Soo Long!!

Oh My Word!! I havent updated in a long time!!! SOooo sorry! Big news on our end! Wyatt Edward Hartley was born 11-1-11!!

He was 8lbs, 1oz 20 1/4in long! Fattest baby born!! lol Our family is complete at last!

Raiden is doing exceptionally well with his new baby brother. He gives him kisses and tries to help me burp him. Its the cutest thing ever. He wakes every 3 hours to eat during the day and gives me a 4-5 hour gap at night!!! He is soo awesome lol

Mark had 2 weeks off of work. He finally got to see what life was like for me with just the 3 kids. He even tried taking all 4 at the same time to school...he said if he couldnt handle it then he didnt see me being able to. Men .. they so dont understand that moms have this job for a reason! lol Tho i cant believe he actually said it tho, this coming from the guy who sleeps 2-3 hours when he says hes watching the kids... He even had the nerve to tell me i wasnt being helpfull 4 days after having wyatt....it was at that point that i just ignored him.
So here i am three weeks out from having wyatt, ebony came home sick, which of course she feels better now that its to late to take her back or to take her brother. But i dont want to chance her puking in my van at the same time. Sigh a moms job is never done apparently lol What stinks about this month is that our fridge broke and from what the apartments say we lost only 200$ worth of food...really we went to Costco for our meat and that alone was close to $250....but cuz we didnt expect our fridge to break down we dont have our recipt..teaches me a lesson. Cant wait to move so that if our fridge breaks its on us and i dont have to go threw "management".
Looking forward to eating some good food next week...then again next month. Glad mark is back to work he has been trying my nerves this past couple weeks lol. Hoping i can make a good dinner tonight before he gets home.

It just boggles my mind!

Its amazing to me how family can just be so cruel to you. At this particular moment im not talking about myself tho i will get to that LOL. You would think that you would get along with at least some of your family in-laws or not. I think its just so sad that people judge you before getting to know you, or even wanting to get to know you. You could be the most awesome person in the world but cuz they have a grudge against your family they automatically assume your dirt. Sigh, its just sad.

I think family should be close because you never know what can happen. In the past 2 years so much has happend in my life that i thought my family would have gotten closer. Frankly im on the fence with my sister, and my in-laws, well im cool with my FIL, but my BIL is just dumb as dirt. And yes iv taken the past 5 years to try and connect with him and frankly hes just dumb! No matter how hard we as a family (including FIL) to help him understand he needs a good job he still looks for little seasonal jobs. Gets mad if someone tells him to mow the lawn...im sorry sir but your home 97% of the time, just got a job that doesnt start till the weekend, and sit in the house watching tv, and playin on the computer all day...just sayin 30 min out of the week isnt going to kill you to mow the lawn.

I feel that my family (husband and children) are so blessed to have raiden in our lives. What bothers me is that because hes doing well im sure that some (the other BIL) feel like we have it easy and are making it seem like he has a disability and he doesnt. If only they understood how hard it is to make sure he doesnt get sick, having to watch his every move at night (well i do that lol paraniod mom). I try hard not to treat him like something is wrong with him, let him play with his older brother and sister. But i have my moments where i find my self jumping (as fast as one 3 weeks or less in a current pregnancy) up to try and stop him from climbing over or off of something. He is learning so fast im so proud of him and he scares me every day for how adventurous he is.

So thats my rant for the day LOL Im still waiting for baby Wyatt to make his apperance. Hoping that after my dr appointment tomorrow he will be here this weekend...then again i have Raiden's cake to pic up on saturday and his party on sunday! So we shall see what happens :)

Stress

How stressed can i be right now?
~rent late/threats of eviction
~gas&electric bill thats massively expensive
~getting kids new school clothes cuz they are growing so dang fast/needing winter clothes
~remembering (which iv yet to forget) to give ray his meds on time
~getting all the baby clothes washed/sorted/& put away before wyatt gets here
~making my hospital bag, ebony&kais over night bags, raidens overnight bag w/med instructions
And all the while making sure the kids are doing their homework, getting their baths feeding them on time, making sure that there is enough space in my room for me, wyatt, raiden, and mark. Im about to loose my mind!

On a good note tho, I ordered Raidens B-Day cake yesterday. Im sooo happy that he has been with us for a year! Only setbacks have been 1 cold, 1 bacterial virus he got at the hospital. Seriously how iv been able to keep this kids sick free is beyond me! He does have pollen allergies but that doesnt surprise me and within the last 4 months he has gotten 8teeth in! So any fussiness or runny noses have been due to that. He is such a strong boy! OH so his cake : D Its going to be a marbled john deer cake with a custard filling....just thinking about it is making me hungry LOL The company that is doing it is sooo generous! Cant wait to get pics of it and post about it!

Nothing real new has happened over the past few days. Our apartments wont work with us over our rent being late. We have 90% of it but due to paying off the rest of our security deposit it made us short... and they wont wait just 5 days till marks pay day. For someone who is weeks away from her due date, its stressing me out just a little. Fortunately that situation has been delt with and taken care of. So I dont need to stress about that.

Now to get Raiden's medicine list together, how much he takes ect., and make him a overnight bag. Same with ebbs and  kai, minus the medicine list. need to get their clothes and some school stuff together for when they have to spend the night at my friends house...oh yes im not counting on my sis she is on her "honeymoon"...must be nice being able to go on a honeymoon not caring about anything right now. Mark and I have yet to have our own honeymoon and we have been married for a year..yes we have kids but WTH?? That sisterly rant has been brought to us by a hormonal mother who is pissed that her only way for her kids to be at school while birthing their brother is out of the country for another week :)

8 teeth?!?!?!

Oh raiden!! For the past month iv been so worried about you, a cold that wouldnt go away. Well NOW i know why i couldng figure out why you werent getting better....back to back teeth cutting in!! His second upper tooth about two weeks ago and i guess for the past week his third and forth upper teeth (one on each side) are coming threw..one is all the way the other is just cutting threw the gum! Iv forgotten how fast babies grow! I mean kai is 5, its been a while since iv had a itsy bitsy in my house! lol

But due the those lovely cold like syemptoms he gets from his teeth hes extra flimy and just cant get that crap out. Poor boy, doesnt help that hes just about done with formula and on regular milk...had me running to the bathroom last night cuz he coughed so hard (gettin the mucus out) that he threw up his bottle. Thank goodness mark was home cuz i just couldnt handle it. Hope wyatt gets here soon so my tummy can handle all the nasty again! lol Im to damn sensitive right now. But other than that he is doing so awesome! He LOVES scrambled eggs and bread. Its actually his food of choice right now.. but today im going to get some yams and other foods to hopefully get him to like as well.

We have a costco card and oh my its a life saver for us....i tried to get into the cuponing thing, and well it just isnt for us. I mean we dont use half the stuff that we recieve cupons for. But costco oh my word, its a paradise LOL looking forward to tax season cuz we are going to get a new fridge for the apartment...been havin issues with the one thats in here. So much food there, and i mean i can get more than one craving taken care of and still have food for later! Its awesome!

Oh Raiden WHy??

Its hard to know when to call the Cardi and when to call the Pedi. I dont like the kids pediatrition..she is sooo impersonal and just..well i guess the right word would be stuck up. I love how you feel judged when you go into a pediatritions office. Your looking for help because your child is sick and yet they say your over reacting dont worry about it..and here is your bill! I DONT call the pedi when it comes to ray. I go straight to his cardi cuz they know him and they are more compasionate to knowing that im just worried about his well being...not being over-protective!
Thats my semi rant about that, and the reason for it is cuz once again he is sick, or is having a bad allergie attack. It makes me nervous. I feel so helpless because i cant give him anything for it he has to rough it out. Fortunatly hes just got a sneeze with a very very runny nose, and thank goodness his mucus is clear.
Wyatt's arraival is fast approching which is making it harder for me to take care of the house, the kids with their homework, and keeping up with raiden and his new found freedom in crawling :) I cant wait for wyatt to be here, we have everything we need. The only thing that i would say we need is more of a want on my behalf is a basinett so that while he and i are sleeping in the guest room hes not in the bed with me but next to me. Mark doesnt see the use in it but i think it would be nice. But other than that we have everything! Im so excited and cant believe how close it is!!
I wish i could nap right now, ray woke up about every 45min last night cuz he either couldnt breath or got out of a comfortable position. Sigh im going to be way overprepared to not sleep LOL

Achey breaky....hips??

I havent wrapped my hips in 2 days...yes totally my fault and im feeling it. Especially last night. We needed to make a run to winco so i could get my ingreediants for taco (which mark ended up making and werent as good as mine) lol but about a quarter of the way threw our trip my body was like no more...he even almost went to get me one of those drive around carts. Um no thanks. I know if a dr told me i had to then sure i would drive it but im cool with a cain or just walking very slow. Of course raiden got a kick out of mark and the kids walking (litterally) away from me and watching me try to keep up. They would get far away then let me catch up. It was evil but ray was laughing so in a way it was kind of worth it.

Saturday we have the most wonderful honor of going to the Sac Zoo!! Raidens surgens are holding some kind of event and by gosh im going to wrap my hips, pack my cain and have a fun day with the kids... iv just only realized that its been like 3 years since we have been there so this will be exciting :) Im also excited that i will get to meet some wonderfull heart moms  : D  The pain is going to be soo worth it, that if i go into labor iv got surgens and nurses all over the park! lol Cant wait to see his surgens and his main nurse, they are all so awesome.

What else could i go threw right now?

