What makes a house a home

    As I close out this Memorial Day Weekend and the realizations that tomorrow reality swings backs in, I find myself a little sad that the weekend could not last just a little longer. This weekend was not a traditional laid back weekend for us, there was no barbeque or swimming in the swimming pool with the kids, we did however enjoy several movies together as a family, did some work around the house, and helped out a few people we love.

    Over the next week life once again will get hectic around our home. My husband will be working late while I spend my days taking care of phone calls that need to be made, going to appointments for the kids, and along with the ever present house cleaning that needs to be done. At the end of each day though each of us will come home to our home. We will sit in our spots that are comfortable as we watch, we will gather around our table to eat dinner together, and we will go to bed at night in a home that we love.

    Recently I have been thinking about our house, the very thing that we call home. See there is a fine difference between a house and a home. A house is a place that provides shelter or it can be a thing of beauty, an architectural wonder but it doesn't mean it is a home. So what makes a house a home?

    A home is a place where mom has put the two youngest to bed and although she has told the oldest to get in bed, she can still hear him playing. A home is where dad has gone around an made sure the lights are out and the home is secured. A home is a place where it is not always clean and at the end of the day mom is walking through picking up glasses and taking them to the kitchen thinking she will get to them in the morning. Home is where a family can laugh and cry and fight but know this is the place where they belong….they belong in not just any house but the home they have built around them.

    Our home is not a perfect house. It has cracks in the wall and the foundation and the walls desperately need new coats of paint. I have one toilet that could be classified as a rocker and another one that…well that one just needs to ripped out and replaced along with the rocker but then both bathrooms could do with a makeover. Our back door has issues with the way it leans causing it to be quite difficult to shut but the front screen door is no better, as it has been bent and has no handle on the outside (we fixed it once but the handle fell off again, I am holding out for a new door). I could go on and on but the list would become boring…..

    It is not just the imperfections of the house that gives it character and makes it our home, it is also the added personal touches from the way the living room is arranged to the laundry piled on the couch. When you have three children there is always something that needs to be cleaned! There is a load of dishes waiting to be put in the dishwasher right now just like there are toys waiting to be put away in the kids rooms (something I will need to get onto the about tomorrow).

    It is the imperfections and the chores that are waiting that makes this house a home. Our home is lived in and that is how it should be. As I walk through my home I feel that I belong here and I see the potential of what could make this house a better home. I do not want to lose that feeling and while someday we may move, hopefully not soon, I hope that whatever house we eventually move to will have the same qualities that makes this house a home.

    Hope you have a wonderful day! I have a dentist appointment with my youngest son….and no I am not looking forward to but you know what, we will have our home to come home to….

    ~Natalie

Checking in…

    I know it has been a few days since I have written….and every day I haven't, I realize I have missed it. I have so much going on the last few days that when I finally sit down to write anything, well I am to tired and tell myself that I will do it in the morning, however, the mornings have not been quiet lately.

    For those of you who follow my blog and those of you who may not follow but still read it, this my way of checking and telling you I am still alive, just rather busy with life. I have several idea's for postings to come hopefully within this next week.

    Today is another busy day, at least until later this evening. My house is almost clean, the laundry almost done, as well as the dishes. Since the house work is so close to being thoroughly completed, I am putting off everything else to get it done. I also have an incentive to help speed the process along. My cousin, who is also my daughter's godmother, is home for a short visit from Germany where her husband is stationed. She is coming by today for a visit and I am so excited! It has been almost a year since we have gotten to see one another and she will be so amazed at the changes in Keira. The only thing I am sad about is that her husband could not come along for the visit.

    Today will be a good but busy day. Look forward in this coming week to some, hopefully, worth wild post.

    Enjoy your day!

    ~Natalie

Inside the head of an introvert, Part 2 - It’s all about the poetry

    Before I go into the post today, I need to apologize to my readers. Last night when I posted I did not proof read my posting before publishing and as a result my readers had to endure some atrocious grammatical and spelling errors. It was rather lat and I was quite tired but that is no excuse not to proof my blogs before publishing them. I will do my best in the future to make sure and proof read my post before publishing them, so you, my readers, do not have to endure anymore such errors. Now on to this today's post. I told you to look forward to a follow up post to last night's blog….so here we go!

