the first one

I am doing much better. The antibiotic I am on is working so far. Praise the Lord!

I wanted to write this two days ago, but since I was in Urgent Care I couldn't.

8 years ago I found out that I was pregnant with my firstborn son. We had been married since May 1997 and it wasn't until December 4, 2000 that I found out I was pregnant. I thought I had the flu for 2 months off and on. One night we were sitting on the couch watching TV and I started craving an apple. When I started eating it, it tasted like bologna. I had Eric try it and he said it was fine. I looked at him and said, "I think we need to go to the store and buy a pregnancy test." We drove to Walmart and came home. I peed on the stick and waited. When I came out Eric said I was glowing. I was trying to trick him and tell him I wasn't (jokingly of course) but he could see the twinkle in my eye. We just hugged each other silently. For all of those years, it was unspoken that we thought we weren't able to have children since we had never gotten pregnant before.

It was about 10pm by this time and we drove up to the highest point in the city and sat and watched the lights and then we prayed. We went home and we called my mother and father in law. For some reason when my father in law got on the phone I started WAILING. It was loud and ugly. I don't know where it came from. He said, "uh...is this a good thing or a bad thing." and I wailed, "Good!" It had to have been pregnancy hormones, right? :)

We were so happy. I remember that Christmas so vividly. We already had a name picked out for a girl and since I grew up in a girls home I knew what to do with girls so of course God would give me a girl. All the presents that year were geared towards a girl. Little did we know of God's great plan.

About a week after Christmas I started bleeding. We went to the emergency room and the triage nurse told me, "Don't waste your time here, you don't need to see a doctor. You are having a miscarriage. It happens all of the time. Just go home and put your feet up." I asked her if I should try to see an OB the next day and she said no. We did not have peace about that. First thing the next morning I called an OB. We hadn't seen one yet because we were in the process of changing our medical insurance. When I talked to the OB nurse she told me to get into the office right then. They gave me a paper to take to the hospital to get an ultrasound and it said r/o (rule out) miscarriage. I remember seeing that baby inside of me for the very first time and I couldn't bear to look anymore because I thought it must have died. The ultrasound technician said, "I am not supposed to say anything, but there is a heartbeat." We cried.

I ended up being on bedrest for the rest of my pregnancy. I felt the best my last trimester and I could get around alot easier without bleeding. At the end of it all we were blessed with this sweet little prince:

Here are some of my favorite pictures of the early years....