Struggling through Christmas

Christmas has come and gone, and it's kind of all been a big blur. The fall/winter season, from Halloween to New Years, is my absolute favorite time of year, and normally I'll go all out to celebrate Halloween, my birthday, Allie's birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Justin's birthday, and New Years.

This year, however, I felt like the holiday season flew past me like a speeding train and I was running to catch up.

Starting back on August 23rd, I spent the better part of two months in a psychiatric hospital -- 23 days the first stay, one week out, then 17 days back in again. The next day, I started the outpatient partial hospitalization program there and participated in that for a little over a month. After I was discharged from that, I immediately stepped down to the intensive outpatient program and was in that for about half a month, then went straight from that to my new DBT therapy program at Three Springs.

So since August 23rd, I've been slightly out of touch with reality. And it's a weird feeling -- one I'm not sure I like.

I feel like I wasn't able to completely enjoy my favorite time of year. I feel like the last 4 1/2 months have been consumed by hospital stays and therapies, leaving me no time to plan for the holidays like I usually do. No homemade, themed, family Halloween costumes. No giant Pinterest-inspired birthday party for Allie. No extravagant family Christmas photos. No baking for Thanksgiving or Christmas. No homemade Christmas presents for the grandparents.

In all honesty, I was actually barely able to keep my head above water. Some days, it was a miracle that I got through the day.

I don't like not having it all together, not being in control.

I actually don't even feel like it's Christmas. I'm happy and so glad to be at my home in Maryland, but it just doesn't feel like the holidays. This isn't a post about the true meaning of Christmas, because I get all that, but there's a certain feeling in the air and in our home that I can't explain that just hasn't been there this year. I didn't even feel that post-Christmas let-down the day after Christmas.

I guess I feel like, for the four months that my world paused while I was in the hospital and therapy, the rest of the world went on without me. And I'm having trouble catching up. I guess I still feel like I'm back at the end of August when I was committed to the hospital, pausing my world.

And I guess, overall, the hardest thing for me is that I feel like I'm having trouble connecting back with the people in my world. And it seems like now at Christmas-time, it's twice as difficult.

Conquering her fears

Just like every four-year-old, my daughter has fears. Some are quite understandable, like her fear of the dark, and some are irrational (although genuine fears to her), like her sporadic fear of the wall (which could also possibly be a stalling tactic at bedtime). 

So many times, I'm tempted to say, "You have nothing to be afraid of," or "Thunderstorms aren't going to hurt you," etc., especially when her fears suddenly crop up at bedtime. But it's important for my feelings to be validated, even if they seem irrational to others, and I want to validate hers as well.

A couple months ago, I sat down with her and talked over what things specifically she was afraid of. We talked about why she was afraid, and then we talked about reasons why she didn't need to be afraid of those things. Then we wrote it all down in a book, which I called "Allie's Book of Fears." I had her draw pictures of the fears and reasons to not be afraid that we came up with, and whenever she talks about being afraid, we pull that book out and talk about it.

The things we Dane owners do

I was organizing my pictures on my computer and came across these classics from this past summer.

Justin, Allie, and I and our friends Mignon and Debbi had all gone downtown for a Dane Date. Mignon has a Dane named Klaus and Debbi was fostering a Dane named Pluto. And of course, we have Miso.

Allie: "Three Danes? I got this."

You wouldn't believe the amount of women who are attracted to a hottie pants guy holding three Danes.

We played in the fountain for a bit, got bubble tea, and walked around downtown some. I lost track of how many times people stopped us and either wanted to pet the fluffies and/or ask questions about them.

At one point, I decided to be silly and pose with a statue. As Justin snapped each picture, he cracked up laughing, and at the time I just thought he was laughing at me. Then when we got home and I looked through the pictures, I realized what was so hilarious.

I'm surprised I didn't see them in this one.

Notice the lack of Dane . . . 

 . . . then BOOM! Mignon and Debbi are in the same position, but Pluto suddenly appears.

Oh yes, and did I mention that my kid was pretending to be dead during the entire photoshoot?

