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Archive for June 2008

Catch 22

June 30th, 2008

(My first guest writer is Brian, my husband. I thought it would be good therapy for both of us if he were to write something on my blog. He agreed and here is his first ever appearance on I Should Be Folding Laundry. Let’s give him a warm welcome! (Both he and I will be reading the comments as they come through, so feel free to leave a comment, we’d love to hear from you.) Brian is my first guest writer of many – I can’t wait for you to read all of my guest writers throughout the next week or so, I am so excited!)

As Beth described earlier, it did take a quite a bit of persuading to get me to
write something on her blog. But hey, pizza is a magical food. So here I am. I
must admit it is intimidating to have such a large audience and the pressure to
come up with something profound is weighing heavily. Beth says not to worry
about it and to enjoy the pizza.

As you are most likely aware, Beth
is having guest bloggers this week since we are moving. This also happens to be
the only week that I am home out of a 5 week span where I am traveling for work
for 2 weeks at a time. I just got back from the first 2 week trip. This was
the longest I had ever been away from the kids and the longest I’d been away
from Beth since before we were married. We were extremely busy during the day
which made time fly, but the nights were rough. I never realized how much I
took for granted being able to put the kids to bed every night and read them
stories. I really missed Beth and it was hard to hear her be so sad and not be
able to do anything about it. Not that I could do much about it if I were home,
but I would certainly feel less helpless if I were sitting next to her.

As
most of you have figured out, most men are fixers. If you tell me something
that is wrong, I will most likely respond with a way to make it better. If I
can’t figure out a way to fix it, I will then resort to finding a silver lining
in the situation. You know, the "yes, you wrecked your car but at least no one
was hurt and you really wanted a new car anyway." However, in the situation
with James and Jake there is no fixing and no silver lining. Which makes me
feel pretty useless. There is no comparison to the connection a mother has with
her unborn children. As a father, you love those children inside her belly with
all your heart and soul, but it still doesn’t touch how much their mother loves
them. For me, watching the pain the Beth has gone through during these past 4
months has been every bit as difficult as actually losing the twins. I
understand why it is so difficult for her that I am going on these trips,
because she knows I wouldn’t be going if she were still pregnant, not to mention
the chaos of starting a new business and moving into a new house.

I truly wish
that I did not need to go on these trips but I feel that some excellent
opportunities will arise from them. And it all comes back to the work / life
balance. I don’t want to be one of those guys that is constantly on the road
and never gets to see his family or someone that might be home a lot but is
constantly working and completely disconnected to what is going on with his wife
and kids. Its funny how that sort of stuff can sneak up on you without even
realizing it. You want to provide for your family, so you go above and beyond
at work, which only leads to more work — then your manager quits and you have
to start all over proving yourself to the new management and so it goes.. its
easy to completely immerse yourself in work (especially when you like what you
do) — its not so easy to put the brakes on and take a step back and ask
yourself why you are doing it and assess if the trade-offs are actually worth
it. It didn’t use to be this hard.

When we were little (that’s what Beth and I
call our early 20s) I had the best job ever. I had no production
responsibilities (that means that if a computer broke, I would never be
called). I worked a normal 8 hr day, had amazing benefits a great boss and
rarely worked late and pretty much never worked when I was home. Beth also had
a full time job so we just enjoyed ourselves when had time together doing things
like eating mac and cheese and lots of crescent rolls. I think we appreciated
how easy things were, but not to the extent we should have. I remember how sad
Beth was when I when on my first business trip, it was for all of two nights
down in Houston. I bought her a TV for the bedroom to keep her company. It was
our first time apart since we had been married and it was a really big deal. I
traveled two other times in the 6 yrs between the first trip and my current job.
In the past two years I have traveled 6 times for my current job. Talk about
backwards, at a time when my kids could most benefit from my influence and my
wife needs the most support. But then again, we are moving into a new house.
So there you go, a catch 22.

I know this is something I will be struggling with for the
majority of my professional career, but I hope that I will be able to keep
things in balance. As GI Joe says.. knowing is half the battle. Before I go, I
do want to thank EVERYONE who has been so supportive of Beth while we have been
dealing with the lose of James and Jake. Even the simpliest gesture of leaving a
supportive comment have meant the world to her and we are forever grateful to
you.

Our Home

June 30th, 2008

If all goes as planned, then tonight will be the last night in our home.

Our home. It is truly our home. It’s warm, inviting, cozy and filled with love. This weekend I have walked within these walls thinking about all that we have seen and felt and experienced here. The love, the kisses, both of our children learning to talk and walk and play. The memories are so sweet. The memories are so vivid. After tomorrow, memories will be all we have.