    Years ago I use to write poetry. I was pretty diligent about writing it until I began to crave more than just my poetry. I wanted to write more. Much, much more. The first two poems I ever wrote were called "Oh Turkey Leg" and "Spooky Sisters." I have no idea whatever became of the poems but I do remember they were funny. Can you imagine writing a poem about a turkey leg! Or how about writing about how spooky (and witchy) your sisters are! (Of course two of my sister were born at Halloween so technically that is where the idea came from.) I am sure that if I ever found them I would probably at the simplicity of life. To a fourth grader though it was my finest example of my writing…I even thought I could be the next Shel Silverstein or A.A. Milne, two of my favorite poets.

    Over the years my poetry has come to mean many different things to me. I can still look at each poem that I have written and tell you what prompted me to write that particular poem – I poured my emotions into these poems so each one is a part of me. As I grew as a person, an individual coming into their own, the emotions behind the poems took on additional meanings. I could see how they related to other parts of my life or even how they related to my life in present day. I realized that thanks to the emotion behind them these poems would carry me for years to come and I hope that someday they will touch others lives as they have touched mine.
    So as you can see the theme behind today's post is about my poetry, something very close to my heart. Poetry can invoke powerful emotions and those emotions can evoke powerful memories. There is real beauty and truth behind poetry; it tells a story and helps bring meaning where there was none.
    A few years ago I self published a poetry book called Of Memories and Imagination. In it I published some eighty-five poems, a few essays, and a short story. Once a week I would like to share with you some of the poetry I have written over the years. Tonight I plan to start with two poems that are all about me. Last night I talked about how I was an introvert, shy and reserved, and while these poems where written around sixteen or seventeen years ago, they still show the type of person I am.
    I believe that everyone has a core of who they are and as they grow and learn and evolve – that core is still there hidden in the background at times but it is there. I also believe that as you get older you come to realize and accept who you are as a person. There comes that point in every person's life that they must face this realization and when that happens they find themselves comfortable and happy and not caring about what other people think of them because they know who they are and if others can't see that then, well, it is nothing to worry about. That is where I am in my life or have been for the past few years – I have come to accept the type of person I am, the type of person I have always been and after reading these two poems, apparently I have know it for quite some time and just forgot it.
    The poems are called I AM and Who Am I? I hope that you enjoy them, in fact I hope you enjoy all of the poetry I share from here on out.
    I wish all a good day and night! It is now time for me to be off to bed.
    ~Natalie

I AM

I am a pair of jeans, relaxed

and comfortable.

I am a variety of ethnic foods from summers spent

in museum learning about different cultures.

I am a style called stream of conscious for

acting and speaking how I think.

I am the New World Symphony for the spirit,

turmoil, and lyrical flow in me.

I am a philodendron for my randomness and

seemingly lack of direction.

I am rosy pink for my soft gentle demeanor

and a hint of vibrance.
 

I am the wind, a free spirit always going

my own way.

 

Who Am I?

I run, I jump, I sing, I dance.

I am a human being

I am alive with a brain that works and

Legs and arms that move.

But the question is:

WHO AM I?

Does anyone ever know who they are?

I am a child.

Scared yet wondrous

A child who wants and gets

Attention and love

I am a teenager.

On the go and ready to grow up

But yet I am still a child

I need more time to grow

I am my mother

I have her temper and

Still I have her intelligence.

I am my father

I have his calmness and

I have his love for the outdoors

I am my sisters

I am all of them rolled into one

I am history

What I write, do or say

Will be the history of my family

I am my poetry

What I write is my feelings and emotions

Everything that comes out on the paper,

Is the person that I am.

But out of all, the most important is,

I AM MYSELF!

I am what I write and think and say!

I do what I think,

I don't go with the crowd

I am different and unique

I see things at my level not at others

I am all that I write and more

No one can say who they are unless they know themselves

I know that no words on paper can say who I am

But I do know that through my writings

I reveal very slowly the person who I am...

Because my writings are

WHO I AM................

Inside the head of an introvert

    This morning I awoke to my house already in full swing; kids up playing, my husband watching television, coffee had been made. It was hot and muggy in the house but there was a breeze blowing gently through it helping, somewhat, to cool the house. For the past month our air conditioning had been broken and a broken air conditioning unit does not mix well with the Oklahoma heat. I set myself for another day of heat in the house. For myself, however uncomfortable, I knew I could bear the heat but I worried about the kids getting to hot, especially Keira.