Ugggh So i did some research and think that i might have Symphysis Pubi Dysfunction. "It means the ligaments that normally keep your pelvic bone aligned during pregnancy become too relaxed and stretchy. This, in turn, can make the pelvic joint — aka the symphysis pubis — unstable, causing some pretty strange sensations and sometimes pain." http://www.whattoexpect.com/pregnancy/symptoms-and-solutions/symphysis-pubic-dysfunction.aspx

I mean really cuz i dont have enough on my plate i need to worry about walking up and down my stairs slowly, using a cain to help me get around the house. I will be buying on thursday or friday a belt to help keep my hips alined. What stinks is that there really isnt anything that can be done, but have wyatt. So on top of all that i worry about with Raiden and making sure he gets his meds on time, i have to worry about if im holding him to much in the day. Oh yes im not saposed to lift anything heavy...um my 10month old is like 23 lbs...yes hes a well fed fatty LOL

Im so happy with him tho, his next drs appointment isnt till november (4 days after wyatts due date) lol Hope i can make that appointment, and if im still preggers by then heaven help me! Other than a cold related to getting 2 more teeth in he has done superb since his glenn!! I mean he acts like a normal healthy lil boy. Goofy like his dad but normal LOL I need to put some dust cloths on his tummy with the way he crawls lol he drags himself just about across the floor..if hes going to exploor he can do his share and help clean up lol

My dad is home and doing well, thats making me happy. Last night i was looking at homes to rent back up in washington and mark was ok with the move...just need the money to do it lol Found 2 homes that if we made 6thousand a month would be perfect for us! hehehe but we dont so i need to lower my standards i guess. Oh and no the rent wasnt 6thousand but the highest i saw was 3thousand. Sigh everything just has to be expensive. For now im going to be happy with my Yukon XL that mark will be gettin me in feb or march :D A vehicle with 4 doors!!! Oh how nice it will be! Im hoping that he will want to trade the van in so he can get a better car for himself but we will see.

It just is...

Poor ray, he just cant catch a break...he either wants me to hold him or wants to sleep. Looks like hes just tooo awake to sleep. Poor thing he needs to take his nap, doesnt help that yesterday he got thrown off his schedule a bit due to "daddy" being home.

Last night (totally last minute) the sister in-law invites us to dinner with marks dad and brothers... Nice thought right, my question is why did they invite us last minute? If they had said something like i dunno 3 days ago we would have made sure that we had the funds to go. SO of course mark and ray went and me and the kids stayed home. But im glad i didnt go, the resturant they went to was nasty. They call themselfs a mexican resturant but to food is faaaaaar from it.

Not much really going on, looking forward to rays cake! Iceing smiles is going to help us out with it and im sooo thankful for that. Hope his party is fun for him (yes i know he will only be 1) but HE HAS BEEN WITH US FOR A YEAR!!! That means sooo much to me. I love him sooo much, and im so thankfull that hes about to make it to that 12 month mark!

Weekend Mess

This morning is very emotional. My daughter woke up at 4am sick, and still is now. Had a dreadful time at my sister in-laws daughters birthday party yesterday. Contractions everyday, just trying to make sure i remember to get the kids homework done everyday has turned into a task for me.

Lets start with the party....
I was well not hounded but essentially hounded about if me and the kids were going to make it to the party on saturday. #1, im due in 6-8 weeks. Iv been contracting since the 18th of august. My hips hurt, which i understand is normal in pregnancy but sitting hurts, driving hurts, standing to long hurts...this isnt normal pregnancy hip pain. #2, ray and i just got over being sick. Its not fun toting a lil heart baby around right after hes been sick, i was watching everyone like a hawk making sure no one was sneezing, coughing, or any little hands (lots of kids there) were going to try and touch him. I dont think anyone realizes the extra steps that i need (or other heart moms) take to make sure he stays as healthy as possible. They see it as being over protective, obsessive, anal, crazy even. And it pisses me off that they act that way cuz if it was their child they would be the same way. Yet there i was, out in gods country (we were in the sticks people), with ray, ebony, and kai. Soon as we got up there my first question was, how high up in elevation were we?? No one told me it was UP there, i would have brought raidens tylenol. Hes never been that high up and my worry was him getting a migraine. He thankfully didnt get a migraine but he did turn a bit blue and i was livid about that. I thought that marks bro and sis-in-law were going to greet us (maybe help me unload my stroller) once we got there...nope nothing. Just strange people looking at us as we parked and the kids and his grand-ma we out the van to the shade...which left me to unloading raiden getting his stroller out, getting the blankets out, and getting my 7lb diaper bag out all alone. I know what your thinkin suck it up dont you do that alone anyways....yes i do. The difference was i was having contractions which i know people had to have noticed, it was 103 and i was panting like a shaggy dog out in the heat. No one, and i mean NO ONE offered to help in any way. Which that i can get over...no big deal cuz yes i do this everyday without help...its the fact that no one offered (within the hartley fam) that ticks me off. We got there probly round 12:45ish, by 1:45pm i look down at ray and he is beat red. I made every effot to keep him in the shade, then realize we are the only ones outside..were told to bring chairs cuz there wasnt enough seating, EVERYONE WAS IN THE HOUSE IN THE AC!!!! There were maybe 5 people of the 50 that were there (that number too i believe was exaggerated since i think there might have been only 25 there). It was just a bad day overall.

So at 3am i wake up to see ebony looking over me as i slept...i swear she is creepy!!! lol But i tell her to go back to bed...then at 4am i hear her in the bathroom throwing up....HERE WE GO, I hope that she didnt get food poisoning...but if she had kai and i would have gotten it too...we all ate the same stuff.... then again she was in and out of the house so i didnt see everything she snacked on. Kai is still sleep and i put ray in the room with mark so that i could sanitize the kids bathroom after ebony. Oy, it just never ends, and by all means im not complaining about ebony being sick...i cant stand them getting sick and me not knowing why or how they got sick. Especially since i doubt she would be feeling this way if we hadnt gone to the party...i truly believe she got sick from something she may have had there. But you just never know...so now im on OCD cleaning mode so that kai, RAIDEN, mark and myself dont get whatever it is that ebony has.

My mom sent me a text last night letting me know that my dad is doing much better. Hopefully soon he will be able to come home from the hospital. That has taken an emotion toll on me as well, but i just dont talk about it...i cant its just to hard. Of all things for my dad to have gotten on top of his Parkinson's is cancer...really like our family hasnt gone threw enough. 3 years ago my aunt died of cancer...almost a year ago raiden was born with half a heart, then the news of dad, and now me worrying over wyatt and praying that he is heart healthy.... Im spread thin and trying very hard not to loose it. My once tightly bound rope of self is starting to gray and im in great need of re-braiding, and dont know where to go to get that help. All i can do is vent here and pray for the best of my sanity. Today we also remember 9/11. Im still saddened by what happened, the families that were destroyed by such senseless acts of hate. Just so sad. Guess im going to be a emotional mess today. Hope the family can brace themselves for it lol and that ebony gets better.

6-9 weeks and im stressing out!!

So much going on and so little time! Im glad that wyatt is almost here, but why does it seem that the closer his date gets here the busier I get! What the world?!
Have two play dates lined up with kai and ray in the next couple weeks. A birthday party next weekend :( one of the play dates is the day before the birthday....and im getting hounded to see if im going (to the bday party) #1, im due in 6-9weeks!!! Why would you expect me to go to a huge party with all three of the kids without my man to help me out??? Sure his dad is going to be there, but hes 400 somethin pounds and in no shape to help coral the kids. Yet i know at the end of the day im going to be the in-law thats not nice, that does nothing with the family....seriously they are killing me (just this particular part of the fam not everyone just one set). Maybe its not my fault for not voicing every little pain that iv had to them. Maybe im looking to deep into this and they arent trying to act that way....but i know them and i just dont want drama.
I like being a home-body and not dealing with family dramma. To me if im not there then i dont have to hear about whats going on or whos doing what or not doing what. I have so much going with ebony and school, kai and school, raiden and making sure i schedule his feeds and meds and naps, and on top of all that i NEED to remember to feed myself. I love my life, i love being a mom and making sure that everything i do is for my kids and my family... but i feel that others (family of either side) have it soooo easy when they dont have kids or have just one or two. And what pisses me off the most is that they complain about how stressful their life is, how they cant do this or that cuz they are so busy...yet iv got 3 going on 4 kids and im able to get so much done, and only complain when i have more than 4 contractions in my day and my hips literally feel like they are going to fall off my body.
Tonight i was able to make enchiladas from scratch the kids fed, pretty here soon im going to get their homework started and then all 3 of them bathed and in bed by 8/8:30. Why i still find time to do school projects and help out elsewhere and do play dates is beyond me. Today i was told by a mom (jokingly and not serious) that i was making them all look bad since i volunteer for Kai's class. Sure i dont do work at the school cuz of ray but i take stuff home occasionally and get it done from the time i drop him off to when i need to get him. Im not overachieving i feel i have a obligation to show that i too have a interest in the kids school. They do learn by example.
I know im ranting these are things that i havent had a chance to get off my chest....to those that read thank you so much for continuing to read. On another hand im looking forward to the 29th of this month, i go back for another ultrasound for wyatt to make sure that all is still well with wyatt's heart. Love LOVE Love my family :)

Hip Pains

Being sick stinks. Being sick while pregnant is even worse. Feel bad that i had to keep the kids in from school cuz i feel soo bad. Yesterday my hips hurt so bad that it was painful to walk, sit, drive....even laying down hurt. I was able to talk with my dr and even he doesnt know why my hips hurt. Baby is good, nothing wrong with him...so i guess its my bodys way of saying stop. My hips still hurt today but not as bad as yesterday, tho if i move the wrong way i feel like i might fall over. Plus i got a cold or something..so i feel misserable. Sneezing hurts, coughing hurts....im so done with being pregnant. Cant wait for Wyatt to get here and i can have my body back.
I know that having two infants will be tough but it would be easier to deal with all the kids while my body is kinda back to normal. Slept from 6pm till 4am this morning. I feel i could still sleep right now :(

ITs going to be a long day!

