A Letter to My Husband on Our Anniversary

Today is my four year wedding anniversary with my wonderful husband.  So I wanted to take some time to thank him for everything he has done for me and continues to do for me.  He may not always think so, but I love him fiercely and appreciate everything he does for our little family.  You can read about how we met on my “About Me” tab, so I’m not going to go into all that.  I will say, however, that it is as fresh in my memory as when it happened.  I hope that I will always be able to remember it this way!

Dear Mr H,

It seems like an eternity ago when I first heard your voice on the other end of the phone line.  A short time after that first phone conversation, we met and the rest is history.  I didn’t know that first night I met you that we would end up married someday with a beautiful baby boy, but I’m sure glad that God had that planned for us.  Every day since then has been simply amazing.  We don’t have a fairytale romance and our life isn’t perfect.  We fight and argue sometimes, but we get through it and at the end of the day we love each other and that’s all that matters.  I’m not sure what the future holds for us, but at least we will experience it together.  I just want to thank you for the things you do.  You work so hard to support our family and I just want you to know that even though I may not say it, I do appreciate it.

Thank you.  For being my husband, for being a hard worker, for being supportive, and most importantly, being a wonderful father to our son.  He adores you and that makes me love you even more.

Here’s to many more wonderful anniversaries together.

I love you.

Mrs H.

Unleashed

My son is the light of my life.  He is my pride and joy.  I never knew it was possible to be so proud of someone and to love someone so much until he was born.

That said, some days he makes me think that I’m going to end up in a crazy house before he turns 3 (he’s 2 now).  I have heard everyone my whole life talk about kids and their “terrible twos,” but I’m starting to think my kid takes it to another level.

I’ve gotten to the point where I HATE going in public with him.  HATE IT.  He listens to me about like this stapler sitting on my desk listens to me.  And in case you’re not sure how well a stapler listens to someone, IT DOESN’T.  Only it has an excuse.  It’s not alive and doesn’t have ears.  In Caden’s case, he has perfect hearing and cognition, he just CHOOSES not to listen to me.  In fact, he ignores me so I’m confident that when I talk he hears Charlie Brown’s teacher.  “Caden, don’t wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wahhh!”  That’s what he hears.

He is getting to the point where he doesn’t want to sit in the high chairs in the restaurants anymore.  When he even SEES the high chair being brought to the table from across the room he starts saying “no.”  Then when we start to put him in it, he screams and starts flopping around.  So then you almost drop him in the floor and everybody in the restaurant is looking at you like, what the heck?  So the last time we went out to eat we had to put him in a booster seat.  That went well.  NOT!  So now he has nothing to keep him in place because those stupid booster seats are just like plastic boxes to elevate you.  That’s it.  So he wouldn’t sit down on it.  He wanted to sit on the booth.  Ok fine, sit on the booth seat.  That lasted about 3 seconds.  Then he was jumping up and down in the seat.  After a few attempts of trying to get him to sit down and failing, I just let him jump.  At least he was being quiet and there was no one in the booth behind us to feel him jumping.  Then he starts trying to climb under the table and put his feet on the walls.  Ummm no.  That’s NOT acceptable.  So I pop his leg a few times.  He doesn’t care.  When I pop him it’s like nothing even happened.  He doesn’t even pause for a second and PRETEND to cry or make a pouty face.  Long story short, we won’t be going out to eat with him until he’s 15.

He’s got so much freaking energy it’s unreal.  It’s like he’s the son of the freaking Energizer Bunny.  I wish I could find those dang batteries and remove them sometimes!

I always said I would never put a leash on my kid like those moms you see walking around the mall, but I shamefully have to admit that I did try it once.  ONCE.  That’s all it took for me to realize that my child was not having it lol.  We were at the beach and knowing my son already, I knew that he would not be afraid of the water and he would run to it and that scared me.  So I bought one of those stupid leashes to ease my own fears of him being sucked out to sea.  We got to the beach that first day and I put that thing on him and he screamed like I was killing him.  Even over the loud crashing waves, everyone on the beach for 5 miles could probably hear him and most of them turned around and looked to see what was going on.  Then he immediately flung himself down into the sand and started throwing a rolling around, limb flailing fit.  Needless to say, the leash came off and we had to chase his chubby little butt all over the beach that day.  So I made a few notes to myself that day.  Number 1, do not take a toddler to the beach.  Number 2, don’t use those stupid leashes.  Number 3, I am really out of shape.

I love him to death.  This is a fact.  And I don’t want to wish the time away for him to grow up and calm down, but good grief!  Am I the only one with a heathen child?  It sure feels that way lol.

