Welcome to Our Next Chapter

I recently heard this on a video I found on youtube. It was one of those days where I was listening to one video after another so I don’t even remember who even said this but all I know is it stood out to me. This man said… 

“There will never be a point in your life where its the right time to do a great thing. 

If your waiting for the perfect moment and perfect timing its not going to happen. 

You know what you have to do is to CREATE the perfect time and the perfect opportunity and the perfect situation.” 

When I heard this it hit me pretty hard, this idea that I have the ability to create TIME in my life. Then I thought some more and said “wait a minute, this is exactly what me and my family have been doing over the last couple of years” Creating a new life for ourselves and with that came an awareness that we are so done sitting around, waiting for the perfect time or perfect moment, but what we can do is CREATE it. We ALL have this power inside us. For some of us it is when we hit rock bottom (whatever rock bottom is for you). I have noticed our “Rock Bottom” is really how much we are able to tolerate. Some are just willing to tolerate more emotionally physically, spiritually, financially, relationally etc…than others but at one point we do reach our breaking point.  

Many of you know that 3 years ago we lost our third child as a stillborn. I was six months along when I delivered Annabelle Grace. When we as a family experienced her loss it lead to one loss after another. The moment this happened in our lives it was like everything prior in our life had been erased and here we were starting with a blank slate and it was up to us what we were going to do with it. What we were able to tolerate had reached its peek and there we stood face to face with it all. We didn’t see it at the time, but little did we know, Annabelle’s life was giving us a new life. A good one that is. But it really didn’t seem that way at first. We began to ask a lot of questions. How are we going to respond to this? Is the situation going to improve our lives? Is this situation going to make us stronger as individuals and as a family? These were some hard questions. At the time my husband went into survival mode which is VERY common for men and as a woman I fell into a downward spiral. I have written several blogs describing our experiences but since then we as a family have carved out some time rebuilding us. I have taken a year away from blogging about our personal life which has lead us to work out some things that have really needed our attention. 

Many people have asked if we would consider having another baby. Some knowing our situation and some innocently not knowing. It is a common question to ask, right? Sometimes it was easy to answer and sometimes it was hard. There are lots of questions or remarks that have been hard for me to answer or hear over the years and to be honest I still have moments. It is so easy to get offended and so easy to misjudge people and assume the worst when really, the truth is, no matter which way you look at it when a friend, a family member or someone you may know is going through a lot it is just hard all around. For the ones going through the pain it is in our human nature to want sympathy at times, for someone to notice our hurt or even understand just a little. It is our job to remind ourselves through the process that some people will be there and some people we thought would be there may not. The beauty is we meet new friends along the way and our environment can’t help but change a little and for some a whole lot. Our situations change us and that is okay. Your perceptions change, your appreciations for life change and your views change. While going through a healing process it is SO important to be understanding of others as well. Meaning, we shouldn’t set our expectations too high. People will not be there for you 24/7. People will not always understand. Your best friend may not have the words to say, and not everyone you think will be in your life forever will. AND GUESS WHAT?? Never will you be able to live up to all those standards either. If we set our expectations too high we will be left with disappointment for the rest of our lives. Now, some people are intentional and have absolutely no filter and some simply choose to remain naive and ignorant and those people you do not need in your life. For some it may be just a phase for you to have to distance yourself in the relationship and you never know, they can eventually come back into your life, but for some you just need to wipe your hands clean and let go. Again we have the power to create what we allow in our lives or what we don’t. This takes time. 

For our family our attention couldn’t be about how people were with us or how people would approach us and so on. We were going through enough spiritually, emotionally, physically, financially…in ALL areas you could imagine that we just didn’t have the time or energy to acknowledge the other chaos around us. Our girls would ask us on occasion to have another baby and my husband and I would visit the conversation at times, but I really didn’t like the pressure I felt when we did talk about it and the conversation never came to any conclusion. I think a part of me was afraid to move forward. I would think "what if I get pregnant and we lose everything again." At times I would have such a positive attitude and think “if we did it once, we can do it again” nothing would phase us and just as fast as that thought would come another one would come saying “but what if we don’t?” Thoughts move fast don’t they? It doesn’t matter how much faith or strength you have, the thoughts come and go quickly. Training your mind to be beat those negative thoughts to the punch is mandatory. It's not a matter of if they come but when they do what is your response. Dwelling on the past does no good. The fact is the past will always be there, fear will always be there, negative thoughts will always be there, but realizing that you have just as much control and power over all of them is something that we all need to recognize. 

Eventually what happened for us is when Ryan went into survival mode and I went though my downward spiral we begin to shut out and num all the feelings just to stay afloat in other areas. Let me tell ya, eventually the numbing wears off and at some point you have to identify the pain you are experiencing head on. I heard on another video someone say “that problem, whatever your problem is, you can not ignore it. That problem will not go away. You won’t wake up one day and it won’t be there anymore. It will be there and it will haunt you for the rest of your life and I am hear to tell you, DEAL WITH IT! The sooner you deal with it the sooner you can create a solution for it and the sooner you deal it will the sooner you will begin to feel fulfillment!” and he is absolutely RIGHT!