Its 4am on a sunday. I woke up at 3am. Dont think that my hips like my laying down anymore :(  I need to clean the house marks dad, and grandma are coming up to say happy birthday to him...he didnt get to do anything last week cuz he had to work. I felt bad but seeing how i just started the whole "celebrating birthday" thing like 5 years ago it was that big a deal to me...that and iv only ever had 1or2 parties anyways.
Yesterday i ordered marks cake, a chocolate cake with raspberry filling. And so that hes kinda surprised white butter cream on the outside....again so hes surprised. Looking forward to the cake! lol And food, just dont know what food im going to serve yet hahaha
But here I am before i clean, need to wake up a bit first. One cup of coffee down and a whole house to clean LOL Raiden slept basically all night, hes still in bed. I closed the door so that if he wakes up mark gets to deal with him LOL I do have the monitor on so if it sounds like mark isnt going to wake up i can go in there! haha
What i feel is funny is that i have all this time, well just a few hours, but iv got the tv on and theres nothing to watch but cartoons :( what have i turned into LOL Id watch true blood but im worried that one of the kids would walk in on it while im cleaning....maybe a music channel..... we shall see :D
OFF to cleaning!!

Just Stressed

I am retaining to many emotions right now and dont have a good outlet for them at all. Not sure if i will be able to keep up my happy face for long. Might be time to crawl in my hole and not come out for a few...maybe till after wyatts born. I told mark last night that im praying so hard that there is nothing wrong with him, i feel that i cant take anymore stress right now. Feel like just one more thing will make me break down. I know he feels helpless and he tries to help me out as much as he can, but hes a man and with how much he works he can only do so much.

The kids are doing good in school. More so kai. Im sooo proud of him, he sits in the front of class and listens to his teacher. Then there is ebony lol, she was moved to the front of class becuase she couldnt focus while in the back. Im having a hard time with her additude and am ready to beat it out of her LOL. She used to be my easy kid...now she has my additude that i had back when i was in middle school! And raiden....raiden raiden raiden...please child let me stand up and walk across the room without you screaming and hollerin at me cuz i want to go potty, clean the kitchen, or heaven forbid to fix my pants just to sit back down. I know he was going to go threw seperation anxioty but good lord its ten fold right now.

Overdoing it, and still not enough!

I am having a blast with the kids going to school! And im soooo glad that they are loving being in school! Yesterday i got the wonderfull awakening of my husband being upset that our account was overdrawn. I understand the frustration, but seriously pissy over 6$. Anyways (so making this a long story short) Because of the way he left home, I became very upset and cleaned like a mad woman...or a pregnant mad woman LOL Moved my room around, have ebonys room to do. Made a awesome salmon dinner last night for the family, and when mark got home he was perfectly fine. I seriously hate men!! lol How do you make me feel like crap, and i feel this way all day, and your over it in like a hour and come home like nothing ever happend. I swear men you need a wake up call. If you have a hormonal pregnant wife/girlfriend/or whatever- you dont get in a argument or just a more heated talk than normal, dont leave letting us think your mad alllllll day. Give us a call so we know things are cool, or a text that implies it (cuz we all know how hard it is to read text sometimes).

So this morning im sore allll over but glad i got what i was able to done yesterday. I still have a lot to do seeing how i found 4 more boxes in the back closet full of clothes. Im not just going to put them away they smell like box! lol I was able to get 6 or 8 loads done yesterday. We will see what i get done today think i might make this a lazy day LOL

I'm tryin to help my hubby out...

Right now at U-Haul on Broadway in sacramento you can rent a 5x8x7.5 U-Box for $64.95 a month. Its the perfect portable storage unit. Great for college students, and holding items while remodling your home. Can be stored on your front yard ...or at the U-Haul whearhouse. It can also be shiped anywhere in the US including Canada. A trailer can be rented for $14.95 for 24 hours to move your U-Box from your home to any desiered location in the sacramento area. Contact the Broadway U-Haul at (916) 456-6446 for more information, or you can contact the General Manager Mark Hartley at (916) 717-8165

http://www.uhaul.com/UBox/

Its funny im his personal assistant right now! Yet again get paid nothing LOL But if i can help him keep his job then im going to do all that i can to help him with keeping it!

Wow the weeks is almost over

My babies...wait im sorry. My Daughter and Son (lol) are enjoying their first week of school! They both like their classes and teachers. Guess the only thing im worried about with Kai is that he may not be making friends..i know it will just take some time. And honestly i kinda hope that he doesnt..if the kids act anything like their moms (and i know this is judgmental) then i may not want him hanging out with them.

Reason i say this is because...living in the Hills has its disadvantages..the people up here (more so the women) dress to the 9's just to take their kids to school, they also flaunt their expensive jewlery and sunglasses and cars. And here i am in my 10$ tank from target driving my astro van. Im sooo cool with not befriending any of the parents...(wispering) "I think one of the moms wants to make me her project." Frankly im scared, but there is a light well a dim light at the end of the tunnel...i saw a ghetto woman picking up her 1st grader!! lol I was so excited that I had to text my mom and sister to say someone looked more ghetto than i did!! hahahaha i know im bad.

Im so proud of myself that i have been able to wake up for the past 3 days between 4am and 5:15am, this morning tho blessed mark woke me up lol...and here i am updating my blog at 9:45pm like a dummy lol still have one more morning of earlyness. Bought the kids some special treats to go in their lunches. Cant wait for them to get them. Ok, im off for today, more to update later :)

The Day Before School

My word! Has the time really come?! My only daughter is going into 1st grade!!! My wonderful (yet dorky) son is going into Kindergarten, his first year in elementary school!! Where did the time go? It was just yesterday that i was pregnant with them, and now they are officially enrolled in school!!!  Looking forward to taking tons of pictures of them in their school outfits, new backpacks, and smiles on their faces!

So as of right now I'm enjoying my cup of coffee, watching Golden Girls, and enjoying the peace in the house. In 10-20min I'm going to make oatmeal for the kids, wake them up and have them eat... i was supposed to have this schedule down by now. To bad baby Wyatt had other plans with my body so iv been trying to sleep in as much as i could! Wonder who's bright idea it was to have the whole school start on a early day...yes that's right a early day. School starts at 7:50 for ebbs and 10:25 for Kai, and they both get out at 1:10pm..now here is my issue.. I have to pick Kai up at his classroom door, and i have to get ebony..cant be in two places at the same time! Sigh going to take them by the school today hopefully i can get ebony to remember where her brothers room is so on Wednesdays she meets me by the kindergartners room.

Sigh, I'm such a happy momma right now. So proud of my kiddos, all three of them :)

Developmental Analyasis

Wednesday morning mark and i (yes MARK and i!!!!) went to raidens developmental appointment. All CHD babies get refered to check how they are developing. Because of the surgeries there are high chances that their development would be slowed. I understand why we needed to go and was happy to go, any help for ray is a blessing.

Well we get there and he knew right away it was another Dr office! lol started crying soon as they wanted to weigh him (my fat 18lb baby!!) We get into our room with the one way mirror which at first didnt bother me, but as they went on it bugged the crap out of me! There were 2 drs and 4 med students back there evaluating him/and more importantly us!

The first dr we spoke with was nice, just getting general information on how he interacts at home, his schedule with meds/feeds/sleeping. All things i expected to happen at the appointment. Then came in the other woman. She was nice the whole time (think thats what bugged me) but in my house when we want something from the kids we ask "can i have that please" we say it to ray as well....this chick was all "gimme that, give it to me" i looked at her like she was crazy. Ray didnt hand it to her either, soon as mark asked him "can i have that please" he handed it to him and let go. I rolled my eyes at her (she was writing something down) so she didnt see but im sure the drs behind the mirror did LOL

She then handed him a block the size of his hand and wanted him to stack them!! Really! The size of his hand, i can see a block 2x's that size him stacking but not something that can fit in his mouth...and that bothered me that she handed him somethin so small!! But again i held my tonge. She even gave him a crayon and pice of paper...now, im sure there are some 9month olds that are extreamly advanced and this would be no biggie for them, but Ray has a older sister and brother who leave crayons on the floor a lot...i dont let him touch them due to him choking on them eating them exct.. so again eyes rolled lol

Finally when the last Dr came in she let us know that for his age that he is doing great and doesnt need any extra assistance. Sure he isnt crawling, but his leg strength is point on he can stand as long as he is assisted and when he is on his tummy he puts all his weight to his butt and legs just wont go anywhere lol
So to me overall it was a great appointment. He doesnt have to go back till right before his 3rd surgery and then after the surgery!

Im so proud of him, and myself... i feel bad that i dont have enough energy to play with him the way other moms can (if it were their only child). But when i look at the larger picture, I am able to take care of every need he has, im able to take care of ebony (which is another big job lol) and kai! And to remember to eat for myself and stay hydrated. I know mark wishes i felt better so that more around the house got done but i know overall hes proud of me too!

Motherhood is hard, but im sooooooo glad that i am a mom. If it was just me and mark no kids i think my life would be sooo boring, the kids have brought us closer together. Im so glad that i found mark, our relationship is wonderfull...we know what the other is thinking, the kids make us stronger especially raiden!

6 weeks has flown by

Cant believe that just 6 weeks ago raiden had his second open heart surgery! Well today 6 weeks later i get to finally hold him under the arms LOL i cant believe how incredibly good he is doing. Our family is growing so fast, need to better budget our meals, raiden is going to be eating table food soon, the baby will be here in 2-3 short months. Looking forward to all that is ahead but budgeting for everything is getting hard LOL

9 months old

I cant believe that 9months ago i was told that my son may not survive life. That my precious baby boy has less than 50/50 chances at life. And yet here we are 9 months later and 2 open heart surgeries later and here sleeping next to me is my raiden!! I am so thankful for all that god has given me, so happy that i was given such a wonderful gift. Thanks to raiden my life has been put back into perspective, things that i thought were important, arent anymore. Making sure that my kids get the best out of life and live their lives as happy as i can make them is all that matters to me now. I need to do better and letting them know about Jehovah God, letting them know that its threw him that all is possible, like their little brother still being here with us today.
Sitting here now just typing that makes me want to cry because sometimes i dont feel worthy of such a great responsibility :) but i know that ray, ebony, kai, and even wyatt were given to me for a reason. Im sooo thankfull for that. They are the reason i live and breath.

