Valentine's Day

Even though I was too sick to do their class parties this year, here are Isaac and Vivi signing their Valentines and delivering them!
Billy was so sweet to buy his daughter a silk rose (her favorite color, of course!) and a small box of chocolates and he bought me tulips and a big box of chocolates!! He was out of town on Valentines day, so he gave me these the day before and then sent me an email later in the week for a pedicure which I did this morning AND he is bringing home Olive Garden take out which is becoming our Valentine tradition!

The kids were spoiled with Valentines and prizes from Billy's family and balloons and chocolates from us. I made red sprinkled cranberry orange muffins and served them on Valentine plates.

Update on J's Adoption...and an AMAZING Surprise Gift!

Close As Can Be

These two continue to be the best of friends! Today, J's caseworker came for a visit. The bad news first: she has done NOTHING in the way of ruling out the birthfather. And I mean nothing. I was very frank with her about how frustrating that is to hear being that this child has been in the foster care system for 7 months and they could have either: a)found him by now and had him sign a waiver to his paternal rights or b) ruled him out as unknown and terminated his rights in court. She had nothing to say to that. So as of now, there is a court hearing at the end of May to do that and then of course "his" 45 day appeal period will then go into effect. So that puts us at a July adoption date at the earliest. Billy and I could not be more ticked off. He will be calling our attorney on Monday to see what if anything we can do to expedite this obnoxious process. *Huge Sigh*

The good news: she handed me two letters from the boys' birthmother! One to us and one to the boys. This is SO big for us because we have never had anything from the birthfamily, not a picture, not a token of Isaac's infancy, nothing. I read them and scanned them immediately for preservation. The letters will remain their private property but I wanted to share a few lines from our letter:

"To The Family That Adopted My Boys"

"...I would like to thank you for taking both of my babies and loving them as your own...I do love and miss them...I will try to keep in contact through letters and cards if that is okay with you...maybe one day God will bless us to meet personally and then I can tell you how grateful that I am."

And my favorite line in their letter said, "letting you go live with your Mommy and Family was the best thing for both of you."

All I can say is "WOW." What an amazing gift to us and them. This is especially amazing coming from children who were removed from foster care. For her to want to do that for them despite her sadness in losing them, is more than we could ever ask for. And it makes maintaining contact with her through pictures and letters all the more meaningful. I want to take her in a big hug and cry with her for the raw end she was dealt in life, for all the bad decisions that led her to this place, and for the gift of life that she gave to my sons. I want to tell her that I know if she could have the life she wanted; she would be healthy, make positive life choices, get clean, and be able to raise the boys she gave birth to. But because she can't or won't, our life is richer and more full. And that just doesn't seem fair, in so many ways it is not. However, I also know my body didn't work right because our God had a bigger plan for my children to come to me, and that plan involved loss and deep sadness for all of us. But the outcome is that I have smiling, happy, thriving sons and a daughter who are the absolute world to me. And that the path that brought us all to this place was worth it a hundred times over.

As I end this blog post (can you tell my head is not so foggy anymore?! Praise God!) I wanted to explain this picture. We put Vivi in J's bed the other night and when we came into check on them, this is what we found:

It appears as though they tried to make pallets on the floor and decided on the beanbag chair instead:

Awwwww....
We really do have the most wonderful kids!! :)

More health information

Billy's facebook status today is, "So many health issues, so little paid time off". SO true. I am having really bad vertigo again today even despite the medicine and rest. I am waiting on a referrel to an ENT to check on inner ear issues. Other than that, there is no further medical intervention scheduled for me. So I am just praying at this point for the vertigo to leave as fast as it came because it is so debilitating when it gets bad.

In other health news, we had J's ENT appt. today and they gave us the results of his sleep study. They said he has "severe obstruction sleep apnea". The ENT wants to take his adenoids and tonsils out on March 1st and admit him to the hospital directly after for 24 hour observation. I need to get back to normal so he can have his Mama with him in the hospital. Right now we are going to be trying to work out childcare for those 2 days for the other 2 kids. We have a couple options.

I am hoping if my dizziness can stay at bay long enough tomorrow, that I may be able to upload our Valentine pictures and get back to a normal blogging routine. For now I am resting still and thanking the Lord for the help we have with Aunt Vicki who goes back to Florida on Saturday. Thank you all for your sweet words of encouragement and advice. It has helped big time to keep my spirits up during this difficult time.

