Dear Blog Buddies,

I recently wrote about not having anything in my life interesting enough to blog about.   Life still seems rather ordinary and uninteresting from a blogging perspective,  but it all seems to add up, piece by piece.  I’ve been so busy the last little while that I had to create space just to do this little catch-up post.  I’ve missed all my regular reading at other blogs, and I hope to catch-up on that soon.  Meanwhile, here’s what has been happening in my world. 

We’ll start with Superbaby.  My little man is now off oxygen all the time!  How great is that?  He has gotten much more active and does a little bit of scooting and wiggling to get to where he wants to go, but mostly he is working hard at learning how to stand and walk.  We’ve been having issues with him losing weight though,  and are trying hard to push the food and calories.  He’s not terribly interested in eating however, so we’ve gotten rather creative in our attempts to get enough calories into him.  We mix his pablum with cream, and I make him soups which I then puree and freeze.  Usually I take the congealed fat off the broth before I use it for soup, but not for him!  Full fat all the way!  When we can only get ½ tbsp of food into him at  one sitting, we need all the calories we can get.  He has started gaining again recently, so I just have to keep a good eye on his weight and get him weighed on a more regular basis.  He is also working hard on getting his first tooth.  What a drawn out process that is turning into!

 Colds, colds, colds!  I can’t believe the sickies around here!  It seems as though I am the only person in this house still feeling completely healthy.  Almost makes me want to move out!  Even Superbaby has been coughing and needing his sidestream medications again.  It seems like it is just one after another.  I have two of the older kids home from school today over coughs, ear aches, and sore tummies.  As long as they don’t breath on me…….

 I’ve started a job.  An actual paid position!  Don’t get too excited though, it isn’t much.  I’m now working as secretary for our church.  A bit of typing and proof reading for the pastor and the board.  Just a few hours a week and it can just about all be done at home.  Perfect for my family, which always comes first, and wonderfully flexible.  A little bit of pocket change will be nice as well, but that is likely all the wage will amount to.  I told you, it’s nothing too amazing, but it will help keep me out of trouble.  J 

We have another check-up trip with the Dr’s in the city next week.  I’ll be disappearing again for awhile over it, but have no fear, I will always return.

 So now you know what is going on here.  I’m hoping to get to visiting everyone else this week so that I will also know what is going on there. 

 Blessings,

Jennifer

February 20th

 

 One year ago today…….

I was in Edmonton for the ‘regular’ ultrasound check-ups on our baby.   The fetal echo of his heart was done in the morning, and everything looked as it had the two weeks before.  The ultrasound was done in the afternoon, and they found signs of distress in the baby that were not present in the morning. 

One year ago today…….

My baby was delivered by emergency c-section.  A team of professionals from the NICU were standing by, waiting for him.  The hour and a half that I waited for them to stabilize him was horrendously nerve wracking.  The first time I got to see him, he was covered with tubes, I.V. lines, and on a breathing tube.  The nurses sat me up just enough so that I could reach into the transport isolate and touch the one bare spot I could see on his head.  Then they whisked him away to the other hospital, and  I stayed where I was for the next three days.

One year ago today……

I didn’t know or really even believe that my baby would survive.   Today, he is my proof that miracles exist. How far we’ve come Babe, how far you’ve taken us.

 

Happy 1^st birthday to my little Superbaby,  Sean. 

Would you like cheese with that?

I feel a whine coming on…..

 I’ve been feeling rather stuck lately.  It seems as though I hardly ever get out anymore, but whenever I do, I can’t wait to get home.  I used to be an interesting person with lots of projects on the go.  Now I can hardly think of anything to write about.   My days are still busy, but who wants to hear (or read) about my laundry and dishes and dirty diapers?  I don’t even want to know about that!  All my dreams lately are about being stuck too.  Stuck in traffic, stuck in a building, stuck in the snow…..  Unfortunately for all of you, my brain is so stuck, this is the most interesting thing I could think of to blog about!

 Maybe it is the winter blahs.  Our days are slowly getting longer; it stays light out past 6:00 pm now.  Sun is up by 9am.  We have three or four feet of snow, and it keeps snowing every couple of days or so.  Temperatures are above the -20C mark now, but the winds are still howling and keeping us all indoors.  Spring will be here soon right?

In the meantime, I’m going back to my laundry, dishes, and dirty diapers for another day, week, month, …….  Still waiting for something interesting to hit me over the head.

R.I.P.

The loss of a friend is like that of a limb. Time may heal the anguish of the wound, but the loss cannot be repaired.

Robert Southey

 

I buried my friendship yesterday.

It had been dying for quite some time, but I still clung to the hope that some day we might get back to what we used to have.  As many illusions do when they break, this one shattered magnificently, leaving me swirling in a black hole of misery for the past three days.  

Once upon a time, I truly loved my friend.  We were nearly inseparable, just like little children with a new best friend we were.  We could laugh until our bellies hurt and the tears ran down our cheeks.  We talked on the phone no less than 3 times a day, often much more.  She drove my husband crazy with her different ideas and great influence over my thinking.  

She really did have a huge effect on me.  I can see it now where I couldn’t admit it before.  Oh yes, there were things we disagreed about, but over all she taught me to stand up to my own ideas.  Unfortunately for my husband, I liked a lot of the seemingly radical parenting ideas she introduced me to and adopted them as mine. 

I first received an inkling that I might need to be choosier about my adoption process when her marriage fell apart.  A messy break-up it was too.  Over 5 years of back and forth and up and downs before she finally declared herself free.  Although with children in the mix, one is never completely free, but there seems to be some kind of working it out happening the past couple of years.  Sometime in there, the first small split started to happen.

Oh it wasn’t very big.  Nothing we even really noticed.  One little judgment is all it takes and the seam of friendship starts to show a little wear.  Over the years, we started to see things differently in more and more places, see each other differently.  We could still get together and laugh outrageously, but we started talking on the phone less and less, and our visits became farther in between.   We each started holding back from each other; no longer sharing every detail of our lives

These past three years we had been more like acquaintances than true blue friends.  She didn’t tell me much at all about her life anymore, and I reciprocated in kind.  Neither of us wanted to be judged so harshly by the other I suppose.  Months went by between phone calls, and visits never happened.  I missed my friend deeply, but neither of us were the same person we used to be.  To be truthful, I wasn’t willing to be the first to reach back in; I had been slapped back to many times at that point.  Even if I had, I now know that we would never have gotten back to where we once were.  Like a river in the soft clay earth, the judgments of the past had eroded too much away. 

The day she did reach out to me, it was in hurt and anger, with an accusation that left me nearly speechless.  It was hours before I was able to realize the full extent of what had just happened.  A friendship that no longer has any trust is no friendship at all, and she obviously was willing to believe the worst of me.   

As I look back on it now, I realize that our friendship had been dead for some time.  It was the hope held aloft by an illusion that died with that phone call.  Hope was just another casualty of the explosion.  So now, with my eyes cleared, I can say goodbye to a friendship, shed a tear for the loss of trust, and lay my false hopes to rest.  I still miss my friend and always will.  While she no longer believes it, I wish her no harm and hope she is well, but she is no longer welcome within my circle, nor I in hers.   Still, I remember what we had and cherish those memories.  My only regret is that we will no longer be making new memories together.