Its only been like what a month! LOL

Its been so long since iv been able to get onto my account! The laptop has been down, and i couldn't remember my id, password from the main computer! Sigh...all is good tho! Im so proud of us. Raiden has been doing soooooooooo good. Since his surgery he has done nothing but get better and better! He really has shown his personality since the surgery as well, and even his apatite has increased! Before he was eating maybe 2oz of food 3x's a day. Now he is eating 4oz of food 3xs a day with snacks!!! This kid is a total porker! But i love it! hes in the 50% for his age in height, but a lil under in weight but still average for his age!!! Im sooo proud of him! I know hes behind tho cuz he still cant sit up by himself but we are working on that.
The kids start school in just 4 short weeks!! I have to get them both backpacks and lunch boxes! School supplies and get a lunch plan ready...if i dont have a plan i dont know how im going to keep things organized once school starts! Now that they are starting school i cant believe that soon the baby will be born! I have to get our schedule together, i have to get this house more together! Everything has to be as close to perfect as possible so that when baby gets here there wont be to many surprises.

Monday June 20th, 2011 Day of Surgery

10:45am- Raiden is going to be goin in for surgery in a few hours! (at 9am we found out that im having another boy!! Due date confirmed again for Nov 5th!)

12:30pm- We walked Raiden w/dad (marks dad) to the OR. It wasnt as bas as i thought it was going to be. He was smiling at the drs. We left while still all smiles so that he wouldnt fuss. Im praying so hard that all is going well down there. Hes on the 3rd floor threw a set of doors to the left...i memorized how to get down there even tho we waited in the picu waiting room :)

Not sure the time, but there is an older gentelman sitting across from us who is snoring really loud...iv complained about family members in the past that were loud, but this guy takes the cake on noise level!! lol

2:15pm- Mark and i are passin the time by pickin out baby names. As o f 1:45 they hadnt started the surgery yet. But barb was on her way down to get info on how it was going. Once again i find myself in a position where im givinng my most heart felt prayers ever. Prayers that bring me to tears, using words i never thought i would have to. Raiden has helped me grow up so much more than i thought i could. He is also showing me strength, when i didnt think i had it.

2:47pm- waiting sucks......Cant really go anywhere. Cant wait in his room. Obviously cant spend the night...such a helpless feeling. At least i have my mark here with me. He is keeping me sain and level (tho he doesnt know it). Looking at his pic (raidens) makes me smile, used to make me want to cry, but he is such a stong boy. Smiles 98% of the walk from his room to the OR :)

3:15pm- Still waiting. Hoping we didnt miss barb, but i believe she would have called us.

4:25pm- Barb saw us but she hadnt been down to the OR quite yet. BUT she did call and so far all is going well. Still praying all goes well and hone in 8 days. I miss my son :( But knowing he has so many fans, and cheerleaders amkes my heart swell up with hope and apreciation for all those going threw this journey with mark and i. Dont think they started the surgery till 2:30, so thats probly making this waiting game that much longer. The waiting area is full of diverse families all with diffrent stroyies. One heart family had their son go threw a heart cath last week. He went home today. Im starting to understand the pain it feels to be jelous of watching families with their babies be able to go home, and yet feel mad cuz im still here waiting. I by no means wish their families ill will, its heart warming to kno that they are well enough to go home.

4:37pm- Think im starting to get dilirious from sleep deprivation. Mark got me a coffee but it only lasted like 30-45min in my system. My eyes are so heavy, they burn, they are dry,, and all the walking today has me physically exhausted. Mark disapeared, dont know where he ran off too. Funny soon as hes gone, i got mistaken for being part of a latino family LOL I swear i need to find out my true heritage!!lol

5:30pm- Just found out more sad news. 2 Children ages 7and 11yrs are up here in the ICU and PICU from a car accident. Their 9yr old sibling died in the car crash that they were all apart of :( What a sad day, to much sorrow here at the hospital. And i just watched a couple follow what looked like a crash cart with their young one on it. My prayers are deffinatly with all the families that are in here today. I feel like i should go up to them and just give them a big hug. (then again they probly look at me like i was crazy lol)

6:00pm- Raiden has been brought bact to the PICU!!!!! Thank you JAH!!! He looks awesome too for the spilt second that i saw him! Looking forward to talking with dr si and barb!! LOVE MY SON AND HIS DRS!!! When barb saw us she was so happy with how he did! So just waiting to find out how exactly everything went.

Sunday June 19th 2011

We all woke up fairly early sunday morning. The kids were in their room playing loudly, mark had just gotten out of the bed. I asked if he would call and check on ray, he did and let the nurse know that he would be in a few hours. She then asked wheather or not "MOM" was coming in at all to see him....Really Ladie??? I showed mark the "finger" and told him to tell her yes. He got off the phone and i proceeded to bitch about how dare she give that tone, I wasnt in on saturday cuz ebony was coughing and i was making sure she wasnt sick...last thing i need is having her go in and gettin ray sick. But no, that nurse just saw i wasnt there the day before and making sure i was doing the mommy thing and seeing my son...sorry i have more than one child and no babysitter. To this point i had missed only one day of raidens 3 week stay at the hospital. Mark has been there everyday and my sister has been there and was there giving me updates on saturday.
Well we leave the house round 8am to go see raiden (ebony and kai too). Round 8:25 we get a call from Dr. Si. Surgery monday! Think at that point mark touched the gas a bit more to hurry and get to the hospital.

June 16th

Praying that my lil chunky monkey gets the breathing tube out today. Preferably before i get there. Calling right now to see how he is doing, please baby hope you had a good night. YAY he did!! Hopefully within the next 4-5hrs they will take the tube out, hope i get there after the fact lol. And they better know what bacterial infection he has!!! lol This has been such a rollercoaster, up and down... If what my heart mommies say is true its all uphill...hopefully :) he is such a strong boy. Love him so much will get pics of him once that tube is out! Thank goodness the nurses understand...to bad my sister didnt get it. She sent me a pic of him with the tube in and i broke down...really mo really!!

The Hospital

June 5th
          Monday Morning
12:00am ~ Stop Formula
12:00-5:30am ~ Juice/Water
5:30am ~ Stop Juice/Water
5:00am ~ Wake up/ Ray&Mark shower
6:00am ~ Leave the house
6:30am ~ Check in at the hospital

June 6th
         Raiden's Heart Cath (Monday)
5:00am ~ Up by 5:15, mark and ray in shower
5:45am ~ Double checking Diaper bag and house that all was in order
6:00am ~ On the road to hospital
6:30am ~ 'phew!' Made it to check in, insurance paper work taken care
of. Disclamer paper work taken care of. Spoke with numorous nurses and dr. vangundy.
8:00am ~ Raiden was given happy 'juice' to help him fall asleep :) My baby is so strong. (not without mark makin both ray and i gag) I even got raiden's medicine song stuck in one of the nurses heads LOL
8:15am ~ Mark carried ray (w/me folloing of course) to the cath lab. THere we left him so dr vangundyand his team can do their work, check his heart, see when he will need his next stage of surgery (the glenn).
8:30am ~ "social security called"
8:30am ~ Hospital food has come a long way in the last few years....Not the resturant quality id enjoy, but food non the less. I ordered a suasage, bell pepper, onion and cheese omlett...good but i soooo could have had better. It was accompanied by "house potatos". That should have been my warning right there! LOL Good thing i was eating, Ray's nurse walked in and told mark good job for making me eat! Silly nurse i was dragging him to the cafateria!
9:32am ~ Ray has been back there for a hour now. All we can do is wait now.
10:00am ~ Checked on rays timming (i got hungry) he has 20-30 minutes left.
10:30am ~ Back in the waiting room for raiden, ate the most awesome tuna salad sandwich!!! Probly cusz im prego, but whatever it was sooo good. Hope my little boy is being strong an as far as his condition goes he is in perfect order and perfect candidate for his next surgerie.
11:15am ~ Still no word from dr vangundy. HOpe and praying everything is going well. This waiting is driving me crazy. 'sigh' Didnt realize how long it was going to take, and how emotional i was going to be. I can barely look at his picture without tearing up. Thinkin of all the moms who had to go threw the surgeries, and loose their little babies. Its not fair that this happend. Its not fair that mothers (and fathers) have to have their worlds crumble without any way to help prevent, or cure for that matter.
11:27am ~ Over heard the receptionist....ray is still in :( Hope and praying everything is ok!
11:35am ~ Iv seen like 5 dr's(nurses) leave the cath lab yet no word on ray. "NO ONE IS ALLOWED TO LEAVE UNLESS IM UPDATED!!!" LOL I said that to mark as another nurse leaves. He leaned forward and said, "Guess they didnt get that memo."
11:35am ~ Ray is BACK!!! All went great. He needed to have 6 coils put in (3 on each side). Un-nessisary blood flow is what its to prevent. We have such a strong boy!
12:15pm ~ Salad for lunch, and i walk back in to rays area and there he is crying like crazy. Not only does he have 2 bottom teeth coming in, and he hasnt eaten since 11pm last night, he has just had all the work done on his cath. Aparently, with having the 6 coils his sats are going to lower. With him throwing the fit like he did that dropped them a lot. Dr vangundy was there the whole time, and tho that worried me, im so glad that he was there made me feel a little better. My thoughts are...he is hungry. Plain and simple. Sure he's going to need to be re-checked to make sure nothing was irritated while in for his cath. Mark feels the same and is pissed that they waited so long and now ray wants food, solid or formula, and he cant have any of that u til he is stable for a while. Dr vangundy saw it nessisary to give ray more pain meds.
4:50pm ~ Goodness, ray is in the PICU again! :) Love it up here. Ate a
slice of cheese pizza for lunch.

June 7th
            Raiden's hospital Stay (Tuesday)
7:05am ~ Sooooo at 11pm last night raiden needed his blood drawn again, no problem right, WRONG. She wanted to put an iv in so his blood draws would be easier. To bad they poked him for a hour and a half with no luck. And becuase i was irritated about it, i wasnt to pleasent with them when I finally calmed him down. Then his nurse "karen" (finnally got her name) started tellin me i needed to write down how much i was feeding him. That alone didnt bother me, what bothered me was the tone in which she was using, then her aditude goes from bossy to condensending. I hate fae smiles and when people smile at you cuz they think they are getting their way and are getting away with it. I wanted to slap the crap out of her. From 11pm-12:00am the caffateria is open to get food. They closed at 11pm last night so i didnt eat. Round 1:30am (after all that happend with raiden at 11) i find out that
she went to eat.
9:30am ~ (7:30am)Surgery (glenn) Raiden!! Ebony and kai will stay with sophie until friday. Morgan will need to pic them up then and keep them friday night, sat, and sunday night. TOnight im going home with mark so i can get a good nights sleep. Pic up raidens scale and puls ox machine. HAVE to clean the living room (i'll let mark clean the kitchen) Must clean our room, clothes put away.Need to sort rays clothes he is in 6-9 onsies a 9month on full body outfits. Seriously hope im having a boy so that we dont have to buy new clothes.