Debbi appears to be smelling Mignon's armpit.

Mignon and Debbi wave hello, Allie plays dead, I whisper in my statue boyfriend's ear, Miso tries to hide, and Klaus is oblivious.

Mignon's incredible flexibility impresses me.

So there you have it. Mad props to Mignon and Debbi for doing the best photobombs ever, to my husband for keeping a straight face as much as possible, for my daughter for going with the flow and deciding to play dead, and to Miso, Klaus and Pluto for putting up with their crazy owners.

Oh, and to my statue boyfriend for sitting still and posing so well the entire time.

Celebrating World Prematurity Day. Celebrating my little preemie.

November 17th was World Prematurity Day. Although my daughter is healthy, happy, and right on track developmentally, I'll never forget the point of my pregnancy when my doctors thought she wasn't going to make it to 24 weeks inside me, and possibly not even make it.

I'm writing a separate post about my high risk pregnancy, since that's a long story itself. But after Allie was born, I wrote out her birth story and I hadn't really shared it with many people, so I'd like to share that here.

Sunday, October 31st
It began on my birthday. Justin and I woke up and decided to go to the Farmer's Market down the road, buy pumpkins and carve them for Halloween, then celebrate my birthday in the evening with a quiet dinner. Anyone who knows me well knows that "quiet" is usually not part of the vocabulary when I talk about celebrating my birthday. Typically I go all out with a costume party of some kind, then we'd have our annual Halloween party/bar crawl at the newspaper, and sometimes my friends and I would even trick-or-treat. My birthday has always been a big deal for me. I'd already tried to convince Justin that trick-or-treating would be okay, even though I was on bed rest. He told me if I called my high risk maternal fetal doctor and got his permission, then we could go.

So . . . pumpkin carving it was.

Right after I got out of the shower, I started feeling weird pains. It started out in my side and shot across my abdomen to my other side and through my back. After about a half hour of me curled up on the floor in intense non-stop pain, we decided we should probably go to the hospital.

I don't totally remember the ride to the hospital, but Justin told me I had my back arched the entire time and my head pushed back into the seat. I just remember thinking it had never taken that long to get to St. Francis Eastside before.

We walked in entrance B of the hospital (well, Justin walked. I staggered.) and the lady at the front desk took one look at me, stood up, and rolled a wheelchair over to us. Justin wheeled me up to 4th Floor Labor and Delivery to the nurses' station where they gave us a paper to fill out. It seemed like it took over an hour to get that stupid form filled out, but in reality it probably took less than five minutes. Our nurse, Susan, finally took us to a room, where she had to go through even more paperwork with us.

Susan was so so kind to me, but so so firm.

Susan: "On a scale of 0 to 10, with 10 being the highest level of pain you've ever experienced and 0 being no pain at all, what would you say your pain level is?"
Me: "If I say 10, can you give me something to make this pain stop?"
Susan, ignoring my question and writing on her clipboard: "OK, so a 10. What is your due date?"
Me: "I don't remember."
Justin: "She's due November 29th."
Susan: "How far apart have your contractions been? Have you had any bleeding or spotting? Did you feel your water break?"
Me: "Really close together, like less than a second apart. I don't think I've had bleeding, but I haven't checked. I don't know what it feels like if my water broke. It probably did, because I think I'm about to give birth. Can we skip this part?"

Susan kindly, but very firmly and no-nonsense-ly, told me that she was required to go through all this paperwork and she was skipping the parts she could. Then she said, "You probably think I'm the meanest person right now, don't you?" And I very tactfully told her, "Yes I do, actually." She told me to focus on something other than the intense pain that was now radiating throughout my entire body and to pattern my breathing.

Susan hooked me up to the machine that monitored my contractions and how Allie was handling them and checked to see how dilated I was. I swore I was at least 500 cm dilated. She informed me that I was barely even 1 cm dilated and no, my water had not broken.

I asked her if she could perform an emergency c-section right there and even gave her my permission to cut Allie out with a butter knife if that would help the pain stop.

Her excuse: "You know honey, I would totally do that, except I don't have a butter knife with me right now."

