LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! 🎤 🎶 🎵 Are you ready for this?! Dun, dun, dun, dun dun dun dun, dun dun, dun dun dun dun dun… 🎶
Mom signed us up for cheer camp every year. I liked it when I was really small, but after that not so much. Well one year she signed my little sister and I up late, we missed the first day or week or something like that. So we were behind in the routine. But my mom convinced the high school cheerleaders who were teaching the camp that we would pick up the routine “in no time…” well we literally jumped into the deep end with both feet. The cheerleaders put my sister and I up front because we didn’t know the routine yet. Great.
The instructor puts one arm straight out to the side and the other on her hip and starts doing the cross kick. You know, like the Rocketts signature kicks. Well we were supposed to be partnered up in groups of 2, so my little sister and I were partners. I started imitating the instructor perfectly, by doing EXACTLY what she was doing. My little sister looked around at the other little girls and tried to put her arm up on my shoulder. I pushed her off and basically said, stop it, what are you doing…? Just follow along here – we have A LOT to learn, so pay attention! Well she just kind of stood there looking around at everyone, which i noticed, so I did too… the reason they had us all partnered up was because you were supposed to cross arms with your partner by putting one arm on their shoulder and the other on your hip… oh holy balls! The reason the instructor wasn’t doing this is because she was BY HERSELF! JUST KILL ME NOW.
So, once I realized this, i grabbed my little sister and whipped her around into position and started kicking as a pair like we were supposed to. I basically acted like she was the dork who didn’t get it initially when the whole time she was trying to very politely tell me how to actually do it! Ugh! What a sweetheart and WHAT AN ASS! But i was just so embarrassed and had previously learned to blame certain things on my sweet little sis lol to add insult to injury, I wasn’t kicking across my body like the instructor was. I was kicking out to the side. So right leg kicks right, left leg kicks left all while holding one arm straight out to the side with the other on my hip in the very front row of all the kids. Yep. I love this cheer camp thing 😬🫣🙄 Needless to say that was my last year doing cheer camp! Ra, ra, shish, boom, ba! Go, Team, Go!
So, yes, I’m going to try to give my kids every opportunity, but I’m also going to try and listen to them when they truly aren’t interested anymore. Which is hard, cause you also don’t want to raise quitters, ect., ect! Ugh, being a parent is HARD! Bottom line, cheer wasn’t for me and little sisters can be right … sometimes.😏
Check out the lastingsupper.com and the nakedpastor.com!!! The Featured Image for this blog is artwork provided by the Naked Pastor!
I truly believe finding the Naked Pastor was “A God Thing.” ❤️ Please read below for more info!
Hello Tired Troopers!
“I got the Holy Spirit! It’s a good train – you should get on it!”
Now, quick disclaimer: This is a pretty long read and I do get “Preachy” – pun intended! But, it is because it took me my entire life to unpack how my heart feels surrounding this topic and something like this is so complex that it can’t be a short excerpt. Please don’t freak out and start picketing after reading this blog… people freak over their religious beliefs. I’m not here to throw stones at any one religion, but I think religion, as a whole, has some major issues that man made, that I dont agree with. That said, I got the Holy Spirit! And it’s a good train – you really should get on it!!!!!
My God is accepting of all. I started saying “My God” after I came back to him. It’s a long story, one that I will fully explain later, but my Dad left our family. Yes, left, left. He didn’t run to the store and never come back. He methodically planned and chose to leave us, even when we were bawling, asking for an explanation, a reason why, and begging him not to. But that’s a much longer story for another time. His sudden departure from our lives was immediately followed by some other tragic events, and I had had it! I had been pushed to my absolute limit and just couldn’t take it anymore. I was broken. Everyone in our extended families (on both sides) had deserted us, and I was done! I was done with God. But, after I had the time I needed to heal, my relationship with God came out bigger, better, and stronger through all of it. It was after this that I started taking personal ownership of my relationship with him by calling him, “My God.”
Have you ever read the book, The Shack? Yeah, me either… but I watched the movie! And I bawled my eyes out because, man, I resonated with it! The Mom/Wife calling God, Mama?! That’s what My God is to me! And, yes, growing up in the church conditioned me to call God a “Him,” but your God can be anything you need them to be! My Mom, sis, and I just recently had a girls’ night, and we had a BLAST! We laughed and talked about anything and everything (as we always do), midnight margaritas were involved (as they always are), and we stayed up until the sun came up and birds were singing! Well, at one point the convo turned to religion, God, and spirituality. My sis said that she was having a hard time trusting God lately because Dad had severely let us down all those years ago and just recently her husband did the same thing, so she was just really feeling guarded towards all men and was worried that was bleeding into her relationship with God because he was a “Him.”
I looked at her and said, “I know the majority of religions have conditioned us to refer to God as a “Him,” but who’s to say that’s right? Why can’t your God be a woman? Especially if that’s what you need to make you feel more comfortable? Or a “they,” for that matter? Because, technically, God is comprised of the Holy Trinity, right? So, God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are all one in the same, so, really: God = They. Let that soak in for a second…” I could see the relief in her face, so ever since then I’ve been trying so hard to refer to My God as a “They.” It feels so right and empowering!