Happy Mother's Day, Angels

May is always a little bittersweet for me.  May has a lot going on.  Mother’s Day is in May.  My wedding anniversary is in May.  My brother in law’s birthday is in May.

May is also my grandmother’s birthday month.  I can’t celebrate it with her because she is celebrating it with Jesus.  She is celebrating it with my grandfather and her sisters.  She is celebrating it with her mom and dad and grandparents. 

That makes me happy for her, but at the same time it’s tough not being able to call her up and tell her Happy Mother’s Day or Happy Birthday.  I wish I could go by and give her a card and a hug and some useless gift that she would leave in the bag for years in her closet for us to find later.

I miss my Mamaw.  I miss her laugh.  I miss hearing her shoes click across the floor.  I miss hearing her rocking in the kitchen.  I miss seeing her dressed up like every day is Sunday.  I miss everything about her.  Even the things that used to annoy the crap out of me.  I would love for her to annoy the crap out of me for just one day. 

So Happy Mother’s Day to you Mamaw.  I miss you, but I know that you enjoyed spending Mother’s Day with your mom and grandma.  One day I hope I get to spend Mother’s Day with you again.

And Happy Mother's Day to all the other moms who have been given their angel wings.    

For My Mom

I didn’t always get along with you.  Sometimes I yelled at you and said ugly things.  Sometimes I stayed out all night and didn’t call.  Sometimes I pushed you away and shut you out of my life.  There were times when you probably thought I hated you.  

I’m sure there were nights when you prayed to God that things were different.  I’m sure there were times when tears flowed like rivers from your eyes.  You probably thought that all your worrying over me would send you to an early grave.

As a mother myself, I now know what that must have felt like for you.  I want to thank you for never giving up on me.  I want to thank you for all your love and support over these years.  You may not feel like it, but you have made an impact on my life and the way that I will mother my children.  

Simply put, thank you Mom.  I love you.

My Son, My Gift

In light of Mother's Day, I wanted to post this speech that I wrote for my communications class last year.  We were assigned to write a commemorative speech and I thought what a better time of my life to commemorate than the birth of my son.  I hope you enjoy it :)

                The birth of a child is one of the happiest times in a parent’s life.  Most people only experience this miracle a few times in their lives.  For a woman, this event is even more special because she has carried and nurtured this being inside of her own body.  She has felt the little punches and kicks for months.  Ask any mother about the day her child was born and you can be certain that she can tell you every detail of that day and the events leading up to the first moment she set eyes on her newborn baby.  It is a moment that will forever be stained in your memory.

                I found out I was pregnant on a Thursday afternoon.  I had been feeling bad all week and had been having some cramping.  I knew something was going on but I wasn’t quite sure what it was.  I had been told that there was a possibility that I would never be able to conceive or that it would be very difficult for me to do so because I have Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome.  This condition leaves a lot of women infertile and unable to have children.  So needless to say, pregnancy was not the first thing that came to mind, but because I desperately wanted a child every time any little thing happened to my body that might be a symptom of pregnancy I ran out and bought a test.  By this time I had taken so many tests in the past year and seen so many negatives that I didn’t really expect anything different, but I bought two tests and went home and took them anyway.  That day they were both positive.  Because of all the previous negative tests, I was a little inclined to think that the tests were wrong.  So I went and bought two more tests.  Those were positive as well.

                We took a picture of my husband and I with our dog and on that picture we printed the words, “Camera to take this picture = $140.  New hair cut and color = $85.  Grooming for the dog = $45.  Knowing that there is really a family of four in this picture = Priceless.”  We gave this picture to our parents, and that is how they found out we were pregnant.  Everyone was very excited about the new addition to the family.  

                My pregnancy was pretty routine.  I never experienced a moment of morning sickness.  My biggest complaint was the heartburn, which I had on a daily basis.  Zantac and Tums made a lot of money off of me during those nine months.  All in all, I loved being pregnant and felt great right up until the end.

                When I was 17 weeks pregnant, we went to the doctor for our big ultrasound appointment where we found out what we were expecting.  I had always known what I was having.  I guess I just had that “mother’s instinct” that everyone talks about.  My instincts were proven correct when the ultrasound tech said “it’s a boy!”  I thought my husband was going to jump out of his skin because he was so excited.

                 Our happiness was quickly counteracted when we were told that the results from a recent blood test had come back positive for spina bifida.  We had to meet with a geneticist to talk about what to expect as well as what our options were for further testing as well as termination of the pregnancy pending the outcome of the further testing.  We did a repeat blood test that day and were told to wait for the results from that test and then we would talk about the future from that point.  My husband and I had already decided that the pregnancy was not going to be terminated no matter what the results said when they came back.  It took a week for the results to come back and when they did we were finally able to breathe again.  Our son was going to be born healthy.