The final verdict was -- I was not ready to go into labor. The pain was being caused by contractions, which in turn was making my uterus spasm, and it was actually the spasms that were causing all the pain, and not so much the contractions. Susan gave me a shot for the pain and a shot to stop the spasms.

After spending most of the day in the hospital, we headed home and didn't carve pumpkins or trick-or-treat. I'm pretty sure I slept the rest of the day from the shots.

Monday, November 1st
Justin and I went to my weekly checkup with my maternal fetal medicine doctor, Dr. Grieg. I was 35 weeks and 6 days pregnant. After the usual ultrasound and heart rate monitoring, Dr. Grieg came in and said it was time to schedule my c-section.

He and my regular OB had previously told me I would need to have a c-section because Allie had been breech for almost the entire pregnancy, and with the low amniotic fluid, it would be too dangerous to try and turn her. The low fluid was also why I would need an early delivery, because as Allie grew bigger, the chances of complications cropping up from the low fluid increased.

Dr. Grieg told me that one of my OBs, Dr. Dach, would give me a call and schedule a time that week for my surgery. I told him that Thursday would probably work out the best, since Biggest Loser was on Tuesday night and America's Next Top Model and Law & Order: SVU were on Wednesday night. He chuckled and said he'd see what he could do. Justin reminded me we would have a TV in the room at the hospital.

Dr. Grieg sent me over to St. Francis for a steroid shot, which would help Allie's lungs develop further since she would be born four weeks early and the lungs are the last things to develop.

The nurse at the hospital, who looked exactly like Phoebe on Friends, hooked me up to the machine.

"Hmmm. Did you know you're contracting about every minute?"
"Um, not really."
"Yep, you are. Also, your baby's heart rate is over 100."
"Oh, that's weird. They just checked her heart rate less than an hour ago over at Maternal Fetal and she was fine."

So what was supposed to be a quick get-the-steroid-shot-and-then-leave visit turned into an over three-hour stay where they hooked me up to an IV because I was dehydrated, monitored my contractions, and waited for Allie's heart rate to come down.

During that time, Dr. Dach called and scheduled my c-section for Wednesday morning. Dr. Grieg stopped in to see me when he came to the hospital to make his rounds. "What in the world did you do between my office and here?" he joked.

They eventually were able to lower Allie's heart rate, finished hydrating me, gave me the steroid shot, and sent me home.

Fast forward to about 7:30 that evening. Justin and I had made our phone calls to update our families and such about the news and we were at the grocery store stocking up on some last minute items. As we were pulling out of the parking lot, Dr. Dach called and informed me she'd had a cancellation the next day and she would like to bump up my surgery to Tuesday morning instead of Wednesday.

I turned to Justin: "So would you like to have a baby tomorrow?"
Justin: "Sure, why not."
Me to Dr. Dach: "OK, we're in."
Dr. Dach, laughing: "That was great. It's like you were discussing the weather or what to have for dinner."

More phone calls were made and we were up until around midnight, rushing to get everything done that we had originally planned to do the next day. Justin suggested it might be a good idea to pack my hospital bag.

Tuesday, November 2nd
We woke up around 5 a.m. A lot of people had told me to get a good night's sleep that night, but I didn't because 1) I was too excited, and 2) we were rushing around like chickens with our heads cut off, trying to get everything done that we'd planned to do Tuesday before my surgery got moved up a day.

We stopped at Wal-mart on the way, and arrived at St. Francis around 8 a.m. My c-section was scheduled for 10 a.m. This time, I walked by myself up to 4th Floor and my pain level was 0!

I was happy that my now-favorite nurse Susan was working that day and would be prepping me for surgery. Justin's mom and sister showed up and hung out with us for a bit. Dr. Rhodes, my other OB, stopped by my room to see how I was doing and to tell me that she would be doing my c-section since Dr. Dach was tied up in another surgery. That was totally fine with me, and I thought it was actually pretty cool, since Dr. Rhodes was the doctor who'd originally discovered I was pregnant back in March.