    As I began my day, like just about every other day, I went in a poured myself a cup of coffee and then sat down at my computer to see what new emails I had. Most of it was junk as usual but one email halfway stood out to me. See when I get up in the morning, the first thing I should grab is my glasses but I don't so I am usually staring somewhat blurry eyed at my screen and still half asleep. Without my glasses I begin to read this email and from what I could read through my blurry eyes, I didn't like what I was reading. Someone had posted a comment about my blog. Now to most people this would be a great thing and at first I thought "Alright! Someone actually ready and commented on something I posted!" but it was not a great thing once I read the post.

    I am considered, as personality types go, a very expressed introvert. I don't mind this at all because I am comfortable with who I am. I have my close group of friends, for which I am grateful for, and I have those who are friends, not quite in my inner circle, but are none the less wonderful to have as friends. I have always been one of those people who enjoys a good book over going out with people, maybe that is why I love the solitude of writing. While I am considered an introvert I am not without the gift of gab should someone strike up a conversation with me. You may be asking what all of this has to do with that someone posted a comment on my blog….well let me get to the point, I actually took offense to the comment. It was exactly the type of thing I was not looking for when I started this blog.

    When I say I employ a close group of friends, these people know the real me, and even then there is only one person who truly understands me, my husband, and even he will tell you he doesn't always understand some of what I do or think…hell I don't even understand myself sometimes. I have the shoulders that I cry on, I have the persons I vent too, and I have the people I share my joy with, and to become one of those people it takes a very, very long time for me to get to know the person before they become someone I will bring into my close circle of friends and even then there is no guarantee that I will allow anyone the person in.

    To whomever comment on my blog, I say this….I know you intentions were good, a reach out to me as a friend. I am not asking for sympathy or pity or even friendship because that is not what this blog is about to me. When I started this blog I started it as a way of letting out everything that I bottle up in me….the good, the bad, the downright "what the hell was I thinking moments," and those times I need to find solace in the arms of my writing. This blog is about me letting go, saying what I need to say in the only way I know how to express myself and that is through writing. Writing has always been an outlet when my life has taken a twist, leaving me shattered and trying to find a way to pick myself up and move on. Writing is a way of organizing my thoughts, of picking through my brain to find that solution I so desperately need at whatever I am facing. And lastly, writing is a way I can show the world who I really am without having to overcome my shyness and the anxiety I feel when I am around people who are not close to me.

    As my day wore on today, I went back to the comment many, many times. I debated whether to answer the comment or just leave it be. In the end I deleted the comment but I did decide to blog about it because I felt that I needed to explain a little bit more about who I am. While in some of what I write, I may ask for pity or sympathy, it is not what I am looking for nor is it what I am really asking for – it is me expressing my thoughts and my feelings in the only way I know how to truly let my emotions out.

    Even though my life may have hit a rough patch, I know that somehow I will make it out of it, even if it is not the way I had hoped, and my family will be okay. So thank you to the anonymous commenter for your hand of friendship but I have those whom I need already around me. I may not see them often or talk with them often but they are there for me, just like I hope they know I am there for them.

    It is getting late now, my eyes are starting to droop as I type the last of this and my mind is calling for bed. At least tonight will be a cool night in the house, the first night in a while. As I said earlier Oklahoma heat and a broken air conditioner does not mix well. We broke down an found someone who could come and fix it today, fortunately it was at a very reasonable rate compared to many others and they went above and beyond what we had expected them to do. It is people like that I enjoy meeting in this world even if it is only for a short time, I know I will always remember them.

    Tomorrow look for a couple of poems I have written as a follow up to this post. Inside the head of an introvert can be very interesting at times.

    Good Night All!

    ~Natalie

Keira's Dance

Keira’s Dance

    It is time to get up and start the day's cleaning. Keira doesn't go to school on Friday so I have tried to make a habit of resting in the morning for a bit and then get up and clean for the rest of the day. It doesn't always work out that way but at least I try. Before I get going for the day I wanted to share one last thing with everyone – Keira's Dance.

