Blessings....Really Awesome Blessings

So....today I had to call the plumber to come in and do a $200 job.  I received a $200 check in the mail to help Jon and I out for commute, food at the hospital and so forth from grandparents.  I was thrilled about that, hence my very optimistic facebook status amidst everything that is going on.

My little brother told his basketball team about Maddie's surgery and they bought her a gift and got her a card.  And he is going to do a prayer request on the morning announcements for her too, which I thought was really cute.

I get the news that we probably have a cracked sewer line in our yard and it will probably cost around $2000 dollars to fix, but we can push it off a little while and our tax return should more than take care of it.

I get inside after talking to the plumbers about that, and realize I was so excited about opening that $200 check that I forgot to open the rest of the mail....We got a $1095 check from the title company that we used for what I assume were overpaid taxes to Oldham Co. that were paid in our closing costs.  I still need to call and make sure that it really does belong to us, because I almost don't believe it.

And to top it off I got a $50 Pier 1 gift card in the mail that I had been expecting, but I am still excited about it.  So, I made over $1300 opening my mail.  Which is good since Jon's sick pay equates to $7.27 an hour and I am taking a month off.

I am feeling extraordinarily blessed today!  I hope everyone else can feel this blessed too!

Snow Days

I guess it would be more like Ice Days...Three days off from school in the week and now it's Christmas break.  I might really want to consider moving to a warmer climate.  Or my next house really needs an indoor gymnasium.  The kids are driving me bonkers, because they have endless energy and no where to displace it. Instead of being able sit and play it's all about wrestling only way to keep them apart I believe would to velcro them to opposite walls.  At least the baby is good!

Oh!  And the cold weather is really starting to put a damper on my Christmas shopping.  I have no desire to leave the house unless it's above freezing, which it doesn't look like that is going to happen anytime soon.  So I have to get a move on there and brave the ice.  I still have to shop for Secret Santa, for my mom, step mom and for Madigan!  I really have no idea what to get for my little girl, she is really at a very in between stage where it's hard to find things suitable for her that she will love.  However, she did love the Barbie Power wheel, I think that her brothers would kick her out and she would never get to ride in her pretty pink car, and no, they wouldn't car that it was pretty and pink....it a car, that's all that matters.

Merry Christmas and Happy Shopping!

Intent of This Blog

The intent of this blog is not to lament over my children's "problems," but instead it is an avenue for me to express what I am thinking and feeling about everything that is going on. I overwhelming feel blessed. I feel that it is very true that God never gives you more than you can handle, and there really isn't much that isn't healed through prayer. What can't be healed through prayer we have been so fortunate to have gifted surgeons and doctors placed in our lives.

I believe in miracles.

I would like this blog to be a place where other stories are shared and where I can share some of the information I have found or have been given. I may not post often being that my life is full of a lot of busy kid work around here, but I will be checking in!

First Reactions (with a little bit of background)

As any parent knows, hearing news about your child's health that isn't "normal" will make your heart sink. When I was 18 weeks pregnant with my first child, Frederick, I went in for a regularly scheduled ultrasound to determine the sex of the baby. However, things didn't go as planned. He wasn't by any means bashful, so they were able to tell us conclusively he was a boy. I really don't think they had to try to get that picture. What the biggest surprise was that day, however, was not the sex, but that he was going to be born with an Omphalocele, which means that some of his small intestine was still left in a sac (encased in the umbilical cord) outside of his body. We had plenty of time to digest this information before he was born, and we understood all of the different things that could be wrong with him.

Needless to say we were well prepared for our bundle of joy that was the largest baby in the NICU at 7lbs and 15oz. He looked like a moose in there. He came out almost perfect, just a few minor things after the omphalocele, and with an excellent prognosis. So two surgeries later he is a very active and playful 5 year old boy with no signs of any childhood illness, but a swirly bellybutton and a small scar.

Two years after his birth I gave birth to a beautiful healthy boy, Joseph. He was my worry-free baby. Wish I could say the same now! He is a beautiful kid, but whooo he is trouble, just as most three year olds are.

Two years after his birth....to the date, I gave birth to my beautiful baby girl, Madigan. We didn't know until the day after she was born that she had a heart murmur. No cause for alarm then, my family has many heart problems, most of them no cause for concern until adulthood, and my oldest has a murmur with no real known origin.

My sister, however, had a major heart defect. She had a Complete AV Communis (or Canal Defect). For this reason they called in the cardiologists to evaluate her and then a geneticist. Genetically, she is a "normal" girl, but she has a Incomplete AV Communis with a Cleft Mitral Valve. It is almost the same heart defect as my sister just less severe, which was great news. I figured if they did my sister's surgery 23 years ago and it went well that all would be fine. They told me that would need surgery before was school age. I think most of that day I spent being "strong" or numb, and then my husband left to get a shower and I sobbed for about an hour. You go over in your head what you may have done wrong and you wonder what you could have done differently, and there is nothing. I felt even worse for my husband, because in his family they don't have these problems and there was no telling where is head was.

Eventually, I got to the point that I didn't really think about her heart problem until a check up came around; every 3 months, then every 6 months. So it was easy to put the heart condition in the back of my mind. We were told by the second doctors appointment that she was going to have to have surgery at around two years old. Which still seems a long way off when she was only 6 months.

We just recently went to the Cardiologist and they said that it's time to do surgery, and she is only 19 months. It took me aback to hear them say that they would be ready to operate as early as mid December and no later than February. I asked them to wait until after the holidays and they feel comfortable doing that so that at least is a relief.