I truly believe that My God has a sense of humor. If not, don’t you think that with all the crap we do down here on earth that They wouldn’t just wipe the slate clean and start over? Like, well, that experiment sure didn’t work, back to the drawing board. Maybe this time Eve won’t eat the damn apple! My absolute favorite and subsequently the darkest one I’ve seen was a news article post of a man who fasted for 28 days because he was trying to prove he was “holy”… well, he successfully proved he wasn’t holy, because he died on Day 28 from starving himself. A profile named “God,” with the quintessential profile “God” pic of a brunette, handsome man, with long hair, a beard, and wearing white, flowing clothing, commented: “F***ing Poser!” I freaking died! My mouth dropped wide open, eyes went wide from shock, and then I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe! Theeeeeeeeeennnn I took a screenshot and sent it to my mom! 😅🤣😂
Anyways, please don’t hate me – I’m so not perfect! I’m very flawed, but I truly from the depths of my soul try to be the best person I can and give to my fellow people where I can! Whether it’s a simple smile, sending up a small prayer for someone I see, holding the door open, lending a hand, etc. I think you can have a dark sense of humor and still be a good person! I married a Marine after all! ❤️ And that man is my soulmate!
For context here, former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt put it best when she famously said:
“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!”
– “Amen, Sister!!!” ~ Tired Mama
I also have to admit that I am quite jaded with religion in general. Growing up, the churches that i was exposed to preached that they were all accepting, but even as a child I knew that wasn’t really true. You could feel it. If someone didn’t wear their finest Sunday best, they would be judged. If someone showed up late for the sermon, they were judged! If someone fell asleep and started snoring during the sermon, they were judged!!! (Lol)
I have a perfect example of this… my Great Grandfather was a Deacon at our family church. Now, my parents didn’t always attend. They were Christian, but (after their own struggles with God) they shipped my sis and I off to Great G’ma and G’pa’s every Saturday to spend the night and attend church on Sunday. Which, WTH, right?! But I have to say, it was magical being able to spend so much time with my Great Grandparents, and I feel so lucky and honored to have gotten to learn from them and have such a strong relationship with them AND develop my strong foundation in faith because of them! But once I got older and figured out it was also because my parents wanted to pawn us off for alone time, it really chapped my a**. Now, as a parent, I’d 100000000% do this and plan to with my mom (the new G’ma)! It’s your turn, Mama (or should I say G’ma?)!! Bye, Kids 👋! Have fun at Sunday School!
Shoot – I got off track here. Anyway, my Great Grandpa was a Deacon at our church. I still don’t know what this fully meant, but I know it was an honor that he took very seriously. Well, another Deacon’s daughter was engaged and wanted to be married in her family church. Their family had been going to this church for generations and was deeply rooted in all aspects of church activities and volunteering opportunities. They were a wonderful family – so generous and warm and welcoming! Well, her fiancé wasn’t religious. He was open to it, but hadn’t fully grasped what it meant to him yet, if anything. The Pastor denied their request to be married in the church because of this!
Excuse me?! What?! How is that “godly” in any way? You mean to tell me that the church is going to turn away a non-believer who was open to figuring out what his relationship with God could be instead of lying about it for a wedding ceremony of basically church royalty?! If a church princess was a thing, the bride to be was it! I know God, Jesus, AND the Holy Spirit were disappointed at this! Everyone did. Well, not everyone. It basically ripped our church in half. Half of us left because this is BS, and the other half stayed and continued to listen to the self-righteous teachings and preachings of the pastor that rejected a beautiful union. We were among those who left. My Grandpa had had it, so he took his family elsewhere to congregate.
Look, I think church CAN be a wonderful thing. It was for me as a child! But as I got older and started realizing that what I thought church was really wasn’t is when I started really paying attention to what was going on and questioning things. I was raised Christian, but mom told me when I was 13 that I could practice any religion I wanted. She just wanted me to have the building blocks first, so I’d have a strong foundation, but ultimately it was my decision. I. Was. Shocked!! All of a sudden, now it’s my choice?! No, this has to be a trick or some test of my faith… I’d better answer correctly! But I talked to her about it and understood that she believes that religion is a relationship – you have to choose the relationship for yourself. Well, at 13, I was NOT prepared to hear that. However, it really gave me a lot of confidence, because it showed me that my mom had the confidence in me to make this monumental decision on my own at such a young age. I will always be thankful to my mother for teaching me the foundation and to follow my heart and then giving me such an amazing gift as the gift of choice. This gift allowed me to start questioning the church and religion in order to figure out what my heart was feeling.
Here’s where I am now: I call myself spiritual. If I had to pick a religion, I’d say I’m closest to Christian, but I basically took the best parts of all the areas that overlap in each religion (that I know of) and try to live my life by those principles. Which all boil down to The Golden Rule: Treat all people with respect, we’re all God’s children, basically be the best person you can be and help others where you can. And, c’mon, with a life vision like that, honestly, how could you go wrong?
I do believe the Bible is flawed, because if you believe that God’s Word, aka The Bible, was transcribed by God through a human, well, humans aren’t perfect, so therefore the Bible (or any version thereof) cannot possibly be perfect, as it physically passed through man. And that’s talking about the original Day One fresh copy! Since then, it has been translated into every different language, and updated, and this and that, over thousands of years. So, yeah, the Bible is flawed. So I, personally, do not take it as 100% literal. However, the Bible does have wonderful teachings. But even so, those teachings are open to interpretation due to being flawed by mankind’s input over thousands of years.