    Back in February, Keira went in for her seventh surgery. Since she was born with micrognathia of the lower jaw, we have been patiently waiting for the doctor to give us the green light to have the jaw distraction done. In September of 2009 we got that green light. So in February, Keira had surgery to attach a metal distracter to both sides of her jaw. The distracter was attached to two screws that we had to turn up to three times a day so we could bring her jaw forward. It was a painful process for both her and I. She may have had the physical pain but oh the emotional pain of seeing her little face and the tears that came from her would rip me apart nearly every day.
    At the end of April, Keira went back in for her eighth surgery to have the screws and distracter removed. It was such a blessing to have those screws and distracter taken out but unfortunately we will have to repeat the process again in the near future. The good thing is we have some time to heal up both physically and emotionally before the next round of surgeries begin.
    Today I want to show the world just how resilient my little girl is. Two days after her February surgery, she was still swollen but her spirits were high. We had just finished watching Dirty Dancing and well my little girl got the urge to dance. It was so cute to see that swollen face on such a tiny body dancing around to 'Time of My Life' and she was definitely having the time of her life. It are the little joys, like her dancing or discovering that now she has a chin she likes to be tickled under it, as she so discovered yesterday, that help push me through the hardest portions of the day.

    I have added a link to this post to my YouTube channel where I have posted the video. Please feel free to share, to send it around to your friends. If one little four year old can be as resilient as her, than all of us can get through whatever we are facing.
    
    Keira's Dance on YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8NIV6kjYx8
    Now it is time to clean a very messy house! Enjoy and who knows maybe I will be back to post more today!
    Natalie
    

I Am Super Mom!

    I am Super Mom! Okay not really – I am just a mom doing what needs to be done. I am the proud mother of two rambunctious boys and one very dramatic little girl. So what makes everyone of late tip their hat to me and have them saying I am super mom? Everything I do is something that needs doing and everything I don't still needs doing. To me, I am just like every other mom, who does what she can and gets her pay in hugs and kisses.
    As a parent, whether conscious or unconscious, you tailor your life around the needs of your family and most important the needs of your children. Just about four years ago my husband and I made a life changing decision brought about by a life changing event. The birth of our daughter was the life changing event and the life changing decision was for me to become a stay at home mom after her birth. So what's so big about that? Women leave the workforce all the time to stay at home with the kids but the difference is our decision was made by our daughter.
    I tip my hat to every mother, who at one time or another, has ever stayed at home with the kids. Staying at home is insane! I was positive, by six months in, I was going to lose my mind. I would look for ways of going back to work. It is crazy all the things you have to do when you become a stay at home mom. Back in the beginning I had more bad days then good days and now when I have a bad day it has just turned into being "Well it looks like we are going to have one of those days!" As time went on though – as more and more good days came – I knew we had made the right decision. So I bet you all are wondering, with how I feel about staying at home, how our daughter – a newborn at the time – made our decision for us. It is because our daughter was born with a rare genetic syndrome called Nager's Syndrome.
    What is Nager's Syndrome? I've never heard of it. That is the most common reaction I get, well next to "Aw what's wrong with her?" Keira, our daughter, has only a mild form of the syndrome, but it is severe enough where it requires her to have a trach (a breathing tube) and a g-tube (feeding tube). Nager's, in technical terms acrofacial dysostosis, is a rare genetic condition involving physical anomalies to the face and limbs. Keira has a recessed lower jaw along with fusion of the jaw (meaning her jaw will only open to a certain point), as well as hypoplasia of both radius bones. She also was born with an underdeveloped thumb on her left hand and the absence of a thumb on her right hand. She has had surgery to correct the left – they took off her underdeveloped thumb and turned her index finger into her thumb – and we did the same process to her right hand. The syndrome also causes temporary to permanent hearing loss because of the underdevelopment of both the outer and middle ear, which Keira has, causing her to have moderately severe bone conduction loss in both ears, requiring her to wear a bone conduction hearing aid. Other than a few physical differences, Keira is a normal, healthy little girl.
    Aw how sad! The poor little thing! Oh, I am so sorry dear! What? Sorry? Sorry for what? Poor little thing? My daughter is a "thing"? Okay so I just went on a tangent there – I am sure most of you thought some of that – those are normal reactions to hearing about my daughter and those are my normal reactions to what is said. Of course I don't say them out loud as most people would be taken aback, thinking me rude at their sympathy – which no offense don't need and don't want. How people react to my daughter doesn't bother me but when they feel sorry for her or me (for having "taken" on such a responsibility), that is where I have a problem. Keira is just as normal as the next kid – smart and mischievous to boot. As for me, there is no responsibility too great when it comes to your child.
    Now here is where people ask me how I do it. And by "it" I mean take on everything I do – which I will give you the short of it. "It" refers to taking care of the housework, the household finances, be a full time college student and a writer, taking care of three kids, one with special medical needs and that includes coordinating with doctors on her plan of treatment, oh and you can't forget taking care of the ever loving man by my side – my husband. This is where I am told I am super mom and my reply to that is – "No, I'm just a mom and a wife and how I do it is, I just do." So my house isn't always the cleanest – I will be the first to admit the dinner dishes aren't always done the night they are used – but the house does get cleaned, the laundry and dishes do get done, the kids are always fed and bathed, and I do manage to get time to myself to curl up with a book or watch a movie with my husband. I have come to learn and believe that when a woman leaves the workforce to become a stay at home mom she has only traded it for another full time job, one in which she gets paid with hugs and kisses.
    Since people think of me as super mom, I began to think of all the different jobs I do, jobs that people get paid for. It is not just me who does these jobs; it is every other mom as well. Here is a litany of jobs a mom does everyday –
    She is a cook, a baker, a candy maker, a maid, a laundress, a seamstress, a grocer, a stocker, a clerk, a secretary, an answering service, a messenger, a delivery driver, a driver training instructor, and a chauffeur. She is a mechanic, a repair woman, an inventor, a scientist, a researcher, a research assistant, a computer specialist, an electronic specialist, a teacher, a mathematician, a historian, a reading specialist, a librarian, an artist, a writer, and a reporter. She is a counselor, a speech pathologist, a linguistic expert, an interpreter, and an occupational therapist. She is a human relations specialist and coordinator, a schedule coordinator, an appointment setter, a marketing specialist, a behavioral therapist, a psychologist, and an early child care developmental specialist. She is a loan officer, a banker, an accountant, a payroll clerk, a police officer, a judge, a lawyer, and a juror. She is a nurse, a doctor, and a paramedic. She is an air traffic controller and a flight instructor. She is an image consultant, a fashion designer, a fashion coordinator, a hair dresser, a make-up artist, a costume designer, a film maker, a director, an actress, a music coordinator, an entertainment coordinator, and a photographer. She is an athletic director, an athletic coordinator, an athletic coach, and a personal trainer. She is a gardener and a lawn care specialist. She is a painter, a plumber, a window washer, and an interior designer. She is in waste disposal management, water works management, and she is an energy conservationist. She is the chief executive officer, the chief operating officer, the president, and she is a queen!
    All of these different jobs can be summed up with just one title – MOM! Every woman who is a mother does all of these and probably more. Oh we might complain from time to time, or get bogged down with one thing or another, but the thing about a mom is she keeps on going and doing because that is what a mom does. So when someone says I am super mom, I'm really not, I am just a mom doing what needs to be done. In my book any mom who can do all these jobs everyday; well she is a super mom!

