thankful

I am thankful. Everyday I am thankful for my children. For my husband. My beautiful friends. My sister. My Mom and Dad. I am thankful for the beautiful baby girl that is growing and kicking inside of me. I am thankful for my job. I am thankful for my home. I am thankful to have a food in my fridge. I am thankful for my in-laws. I am thankful for this life that lately has really been difficult, but still beautiful. This Thanksgiving I am focusing on the positive. Trying to push out all the negative thoughts. Thankful to have another Thanksgiving with my family. For it is true that tomorrow is never promised and to have a tomorrow is always something to be thankful for.

climbing

It's beginning to feel a lot like groundhog day around here. Not Christmas. Everyday I wake up and it's the same feeling. I feel scared, lost, worried, hopeful, optimistic. Everyday is some more news from the doctor. None of it good. How can that be? How can 2 weeks ago everything be "normal"? My good friend said something that I have been thinking about everyday. She said what I am going through is like climbing a tree. Deciding which branch to cling to. Do I climb onto the one where the reality of loosing my mom sits. Do I climb to the one where hope and optimism sit. Do I climb to the one where I close my eyes and hope it all goes away. I haven't made it to the branches yet in my climb. I am not nearly as angry as I was 2 weeks ago. The baby growing inside of me is a great distraction. Somebody asked me if I am mad at God. I feel torn. When I think about my mom and the reality of what lies ahead, yes I do feel anger. Then at that exact moment that I start to feel anger I feel my sweet baby girl kick inside of me. Then I feel gratefulness to God for this blessing. God is testing me. I am not sure if I will pass. I know that I will keep climbing towards a branch on my tree that will give me strength and grace.

surprise

I would have bet money that we were having a boy. I would have bet our brand new beautiful car that we were going to have a boy. I have never been wrong with guessing the sex of our babies. Even when I was pregnant with the twins I knew they were girls. Same with our son. I was wrong. I was so wonderfully, beautifully wrong. We are having a girl. A sweet baby girl to bring joy into our hearts and love into our arms. We are over the moon excited. The kids are equally excited, Brady is most excited because he didn't want to share his toys with a brother. Now he will have 3 sisters fussing over him, oh he will be in heaven. God has a plan here, what is I can't even begin to tell you. But as for now I like his plan with another girl for our growing family. Now all we need is good news. My mom meets with her doctor tomorrow (appointment was changed because they scheduled a PET scan for this morning) All I am praying for is at least one piece of really REALLY good news. I don't think that is too much to ask for.

range

On Tuesday we find out the sex of the baby. On Wednesday we find out just where my moms cancer has spread. The range of emotions I am feeling about this week is overwhelming to say the least. I can't wait for Tuesday but I would love to just skip over Wednesday. I am finding that everyday I am reacting differently to my new reality. On Thursday we took the kids to see Megamind, I yelled at the teenage pimpled faced boy who insisted that I needed to turn my 3d glasses in in order to use the bathroom. Normally I would have been happy to oblige, but my hormones and sadness took over and I yelled at him. This is not like me. I felt terrible. I ended up crying in the bathroom for a 1/2 hour. Friday proved to be better. I felt more optimistic. Saturday was back to feeling sad and hopeless. Today I feel somewhere in the middle. I am finding that I have to take the day on minute by minute. I have to allow myself the right to be sad, angry, hopeful, optimistic, scared. I can only be in control of my emotions for so long. Trying to resist the urge to cry or feel scared is really just delaying the fact that later I will feel that way. So bring on the week ahead. The good and the bad, possibly it could be good and good. And I apologize for anyone who gets in my way when my hormones are running me, I am not in control.

life

Life presents itself differently everyday. For me, my experience has been life is joyous and exciting or overwhelming and scary. I have never experienced the two at the same time. Of course there has been the days where the good mixes with the bad, but never to the extreme of what is happening right now. The Joy: I am 5 months pregnant! The Sorrow: My mother has just been diagnosed with Metastatic Breast Cancer. How can God raise my family up the way he has with the miracle of life only to come 5 months later and knock it all down. I am mad. I am so fucking mad. My mother has already been through breast cancer once. 4 years ago she was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer. She had a double mastectomy and went through chemo and radiation. Everything looked great. She fought the hell out of cancer and it looked like she had won. Now 3 years after treatment they have found that cancer has spread to her lower spine. They see spots on her femur (both) pelvic bone and upper rib. She is having test after test to determine where exactly it has spread to know what kind of treatment to give her. Life is just not fair. But at the same time, with a baby growing inside my belly I feel like a hypocrite saying that. We have wanted this baby for 3 years. It took 3 years to finally be blessed. So when I think about our sweet growing baby I fall back in love with life. Life is bi-polar. The intensity of emotions I am feeling is insane. Just like life. Maybe this is really what it's like and I have just been lucky to only experience Joy and Sorrow separately instead of together. Maybe it's like John Lennon and Paul McCartney, apart they are good but together they are great. I am praying for a miracle here. I am praying that our baby can withstand the anger that is pulsing through me. I am praying that my mom has enough fight in her to kick this cancers ass. I am praying that I find the strength to really believe my prayers are being heard. I am praying that life takes an anti-depressant and chills out for a bit.