The Gypsy Mama - Five Minute Friday - TOGETHER

 Every Friday my lovely friend Lisa-Jo over at thegypsymama.com has us all write for five minutes about a subject she picks.  We stop, drop, and write for five minutes, no backtracking or rewriting or correcting, just write and send.  

Today is Thursday, it's taken me this long to have it dawn on me I know all about TOGETHER, it's what makes up the fabric of my being and my life.  It's also taken me this long to have five free minutes for all of the "togetherness" I seem to have on a daily basis.  :)

My family loves to be TOGETHER.

 We do things TOGETHER.  

We invite our friends to come be in our TOGETHER whenever they have a chance.  There is always room for ONE MORE in our kind of  TOGETHER.  

We go on family vacations TOGETHER with all the kids and grandkids and spouses.  It's chaos but it's a grand TOGETHER CHAOS.

We always ate dinner TOGETHER as they were growing up.  

When my little grandson had his Fall Festival at his school, his whole family, grandparents, Aunt and cousin came.  Our family goes TOGETHER to any event that involves another family member.  

At his T Ball games we had about ten chairs set up for the whole family to come watch.  We enjoy spending time with our family TOGETHER

Each day I babysit my grandson and granddaughter.  They are always TOGETHER.  They have a bond as close as sister and brother which will last through their lifetime I have no doubt.  

When my daughter was hospitalized for 21 days, our family pitched in TOGETHER and juggled kids, jobs, homes to make sure everyone was taken care of and that she had someone there supporting her.  We were all in it TOGETHER.  When my little grandson  Jacob passed away at 23 weeks of pregnancy my family was there TOGETHER with my daughter.   We went TOGETHER and picked out his tiny little sleeper to dress him in once he arrived in this world although already a sweet little angel in heaven. 

TOGETHER is a wonderful place.  TOGETHER is a sweet sweet place combined with loud, seldom silent, never going to the bathroom by yourself, phone constantly ringing, questions being asked, laughter, tears, cars that sound like you have a circus riding with you chaos.  

On the rare occasion where I have time to myself....I miss that TOGETHER

"Wife Wednesday"

I think I will throw a new twist into Wednesdays around here!! 

I follow a wonderful page on Facebook named

Facebook - Woman To Woman Ministries

Each week I am finding myself drawn to their posts and faced with that little nagging feeling that yes, they are speaking to me, I have become just a little bit lazy towards my husband and I can do better and I should do better!!  :)

As a wonderful preacher that I once knew said, if it's something you are being convicted about, then it's something you need to change. 

Monday's question was : " How do you treat your husbands when they walk through the door?  I want you to stop and think for a moment. Think about last week, Monday all the way through Friday. Each day when your husband walked through that front door, what did you do? Did you meet him there at the door with a warm greeting letting him know you are happy he is home? Did you shout a hello from the other room? Did you say, "come get this kid from me now!"? Or did you ignore him? What did you do?"

I will be the first to admit that I don't always run to the door and hug and kiss him.  Sometimes I am waving to him from the computer, or have the grandkids running circles around me as I am running back out the door to yet another place to go for the day!!  He never seems to mind, but truly, who wouldn't want to be greeted like you were the most special person on the planet and the center of someones world? It's also a really easy trap to fall into the whole " well he doesn't do that for me" thing.  You just can't do that.  I have found over the years that it what you do will eventually be reflected back to you.   I have been married now for 26 years.  My husband and I have reached that "comfy" place in our relationship where we "know" that we love each other, but even now it is just as necessary to invest in our relationship and still be willing to take those extra steps to affirm our love and adoration to each other. 

Today's question was "When was the last date you had with your spouse"? 
 I have no idea.  It's been a few months now. (Of course if you read through some of my other blogs you will completely understand the delay...but even with all of the tragedy we still need to find time for just the two of us)  Godspeed Little Man ~ The Story of our Grandson Jacob  I posted a blog not too long ago about making a "date night box" with strips of paper in them containing the names of neat things to do for a date night, favorite restaurants, new restaurants, new activities, movies, ice cream. pizza night at home etc.....Ladies we need to invest in our spouses and our time together.  It' s so easy to let family time take over and all of our other obligations fill all of our hours until you leave no time for the most important person in your life, your SPOUSE!!