1:30pm ~ Conversation with Barb ~
Thursday june 9th 2011 at 7:30am Raiden LaRoy Hartley will undergo his glenn surgery at the age of 7months 2 weeks old! Wednesday evening he may have formula and solids until 1am thursday morning. From 1am-4:30am he can have clear liquids. Bring in scale and pulse ox machine and make sure barb gets them. I keep the binder! 4:00pm ~ At 12pm today i got to eat lunch with morgan.Spagetti and Turkey meat balls... she doesnt eat red meat anymore.. (i roll my eyes at that) I couldnt not eat the red meat! Bout 3pmish, raiden was being a lil extra fussy (and he finally pooped after 3 days). So the nurse thought "imma give him tylenol" not a bad idea, but she gave it to him to fast. End result, a puking raiden with a gagging mommie equaling a laughing nurse. We finnally calmed him down and is now sleeping, but he has gone threw so much! :( My poor baby. Spoke to mom and she is going to try and see about coming out soon because of raiden. Im praying ray will be able to come home end of next week! :) so tonight i will be going home just so i can get some sleep and mark and i can clean up the house tomorrow. I want everything to be perdfect for ray and the kids when they get home. That an mom and dad will be coming ouver and we need the place clean!
7:20pm ~ Raiden gota a sapository round 5pm. He made a poopy diaper a hour to a hour and a half later. I feel so bad for him, his poor tummy was rock hard. I am deffinatly going to need the rest tonight, looking forward to cleaning up the house then getting back here to be with ray. My mind is at ease knowing tomorrow there is just one more day to his surgery.

June 8th 2011
            Eve of Raiden's Glenn (wednesday)
7:33pm ~ I slept sooo good last night! Passed out probly round 9:30pm, woke up once to pee then woke up round 7:30am! Mark cleaned the kitchen and we put together the kids beds as bunk beds again. (ebony is banned from her room!) Cant enfisise how i cant wait to find out what im having, so ready to decorate their rooms! :) We got to the hospital at 1:30pm. The volenteer had just put him to sleep! LOL well mark didnt care he wanted to hold his son! :) I brought his mini gorilla pillow pet, his elephant and mark bought him this awesome singing dog! It has the cutest songs on it. 10 more hours to go! 7:15am he will be taken down for surgery. Cant believe its here already! And we found out he has had the fastest
recovrey rate fo the norwood in UC Davis history, 2 weeks!!! They are very confident about tomorrow! Which makes me feel a lot better. Mark tho im a little worried about, dont want him hurtin himself :)

June 9th 2011
                    Day of Raiden's Surgery!! 
6:50am ~ (6:15am) Dr si was looking over ray. He may have a respitory infection. By going into surgery with it can massivly effect his recovery or even take his life. At 6:20am his nurse took a nasal swab. Hopefully we will know bu this afternoon if not later this morning what the results are from that. If he does have an infection his surgery will be postponed for a few weeks. If he doesnt have a infection hopefully just days. Its another waiting game, but im glad they are taking every precaution cuz ill be damed if they dont. The drs are talking now, hope all goes well.
7:10am ~ Drs are doing their rounds. Overheard them say if labs come back ok, they will schedule him for next week. If he is sick it will be longer. I hope all is fine cuz i dont know if i can leave him or ebony and kai for weeks.

June 10th 2011
                   Day after Raiden was to have surgery
6:20am ~ Yesterday wasnt horrible. At 6:30ish dr si came in saying ray might be sick, but told us about the surgery. Raiden was put under isolation for fear he is sick/others getting or getting him sick. We are still waiting on the result. He was teken off oxygen at 6:15am and right now at 6:30 his sats are 76! Thats so awesome! He is sleeping tho LOL Mark and i left yesterday at 12:45pm. I needed food and more sleep. It was great or reasuring to know that a volenteer was going to be in to play with him after we left. We boughinception and tho mark fell asleep threw most of it, i thought it was really good. We have to wait on his labs but ray is probly going to have his surgery.
6:36am ~ Raiden is still sleeping peacfully. I need to talk to barb about needing more asprin and more enalpril. Its been sitting in his diaper bag since MOnday. Praying that all is well and his surgery will be rescheduled for mondayor tuesday. Im so ready for this to be over but so glad he is being kept well (tho they got him sick if he is). Cant believe3 we got here at 4:15am, sooo early. Mark had to go to work and will be back between 5pm and 6pm tonight. I need to leave at 2pm to get sphie groceries and pic up
the kids. Think i will get stuff for fajitas or tacos for dinner, tacos! 6:50am ~ Dr si has been out by the nurses station for 30 min now. Hope he has good news for me, or some news for that matter. Raiden fell asleep about 6:20am its 6:57 and hes still sleep! yay Ray! Hopeing he can stay sleep, he needs his rest. Sats at 72%. Dont know what they are going to say...hope all goes well.

June 5th, calm before the storm?

Tomorrow Raiden goes in for his Heart Cath. Dropping the kids off at a friends tonight we have to be at the hospital at 6:30 to check him in. 8:30am is when they will taking him in and starting the cath. He has the most awesome nurse, she is going to try and get him in friday for his next surgery (the Glenn). Things are moving sooo fast, im 18 weeks pregnant, raiden is going to be 8months this month, ebony and kai will be going to a new school in 4 weeks.....they are all growing up so fast.
Sooo much stress im glad that i have friends that have been there for me when times had gotten just sooo stressfull. Even people that dont know me personaly but have or had children with the same or smillar condition as ray have reached out to me, and that has deffinatly been encouraging. Hoping all will go well and that there are no complications, praying sooo hard over this. I know iv been stressing myself out to much on this new baby and i need to calm down so that i dont hurt it or myself. Looking forward to my 2 ultrasounds in 2 weeks :D cant wait to find out what we are having!!!

May 21st

May 20th
Its 2:15am and i think im hearing marks alarm going off..."wow is it 4 already?" Nope its the security company callin him sayin the alarms at his job went off. So off he went to work at 2:30am...raiden and i were wide awake tho the sand man was kind enough to dust ray with more sleep. I on the other hand was worried about mark and wanted to make sure that everything was fine, so my dumb butt stayed awake untill i heard from him...at 4am. Vandilisim peole to whomever or whatever business isnt cool, sure if your mad about something vent...call corporate, blogg about how horrible your experiance was. But when you vandalize a building in such a way that the fire department gets called out and then said manager has to go to work and then work at 15hour day, his wife gets a lil pissy and would like to whomp you on your freakin face. And im preggo so i will do it!
Once i knew all was well (or as well as things could be) i finally fell back to sleep around 4:15am...not but what felt like 10min later here come my children whom i love so well..."mommie are you sleep?", "mommie raiden is awake" over and over and over again....my children i know your brother is awake...he sleeps next to me and plays till he gets hungry and screams at me.... and why you feel it is nessasary to say my name so many damn times i dont know. And if you were wondering if i was awake...not really my eyes were closed the entier time that they were talking to me...one would think "ooo mommies eyes are closed lets leave her alone and play in our rooms" but no they kept talking till i opend my eyes and told them to leave.
At that time it was 6:00am, ebony had SUPER MINIMUM DAY at school and was sooo excited about it. Me not so much. My day was totally thrown off by having to be up and out of bed by 6:30 just to make sure that all 4 of us were dressed and ready to go by 7:00am. Traffic up here to get to her school that early in the morning is horrible, but fortunatly we made it there with 15min to spare. (yes i have a led foot) and it doesnt hurt that i got to use the carpool lane! ; ) 
By days end (1pm) i realized that i was going to need to get marks card and go get gas...oh joy..cuz i havent gotten lost like all 3 times before when i tried to drive downtown. But surprisingly i made it there in a decent amount of time. took a while to wait for him, hes workin dont want to totaly bother him, got what i needed and left. Took him 3 more hours before he got home.. i didnt care at that point that he had forgotten my birthday, nor did i care that his dad did either. (his lil bro has the same day)

May 21st
Oh how today was such a better day, sure raiden didnt sleep well and that meant i didnt, but over all it was a awesome day. Marks dad took us to dinner after mark got off work. It was good too!! Filet Mineon with strawberry salad and ceasar saladmmmm and bread an butter oooo they knew i was coming lol and bread pudding! Iv been craving bread pudding for such a long time! Finnaly got it, sure iv had better but still it was good.
After dinner mark and the kids n i went shopping... very unlike mark to let us do that, such a cheapy LOL got the kids a outfit each, and even a hat for ebony and raiden. I got a tank top...may i mention, Old Navy, you have changed your store around. It is not and i say this for all people with kids, it IS NOT cool to cluster F*#K your store the way you have. It was sooo annoying trying to manuver the stroller threw the maze that is now that store...if i were a person of FLUFFY size id say somethin cuz i dont know how they expect normal size people to manuvar in there. But other than that LOL it was a good night.

