Constantly Being Watched

Not only am I watched 24/7 by my own children, but when out in public I am often glared down. I know I am a sight - the crazy lady with 4 little kids and one on the way, but sometimes the stares burn in the back of your head!! I went to the mall this morning (something that is never usually done on the weekends, but I had a few things I needed to do so we were just going to be in and out). So there were alot more people around than usual. I felt like I had to be on my toes at all times because of how much I am watched! I have gotten used to it over the years, I mean when you start off with twins, they are automatic head turners to begin with. The only thing that I have figured out how to deal with it, is to smile! Often seeing my family makes old people smile, so why not stop and let them chat with us and let them have their looks, they just want to enjoy my kids like I do! When people ask really silly questions, I don't get irritated, I just answer and smile and tell them a fun fact about what they are asking about. When people comment that I am: crazy, have my hands full, brave, don't know how I do it, or better you than me (yes people say these things) I simply smile and say I love it! (Side note: my favorite comments are when you compliment my children!) When the girls were little I did get a little annoyed that any shopping trip required extra time because I would get stopped. Now I know that any trip requires longer because I will get asked lots of questions. I actually do enjoy speaking to lots of strangers, because these are actually the only people I come in contact with now besides friends and church members. And I do like letting them know that I truly am happy, yes, I love my family like crazy!! I know my actions and interactions with my kiddos speak louder than words, so I know that I have to be on my toes. So now add extremely large pregnant and the stares and conversations intensify!! Every single person needed to know when I was due and what I was having! And now add a bit of a "handicap" look to me. Wow!! It was stare after stare. I never really realized how you can tell what people look at when they begin their conversations. I get looked at in the face then they look at my bag strapped to my leg and then back up at me. I don't mind it, because I know it is not permanent and I usually tell them what it is for (you know they are dying to know), but I wonder how many times we actually do that to people with handicaps. I bet that would bother people a lot if it was something that you had to live with and your situation was constantly being looked at. I have quickly become aware of it and I am going to try very hard next time I speak with someone with a handicap to constantly look at them in the eye and not "check out" what is wrong.

Are you trying to shine?

I read an article today and it was really cool. I would cut and paste the article, but for some reason blogspot doesn't let me do that. Here is the jist: This boy came to a realization that the moon has no light of its own. It simply reflects the light from the sun. After a few minutes, he comments to his Mom: "That is the same way we would be without Jesus." ~Yet the good news is that you have Christ, the Light of the World in you (John 9:5)~ It made me think of this question: How do you let your light shine? Do you try to shine by yourself and think that you have your own light, or do you let Jesus shine through you? It is hard to make yourself basically transparent and just let Jesus do all the shining for you. There are times when you think you can do it all alone with no assistance or that you may not need God on this one. But the truth is we should always be letting Jesus shine through us. And I don't know about you, but I would prefer to be a full moon at that!!! None of this half moon business and the light is only partially seen. Anyways, just some food for thought and definitely a challenge for myself!

Finley and Bed

Finley loves her bed. The girl stays in it all the time (which I love because with a girl that is as crazy as Miss Finley, it is nice to have a break)! We put her to bed at 7:30 - I wake her up at 8:30 - most of the time she is awake, just quietly laying down relaxing, but she doesn't make a sound so I don't know if she is awake or not. I put her down for a nap at 12:30 and I go get her around 4:30. She just loves to roll around and relax. Sometimes I go in there and she will pull a dress up dress from the floor into her bed and when I walk in, she tells me how pretty it is. The other day I went to find her to put her down for her nap and I found her in Harper's bed (above picture) snuggling and relaxing. This girl won't lay and snuggle with you at all, but if she is in her bed, she is the best snuggler in the world. The only time she will sit still is with Matt - sometimes - she LOVES her Daddy! I just had to document Finley and her love for her bed. I am a little nervous when it comes to the teenage years with her. I foresee noon wake ups and then hours in the bathroom doing her hair!! Yikes!