Today

Aunt Vicki drove me to my GYN today and while she was taking down my health history, I felt very nauseated. So they laid me down and put fans and cold compresses on me. I felt better enough after a awhile to be taken to the sonogram room. Meanwhile the GYN called my Dr. to tell her that she did not believe the vertigo was related to my female concerns and so the Dr. ordered me an MRI. The GYN gave me the results of my sonogram which came back as normal- a healthy uterine lining and ovary size. Typical. Everything always comes back normal. She is going to have me stay on the progesterone and come back for a follow up visit on March 10th. We are hoping my bleeding will stay away (as of yesterday) until then. OH- and my bloodwork from yesterday came back above normal. No sign of anemia. So the Dr. sent me straight down to radiology for my MRI. I had a bought of vertigo during that procedure and about every 3 minutes for the next 5 or so hours. The nurse called to tell me that the MRI came back healhty as far as stroke or cancer is concerned but that they detected a small benign cyst that may be what is causing the vertigo. The Dr. is supposed to call me tomorrow with more details about that, but they do not seem concerned. I am now on Meclizine and Zofran to stop the dizziness and nausea. It works sometimes. For the most part I am extremely fatigued and have a lightheadedness feeling. Aunt Vicki has been wonderful to do every thing for the kids...meals, school dropoffs and pickups, baths, dressing them, feeding the dogs, the list goes on. Meanwhile taking care of me! Thank God for the help because these past 2 days have been really rough. Thank you to all of you who have sent words of encouragement and sympathy. I am hoping I will be on the mend by the weekend as my back has been killing me from all the laying around. I just have no energy to do anything other then rest. Even a book feels too heavy for my arms. thank you for your continued support and prayers.

health update

i am writing this in bed because i know many of you are concerned about my health (and lack of blogging or responding to emails and phone calls). my health has not improved so billy's aunt vicki flew in on saturday to held me for the week as he is currently in pittsburgh until wed for business. today i had the most severe vertigo and so she drove me to the dr. who gave me a shot in my rear to stop the room from spinning. my mother in law said vertigo can come with anemia and being that i have had all the other symptoms of anemia, i believe that is what it is. basically i have had a cycle that has lasted for more than 50 days without ceasing, even with the use of progesterone. the dr. took my blood today and said if the anemia is extreme, i will have to go to the hospital for an iv. i am going tomorrow to the gyn for my tests and possible the scheduling of a D and C procedure. This scares me very much. i am also sooo sad that i had to miss my boys valentines parties. aunt vicki took up all the supplies but not being there to do it is such a huge let down as i love valentines days and parties. having aunt vicki here is a huge blessing and has helped me from spiraling down into severe sadness and self pity. at church yesterday, our pastor said "if God is willing to heal you. He will. But He also may not. And there is nothing you can do to earn or deserve it. He allows suffering even in those He loves for His purposes." I hope that I can find strength in the knowledge that God is very near to me, Jesus was acquainted with our grief and sorry and has laid upon Himself our iniquities. I know this too shall pass and then I will be back in the game of life again.

Lots going on...

This will be a random post that covers lots of territory. Starting with the fact that we are iced in AGAIN. That makes five days of no school because of "inclement weather" this month alone. And the schools are only allowed 2 snow days factored into their calendars. So who knows how this will effect our spring break and/or the end of the year if TX doesn't give a waiver to the school districts. Fun times, people.
Vivi has her class Valentine party scheduled for tomorrow. This ice is supposed to melt tomorrow, so I am hoping that will not call off school. We worked on her valentines (Princess and the Frog) taped to heart ring pops. She wrote her name on all of them! I was so proud. She is giving small boxes of chocolates to her teachers (Mama didn't have it in me to get creative on such short notice), and I am bringing heart cakes/plates/napkins for the party. The teachers told me they are providing heart shaped pizzas for lunch, but then they never sent a note home telling the parents not to bring lunch or to bring Valentines.
Something tells me they are counting on another snow day, but we are prepared either way!

On a side note, but one that is causing me aggravation...we are shopping for a new bed for Vivi. She has outgrown her toddler bed big time. There would be no problem if we were moving to a twin, but for the sake that we don't have a guest room- we want to get Vivi a full size white bed for guests. That is so much easier said than done in our budget. We will of course buy a new mattress, so we don't want to spend a fortune on the headboard/frame. C.raigslist is just irritating me....people put overpriced junk on there. On top of our difficulty in finding a reasonably priced white full size bed, finding full size little girl bedding is even more difficult. I love the zebra look, but she is too young for that in a bedroom. We are in no hurry to have her grow up!! And I don't want to have to buy new curtains or redo her pastel colored polka dot name letters on the wall. So I have to find bedding that already fits with our color scheme. Not fun. Not fun at all.

And in other news and the interest of being transparent on here (can I be any other way?), I am having some health issues that I touched on in a previous post...female in nature... and the Dr. has me on progesterone but they are not taking the desired effect. So I have basically been PMSing for 2 months....this blog is a relatively female audience, right? :) Headaches, cramps, body aches, mood swings, high emotions...you name it I have it. I have an appt. to see a specialist next Tuesday but no one to keep J that day while Vivi and Isaac are in school. Billy will be out of town on business. So sadly, I think I am going to have to cancel the appt. and then next time they can get me in is March 10th. Which means another month of suffering. This whole thing has me feeling like this: Everyday. And I am having a hard time shaking the sense of gloom. These issues have poured salt on an old wound for me. I just don't know why my body is broken in this way. God keeps me needing His strength every moment. Some moments I am good and can trust in Him and other times I am just sooo sad. I know in the grand scheme of things I am blessed to be able to walk around and have no intense pain or disability as so many others suffer with. Sadly though, this has been my own cross to bear in life and for years I was able to do so with peace and contentment. These recent issues send me into worry about what the problem is and what the future holds. Please pray that the Lord would feel very near to me as I struggle. That is all I can really hope for.