May 10, 2011

What a week. Mothers day was fun..good friend took me out to get Pedi's and splurged and we both got full sets! I was even able to get my amizomian eyebrows waxed and cleaned up LOL Then of course in true prego brain fashion i somehow managed to lock my keys in the car...and of course we dont have a spare set of keys to it. But we do have a spare trunk key!! Hubby got the kids together drove the the salon where we were at (just 5min from the house) and unlocked the trunk and had kai crawl threw and unlock the car. Now i thought that he would have laughed at me and then left, no he was a total butt hole to me and let me think that he was completly pissed off. He had, at that point, ruined my day. My girlfriend and i went to lunch i took her home then i headed home. Come to find out he wanted me to think that he was pissed so that when i got home i would be surprised to the flowers and dinner that he was making. Then asked me why i was home so early....men i swear are idiots!!! lol
Today Ebony has a field trip to a science farm, i hope she is safe and has a ton of fun. I registered both kids to their new school, and yesterday there was a Kindergarten Round Up for the new kindergateners...well kai f'd it up and they are thinkin of putting him in a jr k class not regular kindergarten...thing is kai can do ebonys homework less writing sentences!!! So what the hell!! Im stressin about this, also if he goes into jr-k its at a diffrent school..wich means driving ebbs to one place and kai to another place while im 8 months pregnant...yea this isnt gonig to be good. And with me stressin now i just see this being all bad.

Seriously!!

Whats up with me and not getting on here.. New goal! Once a day, at the end of my day i have to post! Things are going awesome right now. Raiden is good, starting him on solids!!!! Ebony is out of school in 3 weeks and in 2 1/2 months she goes into 1st grade and Kai goes into Kindergaten!! Man my kids are growing up soooo fast!

Im looking forward to our growing family being all together and im not prego! lol I can honestly say i cant stand bein prego! Between the morning sickness to these weird cravings, its really just a lot right now hahahaha Iv been up this am since 2:30 thanks to raiden. And what im craving right now are 2 bear claws and potato skins...mark thinks im weird but its this pregnancy!!!

April 28th

Oh man i finally got on here! For 4 days i couldnt connect, but iv finally gotten on. Boy its been a while! A lot has been going on...part of the reason i havent gotten on is my morning sickness has been horrible! Iv lost 10lbs from one dr appointment to the i just had this past monday. The nurse was concerned but my dr knew that my morning sickness was horrendous and wasnt concerned at all. That and im a lil extra fluffy so i had some weight to spare LOL.
But that has past, my allergies to this dag apartment have calmed down as well. Mark bought me a air purifier so that my breathing could get better. And i has helped a lot! Yesterday i had to move the living room around due to us finally getting cable again...well dish network but still cable in my eyes they hooked it up threw the cable line so we dont have a ugly dish on our patio or worried about them not being able to hook it up to the apartment building.
Im totaly looking forward to our new life here! We are going to be here for at least 4 years soo im workin hard on getting things unpacked right now so i can start decorating LOL Ebony has her own room, kai has his own room (he will be sharing it with raiden once ray starts sleeping all night lol). And we have an extra room thats a guest/computer room! I think this is sooo awesome! Now if only i could sleep in my room without having dreams about the bed... its weird but because of that i dont sleep back there hahaha
Ok lets see what else... ebbs and kai went to my moms for spring break, and they loved that. Oh and they finally after almost a year got to see their biological father. It was for 2 days and surprise surprise he didnt call them before he left. I swear i need all rights to these kids cuz he is a waste of my time, kai didnt even remember him (happens when someone doesnt call on a weekly basis to say hi)..ok no venting about him lol Hate talking about him.
Next week is raidens dr app...hoping that it goes well and we can finally schedule his heart cath...putting it off for 2 months has really gotten me nervous!!!! So now instead of his surgery being like this month it will be another month out probly and i hope that i wont stress to hard seein how by then i will be 16-20weeks... oy LOL
Im glad ebony is almost out of school..its costing us almost 100$ to fill up the van and i have to fill it up 2x a week from driving ebony to school everyday, getting raidens meds from downtown, and regular errands..oh and my dr apps. Sigh may 27th cant come soon enough!!

Is it a girl or a boy??

So i know all this is totaly just for fun cuz know one will know for sure unless they get a ultrasound if they are having a girl or a boy. But for the fun of it i tried 2 diffrent test to see if i am having a girl or a boy. The first test i did was taking a small chain (necklas) and taking it making sure its completely still and putting it over my palm...if it goes in a cirucal its a girl, back an forth its a boy... well it did both for me..WTH!! The other test i did was a tablespoon of baking soda in a baggie and pouring some uring in it...yes it sounds gross but seriously iv heard of worse things going in a baggie!! Now if there is bubbling (fizzile) its a boy, if nothing happens its a girl....it bubbled for me. So basicly im either having a boy, or im having twins.. again i ask WTH!?!?!  Im 10 weeks i have a ultrasound i believe next week or in 2, so im sure i will see my lil bean and we will know soon enough... Tho im saying a quick prayer that its not twins!! lol

10 days have passed

I feel a little better, but my morning sickness is still strong. At least once a day i run to the bathroom. But it has gotten a tad better, tho my cold i caught made it raise its ugly head once again.

I had raidens dr app, and once again his heart cath was put off another month it looks like. Im glad that he is doing to well, we havent had to take him back to the hospital other than regular cardi visits. They are especially surprised and soo proud of him about that. But it helps that i only take him out the house when need be. Grocery shopping, taking him to his dr apps, and ebony to school. So it looks like may is when we schedule his cath. Cant believe on the 25th of this month he is going to be 6 months old!  He is growing sooo fast, it seemed like just yesterday that i had him and everything had changed. I look at him and ask why hes so cute and he just smiles at me. Tho on the inside i know he is laughing at me cuz he doesnt sleep at night like he knows he should LOL.

Yesterday i turned 10 weeks. And in this 10 weeks iv lost 14 lbs :( now normally i would be extactic about the loss but thats a lot of weight for bein prego. . . right?? Sure im over weight (thank god i hold it well) but the morning sickness really is making it hard to eat! I just ate a waffel (blue berry) and i feel iffy... sigh .. i just want to feel better i cant even unpack the house cuz of the light headedness, sleepyness (especially when im not sleeping during the night nor day). Its just a lot right now.

I hope there is a light at the end of the tunnel. OOOHh im going to try this test that is "saposed" to predict weather or not your having a girl or a boy...i will let you know how it goes :)    lol

April Fools!!

April Fools on me! Thought maybe i would feel better from my morning sickness, well as i call it all day sickness. But to no avail, i am still sick as a dog and have to pack. I keep gettin in trouble with mark about not doing anything, but its hard to get the motivation when all i want to do is throw up the water that i just drank, let alone food. It has been a good 2 weeks since i last had a "good" meal. In 3 weeks iv lost 10lbs. And whats horrible is that i can feel the weight loss. Thats how i knew something was wrong.
I spoke to the dr and he perscribed me zofran, but that really didnt help. Yes it took the edge off but no matter what i was still extreamly neasuous. I wouldnt complain so much if it was just me, but cuz i have the kids its hard to do everyday stuff.
What makes the sickness worth it is knowing the baby is ok. Seeing raiden smile and try and talk to me, watching ebony and kai play with their brother. But still the morning sickness needs to stop. It would be awesome if we had tons of people we knew to help us move, but so far its just my friend, my sis, and my bro in law helping...and of the 3 only the bro in law is helping move stuff. My friend and sis are helping in a much bigger way...they are watching the kids for us!
Sigh, all i need right now is to be told that im in fact having twins...even tho i saw the ultra-sound and there is only one baby!! lol

Finally I have a Due Date!

Today I had my first appointment with a new dr. And it went great!! He said that im 8w 2d's. Now because this is baby number 4 there is the great possibility that the baby can be born 3 weeks early. So its a waiting game and i will have lots of dr's appointments to make sure all goes as well as it possibly can. So glad that i changed dr's cuz not knowing was killing me!!

3/13/2011

I had my dr's appointment and all he did was a physical. Friday they said i might be 11 weeks, and then that following monday he said maybey 4 weeks. Thats a big gap. I asked him what i meant for me to be high risk, and he said that he would just watch me more closely. Yet he didnt order a Ultra Sound for me to find out exactly how far along i am. I called to try and get answers and they said they will wait till im 15 weeks to schdule a US...but if i am 11 weeks then that will make me within my 20 weeks, how is that watching me closely?? And seeing how i had a misscairage right before conceiving raiden i would think that they would check to make sure that there really is a baby in there.
I cant stand not knowing. In better knews we got approved for rays SSI, thats going to help a lot. And we got a call from some really nice apartments and hopefully will be moving into a 4bdroom 2bth apartment withn 3 weeks. Im praying that we get to!!
Ebony would get her own room, and even kai for a little while anyways! Looking forward to starting over .. again lol. We find out for sure on everything tomorrow! Cant wait!!

Here we Go again!

On thursday i thought somehting was wrong (with me). I couldnt remember when my last MS was and was racking my brain for when it was. I could only think of when i had my 6 week check. Took two pregnancy test ad they both tested positive, well seeing how im "high risk" i called my dr right away. Friday i was at the dr office taking the test there. Since we couldnt figure out when my last MS was they went of my 6 week check. Which puts me at 10 weeks, well 11 weeks today i guess. I go in tomorrow (monday) to have a physical and talk about what is going to be done since i am high risk. I feel bad for my dr, he had no idea that anything was wrong with raiden. So he will probly take every precation. I aslo have to tell Raidens dr's so that they can get me some special ultrasounds to make sure that this baby's heart is ok. I am praying that everything is ok with him/her. Sigh so here I am with a 6 year old, a 5 year old, a 4month old, and 11 weeks pregnant. Think when i deliver i will ask them to just take EVERYTHING out!! LOL

What's to come??

So much is going to happen this next year its rediculous! All i have to say is how much i love my family and whatever happens i know that we will be ok. Seems things go bad, then get worse...and when it looks like all is lost, something extreamly happy and wonderful happens to us. Looking forward to raidens appointment next week. Sooo nervous and thrilled that we are at the point of moving on with his second surgery. So glad he is doing so well! So glad that he hasnt gotten sick, hasnt had any hicups! My lil heart baby is sooo strong!!!

March 1st! Kai's 5 today!

What a day what a day! Raiden is almost 13 pounds, kai turned 5 and isnt my baby anymore. THings are going so well!! What could ruin this day?? I know! My ex sister-in-law coming over to see the kids. And believe me it wasnt for her, she came over to get pics of the kids since their "sperm donor" cant do it himself. Now i know that i am sounding mean....but with good reason. He hasnt called on his own accord since the begining of December (when it was ebonys birthday) and even then he was only on the phone with them for max 7 minutes. He had allllll day to call kai, and he waited till 8:10pm last night to call...surprisingly i let the kids stay up late and to be a bigger person i let him talk to them.
Dont see how bad people get to exist!