A shout out to my Hubby

I noticed on my previous posts that I did not get to shine my hubby's halo at the past weeks events. My Matt did such a great job taking care of me as well as the kiddos. He always knows how to make me feel better and how to help me out (even if I am being cranky because of pain). He worked very hard jumping up and helping me out every time I asked and even when I didn't. He knew how to step it up to get me going and on my feet again. I love how he loves me! I am so blessed to have such a wonderful husband and I know God had us picked out for each other a long time ago. He is so caring and we all love him to pieces! We are getting ready to celebrate our 10 year anniversary this July and it is funny that 10 years ago we were battling me being in the hospital with a tube coming out of my body!!! It was chest tubes then and a kidney tube now!
Thank you Matt for always being here for me and trying your hardest to make me better, even when you have absolutely no clue what to do! I love when you do little things to help me out and that you come straight home from work, love on your family and then sit in the kitchen cleaning so I don't have to. You never let us know that you are run down or need a break, you just do everything and anything to make the five of us happy! We love you Matt and THANK YOU!

Update

Well, I have been home for a little over a week now, and I must say, I have been needing to get back into my groove! I have been sleeping great - actually better than before because I don't have to get up 5 times in the night to go to the bathroom!! I can pretty much do everything now, I just take a couple breaks during the day to rest my body! I will have my tube for about 2 weeks after I have the baby and then they will look into these kidney stones and how to get rid of them - hopefully forever!!! So life over here is getting back to normal and school is back in session.

Our offer on our house has fallen through, so we are back to square one! Everything was going so smoothly and the people were even going to let us rent back until our house was done being built, but they heard that there was some drama with the sewer plant in this neighborhood (something that doesn't effect us at all) so they didn't want to have to deal with it. Such a bummer!! I really don't want to have to start cleaning for showings again!!! But it looks like I will have to. My heart was so ready to be done here and to start at our new house, but those just weren't the right people and our house is getting ready to start year #3 on the market - yipee!! Well, that is enough of getting down on this, I need to go get my sweet Finley out of her bed, take her outside, and then later on I will open my Bible and be ready for what the Lord has to tell me about all this. I know it will be exactly what I need!!! I'm so glad I have Him to turn to for guidance, because I know that I wouldn't be able to do this on my own!

My latest Adventure

Well, if you haven't figured it out by now, nothing that I do is small scale by any means! It all started Monday (the 3rd) night around 11:30. I woke up with this pain in my lower left back. I could not get relief! I was up all night. I went in the recliner and tried laying there, still no relief. I did sleep 1 hour when Matt made me take a Tylenol and put a heating pad on it. I had a Dr. apt that morning anyways, so I knew I just had to make it to then. I drove to the Dr.'s - in the worst pain and waited. The receptionist asked if I was ok - I told her no and they scooted me back. Well, the Dr. told me I had a bladder infection and sent me home with some pain relievers and an antibiotic. I got them filled immediately trying to get some type of relief. I called my sister, Nichole, to meet me at my parents to help me with the kids because I was in so much pain (our inspection on the house was taking place that morning and we couldn't go home). After lunch, I took them home (screaming and crying the entire drive - I don't know how I drove at this point) I put the 2 little ones to bed, and then sat crying not knowing how to get rid of this pain. Well, Mom and Matt had called at this point and both came to my rescue. I called the Dr. office to see what to do and they scheduled me an ultrasound to see if it was kidney stones. I could not wait for that appointment due to the amount of pain, so Matt and I took off and went to the hospital. We waited and got the ultrasound done and then mysteriously my pain subsided. Well, the ultra sound tech girl came and told me that I did have stones (2 on each side- at least they couldn't tell too well) and that I had to go up to labor and delivery. At this time, I felt good and I wanted to go home, but they admitted me and I spent the night. I got out Wednesday morning around 9:00 am. We then proceeded to make our appointment for that day and go pick out all the stuff for our new house. Right before we left, the pain kicked in again. I filled the pain killers, took one, and sat for 3 hours choosing the things for the house. (Our house may have carpet on the ceiling :) The pain was getting intense and I knew things were going to get worse. So at 7:30 that night, we called in back up and Matt and I went to the hospital. (I was about to leave the door unlocked with all the kids in bed and just leave them until my parents got there, but Dad arrived quickly) I was admitted and given pain meds. Thursday: pain all day, tried to figure out what to do. Spoke with a urologist and scheduled a surgery for Friday morning. Friday: Stint put in via surgery in the am and then I was ok that day. We thought we had the problem solved. Friday night, severe pain came in!!! I felt like I was going to explode! I felt like a growing tick! Pain killers weren't working so they had to put another IV in and I was given a clicker to click every 10 minutes to give me medicine. I woke up every 30 min for the rest of the night clicking for meds. Saturday: I was so drugged up that I just slept and we knew that we still had a problem. Sunday: They tried to get me on oral meds - I was given pills that were supposed to last 4 hours and after 1 I was in severe pain. We called the urologist and told him the Neph tube was what we would have to do. The best part of this day was that I had to get an ultrasound of my kidneys and bladder and when the sweetest ultrasound lady scanned my bladder, the baby was just smiling away (ok, I just pretended she was smiling at me). It was the best to see her and know that she was ok in there and to see her little heart beating away. Next step:
Ambulance ride to Presby downtown where they would have to do the surgery. They brought me right to the operating room. The reason why all these Kidney stone issues were mysterious was because I am pregnant and they can't do all the xrays and regular stone procedures on me. They did have to xray me for this surgery but they said they would be fast and do as minimal as possible. Ok - so this procedure was horrific!! I had to be awake!! Sedated, but I felt alot! Now, it also had to be done on my STOMACH!!!! Yes, at 34 weeks pregnant I had to lay face down. I was on the stretcher and the PA guy said, we are just going to roll you like a log onto the table and he put down like 2 folded pillow cases down like they were pads. I was yelling!!!! Luckily they didn't shut the door and Matt came flying to my rescue. He took control and grabbed my bottom and they shoved pillows under me, then he said, "Becca your doing a pushup!" They then stuck more pillows and made a nice little nest. That was stressful! The medic guy even had to assist! What a production. As soon as it was over, I was put back on the stretcher and got a ride back to Presby Matthews. That night the pain was subsiding! Monday: Stint removal surgery. That afternoon the pain was all gone and Matt and I worked on getting me mobile. I was extremely sore and weak but no horrible pain!!! I left Tuesday - in the ice from the snow storm.

