This Crazy Life

Wow…..that’s all I can say about the past two weeks, is wow. I have really been struggling with how much of the past couple of weeks to tell you all about, if any. My heart strings have really been pulled in so many directions. How vulnerable do I get with the world? How soon do I tell them? Do I just keep this between my family and close friends or do I let the people who have been following my journey and supporting me throughout everything continue to do that? I’ll tell you, this isn’t easy, this is hard to put out there. But you all have been my biggest support and cheer section and God ultimately told me that I couldn’t cut you all out now. Especially since we were at such a crucial time in the decisions that would change our lives forever.

First of all, let me catch those of you who may have missed where we were in the adoption process up. A couple weeks ago we had just completed two of our three home study appointments. We were well on our way to start looking for kiddos that we would be able to call our own. The future was starting to become a reality and I could picture our family growing, for real real. It wasn’t a far fetched dream anymore, it was finally coming true. But one thing I have learned from the past couple years, unfortunately, is to never get your hopes up, even when the end is in sight. I thought for sure that adoption was God’s plan for us. I mean we have gotten this far, this has to be the way right? Eh, wrong. Now y’all are wondering what happened right? Maybe you can guess?

Did you guess?

If you guessed she got pregnant, you are correct! Last Sunday, May 26th I found out that we were going to be parents again to a biological child. Yes, you can bet we were so excited. We knew that we weren’t going to be able to keep it quiet for very long because of how many of you were following our adoption journey. But we also knew from experience that we had to keep it as quiet as possible until that first ultrasound. We, of course told my parents and brothers, and then a handful of our close friends. We decided that if anyone were to ask about the adoption and only if it wasn’t avoidable then we would tell. We had a week of bliss as we were wrapping our brains around this turn that life had taken on us. Plans changed in an instant. No more adoption, no more Spartan race, no more pushing myself in the gym. Instead of getting children that we knew nothing about we were going to get a brand new baby. The life we were building in our heads now showed something completely different. We were preparing to make a difference in a group of siblings lives but instead we had to shift to raising a newborn baby.

Now, I am betting that many of you are questioning why I continue to talk in the past tense and are eagerly awaiting my answer. Well, like I said we had a week of excitement, a week of hope, a week of joy knowing that God was answering prayers in ways we didn’t expect. Well Friday night rolls around and I notice some things just weren’t right (I’ll spare you all the gory details). I let my husband know and then I finally decide that maybe I should call the doctor. I talk to the advice nurse and she tells me that she thinks it would be in my best interest to go to the emergency department. Great, just what we wanted to do at 1:00 in the morning when I have to work the next day. I told my husband that if we were going to go, we needed to go then so that I could be home in time to go to work. I thought for sure we would get there, hopefully get right in, they could check whatever they needed to check and we would be on our way. Well, come to find out, an ambulance showed up right after we did so it took 2.5 hours for me to even get to a room. Then they wanted to do an ultrasound to see what was going on, but of course there is no ultrasound tech at the hospital at 4:00 in the morning. So fast forward, they do some blood tests and the ultrasound, then once again lots of waiting as they get the results. All they could find was a small spec that they suspect to be the baby and that my HCG levels were lower than they should be. Which tells them that it could be a miscarriage, an ectopic pregnancy, or that I wasn’t as far along as I thought. Of course, we were praying for the last one. But since it was just the start of the weekend we had to wait until Monday to do another blood test to get more answers. Let me tell you, aside from waiting for my daughter to show up in a life flight helicopter, that was the longest wait of my life. I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach that we weren’t going to hear the answer we wanted to hear so I gave myself the weekend to lay in bed and prepare myself for the news. I told myself that come noon on Monday that that was the end of my pity party, if you will. I know, many of you will say don’t give yourself a timeline on grief, because ultimately that is what this is. But I feel like God has given me a gold medal in grief. I told my family that its kinda sad when you know this kind of pain so well that you know what exactly you need to do. When you are so used to disappointing news, that it really doesn’t even phase you anymore. I was telling my friend how annoying the enemy is getting. He keeps trying to pull us down, you would think he would learn that we can’t be shaken. Finally, my appointment comes and we get the news that I did miscarry once again. Don’t get me wrong, I am devastated. I am not taking this lightly. If you know me at all, you know my heart is broken. But after having a miscarriage before and losing my daughter, I have, unfortunately, learned exactly what my mind and my heart need in order to make it through. Lots of prayer and Jesus by my side.

So, within a weeks time, our lives flipped an entire 360. We thought life was going one way, then it did a 180 and we were wrapping our brains around it going a different way and then once again it does another 180 and we find ourselves going an entirely different direction. We have decided that we aren’t going to jump right back into the adoption process. We are going to take some time to pray about it and really listen to what God wants for us. Maybe this was His way of stopping the adoption process as that wasn’t His plan or maybe not. We really are not sure where we are going to go from here, but we are going to take it slow and listen as God leads us through this crazy, insane journey of life.