at two months...

Sweet Jameson,

At two months:

• You are the smallest, sweetest little boy.  You now weigh 10 lbs, 6 oz (up from 6 lbs 2 oz at birth!), so you're feeling sooo big to Mommy and Daddy, but still look tiny to everyone else.
• You've gone from screaming during baths to just scowling and being quiet.  I'll chalk that up as a point for me.
• Because your silent reflux causes lots of nasal congestion, Mommy and Daddy have to suck out your snot quite a number of times a day.  It used to send you into hysterics.  Now you smile at us as we do it, as if to say "ahh, thanks guys."

Here was your sister, Caroline, at 2 months.
She had a big move from Texas to Virginia at your age!

• We love your "sweet" time right after you eat.  This is when you really start flashing your charming smiles and trying to "talk" to us.  It's our favorite part of the day.
• You are eating about 3 oz. of formula every 2-3 1/2 hours.  This means you are also sleeping at night for only 2 1/2- 3 1/2 hours at a time... um yeah.  Fortunately, Mommy and Daddy rotate the feedings at night, but boy, we are READY for you to start sleeping longer!

• Your big sister, Caroline, is a caring little mama to you.  (well, except when she likes to taunt you in her 4 year old ways as pictured here... I'm really sorry, buddy.  I couldn't help but snap a picture.)  At your slightest whimper, she'll be sticking a paci into your mouth (whether you want it or not) or pulling you out of your seat from a deep sleep just to smother you with kisses.  So it makes sense why the jury is still out on whether or not you're as crazy about her... 

(Speaking of crazy...)


Okay, not really.

We love her.  You will, too, Jameson.

I PROMISE.

• Your silent reflux is doing better since we switched you to a hypoallergenic formula that is already broken down and goes through your system faster.  The doctor also started you on a little Zantac and we thicken your bottles with rice cereal to weigh it down (so it doesn't come back up!).  We keep you elevated after feedings, and those things have all seemed to help in the past week.
• Because of the reflux, you sleep upright in your bouncy seat next to our bed at night.  During the day, though, you loooove a good nap on your belly.

It's been an amazing two months with you, Jameson.  Welcome to our little family.

worth the wait...

I would fill out a million, bazillion questions of paperwork and run all over the city to complete them again for you.

I would be rejected by another birthmother that I thought was "the one" again to have you in my arms.


I would agonize through years of infertility treatments only to get to you.

I would wait and wait.  And wait.  To hear any news of hope again.

I would face the silence, the months of hopelessness and despair again if I had just known you were around that corner.

I would again walk by faith and not by sight, though it mostly felt barren and alone, for you.

I would trust the Author to write a happier ending than I could have dreamed to find you.

The journey to you was not an easy one.


But you, my sweet boy, were indeed worth the wait.

everything is accomplishment...

I'm realizing how much I thrive on what I can look out and say I accomplished.

Even though I'm rarely ever feeling "on top" of my to do's, even before baby, I guess I've come to expect that I should have control over what gets done in my day and what is alright to leave for tomorrow.  I felt like there was enough hours in the day to get a few things done and to still have quality time to spend with my daughter.  The standards around my house are really not all that high, (although as a perfectionist, I'm starting to wonder if that's true...) but if I can maintain things at a relatively functioning level?  I'd say I generally feel accomplished.

(On a side note, it really is sad and embarrassing how much of a direct correlation there is between my inner sense of peace and the level at which my home is picked up.  I know I'm not the only one.)

But in some seasons of life, like the post partum one I'm in now, even the simple is daunting.

Impossible feeling.

Even the smallest luxury like a shower is hard to come by.

And I reach the end of a day and feel a little angry.  What have I accomplished??  I look at my husband, who had hours of quiet, uninterrupted study time and adult conversation at work that day (with no one yelling at him, spitting up on him, or demanding from him, I might add) and I feel jealous.

And maybe a little bitter, if I'm being honest.

Being a stay at home mom is HARD.  Sometimes physically.  But always, ALWAYS emotionally.

There's almost nothing better than it for one's sanctification.

(I'm fortunate my husband "gets" this, and is nothing but respectful and encouraging to me about my job at home, but I know that's not typically the case in marriages.)

It's in the struggle of feeling unimportant, shut in and alone, helpless and overwhelmed, serving people nonstop who are unappreciative and immature-- I'd put it up against my husband's job any day.  :)

But it's in this time I must change my perspective.  I'm running myself crazy to think I can carry on as I always have.  That my accomplishment looks the same today as it did three months ago.

I must choose to see everything, and I mean everything, as accomplishment.

Like getting showered and putting on pants without an elastic waistband.  No makeup, a quick blow-dry to the hair, but all the necessary body parts got clean, so I'm happy.

Everything is accomplishment.