Take the LGBTQ+ community, for example. Every Bible-thumping zealot will recite the verse, “Man shall not lie with Man.” But that isn’t the literal teaching! Way back when, this was transcribed in original Hebrew, which is a very complex language that many other languages have tried to translate with words believed to match, but those words did not grasp the full complexity of this teaching from original Hebrew. You can research this yourself. I’m sure no expert or scholar on the Bible or religions, but what I found was that the original text was warning against incestuous relations of any kind, which I think we can all agree is a condemnation. It was not talking about consensual, loving relationships of nonrelated adults of any kind. My God only sees love.
Now, please don’t message me trying to define what the Bible means by, “Man shall not lie with Man,” because, honestly, I don’t care. Here’s what I always go back to… Did you get to pick the color of your eyes? No. Did you get to pick how tall or short you would be? No. Did you get to pick your natural hair color? No. Is it a conscious decision you make for who you are attracted to? Do you wake up every day and say, I’m going to be attracted to men, or women, or both, or whatever? NO, YOU DON’T! IT JUST IS! JUST LIKE THE COLOR OF YOUR EYES! My God loves us no matter our color, creed, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or lack thereof! They are there for you no matter what! And They made you perfect, just the way you are!
It is an amazing feeling knowing God’s got your back! Like, I think this all the time… how do atheists go through life? Like, this is really all there is and then just nothingness? Is it a huge void, or what happens?? Or reincarnation? Seriously, you might come back as a bug?? And, again, not throwing stones at atheists or reincarnation enthusiasts – those are just as rightful a belief as any of the others. I just have those questions. Because what I believe (and have personally witnessed time and time again) is that God truly has my back. He bails my dumb a** out of so much crap, it’s insane!!!!!! It took me turning my back and walking away from God and religion to truly understand that it is a deep personal relationship that takes work and upkeep just like any other relationship. And it’s ok to be mad at God. It’s ok, because it’s a REAL relationship! And in a real relationship, if you’re mad or don’t understand, then speak up! Be mad! Get upset! Just remember that there’s love there, and where there’s love, understanding, and forgiveness, that trust will follow.
So back to God proving to me time and time again that He (or She, or They, whatever) has my back. I call it, “A God Thing.” Whenever there’s something I can’t explain, but it works out perfectly… that’s A God Thing. A chance encounter, serendipity, etc., THAT’S A God Thing! For instance, I started writing this blog late one night, just jotting my initial thoughts down for a rough draft. When I finished for the night, I literally thought, Wow, it’s going to be hard to find a picture to accompany this blog (because my beliefs aren’t traditional, but they aren’t nothing either… they’re actually quite simple and complex at the same time). Well, the next day my mom sent me the picture at the top of this post, and I went, Holy crap, that’s PERFECT! THAT IS EXACTLY HOW I FEEL AND WHAT I BELIEVE!!! What a perfect accompaniment to my spiritual blog!!! This is a little example of A God Thing! A small one, but they can be small. Shoot, most of them are small, but they add up BIG TIME! It took me years to start noticing them in my life, and I know I probably still don’t notice most, but I really try hard to identify them and give credit where credit is due by saying a thank you prayer! Remember, it’s a REAL relationship, so show your gratitude every chance you get!
If you experience a situation you feel is A God Thing, please pop over to my contact page and share! I’d love to hear and possibly share it on the page, “It’s A God Thing”. Check it out for more stories! And remember that saying thank you is more important than asking God for help – something I constantly have to remind myself of because I still ask for way more than I give thanks for. So give thanks when you realize God stepped in to help you out, because there are a million other times They do and maybe you just didn’t realize it! 🩷💚💙🩵❤️
Ok, so I’ve been seriously impressing myself lately. My reflexes are on point! Like I’m making crazy quick catches and saves that I wouldn’t have ever been able to do before becoming a parent! My hubby has noticed he has this new gift too! Is it possible we both were bitten by some radioactive super spider or something?! Devine intervention?! An evolutionary survival upgrade?! Has anyone else experienced this? U become a parent and instantly get catlike reflexes?! Like super spidey senses?!?!?!
I can catch stuff WITH MY FEET! MY FEET! MY FREAKING FEET!!!!!!!! I dropped a glass in the kitchen and without looking I put my foot out and caught it with my foot against the lower cupboard! Whaaaa? And it wasn’t an isolated incident either! My baby dropped their bottle and I put my foot out and caught it before it hit the floor… um, huh. It’s a little scary, but super cool too!
When we first had the kids I constantly said that parents should automatically grow a second set of arms. Like as in some weird evolutionary thing. Because 2 hands and 2 arms just doesn’t cut it sometimes, then you tack on a second or third child, yeah nah! But, unfortunately even if that does become a thing someday, we definitely won’t see it in our lifetimes. So, maybe the super spidey senses is the evolutionary gift we get as new parents. It isn’t as great as a full on second set of arms would be, but hey, I’ll take it! I’ll take all the help I can get!