At 9:30, Susan wheeled my gurney to the operating room. She instructed Justin to don a pair of scrubs and then wait outside the operating room while they got me ready. I later found out that he was out there watching The Cosby Show and completely missed when they gave him the OK to come into the operating room, which is why they started without him there.

I felt a freezing cold blast of air as I was wheeled into the operating room. I glanced around and saw Dr. Rhodes and several other nurses buzzing around. The anesthesiologist explained about the spinal tap and what would be happening during the c-section, as well as some possible side effects. They put some kind of monitor device thingy on my finger and oxygen tube things up my nostrils

One of the nurses told me I had pretty teeth. Another nurse told me I had pretty hair as she tried to stuff my thick ponytail into a blue hospital cap.

It's a little fuzzy in my memory exactly what all happened at that point, because I was starting to panic. Susan held onto me as the anesthesiologist put the most gigantic needle I had ever seen into my back, and I was amazed at how quickly that stuff worked. And how much trouble I was having sitting up by myself.

They laid me down and the anesthesiologist told me he was going to test the spinal tap and to let him know when I felt that the cotton swab he was rubbing on me was cold. Apparently, the senses your body uses to detect pain are the same senses it uses to detect heat/cold, so this is how they determine if the spinal tap is working effectively.

Then a lot of things all seemed to happen at once. They put the veil up right in front of my face. I became very aware that I couldn't move anything below my sternum. I looked around and couldn't find Justin (because he was outside watching The Cosby Show, remember?).

Then I felt Dr. Rhodes start to cut me open. I didn't feel any pain; I could just feel that I was being cut open. It's hard to explain and a very surreal, weird, freaky feeling.

I got extremely claustrophobic and started having a full-blown panic attack. I opened my mouth to ask when Justin would be allowed in the room, but for some reason, no sound would come out. I felt like I was going to throw up. Thankfully one of the nurses brought him into the room at that moment.

I started crying when I saw him. Well, more like sobbing uncontrollably and beginning to hyperventilate. He tried to comfort me but I panicked even more.

Susan's head popped around the veil: "Hey, so what are you going to name your baby?"
Justin: "Allison."
Me: "What? Nuh-uh. We're naming her Alexandra, remember?"
Justin: "Wait, are you sure?"
Me: "Yes. Babe, we've had Alexandra picked out for a long time now."
Justin, grinning: "I know, but it made you forget that you were freaking out."
Me: "Oh yeah."

Plus, they'd given me some medicine to calm me down and to help with the nausea, so that helped immensely.

After what seemed like hours of Dr. Rhodes shifting my organs around inside my body, all of which I could feel (I said at one point, "Hey, I think she's touching my uterus!"), it was time to get Allie out. The anesthesiologist offered to take pictures for us.

Then I felt a lot of tugging . . . and tugging . . . and more tugging.

"Girl, you have some seriously tight abs here," Dr. Rhodes said.

I don't know how, considering I'd been on bed rest for the last 4 1/2 months of my pregnancy. Dr. Rhodes ended up having to make the incision bigger because Allie's head was stuck in my abs and she needed to dislodge her.

I teared up when I heard my daughter's first cry. And then wondered why I couldn't hear her anymore. Apparently, she'd let out one cry, then took a giant breath, puckered up her face, and held her breath.

Definitely my kid. Stubborn.

Dr. Rhodes brought Allie around the veil, and I got to see her for the first time. She was all covered in uterus goop, her face pinched up because she was holding her breath, and a head full of black hair. She was the most beautiful, adorable, perfect little baby I had ever seen.

Interestingly enough, my first thought was: "She doesn't look anything like her ultrasound pictures." To which Justin replied, "You mean the ones where she looks like a tiny little alien?"

Keep in mind I was still being pumped with drugs to calm me down and help my nausea and lightheaded-ness.

The nurses took Allie over to the french fry warmer and cleaned her up and measured her and weighed her and such while Dr. Rhodes sewed me back up. Justin went with them. Allie weighed 6 lbs, 9 oz, and was 18 1/2 inches long.

Justin came back around the veil holding our precious little newborn. I was so overwhelmed with love my heart threatened to burst.

