yes-I said PICKLE and ONION pizza! It’s super easy to make! Take a frozen cheese pizza and simply cut onion and pickles up! MMMMM! Ya don’t know what your missing!

PooWee’s birthday is right around the corner. I’m thinking of having a birthday party. I didn’t have a party at this age for Andrew or Elijah, just a small family get together with cake and ice cream. I think I want one for PooWee because we really never “celebrated” him coming into this world. My family and PooWee’s dad’s family haven’t really met. It would be nice for them to meet.

My mom, G-ma Judy (my step-mom) and G-ma Suzie (his dad’s mom) would probably help me out with the food. I think I’ll just have snack foods verses a meal. Then I thought I’d make it a drop in when ya want, and stay for however long you want. This way if someone is totally bored they don’t have to feel like they HAVE to stay. (I’m not good at entertaining a bunch of people.) I just don’t know if I can afford it though. We’ll see, I do have time.

I’ve been searching and searching for the perfect gift for him. I think I have it. Here it is, doesn’t it look like fun? He would like the big truck. Currently, he loves pushing clothes baskets around as he stands, so I think he’ll like this.

I’m getting worried about how his birthday will be for me. I’ll have his party on the Sun. before, Dec. 9th. His birthday is Dec. 12th. I hate to say it, but that day may just bring back horrible memories. How do all you mothers that aren’t parenting deal with that day? How can I focus positively on that day verses dwelling on the pain?

Dec. 28th, the day he came home, I want to start some type of tradition. This day has more of a positive memory for me. Wish I could just change his birthday! Elijah thought we could go bowling every year on this day! Maybe when he’s older.

Wow, now that I think of it, there may be some hard times coming for me. That whole time period when he was with J & P. Am I just going to be able to be grateful I have him or am I going to be focused on where he was 1 yr ago. I will try with all my might to think positively. I hope I’m not an emotional wreck.

Gee, what about J & P? Will they be thinking of 1 yr ago too, and feel the pain of their loss? The twins are not here yet. I was misinformed earlier. I guess J & P are in Russia now for a visit. The twins will be coming here next month on a Sunday and everyone at work is planning this party. I think they like to talk about it right by me. Having the twins will help them keep a positive look at the time they had PooWee. Plus, they’ll be pretty busy. I do hope they find peace with our situation sometime. I hope they learn that I didn’t WANT to give them the pain. I hope they learn to forgive me, they don’t ever have to talk to me if they don’t want. I just want them to know that if I could do over-I WOULD IN A HEART BEAT.  I wish them the best.

I am looking forward to turning the car seat around. I think he’ll like it too. His feet are starting to hit the back of the car seat. He is running out of room. He’ll see a whole new world in the car then.

Time to go about my day. Laundry today! I’m soooooooo EXCITED! (Did ya hear the sarcasm?!) :) 

My Mother

Took my mom to the eye doctor this morning. I gave her a copy of my post as we drove there. She read it and then folded it up and set it down. There was no response. We never did talk about it either.

I first understood my mom when I was listening to a speaker at a conference talk about her mom. She stated her mom was “an old German”. (I’m not making any accusations about Germans AT ALL. I’m Germain too!) She went on saying that her mother doesn’t show much affection, her emotions were quite hidden, and it took her many years to learn how to understand her mother.

As this lady spoke, I was wondering if we had the same mother. My mom doesn’t show much emotion. Growing up I never really heard her say, “I love you.” Though I always knew she did. If she was proud of something I had done, it was unknown to me.

As an adult I have learnt to “read” my mom. If I hand her, my finished knitting project that took me ages to make, she’ll inspect it VERY carefully. She looks at almost every stitch, and checks out all the seams. If she hands it back to me with a comment like, “The stitches are too tight, or too loose.” Well, then she feels I could have done better. But, if she hands it back with no real comment, but maybe a hum, like mmMMMMmmhhh. Well, this means she likes it and I did well. To not get a response from my mom is a good thing.

My mom is a very strong lady. She’s 73 years old and still kicking strong. She helps me out with the boys like you wouldn’t believe. My boys love her to death.

She even has a way with Andrew’s friends. She helps me out  with picking/dropping Andrew off places alot. And many of these times Andrew has friends with. If a friend starts walking G-ma Marcy will yell for him to get in the car. In winter these boys often don’t have their jackets on. Well, they now check with Andrew if G-ma is picking them up and will have their jacket on when they get to the car. They love her. They all call here G-ma and are very respectful to her. She will run these kids way across town, where as when I was their age, MY BUTT WAS WALKING!!!

Eli and G-ma can be the best of friends and then enemies all in one day! G-ma spoiled him soooo much that it comes back to bite her sometimes. This 9 year old pretty much can sit back and have G-ma wait on him hand and foot. When she use to babysit Elijah alot every fri. and all weekend and I’d give her money, I learnt quickly to give her grocery gift cards or gas cards. For the money I would give her always ended up in a unnecessary gift for Eli. DROVE ME NUTS!!

And now there’s PooWee. He definitely know who his G-ma is. A big smile grows as he sees her. He has lots of hugs and kisses for her. And G-ma is already spoiling him as my other boys.

My mom is very special. I wish I could give her the world. She’s had a ruff life in the long run and I wish now she that she would have NO WORRIES, but she worries. She worries about me, my boys, my other brothers and sisters. She won’t sleep at night if she forgot to buy a jar of pickles. Her body is usually always aching. She’s pretty healthy though, no major problems, which we are all thankful for. Even the thought of losing my mother brings me to tears.

Today, her response to my post, silence, I’m not sure what to think. I was driving, but I think her eyes were watery. Silence and teary eyes, my mother showed me her heart today.