This Finding Nemo activity mat was a hand-me-down from my bestie, Tulip Mama. At the time I was thankful, but I honestly didn’t think our kids were gonna use it that much. Which is why we didn’t buy one, but why we were so thankful. Cause if it’s free, why not?! So we tried it and our kids loved it! Go figure lol something designed for babies that babies like… whaaaaaat?! Lol and it pays music and flashes lights too. The songs aren’t that bad, but the underwater sounds is my personal favorite!!! So calming and comfy.
The clown fish, Nemo, even has a wimpy fin on the right side! As a major fan, I’m impressed with this level of attention to detail! And I’ve had plenty of time to sit and stare at this thing well lay and stare cause we put it on the bed, but I’ve really noticed the little details, like they put textures on everything! Even the little stars hanging off Nemo look smooth, but they added little bumpy dots around the edges.
My hubby lovingly named this “going to the beach”.
Now anytime the kids need to be worn out or are fussy we say, “Let’s go to the beach!”
If you haven’t, you have to try putting your activity mat on the bed!!! It’s so much better than the floor!!! And the finding Nemo activity mat has a tall border around the back, so it’s really secure! I feel completely comfortable having my kids take a nap in this on the bed right next to me. So, so nice!!! Then if one or both wake up, they usually just go back to playing with the toys hanging above them. SO, SO NICE!!!!! Usually them swatting at the toys and clanking them together is what lets me know they’re up again… and it’s time to play!!!
This has saved us multiple times! Meltdown? Let’s go to the beach! Need the kids to get energy out and then immediately take a nap? Let’s go to the beach! Even just saying, “You want to go to the beach?” Puts a positive spin on any meltdown, hey every little bit helps!
My hubby perfected the magic concoction for guaranteed sleep…
Step 1: Setting the Finding Nemo Mat up on the bed.
Step 2: Lay the kids on the mat under the hanging toys with blankets/sleep sacks to stay warm.
Step 3: Turn the mat music box on and set it to the “boogie song” trust me, you’ll know what the “boogie song” it is for this particular mat. There’s 2 sound modes, boogie songs or underwater/beach sounds.
Step 4: Warm up the kids Warmies in the microwave.
Step 5: Wedge the Warmies between the kids. We started doing this for their safety to create safe separation for their flailing, uncoordinated arms swinging around. They kept smacking each other. The Warmies were perfect for this. Plus, you warm them up and they smell of lavender, yum!
Step 6: Let the kids play with the hanging toys until the boogie songs stop playing (it has an auto shut off).
Step 7 (if needed): if the kids are still awake, then turn on the underwater/ocean sounds AAAAAAAAND BOOM! Sleep City!
P.S. After discovering the Warmies and how much my kids love them, I started gifting them to all my fellow Tired Trooper friends and they are the #1 favorite by far! Everyone I’ve gifted these to has said how much they and their kids love them!!! Highly, highly recommend! There are choices for everyone and they constantly come out with new ones!
P.P.S. My twins are now over a year old and we still use this activity mat to get them to take their mid-day nap… It’s STILL A LIFESAVER!!!! Shout out to Tulip Mama, who has gifted me so many hand-me-downs that absolutely saved us! And I plan on handing them down to my sister! I’m so, SO lucky to have her and her family as part of my tribe!
DISCLAIMER: This post is about pregnancy loss, so I wanted to make a note for those of you who are not ready to read about this topic – because for a long time I wasn’t.
I’ve been putting off writing this blog for some time now. I know it’s important to share stories of loss, but opening this door again wide enough to write a full depth blog post wasn’t something I was looking forward to. Mama Bear, who is my Soul Sister / bestie / oldest running friend (we literally met in preschool) told me she miscarried today and I didn’t know what to say. I have been through this and I still didn’t know exactly what I should say or could possibly say to help or make her feel better. But then I realized there isn’t anything that you can say that will take all the pain away or change the fact that at one moment she was going to be a mother of a precious child and in another moment she wasn’t. So, I ended up telling her how sorry I was, how much I loved her, how strong she is and that I lost a pregnancy too. I decided that it was time to write this blog and in doing so I’d be back in my place of loss and hopefully could be in a frame of mind that would better help my friend through this.
So, here goes;
My precious Poppy,
I need to preface this by saying that my husband and I got married later in life. We met and started dating when I was 25 and he was 32. We dated for 7 years before we got engaged, waited another year to get married and we wanted to just be married for a bit before we had kids. So, I was 34 when we started “trying”. We didn’t try in the beginning, we just “pulled the goalie” meaning we stopped using all contraceptives. I knew we were older, so I didn’t want to put the extra stress of following my ovulation or anything like that right off the bat. Plus my ovulation has always been all over the place, not regular at all. So, we pulled the goalie in December and by April we were pregnant! For those of you who don’t realize, that’s only 5 ovulations, so 5 chances to actually get pregnant. I came to find out that in order to get pregnant it takes all the planets aligning, all the wishes in the world to come true AND a miracle to conceive, but I didn’t realize this at the time of my first pregnancy because like I said, we weren’t trying, we simply stopped not trying to get pregnant and it actually worked! Hallelujah!!!