At one point, one of the nurses told me that I was going to go from the gurney I was on to a regular hospital bed. "I hope you don't expect me to help you out with that," I said, as my entire lower half was still 100% numb.

It seemed like only a few minutes before I could hold her, but in reality it was actually about 45 minutes or so. Apparently they were having trouble getting my bleeding to stop.

My entire world changed when Justin placed that precious little bundle in my arms. I'll never forget the first time I cuddled my little angel close, breathed in her smell, and kissed her little cheek.

They finally brought us to our mother/infant room, which also served as our recovery room. No one except Justin was allowed in for the first hour or so because they were still trying to get a handle on my bleeding. So Allie got a little more time under the french fry warmer.

She would not let go of my finger.

The nurse finally got my bleeding under control, and after that it seemed that a steady stream of people were in and out of the room the rest of the day. Allie's pediatrician. My doctor. Nurses to check on my incision. Nurses to check on Allie. The anesthesiologist to see if I was having any side effects from the spinal tap. Lactation consultants to help with breastfeeding. My in-laws. My coworkers from The Greenville News. My good friend Anna who had supported me from the beginning of my pregnancy.

A few other friends who knew I was pregnant stopped by over the duration of my hospital stay, including Roshena and her seven-week-old baby Beckham.

I was so exhausted I couldn't even think straight, but it was a happy exhaustion. Like the kind of giddy exhaustion that sort of drives you to insanity. At one point, I even glanced over at Allie and very loudly announced to everyone in the room, "Guys, look! I have a baby!"

But finally, the exhaustion won out and Allie and I both drifted off to sleep.

The following three days in the hospital were an intense mixture of love, excitement, fear, pain, happiness, sadness, responsibility, joy, frustration, as I learned how to be a parent while simultaneously healing from the major surgery that is a c-section. 

For some reason, I hadn't thought of a c-section as major surgery, until my nurse came in at 6 a.m. the following morning, unhooked my legs from the compressors, and told me it was time to try to walk. 

Let me tell you, the pain from a c-section is no joke. It took me at least five minutes to get out of bed just to get up and use the bathroom, and every time the nurse came to check my incision, I wanted to scream and cry out in pain. Any time I wanted to hold Allie, someone had to get her out of the bassinet and place her in my arms, because I couldn't lean over to pick her up myself. At the end of every four (or six?) hours, as my pain meds were wearing off, I fought back tears until the nurse came back in with another dose of pain meds.

But it's true -- all that pain of childbirth was overshadowed by the love and joy of my baby. Every time I looked down at her sweet face, or breathed in her newborn smell, or kissed her soft squishy cheeks, or gently placed my finger in her palm and felt her tiny hands wrap around my finger, my heart swelled all over again and my mind was no longer on how much pain I was in. All I could feel was love.

One of my favorite times was during the early morning hours, when I pumped and fed her a bottle (she never learned to latch on). I remember the first time she opened her eyes and looked at me -- I mean really looked at me -- and we just spent about five minutes staring at each other and memorizing every detail of each other's face.

And then her milk coma would set in, she'd yawn her adorable little yawn, and drift back to sleep.

I was very blessed that I was able to carry Allie until 36 weeks to the day before she had to be born. For 16 weeks, we took it one week at a time, with both my doctors consulting every week and deciding my womb was safe for her for another week. God protected her, and he protected me.

Allie turned four at the beginning of this month, and she's as spunky, sassy, sweet, and smart as ever. As I wrote this post, I looked back through the pictures of when she was born and compared them to pictures of her now. It's so hard to believe that my little teeny tiny newborn has developed into this beautiful, tenderhearted, brilliant little lady. I thank God every day for lending her to me, and I couldn't be happier that He chose me to be her mom.

Giving thanks for all that I have

Fall is my favorite time of year. It's also my most dreaded time of year, because of some things in my past. But overall, the reasons why I love this time of year trump the reasons why I hate it. My birthday, Allie's birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Christmas music, decorations, New Years -- just the crispness of fall weather and the cold (and hopefully snow!) of the winter. 