Most people do not experience this because naturally as humans we do everything in our power to fight against pain. Knowing this and talking to lots and lots of people who have gone through a tremendous amount of loss and pain we knew we didn’t want to be like most people and in that moment we agreed that we were going to take our situation and somehow make it meaningful and hopefully beautiful. We didn't quite know how we were going to do that but we just knew we were. In our life before Annabelle we had already experienced what it was like to live life on Auto Pilot. Like I said before, we were drained, our marriage was drained, our finances were drained, our kids were drained, our relationship with God was drained and everything else you can imagine. 

It sure is hard to remain patient. Still, to this day when we find ourselves trying to "fix" each other, one of us has to quickly remind ourselves that it is not our job to fix one another. If we are intentional about experiencing a better life than we have to know that nothing is going to happen overnight. SO, no matter what junk comes out or unexpected thoughts that cross our minds we vow to be there for each other during the process. It's not been the prettiest process. Trust me it's been easy (more on my end) to escape the easy way out and call it quits. I struggle with this and I don't hide it because we all are a work in progress. I mean, doesn't everyone want to skip ahead to the pretty parts and leave out all the ugly parts of a story. Wouldn't you agree though the ugly parts are the best parts of every story because that is what truly makes us who we are today. If we choose to skip ahead our appreciation and perception would never change. Our struggles and pain are meant to change us in a healthy way and if we don't allow time for our soul to heal we will never see the beautiful exchange that can take place and that WANTS to take place in our life. 

I think the biggest thing for us that we have realized thus far in our healing process is that when facing our pain we have now gained such an appreciation, an awareness and an ability to become present in our life. And you know when that exchanged happened? When we finally were able to admit to ourselves that everything was not okay in our world. I love what Tony Robbins says “If we can remain humble and hungry, we can WIN.” I am telling you, instant freedom comes when you can humble yourself and speak truth to those things that don't need to be in your life anymore. Whatever it is that holds you back from freedom has probably been because you have been ignorant to the truth and you have not wanted to face the truth of your current situation. Yes, it is hard to trust again. Yes, it is hard to believe good things can happen again or that we can even forgive each other again. BUT is it possible? ABSOLUTELY! 

As I write this blog I want you to know our hearts desire is as we invite you into this next chapter of our lives that you will be enlightened in such a way where it will bring some hope that you can connect to. Whatever your situation might be right now, know there IS a brighter tomorrow. That there is beauty in store for you. Healing and a joy that will flood your soul. We were CREATED to enjoy life to the absolute fullest and if you are not enjoying life then you are not living. I am NOT talking about all your dreams coming true kind of living. I am talking about a loving yourself, forgiving others, experiencing a life that gives…kind of living. You can have all the bells and whistles and still be the most miserable person. It is finding true freedom within yourself that will allow you to live freely. 

Finally, here we were. The time came. There was a moment when all of my fears, all my thoughts and all my emotions visited me face to face. I am excited to share this because I really didn’t think we would get here, but here we are. 

I asked my girls one day, “give me one good reason why you want mom to have another baby.” I was not looking for the typical answer that all kids say like “Cause we want one.” I was looking for a solid answer that made sense. Well, with no hesitation my oldest gave me an answer that I had never thought about. She shares her answer in the video below so you will just have to watch it...

Her answer truly healed a wound in my heart almost immediately. There are some people that know the time is right to either have more kids or not. For my family and I little did we know we really had to create this so called "perfect time." I am a strong believer that nothing in this life is perfect, but I do believe you can create “perfect” situations by inviting in conversations around it. Not hiding the conversation or being afraid of it but embracing it in such a way where it becomes perfect for you and your family. Not everyone needs to understand all the details. The main thing is you understand it and it is right for you. What my daughters answer did for us is realize this new space we had created as a family had made more space in our life to now give more. This was such an important moment to me because we really haven’t experienced being in a place like this before. When it came to another child I just knew it had to be an honest and true decision. So here I am ready to announce that 

YES! WE ARE HAVING ANOHER BABY!!!

This child was planned, this child has been talked about, prayed for and really has come at the perfect time for our family. Any obstacle or resistance that comes our way I have now realized it is up to us how we respond to it. 

Friends, can I just tell you to please focus on your life that is right in front of you. Don’t try to skip ahead. Look for the beauty in every situation you are in. I promise, beauty is there. Hold on to those little promises. They are just for you. The past is the past. We learn and grow from the past but we do not remain there. 

As we continue to share our story with you, we pray you find healing and freedom. If you have read this far, THANK YOU! We would love for you to watch our video if you haven’t already as we share our excitement with you. We look so forward to sharing more throughout the process. 

Thank you again for taking time to read our blog…Stay tuned for updates along way!!!