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...

Well, here we are again... another late night, I am wide awake... it has officially become tomorrow, and I don't feel sleep coming anytime soon. I haven't had a whole lot of worth-while thoughts running through my head lately; everything has become very routine and my days just sort of fade in and out of one another. I mean, it is not necessarily a bad thing, but when I get into these robotic ways I feel like it means I am slacking on the children. I may be comfortable with cleaning floors, dishes, and doing laundry at the exact same time everyday, and spending spare time watching tv, crocheting, and sitting around the house; but these poor girls must hate it. I really need to find a way that we can still go do something without me breaking my rules for pregnancy. The beach is a no-no because walking in the sand is a workout so, I cant do that. The park would be okay if it didnt mean chasing Boo all over hell and back... getting the pool out and letting them swim in the ...

Well, I honestly have to question my mental health on certain days. It feels like every time I talk to someone who is about to make a career move, their number one concern is how long that job is going to take them away from their families... I do not think we ever even considered this when he started doing what he is doing now. It's the weirdest thing to me that people are conerned with deployments and training schedules... I never really give it much thought because it is normal to us, I guess. I remember a time when I was adjusting to Steven always being gone, and I literally had to carry a picture of him with me at all times because I was certain that I was going to forget what he looked like. There were very late nights, up with kids, where I was worried I was going insane because I did not feel like this husband of mine actually existed. How ridiculous is that? Now, I suppose we have gotten so good at being apart, that he can be gone for majority of the year and I do...

It would appear I may have my answer. (Mallisa was right). I went on to my pregnancy group and asked them if they had any ideas as to what could be causing all my issues... I figure if you want to know what is going on in a pregnancy, who better to ask than an entire group of pregnant ladies. That is like asking all their OBs too... Well they all made the suggestion that I could possibly be anemic. I never honestly considered that. With the way I have been feeling I thought gestational diabetes, low blood sugar, low blood pressure due to progesterone injections... i just didn't think anemic. I mean anemics are usually tired.... but wouldn't you know that one of the symptoms of anemia is insomnia! yep, that's right... and if that is the case, it sure explains why I have had the golden opportunity to say hola to 0300 so many times in the last couple of months. Aside from insomnia, it also causes increased heart rate, shallow breathing, dizzy and lightheadedness, headach...

Things feel like they are slowly getting better. My heart feels a little happier today, and my headache was knocked out with a small 1500mg dose of tylenol. Boo-yah! I win! I cannot begin to express how good it feels to have a laptop again... I know it sounds stupid, but when I am sitting at the other computer I feel like I should just be playing games. Too many long nights of Evony and bigfish games with Jean Marie on that computer to ever feel like it is meant for anything else. Aside from that, getting boo's room done and getting the rug into the living room have made this house feel a little more "homey." So, I have slowly been getting Ivan's room ready. Unfortunately, in order to do that, I have to get Cara's room ready first because a majority of the things in his room have to be moved to hers. Last week I moved the kitchen set, barbie vet set, and all the girly toys. Today I moved the rainbow paper lanterns and the last girly poster. Boo's room...

Just because it's raining, doesn't mean it has to pour. Sure, in the last few months my life has been a small chain of unfortunate events. Deployment, my laptop crashing, whatever is going on medically, my email being hacked... but things finally feel like they are smoothing out. Today I got my new laptop. Which means I can do what I want online, and the girls can finally have their computer back to play their games on. It also means that I don't have to sit in the other room waiting for steven to sign on. I can have my laptop running right here beside me and catch him at anytime he manages to get online. Technology has become so important in this world, I can't believe it. I do not know how other generations handled waiting for hand written letters... this would have driven me crazy. Dont get me wrong. I love sending out hand-written letters to him, quite often actually... but I do those to supplement the emails, IMs, and other ways of communication. I could...

 It has taken some thinking over, but I think it's finally time to wrap it up and be done with this. After Ivan is born I am going to be getting my tubes tied. Should be interesting lol. For those who don't know; he was a bit of a surprise. I got my positive pregnancy test just a couple of weeks after me and steven had a conversation/debate about how Cara was a hand full and we were done with 3. Kind of funny, because odds are that I was already pregnant when we had that discussion. Now a few years ago, I would have gotten an IUD or something reversible, pills, shots, whatever... just in case we decided we want more... but damn we are so done. Ivan isn't even here  yet and he's wearing me out. That and I realize we are now up to 6 mouths to feed. That's a lot of food. lol Im gonna have to put a lock on the pantry and fridge when they turn into teens. Aside from the obvious reasons that we shouldn't have anymore children. (I mean, I don't want...

 kitty at 3 days old.  I watch the calendar day in and day out, sometimes noticing that when I am thinking about time, I am holding my breath as though that is going to help get me through all the stress. Every morning when I mark a day off of the calendar I feel as though I have spared myself a lifetime of fear and anxiety, only to be faced with the hundreds of more that lie before me. The worst part of it all, is that it is not even the deployment, and the danger to my husband's life that has me wound so tightly. It's this pregnancy. I am currently 27 weeks and 2 days pregnant with our little boy. And if this pregnancy was my first with Stasia, I would be delivering in 3 days! I just want these next 3 weeks to move by with a bit of urgency. I cannot stand how it makes me feel, the fear of going into Preterm Labor looming over my head with every waking hour. I do not ever want to go through the NICU again, and if I can make it through this pregnancy, I won...