There im done venting about him, own to better news. As of today 3/2/11 Raiden LaRoy is 13lbs 1oz!! My word iv got a fatty!! His ox levels were 78% I couldnt ask for a better morning!! This weather stinks for taking 3 kids out to the store in but im happy its not 100 degrees either! I found a apartment thats not to far from here that would give us 2 hundred more square feet a area for a washer and dryer and only cost a hundred dollars more than what we are paying now. I hope that something comes available this summer. Im totally looking forward to rays next appointment, its making me so nervous. Knowing that in just a month to month and a half he will be having his next surgery...goodness its making me so paranoid! lol

Painfuly Long

I know, I know it has been way to long since i have updated my blog. I hate not finishing something iv started and thats what im determind to do.

Raiden is doing AWESOME! He is still gaining 20-30 grams a day. He weighed 12lbs 10oz this morning! His ox levels have dropped but its nothing to worry about. On March 9th we schedule his heart cathider!! Im excited and nerveous all at the same time.

I caught the stomach flu from my wonderful husband, who caught it from kai, who caught it from ebony, who got it at school. (dont ya love how that works) And of course in true fashion i got it the worst out of everyone!! Poor ray had to deal with me being sick and mark was working. Thank goodness ebony had the week off from school so i didnt have to worry about taking her to school. Im mostly thankful that so far raiden hasnt gotten sick. I think i would just die if he got sick.

Im looking forward to this weekend. Grocery shopping is something that i love to do. But this time im going to have a better game plan for when we go. I made a schedule for the family with our chores...im hoping that we will be able to stick to it and help keep us better organized.

I want to start cooking more foods home made than going out..something that has been happening a lot the past 2 weeks. I like how fast it is but hate spending the money when i know we can make food that taste so much better.

I think my biggest worry right now (besides raiden's surgery) is if my hubby got his promotion or not. He had a interview 2 weeks ago for a general manager in training position. The first interview went great, out of 4 canidates he was the only one that passed. Then this past monday he had a second interview and we still have yet to hear how that went. Its making me nervous becuase we need this! And they have done this to him before, offered and said he had a promotion then he never got it. Sigh....hope this works out...we need a bigger place. Especially if we are going to try for a girl....dear lord did i say that out loud????

Feburary 1st 2011

Today is the start of CHD Awareness! Its also Black History month!! What a month we are going to have. I was able to get in contack with Mended Little Hearts and will start going to monthly meetings with familys coping with CHD in their families. Its going to feel so good to be around other parents and adults with a CHD/CHD child. Seeing and hearing what they have and are going threw is going to be encouraging and so upbuilding. I cant wait! And i was able to get the great idea from them and making Raidens cardiologyst a gift basket..a thank you for the hard work that they do in helping keep our heart babies healthy! I love his cardis!! Starting the today im going to make a diffrent treat for the month of feb. ♥ cant wait to see how this turns out!!

January 29th

Taxes are done, and now we just have to wait on them. We will be able to pay up on all our bills as well as paying our rent a few months in advance! Im so looking forward to it! I feel like things are starting a new, and all is going to be ok. Raiden is eating 4-6oz every 3 hours, ebony is about to graduate kindergarten, and kai well kai is kai lol. Our family is doing great right now!

January 26th

How many times does one need to tell a 6 and 4 year old to clean their room?? Im sick of asking all day! Sigh and then when i take the time to clean it they dont say thank you, and its worse within a hour. Wonder what can be done to help them understand that they need to help clean their room. Need new techniques on how to discipline with out them rebelling. Ebony is almost a lost cause...screams and crys every time i ask if she can go clean her room.

On the upside, they are having a blast helping take care of their brother. What stinks is that Kai has been sick like 4 times since raiden has been born.. not sure if one of those was bad allergies but its rare for him to get sick this many times. Poor thing he loves being around his brother too, and now he cant be close.

Ebony looks like she is excited but really she wants to hold him and give him back LOL she loves her brother but she has "Been there done that" lol

January 25th

Happy 3 Month Birthday Raiden!!! You light up my life and every day you make me more proud and more blessed that im your mother.
With that said i have a new idea for a tattoo for him. My first idea was a combination of all three of the kids names but their meanings. So ebony, kai, and raiden would translate into a picture of the ocean at night with lightning...still working on designs for it and a place for it to go. But my most recent thought is his footprint either on my chest near my heart, or someplace else..not sure yet.
Today we ventured out to the mall...had to do our taxes. And what a great trip that was! Not only will we be getting a ok amount back, i was able to window shop for myself and the kids! I cant wait too a sling and new clothes for raiden, and new shoes and some clothes for the kids!
And what do i get!? A brand new wardrobe! When i became pregnant with raiden i was 210Lbs!!! The heavist i have ever been in my life! Right now i am 180! I lost 30lbs just having him!!! I still have a ways to go but right now only tank tops and 1 pair of jeans fits me right now. So i get to go shopping for myself and it feels good seeing how its been a long time since iv shopped just for me.

Skipping A Few Days or Weeks..

Trying to find the motivation to get things done is so hard... but i want to do sooo much. I would love to decorate our apartment but alas we are hoping to move out soon. So here i am looking at things to make our new place cute and our own...no we dont know where we are going, but i like to think about what it would look like. Thinking of ways to decorate help me escape the perils from the day, like finding out that our SSI application after 31 days still hasnt been processed. One of those times when being on hold for over 20minutes really makes a person want to break their phone.
And in other news i found out that my birth controll was the culprate to why my supply started dwindlling away. So obviously its condoms or no sex..well so far its the latter. We are just to scared to do anything cuz we dont want to have a 4th child right now. Maybe when raiden is in school but deff not right now.

The perils of Pumping

When i had my daughter we tried nursing. Because she is tonge tied it made it difficult to latch on. Once that was determined the reason for her inability to nurse i was given the option to pump. I remember it like it was yesterday (you never forget your first time hehe) my mother and i were sitting in the lactaion office at the hospital. The consultant came in with the pump. Got me all hooked up, and wouldnt you know it i screamed at her soon as she turned it on!! haha I was embarassed and mad all at the same time. I was also young and dumb and swore i wasnt doing that again. When my daughter turned 5months i found out i was pregnant with her brother...4 months later i was put to the test yet once again. Thankfully he wasnt tonge tied. He tried to nurse but my milk hadnt come in untill 4 days after he was born. By that time he was used to the bottle..so i didnt even try.
When i became pregnant with Raiden my husband was adimit about his son nursing. For my love for him i said we can at least try. Little did we know that he was going to be born with HLHS. Once he was stable in the PICU i made myself pump..i kept telling myself that this was for the health of my son, and that he needed my milk more than formula and it was going to help him get strong and healthy. (might be why i over produced too) I felt and still feel like im a milk factory! My supply has gone down within this last week, and im trying every natural way of getting my supply back. Its never fun having maintenance men working on your apartment and screwing with your schedule..but its a thousand times worse when you need to pump or nurse your baby. I could have put a note on the door telling them to come back in 45 min, but i know the work would never had gotten done. I also could have just nursed him and had a blanket over him...but im way to conscious of myself to do that with strange men walking in and out of my house.
But now im back on track..and have to remember that i HAVE to wake up at least once in the middle of the night to pump and then to pump ever 3 hours max. With a kindergarten and a  4yr old its hard doing that every 3 hours. I dont think my stress right now is helping any either. I drink close to a gallon of water a day some days more, and i will admit i have a addiction to caffeine. I have to have at least one diet pepsi in my day and a cup of coffee.  I just dont feel complete without those. Its hard but i have to do it to keep my lil guy strong.

The first month

It was amazing, i forgot how easy it was to wake up with the baby to feed and to change his diapers. It also helped that he came home after 3 weeks so he had a sleeping schedule partially down. And i had had some rest so i wasnt exhausted myself. By 7 weeks old i was able to get raiden to sleep from 10pm to 6am! I hear stories about moms having a hard time getting their little ones to sleep all night or to just get on a schedule period, and i am so glad that i was blessed with kids that like to sleep! My other two started sleeping from 7pm-7am at 6weeks old. So i think Raiden is doing very well! He wakes up just in time for his medicine at 6am then around 6:60-7am he is back to sleep until 9am. Some mornings he stays up and takes longer naps during the day, but that doesnt bother me.
The hardest part of him sleeping all night is for me to wake up and pump. I started pumping 3-4days after he was born. I wasnt sure of the resources i had and my husband bought me a hand held electric pump so that i didnt loose my milk. Then a week after that i had an appointment with WIC and was issued a media pump. And thank goodness becuase my little pump's motor is about to die! lol On average i was pumping 2-3 ounces from each breast. One morning i was able to pump 5 ounces each. My lil guy was going to be well fed. After i was used to pumping i started freaking out. My chest didnt hurt, the "girls" felt normal again. Not one of my lactation cunsultants had given me a heads up that they go back to "normal" once used to producing milk. I thought that they were saposed to feel engorged when it was time to pump or nurse. I dont miss that feeling but since out of the 3 kids this is my first time breast feeding it scared me cuz i thought i was loosing my milk. And of the three this was not the time to loose milk i needed him to have this!

November 16th 2010

I woke up at 5am ready to give Raiden his medicine. We were still at the hospital just waiting for his cardiologist to come in and give us the discharge papers. They had explained how to weigh him (we were given a take home scale) and they also gave us a Oxygen reading machine. He gets his blood pressure meds twice a day, he gets lasiks twice a day, and he gets asprin in the morning. 6am and 6pm...easy to remember. When everything was said and done, we got the discharge papers and our little soldier out of the hospital at 11am. 