So let's all pinky promise to start doing better for our spouses....

please go visit these wonderful ladies on Facebook or on their webpage at
http://www.w2wministries.org/

The new "reality"

A couple of months ago I posted a blog about our new "reality", which consisted of my daughter being hospitalized trying desperately not to have her baby early and being on complete bedrest.  Unfortunately no amount of prayers and trying could stop him from arriving and Jacob Austin was born still on February 10th, and now our "reality" has really changed.

I came home the other day and mentioned to my daughter, who knows all too well, what this new reality is like.  I was in a Dollar General Store.  I saw some really cute Easter yard signs.  The first thing I thought was "that would be so cute out at Jake's grave".  I no longer think of any holiday unless I think of how we can include Jake as well, and I didn't even think of how cute that would be at our house. 

When we are in a store and see a mother with a small son it's almost like we have to turn on blinders and act like we don't see them and that they don't exist.  The pain is just too much to have to look at them and remember that we got "gyped" out of having Jake with us.  I'm pretty certain that most parents/grandparents feel this way who have lost a granchild at any age. 

It's really hard to know that if he had just been able to live two more days, and had been delivered, the hospital would have been able to do everything in their might to save him.  For those of you who haven't been down this path, in the United States a preterm baby is not allowed to be "saved"  until they reach the 24 week mark.  Jacob "technically" passed away at 23 weeks 5 days and was delivered on 23 weeks 6 days.  One day before they would have whisked him to the nursery to save him if he had lived.  We see photos and stories of people whos babies were delivered at 24 weeks the same size as Jake who are doing fabulously well.  It's a dull heartache that never goes away just wishing the outcome would have been different. 

We are just a family who loves children. 

If you are reading this you probably already know this :)

We have a strong faith in our Jesus, and we know that Jake is with God now, and we are most definitely at peace with that.  I'm pretty sure God understands that we still would have wanted him here with us.  While I am on this subject, my daughter shared some pics of Jake on her Facebook page.  To us he is beautiful.  I know there are those who don't agree and who don't understand why she would post a pic of a baby who had passed away for the public to see.  She's even had some people delete her as a friend.  Of course they are those who have several healthy children and who have never known anyone this has happened to before.  I told my daughter this.  Pain comes into everyones life whether they expect it or not.  Life has a way of throwing curve balls at your when you least expect it.  It's a lot easier to judge when you are living your comfy little life.    Empathy is a great skill to learn because everyone will at one time or another feel terrible pain and they will need someone to be there for them as well. 

It also really sucks that my daughters husband turned out to be such a downright evil person.  He would lie lie lie to my husband and I and act so nice and then turn right around and be so evil to my daughter.  So not only are we dealing with the death of Jake she is having to deal with lawyers and going through a divorce at the same time.  He called her the morning after she delivered Jake and told her he had filed for divorce.  At that point he had been so mean to her during her hospital stay that we knew she would never be going back there, but it's just the way he chose to time it.  He was trying to deliver the biggest punch to her he could.  Really, nothing could make any of us happier than for her to be far far away from him, so we are thankful in the long run, but because of the way he did it, which basically was trying to screw her over and let him get out of paying any medical bills, it caused us to have to hire an attorney and fork over money unnecessarily(would have been unnecessary, now it is necessary to be able to afford an absolutely fantastic attorney).  If he would have just been a big boy and done it the right way everything would be done in a few days.  There is so much more to say but I will leave it at this.  I am so happy she is able to get away from him, I just despise the way it  all had to happen. 

Now don't get me wrong, while we miss and love Jake, and are trying to help as many others as we can through what happened to my daughter, we are still smiling and laughing each day, enjoying the many blessings we do have including my daughters five year old son, my other daughter and son in law and their baby girl, and my husband and our many friends and extended family.  It just really really sucks to see so many people living their dreams and to have to sit by and watch my daughter having her hopes and dreams get stomped into the ground. 

She is in the process of rebuilding her dreams once again, she will be going back to college this summer to finish her Bachelor's degree in Social Work.  I have no doubt that she will emerge like a Phoenix from the ashes and bloom beautifully once again after suffering so much pain. 

If you are reading this, and you have been through the loss of a stillbirth, first let me say my heart goes out to you, I know firsthand  the pain and ache.  You are not alone.  Please go visit my daughters blog at

http://www.stillloved.blogspot.com