Angela, Wife, Mother, Christ Follower

Start with First blog post and read up!

The Next Few Days

Sigh…this is the hard post to write. It’s mid-June now. Guys, you might not want to read this post. It’s real and it’s about girl “stuff” and it’s a little graphic.

Saturday morning (February 16) when I went to the bathroom, I noticed I was spotting a little. I wasn’t too concerned because I knew that is a possibility during pregnancy and the bleeding was very slight. By Sunday it was significant and there was “tissue” (gross, I know). But it was nothing more than a normal period. I got online and did a little research (pretty typical for me). What I found was not what I wanted to read. If I really was pregnant, I had probably miscarried. A little bleeding is ok. A lot plus “tissue” is not. Freddy was very sympathetic, but he hadn’t had as much time to think about “the baby” and get used to the idea of me being pregnant. I was a bit freaked out. I was in a fog all day Sunday, I don’t remember what we did, but I think we went out. I remember Freddy saying something about getting me out of the house for awhile. Monday morning I called the doctor. They scheduled me for a beta test (a blood test to measure the hormones your body produces when you’re pregnant) on Tuesday morning. They do an initial test and then in a few days they do another. If you’re pregnant the amount of the hormone multiplies every day. If you’re not pregnant your body doesn’t produce the hormone. If you’ve had a miscarriage the amount declines. I kept thinking maybe the pregnancy tests were wrong. They’ll call me back and tell me I wasn’t pregnant. No such luck. I had been producing the hormone, but the level was low. Not where it should have been at 6 weeks. In the mean time, I continued to bleed and there continued to be “tissue”. I put the word “tissue” in quotes because that’s the term the websites used. It seemed a lot better than the reality that it was, in fact, the baby that my body, for what ever reason, had decided to abort along with the layers of protection my body had initially created for it. For a week I couldn’t get away from the fact that I had been pregnant and wasn’t any more. Every time I went to the bathroom I was reminded of it. I know that there are several reasons that I could have had a miscarriage. That it wasn’t my fault. That didn’t really help any though.

By the next weekend I was REALLY low. We were “in between” churches and hadn’t found one that we felt called to yet. I told Freddy Saturday night I needed to go to church. I needed to go somewhere I KNEW God would show up. So we made plans to go to the Oasis Worship Centre the next day. During the night, my precious, angelic little 5 year old came into my room, up to my side of the bed, and did a very convincing imitation of Linda Blair. Of course! The man in red has done this to me before. I needed to be at church Sunday morning. I needed to be in a house of worship and close to the Father. So Satan makes my 5 year-old puke all over the side of my bed and the floor. Fortunately my very loving husband was willing to stay home with Rebecca while Savannah and I went to church. It was amazing. The sermon was on the church’s vision. And yet it spoke to me. I felt God’s love. I felt as if God was saying “It’s ok. The baby’s with me. Something wasn’t right while it was in you, but its perfect here with Me.” I went through a painful few weeks, but it was much easier after that. (There’s a lot more surrounding our first visiting and joining the Oasis, but this post is long enough as it is.)

So there you have it. Freddy and I were waiting to tell people we were pregnant until after I had seen the OB and gotten an all clear. And were reluctant to tell anyone afterward because we weren’t looking for pity. Until now no one else has known about this journey. I take that back. I did share this with a very good friend during a special discussion about how alike we are and some of our struggles along the way.

So, after all that, why blog now. Well, I felt like this might help someone out there. Maybe it could answer some questions or at least let someone know, they are not alone. Most of this blog will be dedicated to family news and my observations of life, etc. It took awhile to get these posts up because we wanted to tell our families in person before the blog went up.

I promise future posts won’t usually be this long, and will have better titles.

Blessings!

-Angela

Found out & told Freddy

On Tuesday (February 12) I started suspecting that I was pregnant. I don’t always do a great job of keeping up with when my periods are, but this time I knew when and also knew that there was a ‘moment of weakness’ since that time. On the way to work, I started planning how I would tell Freddy if I was. The feeling was so strong that I decided to stop on the way home and get a test. I got home and everybody was already there, so I ’snuck’ the test inside in my purse. After about an hour I had to go to the bathroom, so I took my purse upstairs with me and read the instructions and found out that I didn’t have to wait until morning to take the test, so went ahead and took it. Didn’t even have to wait the standard 3 minutes for a positive!

Thursday was Valentine’s and Freddy was taking pictures at the Predators game. We don’t usually do much on Valentine’s Day. Too hard to go out. We just get cards for each other, sometimes a small gift or two. I had left a card for him in his car in the morning and had driven out to his work and left him another one in his car along with the ones from the girls. I told him I’d wait up for him after the game (usually I’m asleep by the time he gets home). I had the video camera set up and when he came in I had him come sit on the love seat with me. Then I presented him a pink rose, then a blue rose and then I gave him the test. He was speechless (a rarity).

God has truly blessed us. We feel incredibly blessed to have found each other and to have Savannah and Rebecca as a part of our family. This baby is only going to increase our blessings.

Blessings!

-Angela

The first two posts were actually written back in February. Family and friends please read through the third one before you start calling!

First blog post

I signed up for this blog almost a year ago. And this is my first post. You see, I just knew that I’d have tons of stuff to blog about. When Freddy and I have gone on long vacations, I always enjoyed writing emails to the friends and family back home to tell them about where we’d been and what we’d seen. Well, everyday life wasn’t as easy to write about. [You see I'm not the type to vent my frustrations in front of the whole world. I know, that can be the point of blogging, and that's fine. I read lots of those blogs.] So, after a year of not blogging what have I found to blog about? I’m pregnant! I’m 37 years old, with two daughters (Savannah, 8 & Rebecca 5) from a previous marriage. My husband Freddy (I was going to say current, but that sounds like he may not be in the future and he definitely will be. And then I thought I’d say 2nd, but there again it sounds like there might be more to follow, so I’m sticking with just my husband.) had never been married before and he has no children of his own. So this is going to be an amazing ride for both of us. I may, through this journey, compare pregnancies and/or reactions of Freddy.

So there is the first post. In the next posts I’ll tell about how I told Freddy and how we told the girls and our families. Of course all of this will be posted after we’ve told everyone. I don’t want the family to find out via blog post.

Of course, I expect most of my readers are family and friends, but I will try to post more about my/our history as I go.

Blessings!

-Angela