Emotions

In my two previous post, I have brought my readers up to date with my life. Now it is time that I share my emotions with everyone. I don't know what to do anymore so I am going to write and hope that something good will come out of what I am sharing with the world on the web.....

Emotions

Every morning I wake up with a headache, my ears ringing. My emotions are so taut, I wonder if I will make it through the day without them breaking. Sleep feels nonexistent to me because even in sleep my dreams torture me of how my life is heading, but it is not me that I worry about, it is my children. Those three innocent kids that do what they are told to, who help clean the house, who will somehow think it is their fault because they did not do enough to help.

I have made mistakes in my life, decisions I wish I could go back and change but if I continuously look at life like that than I will never move forward. I am a firm believer that you can’t run and stick your head in the sand when a problem presents itself. You wait a bit, maybe avoid it for a while but it won’t go away, so you must use that time to figure out what went wrong and how you are going to handle the problem facing you before it gets to a point nothing short of a miracle will save you.

They say there is always help available you just have to know how to find it; they also say you have to ask. Well I have looked and I have asked but it only leaves us worse off than we were in the first place – it also doesn’t help when you get inconsistent answers to your plea for help. I have stopped asking for help because I can ask and ask for help until I am blue in the face and I get nowhere. I have stopped asking for help because my problems are my problems alone and I am tired of people talking about me and all the things I have done wrong. I have stopped asking for help because I am tired of getting lectured about what I have done wrong or people telling me what I should do. I have stopped asking for help because I am tired of people judging me. I have stopped asking for help because no one will help without telling me how bad of a person I am for the choices I made; choice I made thinking they were the correct ones to make. I have stopped asking for help because asking for help only breaks me faster.