Except sometimes, those memories don’t feel like such a small thing. They are so sweet, they are sometimes bitter, they are sometimes heartbreaking, but through it all we have experienced it all as a family.

This home was my protector after James and Jake died. It was the only place where I felt secure and certain. Every time I walked outside this home after losing them, I felt so alone in this big world, so unsafe, unsure of what will happen, but upon returning through the front door, the not so certain became certain again, I was comfortable in my grief, if that’s even a possibility. I feel gratitude towards this home, I want to hug and thank it for being there for us, through it all, I want to sit and share memories with it over coffee, we’d swap stories remembering the time Brian threw up on the bedroom wall or the time I burned my arm on the oven. And the good, the moment Racecar came home from the hospital, Ariel’s first day of school, or on Christmas day when we told Ariel and Racecar that we were going to be adding to our family by two this summer.

If I could, I’d thank our home for being gentle with me on the days I would wake up and realize my babies had died, I would wake up hopeful it was just a bad dream, but no, it was painfully real when I realized my belly and my heart were empty.

This house is so beautiful. And so are the memories.

I’ll miss our neighbors, who are quiet, friendly and they respect our privacy and our space but would do anything for us. I’ll miss the many varieties of flowers that we planted that came back every year without fail, and yet every year I was in awe of their beauty.

I’ll miss the trees in our backyard that are the home to the birds singing their beautiful songs. I will miss it all.

I say good bye to this house, with sadness, but no regrets. It is time to move on, to create new memories in a new home, a new adventure. We are parting with such sweet sorrow, but we are definitely looking forward to tomorrow.

Holy Crap, we’re moving.

June 27th, 2008

I’ve been in denial, MAD DENIAL that we are actually closing on our houses on Monday. We have not packed a thing (packers have been hired, however, we are in charge of packing the bedrooms and the bathrooms), we have no window coverings for our new house, we do not even have an oven. Honestly, I don’t plan on cooking, Brian doesn’t planning on cooking, unless you plan to come over and cook, then why do we need one? Just one more thing to clean. Am I right or am I right?

So, this is where my life of getting up in the morning and staying in my pajamas until eleven, okay twelve, ends and my new life of craziness begins. I’m okay with that, crazy and I have known each other for a long, long time, we get along great. Usually.

I leave you with some important bits of information.

First, I blogged over here and I helped babysit Jo-Lynne’s blog while she was away by guest posting on her blog. (her blog was very well behaved, by the way.)

Speaking of guest posting, while I’m moving I have asked some people to guest post on my own blog because we are moving on Tuesday, July 1 and have I mentioned that I won’t have internet until July 10th? While I plan to stop in and show you pictures of our house, our progress and our new bath tub, you’ll also be seeing some new faces around here next week and maybe the week after that.

One of those faces is my husband. He’s going to blog for me. I asked him, he said "no," I said "please, please, please, please", he said "no." I said "fine, then I won’t cook dinner anymore" he said "you don’t cook dinner" and I said "fine then I won’t be in charge of ordering the pizza anymore" and he said "okay, FINE. I love pizza."

So, there you go – I have packing to do and pizza to order.

Also, I have winners for the 10 cases of Primo Water! Just e-mail me your address and Primo will send along your case of water! Congrats to the winners.

1. Midwest Mommy
2. Peggy (bex e-mail)
3. Irish Mom
4. Anna
5. Steff (gmail e-mail)
6. Gina
7. Aimee
8. Carole
9. Cereal Dieter
10. Alaina

The Good

June 26th, 2008

Brian came home yesterday, two days earlier than planned and now when I see him I think he’s a Super Hero – because yesterday? I went to lunch with this girl (she lives in the same small town as me and that makes me feel like I won the lottery). Then last night I had dinner with my friends. It was awesome. Like so awesome because I was not stuck at home all day long and I socialized and I feel like a thousand pounds has been lifted off of my chest.

I was beginning to feel like a prisoner. And the thing is, while Brian was gone, the kids were good, enjoyable for the most part. They slept well, ate well, fought well, played well, tattled well and sometimes, they did get on my nerves, but that’s to be expected. I’m sure I got on their nerves, too. Particularly when I would not let them get Swiss Cake Rolls at the grocery store.

It’s amazing to me how quickly time is passing, it’s just unreal. I feel like I wake up in the morning (at eight, nine and once even 10:00!) and before I know it, it’s bedtime (which lately equals 2 in the morning – Thanks, Be Design!) I stay up late, I eat ice cream, I work a lot.