Let me tell you how I found out I was pregnant for the first time…
I had just discovered the show Tucci in Italy (HIGHLY recommend by the way..) and saw the episode on the fried artichoke hearts and wanted to try it myself! Hubby and I love artichokes, so I thought this would be a real treat! I’ve never deep fried anything, but I’m not stupid… or so I thought… well the recipe called for super hot oil, and my dumb ass thought that putting a lid on the oil would help it heat up faster just like it does when you boil water. That was mistake #1. THEN I had the brilliant idea of taking the artichokes outside on our back porch to clean and trim down to expose the hearts. It was such a pretty afternoon, sun was out, it smelled so fresh, warm, just perfect. That was mistake #2. THENNNNN I doubled down by putting these two brilliant ideas together by putting the pot of oil on the stove, covered, on high, and going outside to trim the artichokes down while the oil came up to temp. This was the catastrophic mistake #3. Again, my dumb ass I guess forgot that oil will combust on its own if heated to an extreme degree, and I was treating it like a pot of boiling water… so SO stupid. Welp, I’m sitting there outside with my husband (who didn’t know I had the pot of oil on the stove) trimming down the artichokes when I started smelling strong garlic… (to make the fried artichokes extra yummy I decided to use an entire bottle of special garlic olive oil to fry them in…) I smelled the garlic and my eyes got wide. It was like in the movies when the camera closes in and the main character realizes all of their life failures at once… THAT IS WHAT I DID.
I jumped up and opened the sliding glass door into the kitchen and saw a wall of flames coming off of the stove. I yelled fire to my husband and ran inside to look for my phone to dial 911. While I was looking for my phone, my husband had gotten all of our fire extinguishers and started trying to put out the wall of oven flames. He succeeded to put the fire out twice, but everything was so hot that it only lasted a few seconds and it burst into flames again… so not my finest hour (I’m literally cringing just writing this). Meanwhile our house is filling up with smoke and I still can’t find my damn phone. My mom lives 3 houses down, so I gave up looking after 30 seconds that felt like forever and sprinted to her house. I banged on the door, she answered immediately and all I said was fire at my house call 911!! I turned to run back to the house, stopped, whipped back around and yelled, “GREASE, it’s a grease fire”, then ran home. By then neighbors of our cul-de-sac were out in our front yard when I came running back and one goes, is there anyone left inside? And I said my husband and ran into the wall of black smoke inside to look for him. I screamed his name all throughout the house and then ran out into the back yard to find him there with our two dogs. So, everyone got out safe. The fire department arrived in 5 minutes flat and was able to put out the fire. To add insult to injury my mom is a volunteer for the fire department, she isn’t a fire fighter, but she’s on their Air Support Team, who support the fire fighters when they are called out to fires, so we know the entire department because of her. It was super embarrassing, but also very comforting to have friends there saving my house. One of the fire fighters who I have literally known all my life walks up to me and goes haha I think you might want this, and hands me my cell phone. Then he laughs and goes, sorry for getting it wet, it was right next to the stove, so we accidentally got it with the hose.
Once everything calmed down and we were checked out by the paramedics I broke down in tears. I ruined our home over the dumbest mistake I’ve ever made. Just completely careless, brain dead, POS, loser, you’re smarter than this, you know better… (this self punishment went on for a long time, it will always be a cringe worthy memory for me)…
Anyways, this story is about Poppy not my ridiculously stupid house fire. Well because we had been trying to get pregnant I hadn’t been drinking to “keep my system clean”. Well my hubby grabbed our super nice bottle of whisky that we got from an auction at H&H (please look up Heroes and Horses, it’s a wonderful organization). Which was half charred from the fire to all take 1 shot to calm the F down. I gave him “the look” so he found a private moment to ask what was up. I said, “Listen, I don’t think I am, but will you run home to grab a pregnancy test for me? I feel like I should take one before I take a shot.” He said no problem and ran home to grab one. I took it and it was negative, so I was in the clear.
The next day I was feeling much worse, super sad, mad at myself, unsure of what we were going to do… that I wanted to actually drink not just have one shot. It was weird something told me to take another test even though I had just taken a test the day before and it was negative. So, I went back to our charred, ashy, broken home and grabbed another pregnancy test out of the bathroom cabinet. I took it in my sister’s home bathroom (she lives 5 houses down from me) and it was POSITIVE. We were actively “trying” and upon seeing the positive result I literally said “oh s***” out loud in the bathroom. Which surprised me, because getting pregnant is something we really wanted, but c’mon the circumstances now were not ideal! But right after the “oh s***” moment I got really, really, realllllllllly exited! Talk about going from an ultimate low to an ultimate high! I couldn’t wait to tell my hubby I was pregnant!
I told my husband and we decided to tell the family because we all needed a win. So, I found out I was pregnant for the first time the day after our house fire and I was on cloud 9! Everything was going to be ok, I’d make sure it was ok! There was going to be a baby! I named it Poppy because I downloaded one of those pregnancy apps and it said that for how far along I was that the baby was the size of a poppy seed. This pure joy lasted exactly one week. I started to bleed. I panicked and called around to see where I could get a pregnancy test at a doctors office. I couldn’t even get into Planned Parenthood. I finally found a lab that would check the amount of HCG in your blood. I went and had my blood drawn for this test. I also purchased more pregnancy tests because the HCG test would take a few days to get the results. All the subsequent tests I took came out negative. I was devastated.