Like collecting clothes from everybody's hamper and throwing them into a laundry basket in order to do laundry someday.  Sure, they're no cleaner than they were the day before, but hey- at least now they're centrally located.

Everything is accomplishment.

I put five stamps on some thank you cards that have been laying around the house ready to mail for two months now.  Of course I didn't get outside to put them in the mailbox yet, but I'm making progress.  The stamps are on.

Everything is accomplishment.

Yesterday I ventured out, dressed AND showered, to take not one, but TWO, children to Target to buy an outrageously expensive formula and new bottle nipples for my infant's reflux issues.  Came home, only to find I bought the wrong kind for the bottles we have.

But everything, even getting out, is accomplishment.

I played a game of Fancy Nancy Dress Up with my daughter while my baby was napping.  We played on the living room floor next to the two foot pile of hand-me-down clothes strewn across the rug for the past seven days.  And the fact that the clothes had been taken out of the black plastic trash bag that sat in the middle of my kitchen for a few days prior to that was also accomplishment.

Indeed, everything is accomplishment.

Lunch and dinner were BOTH prepared by me at home the other day.  No, it wasn't nutritionally balanced or grain-free or organically produced or paleo-approved or any of the things that are heralded as true accomplishments these days.  But it was food.  It tasted good.  It filled my family's bellies.  I even heard a "I love these noodles, Mom."

Everything is accomplishment.

My baby is currently sleeping next to me.  My daughter is in preschool.  My house is quiet and I could be getting so much "accomplished" in these minutes.  Instead, I'm typing away to you, sweet blog readers, because maybe my mental health is a little more important than a clean kitchen today.

Everything is accomplishment.

bedtime...

Books.


Capturing smiles.


Bible story.


Snuggles.


Jesus Storybook Bible.  (Seriously, every Christian should have one...)


He looks up to her.

needy...

I am so needy.

I hate being faced with that reality, and I hate admitting it.

I hate being the friend who asks for help, but feel like I rarely have the ability to offer it in return.

I hate that I look around at parents of 3, 4, and 5 young children and feel like I'm the biggest wuss because I'm struggling with 2.  How do they DO it??  And appear so... together?

Why does it feel like I'm always drowning a little?

I know.

I must give grace to myself.

I can't do it all.

But when showering and getting two children to church all by yourself (because Daddy has to preach at another church 2 1/2 hours away) takes every good bit of 2 1/2 hours??... that's my accomplishment for the day??  Really?

Probably thanks to seven weeks of sleep deprivation, I'm having an emotional weekend.   As amazing as it is to have sweet little Jameson in our family, it's also been a challenge.  And I'm feeling worn down and ragged in my body and in my soul.

I love how people ask if we're getting any sleep, and I tell them, "Well, about 3 or 4 hours at a time," to which I'm met with laughter and chuckles.  Okay people, in a year, I'll laugh with you.  :) But right now?  Lemme tell you-- it's SO hard!  (can I please have the world's smallest violin to play right now?)

Two days after Christmas as I sat in a hospital recliner with my sick infant in my arms and a stir-crazy four year old bouncing off the walls of a hospital room, I hit a low.  I have no family here.  It's Christmas time, and I have no family that can help.  And usually that's okay, because our RUF students and our church family more than make up for that loss in our life.  When you're like a missionary to your own culture like a RUF campus minister is, that's just part of life.  But this time, while everyone was busy enjoying Christmas with their own families and we were cooped up in a hospital and help was so difficult to come by... it was hard.

It was at that point that I didn't want to ask for help,
though I needed it desperately.

I came up with every excuse as to why so-and-so wouldn't want to help us.

I just don't want to be a bother to anyone.

So there I sat crying in the hospital room, having my own pity party, feeling like no one loves me. (I know, I'm so ridiculously sensitive and dramatic sometimes.  Forgive me.)

But in all honesty, most of it was probably my own fault for not reaching out to enough people and asking for help.

(at this point I must say that two of my close friends here were literally life savers to us, so I can't go on writing without thanking them first!)

This week, my family has come and gone, and here I am again.  Feeling alone and shut-in my house.  Just trying to keep everybody fed and alive and out of the hospital again.

Most of the time I'm just in survival mode, and I don't even have time to stop and process how hard life feels right now or what a difficult first month it's been in and out of doctors offices with Jameson while trying to also parent our daughter and figure out how to do life with two children instead of one.  I still don't even know what "normal" life looks like once Marc goes back to work full time this week, or when I take on my part-time worship director job next week.

I wish I could tell you godly things like Scripture is really sustaining me.  Or that I can feel the prayers of the saints lifting us up.

But in all honesty, it's more like caffeine, chocolate, and numerous episodes of Parenthood that are keeping our household going.

That and the grace of God, of course.

Today, after my big accomplishment of GETTING myself and two children to church, I realized how needy I am right now in this season of life.  It's been a WONDERFUL!!, but difficult, month.