I mean, a lot.

But that’s okay, I’ve been busy. It’s what I wanted.

I guess I’m feeling a little bit down because I thought that if I filled every waking moment with something, that I would feel less sad. or I would be too busy to feel the sadness. But that’s not the case.

I am sad and that’s okay. I so badly need to be okay with my sadness and not try to fight it. It’s just that being sad is so….sad.

Today, I need to focus on the good things, the great things. My sister-in-law and her family adopted a beautiful baby boy, he came home yesterday, my other sister-in-law gave birth to a baby boy just hours ago. I think about the little toes and fingers and the life that is being brought into their families, and the love that goes along with it, well, I can’t help but feel good about that. Two nephews in one week! Not many people can say that. We are blessed, for sure.

Here are some pictures that I took over this past week, more reminders of the good in my life.

There’s beauty on my deck:

And in my yard:

And near my home, at the perfect time of day:

(if you look real close, you can see the Chicago skyline, way in the distance.)

And in the sky:

And a double rainbow.

But mostly:

No matter how hard life can be, it’s always so very, very good.

faith for the faithless

June 24th, 2008

I am not referencing God or religion or church or holiness when I write the word faith.

When I write faith, I’m referring to trust. Trust in life. Trust in good. Trust that everything will go along as planned because that is what is supposed to happen.

I have always been faithful in my life. I had never been given a reason not to be faithful. I am a good person, I never lie, I always try to do what’s right because it’s right, and not for personal gain.

I was faithful.

and then, oh my god, my babies died. These beautiful, amazing gifts that were given to us were taken away.

Faith was with me throughout my pregnancy with James and Jake. I had gone in for the ultrasound at eight weeks because I was experiencing painful cramping and discharge, after my ultrasound I went home and my doctor’s office called and said "the doctor wants you to come in tomorrow morning because we want to find out why you were having cramps and the discharge." So, the next morning I hopped into the shower and I touched my belly and I cried. I cried so hard because I felt so blessed. I could not believe the gift we had been given.

An hour later I was sitting in the doctor’s office, I could not wait to talk to her about the two babies growing inside of me. Instead she came in and said "according to the ultrasound, your babies share a sac (also known as monochorionic) and there is a 50% chance that they will not survive because their cords will become entangled, killing one and then the other. My hope is that the tech just did not get good enough images and that you do, in fact, have diamnionic twins (two separate sacs). We will do an ultrasound in our office in two weeks."

I left feeling crushed. My emotions went from elation to sadness, faster than I ever dreamed possible. I had planned to buy a twin pregnancy book after my doctor’s appointment but I felt so silly doing that now after having that appointment.

But I did buy that book because I was faithful.

And so, two very long and emotional weeks later, on December 26th, we nervously entered the ultrasound room, the technician put the wand on my ten week belly and said "it’s diamnionic." We cried, we were so happy and relieved. Except the words happy and relieved do not really even touch what we felt that day. We just knew we were so in love with these babies who were to join our family come this summer.

But then on December 31st, I started to bleed and my world came crashing down on me. Blood. The thing I feared the most every time I went to the bathroom. And there it was – that sign that something has gone wrong. I immediately paged my doctor who told me to go to the emergency room. I remember on the way there thinking "there is no way I am going to lose these babies." I was so scared, and it was so beyond me.

But I had faith and thirty minutes later I could see two little heartbeats.

So, on February 25th, 2008, when the nurse could not find their heart beats, I was fearful and faithful, I had faith as I took the elevator down to ultrasound, faith that these babies would soon be kicking me in my ribs. I had faith.

But then I watched the words "no cardiac movement" being typed slowly with one hand onto the screen. A piece of me died at the moment. And sometimes? I think that piece of me was my faith.

Because now I tread through life cautiously, I fear cars running into our’s and injuring my children, I don’t get my hopes up for our new house because I’m certain the deal will fall through, even with the closing being less than a week away. I fear another pregnancy, I fear I’ll never see Brian again when he leaves for a business trip, I fear for Be Design, I have lost faith in myself and people and my surroundings.

I fear the rug being pulled out from beneath me in every situation.

I tread softly, cautiously, painfully through my days. I try to be brave, I try to trust. But sometimes, unfortunately, when I begin to regain that faith again, something else seems to happen and I lose the little bit of trust that I was able to build up in my life once again.

Losing my sons was hard enough, losing my faith makes it even harder to accept and move on.