             

                The rest of my pregnancy crawled by at an excrutiatingly slow pace.  I couldn’t wait to meet this little person who was growing inside me.  My due date came and went.  The last week of my pregnancy I was put on bed rest because my blood pressure was high.  I was a little relieved by this though because I was terrified that my water would break while I was at work.  This way I knew I would be home whenever it happened.

                On Sunday April 12, 2010 I woke up feeling a little “off.”  I just assumed it was because I was 41 weeks pregnant and miserable.  As the day went on I started to feel a little better but then I started to have dull pains in my lower abdomen.  By 9pm I was having contractions.  They started out pretty far apart and irregular so I wasn’t so sure that I was in actual labor.  As the night went on they finally became regular and started coming about 4 minutes apart around midnight.  I decided that I would try to get some sleep and wait it out because my water hadn’t broken yet and so I knew it might be a while.  Around 3am I was still awake and unable to sleep through the pain so I got up and took a shower and got ready.  Then I woke my husband up and we went to the hospital.

                I got to Duke Hospital around 4am Monday morning.  After I was checked in they confirmed that I was in labor and that I was only dilated to 1cm and about 80% effaced.  They asked me to go walk around the hospital for two hours to make my labor progress.  Walking makes contractions come faster and harder, so I was having them about every minute while I was walking.  It was impossible to walk during a contraction so I would have to stop, lean on the wall and breathe through them.

                After two hours of walking circles around the elevators, I went back and had the doctor check me again.  I was now dilated to 4cm and about 95% effaced.  I was admitted and taken to my birthing room.  Shortly afterwards the anesthesiologist came in to give me my epidural.  This to me was the scariest part of the whole process.  The thought of having a needle stabbed into my spine was not particularly thrilling.  Much to my surprise, it wasn’t really that bad.  I hardly felt a thing.  After the epidural was placed, they pushed a bolus of medicine through the line to make sure that the epidural was placed properly.  Apparently my body didn’t like this too much because when they did this, my blood pressure bottomed out and I passed out.  They reacted quickly and were able to get my blood pressure back up pretty fast and life was good again.

                I spent the entire day Monday in labor and waiting on my little guy to make his appearance.  They broke my water around 4pm that day but I never progressed past 5cm.  in fact, when the doctor came in to check me at 11pm that night, the baby had moved back up and out of the birth canal.  The doctor said that this was usually a sign that the baby was too large to pass through the pelvic bones and that we should consider a cesarean section.  

                At 11:30pm, I was taken back to the OR to have my c-section.  It was such an odd feeling lying there awake on that table knowing that on the other side of that curtain they were cutting my stomach open and I couldn’t feel a thing.  It was difficult for me to really focus on what was going on though because I was so drugged out by the medicine that they had given me at that point.  I don’t really remember too much about this actual part of the night because of that.  I just remember lying there and being so cold and feeling like time was standing still.

                At 12:34am, Caden Anthony Hopkins was born weighing in at 9lbs 4oz and 21 inches long.  

There is a picture of my husband and I with him in the OR, but I was so out of it that I barely remember taking it.  When my husband brought him over to my face, I couldn’t even see him.  I could barely even hold my eyes open.  My husband said he was screaming bloody murder, but I never heard a thing.

                Afterwards I was taken to a recovery room and Caden was whisked off to the nursery.  I didn’t get to see him until about 6am that morning after I was settled into my room.  I remember the nurse pushing him into the room in his bassinet.  He was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen laying there all bundled up in swaddling blankets wearing the little pink and blue knitted cap.  I was overcome with love for this tiny person that I didn’t even know I was capable of feeling.  I couldn’t wait to pick him up and hold him in my arms.  This was my child.  I made this person.  What an amazing thing to be able to say.

                The time since he was born has flown by so unbelievably fast.  Next week my little baby is going to be turning 1.  Kenny Chesney said it best when he said, “Don’t blink.”  I know that this is onlyt he beginning and that I will be asking myself every year where the time has gone.  But no matter how many years go by, I know that the memory of the day he was born into this world and the first time I saw him will always be as fresh as the day it happened.  I feel truly blessed that I was given the chance to experience such a miracle and given the opportunity to know the real meaning of unconditional love.  Having a child has forever changed me, and for the better.  This was my greatest accomplishment in my eyes and I don’t foresee any future event ever topping the birth of my child.