I felt so stupid for telling everyone I was pregnant. I felt like losing the pregnancy was my fault. I hated my body because it couldn’t do the one thing it was literally made for. How did I lose this baby?! Could it have been the terrifying stress of the house fire?! Then my thoughts got super dark… so I got my period, that meant I shed everything… including my precious baby. Really?! I have to flush my precious baby down the toilet?! THEN I desperately thought, maybe I can see it, like get some closure?! But no, it was too tiny – a little blood clot that was too small to even notice… the size of a poppy seed… Again, I was WRECKED! I stayed in bed for 5 days straight. Then, my mom, bless her soul, thought that the new movie, Lial Lial Crocodile, would cheer me up, cause how could it not?! It’s an adorable movie about a singing croc, C’mon?! I laid my head in her lap and cried through the whole movie. Then, I felt bad for ruining the movie for everyone!
THEN I started downplaying my own grief!! I was like ok, so you were pregnant and thought u were going to be a mom… big deal… what? That lasted a whole week…?! Oh, some big loss! That’s nothing compared to these poor women who have still births or are much farther along than you were… which is a nightmare that no one should go through, but a loss is a loss. I still thought I was going to be a mom… There was going to be a baby and I was going to me it’s mama, then nothing. And I didn’t get to hold my baby, I had to flush it down the toilet. So f’ed up.
Exactly 2 weeks later I got a notice that a certified letter arrived at the post office for me. Which I thought was super weird because I didn’t have a PO Box… my sister gave me a ride down to the post office and I went in to get the letter. I was really nervous, who would be sending me a certified letter? Why? Am I being sued?? Doesn’t someone walk up to you and hand you the letter and say, “You’ve been served”, when you’re getting sued??? That’s what happens on TV…? Well the post office found my letter and gave it to me. I ran to the car and opened it. It was from the lab where I had my blood drawn to check my hCG levels. It confirmed that I in fact, had been pregnant. I just started bawling. Thank God my sister drove me, I definitely didn’t want to be alone in that moment.
Miscarriage is extremely common. Something like 1 in 4 pregnancies are miscarriages and that’s just the norm! I don’t mean to discourage anyone with that fact, I only want people to be aware of how common it actually is. I had no idea and I for sure never thought it could happen to me! It hit me harder than anything I had ever experienced before. But, once I got the courage to talk about it I found out many of my friends had had them as well. I had a girlfriend who had 5 miscarriages before she had her beautiful healthy little girl and she just had a beautiful healthy boy! It is just an unfortunate truth that every woman needs to talk about. We need to stop blaming ourselves and be there for one another and the only way to do that is to talk about it! I pray you never go through anything close to this. But if you do, it will be ok. Just work on having the courage to talk about it. It isn’t your fault!
Now once I felt comfortable enough to start trying again after our miscarriage I would still cringe and get pissed at diaper commercials or the baby isle in the store, etc. It was so incredibly gut wrenching how negative test after negative test was! It felt like everyone was having babies and I wasn’t. So, so unfair! I even got jealous of this adorable little preggo mama who was waddling into the store with her hubby and 3 other kids bopping around… I literally thought, B u already have 3, why do you get another one and I have none?! Yep – I hit rock bottom…
But then again, at least I knew I could get pregnant, but why wasn’t it happening again?! This jealousy and sadness lasted a long, long time. I swear it lasted just up until I got pregnant again. Once I let go of or got over the jealousy, I finally got pregnant… coincidence, maybe, but I know harboring those feelings wasn’t helping anyone… the sadness however still comes and goes. But, like any loss it’s something that will always be there.
I just recently learned that a rainbow baby is a baby you have after a miscarriage because after the storm there is a rainbow. Which I think is beautiful. I was blessed with a set of twins my second pregnancy. I was so lucky I got a double rainbow! Now, if I would have carried Poppy to full term I wouldn’t have had the babies that I have now. I couldn’t imagine my life without these two – and I believe I will meet my angel baby, Poppy, someday… and they will meet their Dad, brother, and sister! And get this – my twin’s birth flower is THE POPPY! Can you believe it?! How special is that?! That’s definitely what I would call A God Thing!
Mama Bear had an amazing idea. She is going to give her angel baby a Viking send off on what would have been their birthday. She is shutting off her phone and running to the mountains and river where she laid flowers to rest for her Grandma. She said this idea helped her feel so much better because it will be a form of closure… a better end than a flush. She invited me to go with her! I was so completely touched and honored that she would share this intimate experience with me. We are going to pack a lunch, grab some wine and ugly cry as we honor our angel babies. And get this… her angel baby’s due date is 1 day before the twins first birthday. You can’t make this up! That’s ANOTHER God Thing right there!
(P.S. Mama Bear made a picture like this of her family when she invited me to do the Viking send offs. Then, she made this picture for me that represents my family… it made me cry, I just think it’s so beautiful! Thanks again Mama Bear!)
No matter where you are in your journey there’s no wrong way to make a family. You will discover exactly what you were meant to have. Keep the faith and trust in yourself and you can’t go wrong!
My double rainbow❤️❤️
Finally having the courage to write down my story comes full circle… Mama Bear just told me that she is creating a memoir-style book filled with real stories from women who have gone through infertility or pregnancy loss. She is currently in the compiling stage. If you would like to share your story for this project, please email her at healingwithmamabear67@gmail.com and she will email you the submission guidelines. “We don’t share to compare, we share to show you are not alone and you are more than a statistic.”