The first place we went was to see his great grand mother. She wasnt able to make it to the hospital after he was born so we thought we would see her before we went home. After our visit we picked up ebbs and kai from our friends house and went home. They were sooo happy that their little brother was home. For days they asked where he was and why the baby wasnt home. Its amazing how little kids think, they understand so much more than we give them credit for. I would ask ebony (age 6) if she knew where her brother was. She would answer and say "yes hes at the hospital" i would then ask her if she knew why he was at the hospital and she would respond "he had to have his heart worked on to make him stronger". If only she knew.

It was an amazing first day back. I had all my babies with my in my arms, my life felt complete once again!

The PICU

 I was there every day or night with the exception of 3 days. And those were the hardest 3 days to be away from him. My other 2 children had colds and i had no sitter for them, plus my husband was at work. And to top all that off we only have one car, and my folks had gone back to WA. Mentally knowing that i knew there was nothing i could do, but emotionally i felt like i was letting raiden down for not being there with him. All our nurses understood our situation and were very helpful, except for one. She was a new nurse that over saw him for that 3 day period and called me asking when i was going to be there to see him. I explained that i couldnt make it in and she said i needed to be there because of the baby. Duh i had to be there but if my other kids couldnt be watched and were sick what was i to do. My family flew down to stay as long as they could and went back home. I had no one else to help out. I talked to the social worker about what happened with the nurse and let her know our situation. Last thing i needed was CPS being called on me because i wasnt there. She understood and helped out with parking passes. (not that it was the problem) Thank goodness that i had told them i was pumping and planned on nursing, i was able to receive free vouchers for breakfast lunch and dinner while i was visiting with him. He was rarely awake and when he was he was just so perfect.
Everyday was a mile stone for him. They were worried about him being able to breath on his own, and he was able to. They worried about him not being able to eat from a bottle well due to the tube that was put down his throat, and as soon as the took the feeding tube out he was eating the normal amount of milk for his age. He just kept surprising them. It got to the point where i think they were expecting him to do really bad and he just kept proving them wrong. Then on the 13th of november we did our 2day overnight in the PICU. He wasnt hooked up to anything and we took care of him with very little help from the nurses. And then it happened.. on november 16th 2010, Raiden was able to go home with us!!!

Raiden's Surgery

I never thought that i would have to spend any long period of time in a hospital for any of my children. Yet here we were, with our 1 week old son. Waiting for him to go in for his heart surgery. I couldnt handle not being at the hospital and was there at 7am with my husband. Before this, this was the first time i had seen my husband cry. We talked all day, trying to keep our spirits up. Thankfully my family was able to watch the children while we were there. Around 4pm we were called back up to the PICU. So many thoughts were going threw my head...was he ok..was the surgery successfull?? I needed to know! And there he was, laying in the warmer with his little chest opened up. First thing i did was cry, and then the dr told us that he went threw the surgery with flying colors!! They let us know that his chest would be open 24-48 hours for that just in case they needed to go back in, in a rush. I couldnt stay that night with him, i couldnt bare seeing his chest open like that. At the same time it killed me to be at home, yet the nurses and dr's told me to go home and get rest. They could see i was pushing myself beyond what i should have been doing.
We were back the next day sitting with him...it was so strange seeing him like that. I learned then that he might be in the hospital for 30 days. I didnt know how we were going to keep this up. Driving back and forth, my daughter was in school, my son was sick with a cold so he couldnt be there with me. I felt like everything was falling apart, and fast.
November 3rd we got a phone call from the dr saying they were closing up his chest that everything was looking great...better than expected even. It felt so good to hear that...my little man was so strong!! We got to the hospital just hours after his chest was closed up, still heavily sedated but he looked calm and content. Its so amazing how resilient babies little bodies are.

Being Discharged

Raiden was in the NICU at UC Davis for a few days before he was moved into the PICU. He was admited on the 26th of october and on November 16th we were able to take him home. But that time in between was the hardest time. When we walked in and saw him the first day i had just been discharged from where i had given birth to him. It was hard to walk, the epi was still wearing off, it hurt a lil to sit, but no matter what i was determined to walk and see my son. Seeing him in the incubation crib was so hard. All i could do was cry, i know that the dr was trying to tell me what was going on and what they had to do to raiden, but i couldnt hear any of it. All i heard was the sounds of the heart monitor and beeping of other monitors on him. A social worker was talking to us and for that time i was able to get my mind back to where we were to answer her questions. I hate social workers, i know that they are there to help, but iv had bad experiences and heard of how they can ultimately hurt you in the end with how personal they can get with their questions. Mark took me home round 3pm i needed sleep i had been awake way to long and was sleep deprived. But once i got home i couldnt sleep.
I started cleaning and organizing, i didnt know what to do with myself. My other two children came home for a few hours and they were able to help distract my mind. I knew then that i had to be strong for not just raiden but for them as well.

Then Things Changed...

It was crazy, by far the easiest labor iv ever had. Really it was nothing! Had Raiden LaRoy at 9:33am on Monday October 25 2010. The epidural that i received was to high so i still couldn't feel my legs, but other than that i was feeling great! I had to share a room for the first time, and id have to say id rather not do that again. A couple hours after he was born we tried to see if he would breast feed. And he was a champ at it!! I never breast feed my other two so this was not only a new experience for me but it felt so good having that close connection to him. That first 24-32 hours were great.Well besides having to make sure that the other persons' guest didnt see me whip out by breast to feed the baby. At 8pm my nurse came in to check on us and noticed that raiden was breathing a bit fast. She said she was going to go have him looked at (just in case). When she came back in the room with out him i knew something was wrong and started tearing up. She said that she hoped it wasnt what she thought it was but was having the dr staff to take a look at him. A hour or so later his cardiologist came in the room to talk to mark and i. He let us know that raiden had high acid levels in his blood and needed to do more test to confirm his suspicions about what was wrong with raiden. Mark went home to shower (and break down) and came back around 1am. I laid there crying not knowing what was going to happen to my child, the cardiologist just told us that there was a good chance that our son was going to die. I tried my damndest not to sob to loud cuz there was still a person in the bed next to me and it was 10:30pm at that point. At 11pm they wheeled raiden into my room in the mobile incubator. They were taking him to UC Davis where the top Pediatric Cardiac Surgeons are in our area. They asked if i wanted to hold his hand before they took him and i did, but honestly i was so afraid of touching him. Once he was gone, again i cried. Iv never in my life cried as hard as i did that night. Nurses kept coming in the room checking on me and making sure that i was ok. All i wanted to do was go to sleep, i knew there was nothing i could do, nor could i follow him to the hospital that night. I started to drift into sleep when yet another nurse came into the room. She started praying with me (more her than me i has half asleep and didnt have the strength to tell her to get out of my room). Looking back on it now i laugh but seriously the woman was laying up on me telling me i was so strong. CREEPY!!! I know she had good intentions but come on!! After she left i tried going back to sleep..mind you i had been up since 5am and by that time it was close to 1am. When mark made it back i was finally able to get sleep, after many times my nurse told me to go to sleep, he made sure that they didnt bother me so that i could get sleep. I was so glad to get out of the hospital so that we could go to UC Davis to see our son.

Pregnancy After 4 Years

2 months after I miscarried we were moved into a hotel by our apartments due to a black mold problem. Thank goodness for that, it was disgusting. Thank goodness it was in our bedroom and not the kids. It was while we were at the hotel that we found out I was pregnant yet again. My husband had this funny feeling that i might be so he took it upon himself to buy 3 pregnancy test (he wanted to make sure). I took the test on 3 different days at different times just to see what they results would be. The first test was very faint, the second a lil darker, and the third bright pink. I tried going back to my dr but found that my insurance had changed and had to find a new dr.
The dr that i found was a older gentlemen and was, and still is, awesome. I normally dont like male drs but i felt comfortable with him. He did all the initial test that are to be done, blood work, glucose test, ect. Every time i went in i asked it the baby was ok. The last miscarriage really sent me for a loop. When i hit 11 weeks i was paranoid. I didnt want to do anything because i was so scared of loosing the baby. And yes there was a heartbeat and an ultrasound done and there was a baby!
At 14 weeks were found out that we were having a boy!! I was so excited to see his heart beating. To see his little face. I couldnt believe i was having another son. My husband and other son were in the room with me when we found out. All my son kept saying was, "mommie look thats my baby on the tv!" He was so excited, which made me almost cry.
I only had morning sickness for 3 months and sailed threw the rest of the pregnancy. It was around 7 1/2 months that i became very dehydrated and went into pre-term labor. The drs were able to stop it and i upped my half a gallon of water intake to a gallon. After that i was good, threw the month of september and october i had contractions everyday. On the evening of october 24th round 8:30pm i felt like i needed to use the bathroom. I asked my husband to help me up off the couch so i could waddle down the hallway. I had just stepped into the bathroom when my water broke..right there, all over the floor! That was a new experience because the drs had to break my water with my son and daughter.
No one told me that once your water breaks...it doesnt stop. I thought it would, but it was like a gush every so often. So not lady like lol. Once i was upstairs they had already called the anastesiologyst. It took him 3 stabs at my back to get the epidural in correctly. Of the whole labor process getting that done was the most painful part, literally.  By 9:33am on october 25 my son was born.

The first time...

The first time we found out i was pregnant we were extactic. A 3rd child and the first for my husband then Fiancée. But it was at 7 weeks that my dr told me of her concerns about the pregnancy. She couldnt find a heartbeat. She said that it wasnt to worry, it can be hard to find that early. At 9 weeks she gave me the news that she believed that i had a blighted ovum, and that is the reason she couldnt find a heart beat. That night i told my husband the news.. He was upset but kept high spirits for me and my other two children. At 10 weeks the dr prepared me for the possibility again, and told me what to do if i miscarried. That saturday on the day of 11 weeks i miscarried. I have never been threw that kind of physical pain before. My kids were so excited that they were going to have another brother or sister, and it pained me to tell them that they werent. And at the age of 4 and 5 they really didnt understand that i wasnt pregnant anymore. I stayed in bed for 4 days. I couldnt move, couldnt take care of the kids, couldnt function. It was to hard to deal with and i didnt know how to cope with it. We agreeded that it was a sign that maybe then wasnt a good time to have a baby, we only had one income and were struggling as it was.