Once I step out of my house, I put on a fake smile and happy face, I fight back the tears that I am feeling and I brave the people around me. Why should I tell them what I am going through? So I can get their sympathies. I had enough of that when my daughter was born – I just can’t take hearing “Oh I am so sorry for you!” Being sorry for me does me no good! Being sorry for me doesn’t help that I am losing my home! Being sorry for me doesn’t help the fact that I can’t afford to pay my bankruptcy payment! Being sorry for me doesn’t help the fact that I am going to have to look at my two boys and tell them we have lost our house because I couldn’t contribute to the finances because I had no one qualified to care for their sister! Being sorry for me doesn’t help the fact that I will have to tell them they won’t be able to attend their school next year! Being sorry for me doesn’t help me feel any better about the decisions I have made that put us here in the first place! I am not sorry for myself, I am angry with myself for not having the strength to say NO! or to take the money when I had it and put it back into savings! And who suffers for it all, my children, the very souls I was entrusted to take care of and look what I am doing to them.


My daughter has been through eight surgeries to correct the birth deformities she was born with. She is the bravest person I know and she is only four years old. She can be swollen and hurting from being in surgery yet if she sees someone else is hurt or crying, she will come hug them and pat them on the head, her way of telling them it will be okay. It is in those moments that I find myself pushing forward. It is the joy of seeing her stick her tongue out past her lips for the first time in her life that tells me all the pain I am feeling, all the hurt will eventually go away; eventually everything will be better.


People say I am a strong person but I’m not, I am only good at hiding behind a mask so people won’t see how everyday another little piece of me has been broken, shattered. I don’t know how many more times I can take seeing my son’s sad faces as I tell them I don’t have the money to give them for the snow cone they want at school or the fifty cents they want to get a treat at lunch. I don’t know how many more times I can take the betrayed look on my daughter’s face as I send her in for another surgery. I don’t know how much more I can see of my husband drained from working as much as he can so we can somehow make it out of the situation facing us and all I can do to help him is to clean the house and cook the dinners and take care of the kids.


I am tired of not being able to breathe because my emotions are stretched thin. I am tired of not being able to do more for my family. I am tired of always being in a stressful situation, no matter how I plan to avoid such situations. I am tired of my body being tight and hurting from the stress I face every day. I am tired of the torturous nightmares that fill my nights and the tiredness it brings to the next day. I am tired of being tired.


I have dreams like everyone else in this life but my dreams are not grand dreams, they are simple dreams. I dream of finishing my college education. I dream of staying in my house with its cracked foundation and myriad of other problems. I dream of being able to write a check out before my bills are due and not worry that I won’t have the money to cover it. I dream of being able to go to the store and pick up simple household items without worrying what I am taking away from by buying something as simple as toilet paper or paper towels. I dream that I will somehow crawl out of this hole a better, wiser person. I dream that today will be the day that I can look at my children and not see the hurt upon their faces because I told them no. I dream that the pain I feel will go away for good….


Dreams don’t pull you out of quicksand; especially quicksand you created for yourself. Many of us go through life with the best of intentions but those best of intentions are not always the best and it is only after the decision is made you realize it was the wrong one to choose. Would’ve, should’ve, could’ve does not get you through life, it only makes the situation you are in harder to face but in the end you must face it.


This writing will not get me anywhere. I am one of those unlucky souls that will never get the help I need and I will never see my dreams achieved. I will never be that lucky soul who wins or is given enough money to give them a fresh start; a chance to turn their life around. I am at the point that I am ready to give up but I can’t because I have three beautiful children depending on me, their mother.


So tomorrow and the day after and the day after that and so on, I will wake up with my headache, my ears ringing, tiredness filling me from the nightmares I have traversed through the night. I will wake up worried about the day and what it will bring. I will worry about seeing my children’s crushed faces and my husband drained from working ten hour or longer days. I will worry if this is the day that the fight I keep fighting will come to crushing defeat; a fight I don’t know when to get out of; a fight that will leave me and my family broken from…..And why do I do this every day, day after day? It is a simple answers – because I have to….