So, as you know from my About Page, I’m a lucky mother of twins! But you also know I didn’t think I’d ever feel lucky for having twins… Twins run in my family… on both sides… so I guess chances were pretty good I’d end up with twins…? BUT I DID NOT WANT TO! Because of that, my immediate family thought it was funny to joke about it. Which I did not think was funny. I’d actually get pissed. I was dead set against it. So much so that I’d make a joke about giving each half a medallion at birth, then years later if they ever found each other again, well that’s just a good day for everyone… (Yes I’m THAT dark, yes, I stole this joke from the show Friends, it was hilarious, so i used it!) Hello?! It fit perfectly! The funniest jokes have some truth to them after all…
So, if twins ran on both sides of my family, why was i so against it?! Welp to put it plainly none of the twins in my family had good relationships with each other. One set grew up and chose completely different religions, which would have been fine, but they doubled down by not respecting each other’s beliefs… yikesx1000. Another set were absolute polar opposites. One was sweet and gentle and kind, the other was crazy and lashed out and ended up in prison… yikesx10000000. The other set was just plain weird and again one ended up being the sweet caring one while the other was mean and judgmental. Barf. Now, I’m a big believer in nature vs nurture and I know that parenting (or lack thereof) contributed to a lot of how they ended up – but still, having seen first hand how multiple generations of twins turned out resenting each other was enough to freak me out and completely turn against the thought of it!
Then, growing up I also had multiple sets of friends who were 2 years or less apart from their siblings. This caused major, major, issues with schooling, crushes, sports, academics, practically everything! YIKES, YIKES, YIKES!!!!!!! NO THANK YOU!
Now, I’ve also met twins who were complete 1000000% best friends, but sadly that wasn’t the norm that I had witnessed…
Now, back to parenting… my mother is not perfect (no one is). BUT, she always wanted a close relationship with her sister that she never got growing up, so she was bound and determined to make my sister and I close. Which took A LOT of work. Everyone would always say, aww you two are so close, you guys, like, never fight. Well, we were close, but we fought, of course we fought! We were siblings after all! And the 3-year-age difference was big when we were little. Mom would dress us in the same clothing, just different sizes and different colors, but always matching, ugh!!! I really grew to resent this. I didn’t want to be dressed the same as my 4 year old sis at 7! Then there was the whole I didn’t want my ‘lil sis constantly following me and my friends around and copying my every move! (Today I LOVE when she copies me, so sweet – what a compliment!) But back when we were really little it was just annoying sometimes! Then, the tables turned lol we got a little older and I would get bored and want her to go play sports with me outside, well she became a bookworm and only wanted to sit and read. So, it goes both ways!
My mom stuck by her guns through it all. One of her more genius tactics was to literally make us “kiss and makeup up”. It didn’t matter where either! We’d start bickering in the store, nope! You guys kiss and make up, right here, right now! Mom kept this rule up so long that once we were older I’d smile and look at my sister and go, “ok” and go in open mouthed! This grossed my sister out and we’d both end up laughing. So it ended up taking us from fighting together to laughing together. That tactic isn’t perfect for everyone, but it sure worked for us! Now that we are full-blown adults our mom constantly jokes about how our closeness comes back to bite her in the a**, like when we out vote her or gang up on her, but it’s still all in good fun. I’m not going to do exactly what my mom did, but I’m absolutely going to work just as hard as she did to ensure my kids are close. They both lucked out and got a built-in best friend for life, they can’t take that for granted! I’m definitely going to take my mom’s core principles and see what works for my kids.
You also know from My Precious Poppy post that I lost my first pregnancy. So, when I got my hCG test results and it was so much higher it gave me a lot of hope! I just kept talking to my little baby in my belly saying, you hang on, you just stay in there! Well I dusted off my copy of What To Expect When You’re Expecting (I purchased that book the first time I got pregnant… then threw it under the bed out of heart break when I lost the first pregnancy…). I also found the book, Bringing Up Bebe, which I fell in love with! Well one night I was up late reading Bringing Up Bebe when I put down the book and just thought about how lucky I was to finally be pregnant again and how if this was twins – well… that wouldn’t be the worst thing after all… I couldn’t believe it… from dead set against it to huh, that might actually be kinda cool… what?! But I was actually… kind of… hoping… deep down… that it would be… twins! I was absolutely SHOCKED, but it just felt right all of a sudden. Like a warm hug, or a new crush, that’s the feeling I had.
