Mama Arty v.2.0

I hate aspects of this lifestyle. Nothing turns the stomach faster than hearing about the loss of a Marine. It breaks my heart. It sets reality in place, reminds you of your fears, the ones you shove down in a deep dark place. Suddenly you become very aware of days in country, days left until safety can be granted for a time. You see a name come up in the news and your mind flips frantically through this list of all the names you know, all the guys you have met, the names your husband has spoken about, and you just pray that God not let it be someone you know, or someone important to your husband. Many times you get lucky, and the causalties are not associated with you; but you feel the hurt and fear for their families regardless of weather you knew that man or not. Sometimes you are not so lucky and you are hurt for your spouse who has lost someone he cares for, and other times, you suffer in the thick of grief right along side with so many others. I have had the unfo...

Growing up, I always remember how our mother and father told us that if we ever did something wrong, they would not protect us from getting what we deserve, but that they would turn us in themselves if they knew we did something wrong. I can't agree with this logic more myself. What a disappointment it must be to see your own child completely fail in the things you taught them. Of course this does not only apply to if your son goes postal and offs his girlfriend... but I think it also makes it obvious how I would handle my children doing something blatantly wrong in their personal life. Now, I am well aware, from my own lack of making right choices from time to time, that there are moments where you are tasked with helping your child figure out just how an adult is supposed to act. Sure, at 20-25 we all like to think we know what we are doing; but we screw up. If you have ever seen a bird trying to learn to fly, I feel like that is what the early twenty's are all about....

I honestly dont remember the last time I was literally falling asleep while watching television... but I am exhausted. It feels like everything has settled down with Cara and now the exhaustion of it all has finally caught up to me. I need to just sleep in, but alas, meds at 0100 and 0700, so no rest for the mommy. It's going on midnight, and I have to wonder if it's even worth going to bed for an hour, just to have the cursed alarm wake me up in a little bit. Guess it is good practice for when Ivan gets here and is on my case for late night feedings. Oh, how I hate newborns! I know that is a bad thing for a mommy to say, but who enjoys anything that tires them out and makes them miserable? Sure, I love my babies... but I love em even more when they start sleeping through the night. There's your honesty for the evening... I guess I'm too tired to sugar coat things. That or I'm just bad at sugar coating... either way.. there you have it :) I guess I will go ...

Finally... it is the day I have waited for! We are out of the woods and headed into the open, take a nice long fresh breath of air, because today, we are officially 30 weeks pregnant! In just 2 more weeks we can completely let our guard down and than 2 weeks after that... hell, I can go back to being normal... well, as normal as being 34 weeks pregnant is going to allow. I didn't think we were ever going to make it to this point. It felt like it was an eternity away, and now here we are! I had mentioned in a previous post how this is around the time that I start really look at my situation and accept what is going on because I don't have to worry so much if the baby comes earlier than it should. Well, I gotta say... wow. It's starting to set in that in just 6-10 weeks we are going to have another baby; and not just any baby, but our last baby! It's a little sad to think that we are done, of course I just have to look over and see these three climbing a...

I handle alot, and I mean alot, of crap in my day to day life. Doing this whole deployment pregnancy thing ensures that I am never short on stress or have patience at the end of the day. But a thousand sleepless nights worrying about the husband and stressing over the potential of preterm labor fails to hold a light to when I got to watch my poor baby hurting. Today was probably the longest day I have had so far this deployment. I can't understand how there are "moms" out there in the world, that can walk out on or fail their children... I would have done anything today to keep my poor baby from going through catheters and IVs and xrays... ugh. I thought to myself hey you're a NICU mom, you can handle this but I was so very wrong! I think that the nicu took all my ability to handle seeing my children go through medical b.s. It feels like as a mother, you can only handle so much, and it literally broke my heart to sit there and have to hold my poor little girl...

Well, here we are... 940 at night. I cant remember the last time I was in bed this early... too bad I am not actually in  bed... I am currently taking up residence in Boo's room because of her fever. I am worried, I would hate not to hear her if she woke up in the middle of the night and needed me. And this way, when I wake up the millions of times I wake anyways (thank you Ivan) at least I can check to make sure she is okay. Nothing is worse than a sick baby. It's sad. And it is scary because they can't tell you what is wrong with them so it becomes this guessing game of treating random symptoms and praying to God they don't end up throwing up! As of now she is sleeping soundly. Almost teasingly, tempting me to go to my own comfy bed, but mommies don't just go to sleep when their babies are sick... so... the floor (well the mattress on the floor) it is. I just hate that feeling you get when you look at them and they are all sad looking, when you get that f...