Life’s Decisions

    So I was finally able to finish my first blog post yesterday. I did not get a 'jump up and down' feeling from posting it but more of a 'hope I am doing this right' feeling. Blogging is such a new experience for me and I am really not quite sure how I should be feeling but overall I guess you could say that I am feeling good about. See feelings are a big part of who I am and how I write. I tend to take all my emotions and pour them into my writings. It is such a wonderful outlet even if no one ever reads a single word I write.
    In my first post I talked about needing an outlet for what I am going through, so I decided that my second post should be a backdrop to what is going on in my life at this moment. My third post will be all about how I am feeling right now and my fourth post will be an article I wrote about being a SuperMom. I will be posting all of them in rapid succession as they are all relevant to introducing myself to those reading my blog.
    In my little world, and I do believe it is little, I see many things crumbling around me and there is nothing that I can do to prevent them from completely crumbling to the ground. As much as I hate to say this, I believe that it is from one single choice I made that put all of this into motion. I do not regret the decision I made because I believe the decision was the right decision to make and I believe that my children have benefited from it as well but I do believe that the decision did set into motion the financial devastation my family is facing at this moment.
    Almost four years ago, now, my husband's and my third child was born, a daughter. Her name is Keira and with her birth came a roller coaster which we have never gotten off of. Most every major decision we have had to make over the last for years, in some way, related to Keira's birth. See our daughter was born with a rare genetic syndrome called Nager's Syndrome. The symptoms of the syndrome are too numerous to list (and I am saving that topic for a later date) but as for Keira the main cause of concern with her has been the micrognathia of the lower jaw, as well as ankylosis of the jaw. In layman's terms, Keira was born with an underdeveloped lower jaw, as well as fusion of the jaw, which has hindered her ability to speak, eat, breath, and drink. At just over twenty-four hours old, Keira was taken in for her first surgery to have a tracheostomy done; a week later she was back in surgery to have a feeding tube put in. It is because of her medical needs I made the decision that I believe set us on the roller coaster we are on now.
    I never hesitated or waivered in my thoughts of Keira. When they told us our daughter would be born with some birth defects, they gave us options. When I say 'options' I mean they told us we had two weeks to decided if we wanted to abort her. They told us that most in our situation do; well we are not most people I guess because aborting her was never an option in either mine or my husband's opinion, she was our daughter. And so we digested the fact that our daughter would be born with some physical deformities and we came to terms with the fact that she would need some medical care. Then the time came for her birth, as with it all we took things in strides. The doctors examined her, she stayed in the NICU, and we discussed treatment options, options that would give her the most normal life possible. It was while she was in the hospital, my husband and I started to realize that even with nursing care that would be provided, one of us was going to have to stay home. Some people are better at handling medical issue than others are. I seem to be the one that can handle it better than my husband can. So I was the one who was trained on how to do all of Keira's medical care and I was the one that got to stay home.
    I have never regretted leaving my job to take care of my two boys, my daughter, and her medical needs. It was the right decision to make at the time but sometimes I can't help but feel I am getting punished by making that decision. In life we all sacrifice something and for us it was our financial stability. You weigh all the options carefully before you make a decision and that is what we did. We looked at the long term effect and knew that it was going to be rough but we thought we had made the right decision. For the most part we have did make the right decision but there have been setbacks along the way; it is those setbacks that I find myself today trying to deal with. You know the old saying you can't put a band-aid on a leak and hope it will hold. Well, I guess you could say, that is what we did with several things. We tried to do a quick band-aid fix to many of our financial problems and hoped that it would fix them but they continued to leak and now we are flooded.
    Not too long ago our daughter went in for her eighth surgery. Can you imagine being almost four years old and already you have had to endure eight surgeries? Well my daughter has and she is a trooper like none other. Kids are resilient that way. It is hard enough to deal with having your daughter go into surgery, twice in a three month period, but when you add a bankruptcy, paternity results of a child you have been looking for for nearly ten years, college finals, and bills you don't have the money to keep up with, well as the saying goes….something has got to give.
    Something did give and everything seemed to come crumbling down around us. My daughter's surgery I can handle, the betrayed look on her face as I send her into surgery, I can't but I am doing what is best for her and I tell myself in the end she will have a better life for it. The paternity results I can handle as well. My husband has a son from a previous relationship that we have been searching for in December of 2009 we found him. We had been searching for him because my husband wanted to know if the boy was truly his son. When we finally found him, the mother unleashed years of anger on my husband without giving him one ounce of credence, and then decided to file for child support. She wants my husband's money but is unwilling to allow my husband any visitation or custody of the child….can you see where this is going? So we have found a lawyer who can help us file but we don't have the money to move forward. I can handle all of that but what I can't handle is how it will affect the little bit of money we have due have. All we wanted her to do was to wait just a little bit so that we could take care of what we had going on here. Our daughter's surgery, our bankruptcy….but years of anger trumped our careful planning.
    Now on to the bankruptcy. When I agreed to file for bankruptcy, well to be honest, I didn't know what to think. I hate to say it but the lawyer we picked is not very organized and half the time can't even remember that he has talked to us but we had already paid him the money. We spent two months getting on to him about filing it then when we are down to the wire and we really don't have much money, he files and then drops a bomb on us and tells us we need to come up with $1695 by the end of May….three weeks, we have three weeks to come up with the money….HOW IN THE HELL AM I SUPPOSE TO DO THAT???????? We are filing bankruptcy, hence we don't have the money to pay that, besides he told us we wouldn't have to start paying until after we had gone to court….now we find out different. I felt stupid, I felt small, I hurt from the worry and strain this is putting on us. I can play a blame game all day long but in the end it was the band-aids we put on the leaks that left us standing in water we can't tread.
    So this is where we stand as of this moment. We have gotten past the healing from surgery, we have finished our college finals, we are trying to desperately come up with money to pay our lawyer in the paternity and custody case, and we have a bankruptcy case that will fall through because we can't make $1695 month payments. On a side note, if the bankruptcy does fall through it could mean we will lose our house. I can face losing the house and how I will look in everyone's eyes for it but I can't face my children if I have to tell them we will be moving because we lost our home.
    So now you know why I am so stressed. I try and look at it as there are others out there that have much more to cope with then me but man this is hard. I have only myself to blame. I think back to when I worked full time and wonder if we would be where we were if I hadn't left my job? My daughter is so much more important than a job but a job helps to keep us financially sound and I am so tired of being on rocky ground, my body aches from it. And for those of you out there that are asking why I don't get a job, well I have no one I can trust to take care of my daughter during the day. It is not like I can pull someone off the street and say "Hey babysit my kid….and oh yeah you have to learn how to suction, change a trach, change a g-tube, how to clean around a g-tube and trach, how to do feedings through a g-tube! Oh and I can't pay you very much." Like that will happen, right? When it comes to medical issues, I have found that unless you employ someone who has some sort of a medical background, no one wants to take care of her because they are too scared of the possibilities of what could happen should she not get the care she needed properly.
    Anymore I don't know what to expect of things. I have my hopes and my dreams, simple things, nothing grand but those hopes and dreams, no matter how simple, are out of my grasp. This is my last hope, my last effort to contribute and make right the wrongs, I hope that someone will come across this blog, that just the right person who can take pity on me because right now accepting the pity of someone, anyone, is the only hope I have to bring my family out of the lonely hole I feel we are in.