Well the amount of time they make you wait between that first pregnancy test and your first ultrasound is criminal! My positive pregnancy test was 12/28 and my first ultrasound was 2/4. I get it, I did the research, u need to typically wait at least 8 weeks to be able to confirm the pregnancy via ultrasound.. blah blah blah… I was uber impatient lol I mean, it took FOREVER to get pregnant the second time! Then, the day finally came!! I was equal parts freaked out, scared and excited. Small side bar here – if you’ve never had an ultrasound typically the first one is done with a vaginal wand ultrasound. You don’t get the belly one until your farther along. I didn’t know that, my sis (a nurse) told me that would happen. So luckily I was able to tell my husband as well so at least we were both prepared. Cause that would have been a shock lol! You want to put what, where?! That’s not what they show on TV! 😂
The ultrasound started and there was a big screen TV up in front of us showing what the tech was seeing on the computer screen. Well just like the movies it’s all black and white and wavy. It didn’t look like anything or at least we couldn’t make sense of anything. Plus I couldn’t see anything either, so I immediately started panicking thinking I lost this pregnancy too because to me it looked like a vast empty void! Well the tech is looking around and making small talk… “Is this your first pregnancy? Oh wow, first kid for both of you, how exciting.” Then she got real quiet. Like stopped talking all of a sudden. I looked at the screen and actually saw something… it looked like 2 circles, but again I had no idea what we were looking at! I held my breath, was there a baby in there or not?! Was there anything in there?! It felt like 20 mins of silence when it was actually like 15 seconds in reality. Then she goes, “Huh ok… yep, ok…. See that? There’s TWO babies in there, yep that’s two.” I immediately started crying tears of joy. My husband goes, “I knew it!” I laughed, but sucked it up real quick cause with every cry/laugh the camera jumped and I needed to see these two little miracle babies!!! There they were, baby A and baby B. Unreal! She printed us out a few pictures.
Side bar: Baby A is always the baby that is closest to your cervix, and therefore will be the first born whether you have it vaginally or via c-section.
Hubby and I were on cloud 9 and in shock sitting there with a photo strip souvenir of actual proof that not only were we 100% pregnant, we were going to have TWO BABIES! We rushed right over to my mom’s house to show her. I decided to just hand her the strip of pictures instead of telling her it was twins to see her figure it out for herself. It took her about 5 seconds and she yelled when she realized and looked at us shocked, then cried happy tears. Funniest part was that she looked back at the pictures and goes, “Fetus C?! There’s a Fetus C?!” We laughed and told her the ultrasound tech messed up and accidently put “Fetus C” on one of the pics, and she couldn’t figure out how to change it, so she just told us to ignore the C, it was really just A and B. Too funny!
One of my favorite, albeit frustrating, sayings is “When you make plans, God laughs.” Welp I never had any intention to have twins and would legit get mad at the thought of it. But, God knows best and we were blessed with two perfect babies! And in hindsight, I hated being pregnant. You’re always tired, hormones SUCK, and my food aversions were the worst. Only cool thing was feeling the babies kick. Oh, and not having to “suck it in.” For more info read my blog on What Pregnancy Is Really Like/What They Don’t Tell You About Being Pregnant and my blog Don’t Suck It In. But with how long it took us to conceive the second time and the fact that I was a geriatric preggo, (I was 35) we might have not gotten the chance to have a second child. Yes, we were definitely open to adoption, but we were blessed with exactly what we were supposed to have. Not preaching… Buuuuuut, If you’re the least bit interested in God, try talking to him, it’s an amazing feeling knowing the Big Guy has your back. He’s sure proved he’s got mine! My babies are walking proof! For more info see my blog: Got The Holy Spirit, It’s Not What You Think…
These are my actual little miracles first pictures ever!
(See Fetus C???)
Ok, so now you know… if you see this ⬆️on the screen, CONGRATULATIONS, IT’S MULTIPLES!!!
Side note, later on in our ultrasounds one tech said that sometimes with “twin” pregnancies there are actually 3 in there, but they don’t figure it out till later cause they just keep thinking they’re seeing 2… um, yeah, we only ordered one, ended up with a buy-one-get-one-free situation, so we’re good… but this freaked me out for a while lol any of my fellow Tired Mamas who had triplets or above you are one tough Mother —!!!!!!
Let’s get into hot flashes! Ah, yes, the lovely feeling of being on fire and there’s nothing you can do about it… what fun! Growing up my poor mom always ran hot, but then when she went through perimenopause she discovered hot flashes. It. Was. Awful! She would get hot flashes allllllllll the time and there wasn’t anything to do but wait it out. Well, flash forward to after I gave birth to my twins and I started having hot flashes!!! Whaaaaa?! All I had to go off of was my mom’s pregnancy experience and she never got hot flashes until perimenopause. Well, surprise! It can happen!
Hot flashes SUCK! You’re hot, yes, but it kind of feels like hot sweats and then cold sweats (like the kind you can get when you’re sick). First it’s hotter than balls, and you sweat… A lot! Then, when it passes, you freeze because your body returns to a normal temperature, but you’re soaked because of all the sweat. So, you end up freezing!
I can’t tell you how many times now that I have woken up drenched in sweat! Like soaked! It’s just so uncomfortable! I was told these would subside after I stopped breastfeeding, but that was 3 months ago and I am still getting hot flashes on the reg! Ugh!!!
One time my sweat rolled down the small of my back in bed, which woke me up and I flipped because I thought it was a huge spider! Argh!
I actually ask my husband all the time, “Is it hot in here, or is it just me again?!” 99.999999999% of the time he confirms that yep, it’s just another hot flash…! Bleh!
I actually got sick once about 6 months ago and I didn’t realize I was getting sick because it just felt like I was having my normal hot flashes… nope! Hot flashes are THE WORST.
I sure hope these stop soon… but it would be my luck that these post-partum induced hot flashes stop right as my perimenopause ones start! Ugh, I sincerely hope I get a break in-between!!! I’ve actually started carrying around a big folding fan! Thank you Drag Queens for making these fans “fashionable” again… I owe you one!!! 🤗 Clackity, CLACK! …If you know, you know 😏 😉 😎
