Both my beautiful boys just went down for naps, I have a cup of my favorite peppermint tea steaming next to me, and my dishwasher is unloaded. Thats enough for now. Please bear with me as I write this post. I feel like it could be the shortest ever by simply stating in all CAPS, “WE ARE ALIVE,” or it could end up being the length of War and Peace with all the information, emotions, and lessons learned these past few months.
As most of you know, my 20 month old son Liam broke his left femur (Jan25) two weeks before my c-section with our second son Cohen (born Feb 13) which also took place in the middle of one of the busiest business times for my husband. It was the start to the hardest and most challenging time for our family.
Here are a few of the posts I was able to get up amongst the chaos…
My Baby is in a body Cast…
Baby Liam Update
A Family of Four
As of today, we are all healthy and happy!
Liam finally got his cast off March 15, and it was one of the happiest days of our lives! Although his leg was only 80% healed, there was tremendous bone growth and since he wasn’t going to be walking right away, the doctors were not worried. The first couple weeks he mostly army crawled around the house, getting used to the lightness of his legs and gaining strength to start supporting himself on his knees. The last couple weeks he has been crawling all over the house, enjoying his newly found freedom and evening pulling himself up standing on some of the furniture. Then today, he was able, with the help of Boppa, walk out of the house and down the walk way! It was a heartbreaking and yet praise worthy moment! As a family, we get to see Liam take his first steps TWICE!!! Not every mother can say that!
Liam Walking
Baby Cohen is getting bigger everyday and his personality is starting to show through! God knew we needed an easy going baby during this stressful time, and that is exactly what we have! Like every other infant, he is high maintenance, but he rarely cries and is already starting to smile and only gets up once to twice a night to eat….a lovely treat for this sleep deprived mama!
Cohen is getting used to his loud and playful brother, and Liam is a wonderful help collecting baby blankets and sharing his favorite toys with his “bebe.”
These trying past couple of months, we took each day moment by moment, and now we are able to take it day by day. January 25, 2012 was the start of our survival mode; nothing else mattered except caring for Liam and preparing for Cohen. But we were not alone. Not only did we have the Great Almighty on our side and keeping us afloat, we also had an amazing army of friends and family.
My mother and mother-in-law basically lived with us for a month and half, helping me care for the boys and my home. The simple task of laundry was daunting and I laughed at the idea of clean toilets. Our supportive friends set up a dinner schedule, bringing us wonderful meals I didn’t have to make every other night for two months! I still can’t think about it without tearing up! Not having to worry about what was for dinner was a huge burden off my shoulders! So my mothers were helping me with the boys, friends were bringing us dinner and a friends cleaning company, throughly cleaned my home as a gift to our family!
Jerad and I have always been very independent people, wanting to take care of everything and just do it ourselves. It was very hard for us, but a good lesson to be learned, allowing others to help and bless us. Everyday we were floored and brought to tears over the love and blessings we received. There are still moments when words just don’t seem enough to describe our gratitude!
This journey affected every aspect of our lives: Emotionally, physically, financially, our relationships, our marriage…
Things are getting back to normal, whatever that looks like with two kids, and we are now starting the journey of processing all that has happened and trusting God to bring us through and continue to open our hearts to the lessons to be learned. You don’t go through something like this and stay the same.
Now that we have two wonderfully healthy and beautiful boys, we realized that we started this “having two kids” business completely overconfident! We figured one wasn’t too bad, so how hard could two be! Wow, did we get a rude awakening! Every day is an adventure as we figure it out! My MomSense magazine from MOPS had a article written by Emily Kates, a fellow MOPS mom, that spoke right to my husband and I! We laughed at how it felt exactly like our current situation and she put into words how we felt! Here are a few quotes from the article…
“Two kids rocked our world. We were overconfident going into it…”
“as a first time mom, being sleep-deprived felt like a badge of honor. The second time, child #1 rips that badge off your chest and stomps on it while having a tantrum…’you sleep when they sleep’ advice isn’t really possible because it means leaving a 3-year-old unsupervised.”
“What no one told us is that two children can be really hard on your marriage. We did one child together…with two kids, it was divide and conquer, which works just fine except that the divide part eventually takes a toll on mom and dad.”
Pretty much right on the nail. So, we are adjusting, rescheduling and figuring it all out with lots of laughs, dirty diapers, scattered toys and a few tears.
Today is actually our 4 year anniversary, so the mom’s are heading over to watch the boys, I’m going to try and squeeze my post-baby body into my little black dress and the hubby and I are heading out for a fancy dinner with actual linen napkins and candlelight!
So there it is: a scattered update on the Hill family. I guess you can say I am officially back to blogging, and will be posting as much as my lil’ monsters allow for!
And HAPPY EASTER!!!!