Since the middle of August, I've been in and out of the hospital twice (for the better part of two months), in outpatient therapy at the hospital for one month, and I started a very intense DBT program with a specialized DBT therapist and weekly skills classes at a place called Three Springs. So the fall has kind of just blown by, and I feel like I'm rushing to catch up.

Thanksgiving crept up on me before I knew it, and it's hard to believe that tomorrow is the much anticipated "turkey day." I won't lie -- this year, especially the last several months, have been extremely, excruciatingly, painfully hard for me. Really, the past eight years have been hard for me. The things I struggle with, and most likely will continue to struggle with for a long time, overwhelm and discourage me. So many times I just want to be "normal." I don't want to have a diagnosis of bipolar 2, PTSD, major depression, and borderline personality disorder. I don't want to be in and out of hospitals. I don't want to go to therapy twice a week. I want to be able to handle the daily grind of life and not crumple under its weight. I don't want to feel, well, worthless.

But in the midst of all that, I realize I do have so much to be thankful for. Even basic things, like a home to live in, food to eat, my amazing little family, my dog and cats. The freedom of living in this country, with all the good and the bad that comes with that. Safety from people who try to hurt me. Friends who will go out of their way to help me and let me know they're there for me. Family and friends who invest in my daughter and love her like their own child.

It's easy to forget how blessed I am. Although being content doesn't mean I'm not depressed (that's like comparing apples to oranges), I really do have so much.

I have an amazing husband, and I'm beyond thankful for him. This man has stood by my side through thick and thin. As he once jokingly put it, "If I were going to leave your ass, I would've done it long ago." And really, I've never doubted his love ever since. He is so patient, loving and caring with me, and he truly exhibits the unconditional love that 1 Corinthians 13 talks about. He is my soul mate, my best friend, and I'm so thankful I get to experience the ups and downs of life with this man.

Our wedding day. And look, I even let someone curl my hair!

Would you still love me if my face froze like this?

Our first date

I mean, we'd only known each other for only a few months, and he stayed up all night at the barn with me because my horse had colicked and I needed to walk her and not let her roll until she pooped. That right there folks is true love.

I haven't kept it a secret that my incredible daughter is my reason for living, for wanting to become emotionally healthy, for fighting so hard when I'm ready to give up. From the moment I discovered I was growing a little person inside me, the first time I heard her heartbeat, when I found out I was having a girl, my life changed forever.

And the first time I heard her cry, the first time I saw her, the first time I held her in my arms -- I can't even begin to explain the feeling of love and responsibility that threatened to make my heart explode.

First time I touched her.

Family of three!

First time I held her

She wouldn't let go of my finger.

We were both so exhausted.

God gave her to me when He knew I truly needed her.

No one will ever know the depth of my love for you. You're the only one who knows what my heart sounds like from the inside.

I'm not perfect to look at, and I'm not perfect to love, but I'm perfectly her mother.

I'm so blessed with amazing parents. They did everything they could to make sure my brother and I had the best childhood possible. They've supported me as an adult and let me forge my way into adulthood without being pushy. They've always been there when I needed them, even dropping everything they were doing and coming down to South Carolina when I fractured and dislocated my ankle and was having seizures. I've never once doubted their love for me, and I hope that I can be half the parent that they were to me.

The first time my mom held me -- at the airport when they picked me up from my flight from Korea.

Collage I made for my dad

My brother and I are 22 months apart. We had our typical sibling fights growing up, but my brother is my best friend. I know I can always talk to him if I need to, and he has a heart of gold. He is currently serving in the military, and I couldn't be a prouder big sister (although he is almost a foot taller than I am).

He's probably going to kill me for posting these . . .

At the first class ball, when he graduated from the Coast Guard Academy

My animals are such good therapy for me. Our Great Dane, Miso, is the gentlest, sweetest dog, and she's so good with Allie. Wem, Muffintop (aka Fat Cat), More Kitty Cat, and Prince Charming Tooter Rooter Cocoa Water are the best cats in the world. 

Best friends.

Snuggling with Miso and Fat Cat

Princess karaoke!