Stream of Consciousness

    In January of 2009, I sat one night thinking of things I could do help boost both my writing career and help with the finances of the house. I had heard of people making money off of blogging so I though, "Hey that is something I should check into." I did the research and found that it really wasn't all that great of a money maker but the idea of blogging stuck with me. After a few days of mulling the idea, I decided it was something I wanted to try. What could it hurt to try it?
    Somehow though I always fell short of writing my first blog out. I would write on it and then set it aside and then go back to it. Here it is May of 2010 and I still haven't finished the first blog I started. After a while I realized I was over thinking it. I would have all these great ideas go through my head, an interior monologue of sorts, that would be wonderful to blog about but I would never write them down because I would tell myself I needed to finish that first blog I started. Well as of yesterday morning I threw that idea out the window, decided I was going to start fresh and this time I would finish my first blog.
    One of the main reasons that blogging appealed to me was the fact that I am continuously writing in my head, hence the interior monologue comment above. When I was in high school we had to write a poem title "I AM" and in the poem we had to describe ourselves through 7 different items - a piece of clothing, type of food, style of writing, type of music, a plant, a color, and one of the four elements. My mother helped me to identify many of the items and it was thanks to her that I learned what Stream of Consciousness was. Stream of Consciousness is a style of writing but it is also defined as an interior monologue or the continuous unedited chronological flow of conscious experience through the mind. Well both of those describe me! Sometimes my head feels so full of thoughts that if I don't write them down I feel as if my head will explode!
    So what has changed that has lead me to this fresh start – oh so much has changed since the idea first appealed to me. Right now is a particularly tough time in my life. From day to day I do not know what will come next and I need an outlet before my mind gets the best of me! I have never been good about talking to people about my feelings or sharing my thoughts but if I was asked to write it down, well then that I could do. Writing comes naturally to me. So hold on tight as you are about to experience my emotional roller coaster and maybe I can get through everything intact and better than I was before.
Natalie