Almost 2010

Today I'm packing up Christmas. Normally, I would wait until after New Year's Day to pack up Christmas, because I love the decorations and lights and cheer. Understandably we aren't too cheerful this year, so I'm packing up early. It's a good thing though, because our tree's dried up and Trey says it's a fire hazard. With packing up, it hit me today that a new year will be starting soon. My dad and I have said many times over the last few weeks that at least we know 2010 will have to be better than 2009, because nothing could be worse. However, that's not entirely true. 2009 has been the best and worst year of our lives. We got to experience the joy of having a child, but then had to endure losing that child much too soon. We got to meet new families that have become great friends of ours and have gotten to cheer them on through some amazing successes. Unfortunately, we've also had to sit with them through some terrible times. We have met and become friends with one of the most incredible teams of physicians and nurses that I have ever had the pleasure of encountering and have seen them at their finest. We also learned alot about what it means to be loved and cared for like we never have before. Overall, it was a year of ups and downs. According to which day you look at, there may have been more of one or the other...but overall I don't think I'd trade this year for the world. I think that the joy we experienced can't be replaced and that the sorrow and grief brought us closer as a family and closer to God.
So...what does the new year hold? We are currently waiting for our results from our genetic analysis to see if either of us is a "balanced carrier" for a Robertsonian Translocation. That's a big, fancy way of saying that Wesleigh Anne inherited Down Syndrome from one of us. A small percentage of children with translocations are "de novo" cases....meaning neither of their parents is a carrier. However, a large portion are inherited and 88% of those come from the mother. Not a very comforting thought for me. However, we have chosen not to find out who the carrier is...just that one of us is or hopefully that neither of us are. We can then make decisions about whether we will ever have children of our own or can adopt. That sounds like a funny way of saying it, because if we are lucky enough to adopt, I know that child will be loved as if or possibly more than our own. To that end, we are also beginning to work on a book to give mothers who are putting their children up for adoption to "sell our family" to them. We will tell about ourselves, why we want to adopt and how much we would love to have children. Hopefully we can be good salesmen and convince a mother that we would treat their child at least as good as anyone else (although I'm pretty sure they would be the most spoiled and loved child on the planet). Also, this year brings me going back to work at the hospital. I'm going back as a "flex" employee which means I set my own schedule and rotate through all of the critical care areas. This gives me a little more freedom to help Trey with the students and allows me to work day shift. Lastly, we are looking at some housing options here in Conway and hoping to get into a new house this Spring. That means we need a lot of people to pray really, really hard that someone in Rocky Mount will buy our house. If you live in RM or know someone moving to the area, it really is a great house!!! And, we did all of the remodeling work and put in new carpet and a new deck and new appliances....it really is a pretty good deal!!!

In closing, I hope that each of you and your families are incredibly blessed and happy in 2010. Each of you has been such a blessing to Trey and I through this most difficult year, and we hope that you reap great rewards for the love and kindness you have shown to us!

And so this is Christmas...

I apologize for taking so long to update. I find it harder to do some things that we did while Wesleigh Anne was alive than others. This is one of the tougher things. Perhaps that is because it requires thought, I'm not sure. Our goal most days is to be as busy as possible from the time we wake up until the time we pass out at night. So far, we've done a pretty good job accomplishing this goal. Trey has been keeping the youth busy and I'm still playing secretary at church. We also have put up the Christmas tree, decorated the house and gotten all of our Christmas shopping done. Christmas really doesn't feel the same this year. We were already making big plans for Christmas when Wesleigh Anne passed away and now the giving and receiving of Christmas doesn't seem so exciting. We are thrilled to get to spend some much needed time together and with our families as well as with many good friends. We are also excited to travel to MUSC next week to take presents that were collected by my women's group at church to the babies in the PCICU and 7C step-down units. The staff of these units were so good to us during Wesleigh Anne's illness that we are happy to be able to give back to them. We were looking forward to seeing some very good friends during this trip, the Wilsons. You may remember them as I have asked for prayer for their son Josiah many times. However, we are more excited to not be able to see them because they are going HOME!!! Please continue to pray for this amazing family as they make this transition. Erin (the mom) put it best when she said "it's not like we're taking home a healthy baby...we just got the right machines and learned enough to take care of him at home". I know they will face many challenges in the days ahead and I know they would appreciate all of the prayer you can give them. I don't have much to say today, mostly because we haven't been doing much out of the ordinary. It's amazing after a crisis how quickly you fall back into a routine because routines are comforting. All of the notes and phone calls from so many amazing friends have been comforting as well. We look forward to getting to see all of you sometime soon!!!