Girls' night

This is embarrassing

My caretaker when I fractured my leg and dislocated my ankle

The adventures of Meatball and Slim

Sweet More Kitty Cat

Hi, I'm More Kitty Cat, and I like warm hugs.

Silly cat

More Kitty Cat and Wem

Not what I expected to find when I opened the doors of my laundry closet

Oh Muttsy . . .

Call me a crazy cat (and dog) lady, but I love my fluffies.

Allie and Tooters drinking from the sink

Tooters is mesmerized by the coffee percolating.

I couldn't have gotten through the past three years without my amazing doctor and therapists. My OB-GYN Dr. Tiffany Rhodes delivered Allie, and she's been there for me as a doctor and a dear friend for the past four years.

Tiffany and I after the March of Dimes -- I was so excited that she walked with our Team Bitty to honor my daughter.

My therapist for over three years, Dana, has literally saved my life twice. She is the first person I was able to open up to about several things in my life and she has helped me through so much over the past three years. I wouldn't be where I am in my healing journey without her.

The other therapist on my treatment team, Bailey, has taught me skills that have helped me so much, and she is one of the kindest, funniest people I know. My outpatient therapist at the hospital, Heidi, is just amazing, and I can't say enough good things about her. And my new DBT therapist, Kim, is so genuine and caring, and goes beyond and above to help me. 

I am so blessed to have all these amazing women in my life.

My physical therapist, Jessica, has become a dear friend of mine as well. She has the most tender heart and is one of the sweetest, kindest people I know. I love her to death.

I can't find my "normal" picture that I have with her, but here we are at Halloween. :)

One of my best friends, Julie, and I hit it off from pretty much the minute we met each other. Our family and their family just clicked, and it's like we've all known each other forever. Julie and her boyfriend Chris are Allie's godparents, and they love her like she was their own. Their little boy Drake is only four days younger than Allie, and the two of them have grown up together. Every time I've been in the hospital, Julie and Chris have without fail done whatever they could to help, from picking up Allie at daycare (she and Drake go to the same daycare) and keeping her until Justin got off work, to making sure both Justin and Allie had plenty of food to eat in my absence. I couldn't ask for better friends.

This is how Asians celebrate Thanksgiving.

Chris, Drake, Allie and me

So excited about their prizes at the Japanese Bon Festival

Priceless

Two moist owlettes

They were playing 'family.'

One of the most important things to a parent is peace of mind that they're kid is being well taken care of. Allie goes to an in-home daycare, and Mrs. Amber is absolutely the best, hands down. She really invests in the kids' lives. She does circle time with them. She teaches them things, as well as plays with them. She takes them on field trips to the pumpkin patch, apple picking, a visit to the dentist to learn about brushing their teeth, to the zoo, to the Children's Museum, swimming during the summer. And not only is Mrs. Amber the best daycare lady in the world, but she's also an amazing friend.

Dress like a cow day at Chick-fil-A

Explaining to Allie and Paxton why they shouldn't spray air freshener all over the room. She's so patient with them.

I have the best in-laws. My mother and father in law are the best ever, and my aunt, uncle and cousins are awesome. I know a lot of people who fight constantly and don't get along with their in-laws, and I am very fortunate that I get along with mine and love them to death. They are my family, and I couldn't ask for better in-laws.

My mom (Oo-ah) and my MIL (Ooma) with Allie

My FIL (Doodad) and my dad (PopPop) with Allie.

family reunion

The yearly vacation to Edisto

Caucasians wear chopsticks.
Asians wear forks.

My godparents, Aunt Carolyn and Uncle Paul, are my second parents. They have always told me that I'm the daughter they never had. And they treat me like their own daughter. My godmother is the most soft-spoken, gentle, caring woman in the world, and my godfather is the most genuine, hilarious, truly kind man in the world. I know I can go to them about anything, and they've always been there for me my entire life.

And this is barely scratching the surface of all the blessings I am thankful for. God has abundantly blessed me, and most of all, I am thankful for my salvation through his son Jesus Christ and the promise that I will live with him in eternity.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.