I am a homeschooling mom who is married to my high school sweetheart. While it's not all roses and violins,we have built a good life together and truly enjoy being together as much as possible. We have three children here and three more in Heaven. We are conservative Catholics who believe that our love of Christ should govern everything we do. We are also human, and make many mistakes, but through prayer, confession, and a lot of reading, we are trying harder and harder to become saints. We practice NFP and are happy to answer any questions anyone has about that. My husband works hard, commutes far, any generally tries hard to provide the best he can for our family.
We lost our first two pregnancies due to hormonal imbalances. That is when we discovered NaPro technologies and have been blessed with the knowledge of a few great and Godly doctors and nurses who also love the Catholic faith. Through their efforts, a lot of prayer, and the grace of the Holy Spirit, we conceived our first born. For this blog, we will call her Cowgirl. She is a nature loving, horse-riding, free spirit who is likely to be found with her hand either covered in mud or paint, as she is a passionate artist as well. She is part of my inspiration for this blog,because I realize the lack of information on vocations, and the need to feed our children with grace and insight into hearing God's call for them.
When Cowgirl was just minutes old, my husband turned to me and said, "Can we please have more?" I, of course, wanted more but after 36 hours of labor was not really in the mood to talk pregnancy again. However, after about six months, we returned to our doctor and started trying for another baby. It took three years and even more prayer and grace from the Holy Spirit (a topic for a future post) before we conceived our first son, Buddy. He really is my little buddy, he spent the first three and a half years of his life on my hip with his cheek pressed to mine. It was only after the doctor informed him that he was nearly 50 lbs and Mommy could not carry him night and day, that he began to venture away from me. He is a rough, tough boy with a sensitive heart that he wears on his sleeve. Buddy enjoys sports, inventing things, and spending time with family. He loves deeply and has insight into matters of the faith that can rock your world at times. Buddy has a brief crying episode about every 6 weeks because he wants to find a good girl to marry who loves babies and he hasn't found her yet...lol!
When Buddy was 16 months old, we found out that we were once again expecting. We were amazed and excited. We had planned on returning to the doctor to start the whole procedure of charting, lab tests, and hormone balancing but due to family illness (another future post) we had waited and had just decided to contact the doctor to make an appointment. Unfortunately, at almost 11 weeks, the baby's heart stopped. Our daughter, who we never got to hold, but loved very much was born to God. We were heartbroken. It was a difficult miscarriage, emotionally and physically. We were advised to wait at least a year before trying again, however after a year, my body and our circumstances seems to still not have recovered. As the hormonal problems seemed to increase, I was told by my primary doctor that I was entering early menopause--at 36!! I was upset, but thankful for the two miracles that I did have the blessing of mothering. In the meantime, our original NaPro doctor retired. We started to look for a new one and found a doctor that is the most wonderful doctor I have ever met.
At first look, after a battery of tests and charts, it didn't look good. The good doctor put me on hormone supplements, more than I had been on in the past, and diagnosed an underlying infection that other doctors and tests had missed. I left the office with the request, "I just want to feel better." I did start to feel better, but with all the scar tissue from the infections and D & C, the hormone problems, along with other factors, another baby was something I barely dared to hope for, but still continued to pray for. God is good! At the end of November 2012, I contacted the nurse from the good doctor who was also a personal friend. My cycle was crazy and I didn't know what was going on. She listened and said confidently, "Jennifer, you're pregnant." What! Really? WOW! We took a pregnancy test that evening after the kids were in bed, and sure enough, it was positive. We were both filled with joy, absolute joy. The first thing my husband said to me, I will never forget, "This is a great gift from God!"
Our baby truly is a great gift. It was another difficult pregnancy which was dicey up until the final moments, but it was so blessed. On July 31, 2013, our beautiful son, Little Man, was born. I have to say, I never liked the nickname little man, but it fits him perfectly, he truly is a little man. He has brought such joy to our lives. I am so thankful for this gift and will never be able to express how thankful I am.
So, that is my introduction. Thanks for reading. Hope to see you here, again, soon.
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