And I can't pretend otherwise.

I bawled almost the entire way through the sermon, fighting within my heart how much I need help, but don't want to be that person that asks for it.  I don't even know where to start, and the thought of it seems exhausting.

I didn't even want to go to church, but it was the arms that reached out to hug me immediately after the service that brought me to more tears.  It was the saints gathering round to offer their ears to listen, their arms to hug me, their nods of understanding.

And I couldn't help but speak the words, "I need help."

There's really no amount of cute clothes or false facades that can take away our neediness, is there?  Often times I feel like church can be a place where we all put on a big, fake show-- before God and before one another.  

But today?  I couldn't cover it up.  I'm so needy.  Really, I'm no better than the beggar on the street corner.  I've just learned how to hide it better, I suppose.

I guess that's what Love does to you.

It reaches out to you, and takes you in Its arms.  There's no hiding anymore.  There's no need to. There is freedom.  And the masks fall away.

You can't help but crumble into the mess that you really are.

And it's okay.

Love humbles you, for Love is not expecting return.  Love is not there waiting on you to just get it together, so then it will reeeeally love you.

Love, quite simply, loves.

Today I feel my need so keenly.  Love knows that not just today, but every day I will be in great need. (whether I feel it or not.)

And that's precisely why I need
Him.

smiles abound...

I love this boy.

No, really.  Like, I love, LOVE this little guy.

Could that little face be any more sweet?


He melts our hearts with lots of smiles during his "sweet times" after eating.  If he flashes those cute, gummy smiles when big sis is around, you'll find her squealing with delight and squeezing him (too tightly, I might add) with hugs.   Could he be any more adorable?


We have much to smile about, especially after the news from a swallow test that his airways checked out just fine.  What a relief to know we are only dealing with silent reflux and not anything that would require surgery to repair.  (Though reflux is no cake walk, either.)  Thank you, Jesus.

He doesn't have reflux in the spitting-up sense, though that certainly happens on occasion.  But it breaks our heart to hear him choking, coughing, and trying to clear his throat often after he burps as his little digestive system isn't mature enough to keep things down.  With silent reflux babies comes more respiratory issues-- hence we've had bronchiolitis twice already in the first month.  It's particularly worse at night.  It's also worse when he lays on his back, even while elevated.  (during the day when I can watch him, I let him sleep on his tummy-- I know, I know, I'm not supposed to...-- and he sleeps for long stretches beautifully.  If only...)


The good news is that with this silent reflux, he's not even fussy about it.

Tough kid!

Either he's got a high pain threshold or he's one laid back little man.

I don't know that it really bothers him a bit, except that it keeps him from resting well at night while he's sitting up sleeping in a bouncy seat.  He's not shrieking in pain or acting "colic-y" like most babies with reflux.

Nevertheless, we are trying a reflux medicine (Zantac) that will help reduce the amount of acid so that his esophagus won't be harmed while his system is still developing.  So far we're not seeing any change.  And we're also switching around formulas a bit to see if that makes any difference as well.

(Marc and I also welcome any ideas or resources that you all have that may provide some help, too.)


But reflux or no reflux, there's no doubt we've all got SO much to smile about around here.  :)

hands of love...

Different from any previous "Hands of Love" posts.

No recipes today.  Just truly hands of love.


Pop's.


Mamie's.


Jameson's on Auntie Jill.

Great Grandpa's.

Uncle Adam, Trev, & Ty's.


You can't help but put your hands on this little guy...

Jameson, meet...

Oh Jameson,


Meet your Mamie.  She thought you were soooo cute.


Meet your Pop.  He thinks God has special plans for you!

They came all the way from Texas just to meet you.


These guys flew in from Chicago to see you, too!


Meet your cousin, Ty.  He called first dibs on holding you over a month ago.


Meet your cousin, Trevor.  He couldn't stop staring at you for hours.


Meet your Auntie Jill and Uncle Adam.  They think you're pretty wonderful.


And I think the feeling from you is mutual.


I couldn't believe how much your cousins wanted to hold you and take care of you!  Your newness never wore off.  It was neat to see you wearing some of the clothes that both of them wore when they were babies.  (wow!)


And when it was someone else's turn to hold you, James John had to do.  :)


Auntie Jill's 2nd grade class at St. Peters in Arlington Heights was so, SO sweet to make you a soft, warm blanket as their class project.


And they made one for your sister, too!

(thank you guys SO much!)


Jameson, you weren't the only one getting snuggles.


And Auntie's sis-in-law, Lori, sent you a Haitian nativity set.  So special since you are half Haitian.  I know your birthmommy will looove seeing a picture of this.


Brothers-in-law.


Sisters.  (can you tell?)


You are melting everyone's hearts with your smiles.

Fun times with Pop.  (love your big eyes here...ha!)


And we all love YOU.