The Baby? Well she did great the whole time. Her heart rate was wonderful. I did have to get a shot twice to calm down my contractions, but that is probably just from all the trauma. So all in all, hopefully she will be ok from all the meds, but she is fully developed so that is a good thing!

We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends and family. There were people supporting my troops left and right here at home. Dinner was brought every night so my Mom didn't have to cook and worry about that. Chloe asked me about it tonight and was wondering why everyone brought food. I explained to her they were helping everyone out and then she said, "And did they pray for you to get better Mom?" I love it! They know that I got better because of all the prayers - it is so great to know there were so many people out there praying for me! The kids were happy and well taken care of by Grandma and Grandpa. (I knew Mom would get in the grove, she is very qualified for the job :) I will have to admit, I was very scared to come home. I have this tube coming out of my side with a drain bag attached to it. (I will post a pic of this later once I am clean - I can't take a shower either so Matt and I are tackling this cleaning thing tonight!) It is hard to move around. I can't bend. I can't get out of chairs. But sitting at the dinner table together last night was the greatest!! Yes, I cried all night because I finally had time to react to everything, but now I am ready to heal! The big kids have alot of questions, but understand. Finley is a little off, but that is completely understandable for a 17 month old (not to say that she still has to spend alot of time on the naughty mat now to get back to reality)! I am so thankful to not be in that pain anymore! It was awful! So I will have this tube coming out of my side until I deliver the baby (not sure when they will take it out) and I just have to adjust how we do things around here for the next few weeks. But awesome thing is we don't have to move!!! We have prayed the past 2 years for the right people to buy our house, and these people are going to let us close on this house in 2 weeks and then rent it back to them until our house is built!!! God answers our prayers in the best ways, the waiting is just tough sometimes!! It is so great that in times like these, when it is all over, you can just sit back and reflect and smile because you know you were well taken care of in HIS hands! The healing process is going to be tricky because my belly is only getting bigger and the end of pregnancy comes with its own set of fun complications, but we sure are going to have a wonderful baby by the end of all this and I CAN NOT WAIT to hold her now especially!