Quin's Story...

For every birthday, I put together a shutterfly photo book for the kids that is filled with all of the past years favorite photos. At their birthday parties and for the year to follow, it's always nice to remember all the great memories through pictures. Not to mention what a great keepsake it is for always. It comes the time for me to begin working on Quin's very first photo book. With this being the last, first birthday in our family, I have been emotional and I am really trying to make these last few weeks last. So, before I post his birthday book, I thought I would share something. I shared this with my MOPS (mother's of preschoolers) group but it seems appropriate to share in honor of his up coming birthday. It's real and honest but a gentle reminder of how far our family has come from the very day I found out we were adding another person into our lives.

I woke up feeling nauseous. It was a feeling that I knew all too well, but in denial, thought it was from the hot cocoa that I made myself for breakfast that morning and perhaps it just wasn’t sitting well. All the way to our weekly outing to Target that morning, I was sweating and had a feeling of panic on the longest five minute car ride ever. I placed my daughter in the front of the cart and insisted that my four year old son please just sit in the back of the cart instead of walk because we just needed to get in and out and go home. We passed the make-up aisle, the toothpaste aisle and made our way to the aisle with the pink box promising answers “five days sooner”. I quickly grabbed the box and sped down the aisle praying my son wouldn’t ask what I had just put in the cart. Before he noticed, we made our way to the toothpaste aisle and let the kids pick out a new toothbrush to mask the obvious item I had just placed next to him. “What’s this Mommy?” “Nothing buddy, just something for Mommy.” We made our way out of the store and back home. Getting the kids out of the car and in the house, I decided to take a deep breath and calm down and play with the kids for a while. A while meaning probably a total of 4 minutes because I knew there was something I needed to confirm. Note: at this time in my life, I had truly been praying for patience and guidance in being a better mom. I had been feeling VERY overwhelmed with motherhood and all its struggles it was throwing my way over the past few months. I was feeling helpless and hadn’t really spent a lot of time with God. Seems to be my pattern of my relationship with Him; rely on Him when times are tough and I’m desperate for guidance. Then when I find that guidance, put Him on the back burner until another struggle comes my way. He’ll be there waiting, right? I make my way to the bathroom, lock the door and unwrap the box. I wait the time it says to wait on the box and pray and rock and pray and rock. ……..two……pink……lines. Not sure the second line is really dark enough to count as a second line, I open another test. I wait the time it says and pray and rock and pray and rock. …….two……pink……lines. I stand up and look in the mirror across from me as my eyes fill with tears, my face flushed and my heart racing like a horse in the Kentucky Derby. Who is this person staring at me in the mirror? I don’t recognize the reflection. Not two minutes before I took these tests, I was a mother of two, praying for patience and guidance before I was going to have some sort of nervous breakdown. Two minutes later, I was a mother of two, praying for patience and guidance before I was going to have a nervous breakdown, on the verge of a nervous breakdown because I was now going to be a mother of THREE!!!! Seriously, GOD, are you kidding me? How on Earth or Heaven for that matter, is this going to teach me patience? This was the furthest thing from my mind in regards to guidance and patience. I am not strong enough, I am weak and I am failing as mom as it is. I…..can’t…..do……this!!! Curling up into a ball on the bathroom floor, I began to sob. What was I going to do? I had never felt overwhelmed like I did in that moment. Sure I’d been overwhelmed with laundry, a full scheduled day of too many things in a short amount of time, the stress of family relationships, bills to get paid with very little money. Never had I felt what I was feeling from something as simple as ….two…..pink….lines. I heard a knock on the bathroom door from my almost four year old son and a little voice asking to let him in the bathroom. I opened the door and he sat next to me, saying nothing and placed his little hand on my leg. In that moment, I was reminded why I became a mom in the first place. Or rather, why I was chosen to become a mother. That feeling I got in a very desperate situation was a feeling that only God could have comforted me with through the very thing I was most afraid of…a child. I know that was God’s touch resting through that little hand on my leg. Such a peaceful feeling and one that I won’t forget. God has shown me so many things through my son. The son who makes me want to pull my hair out, that doesn’t stop asking questions, that won’t stay in his bed at night, that back talks, that hits his sister,……that teaches ME when I need to be taught. How can I deny that? It took me a good four months, of a very hard pregnancy, to accept the new role that I would be faced with over the following months, a mom of three. A few months later, I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Truly stood there and stared at myself from my eyes to my face, to my growing belly, to my fat ankles, to my toes. How blessed I felt to be faced with the role of becoming a mommy for the third (and final) time in my life. How could I possibly deny and fear this moment? I have so much joy and I HAVE been taught patience and have truly changed as a woman. It doesn’t compare to the reflection I faced only a few short months before; a weak, desperate, tired, insecure, broken woman who couldn’t take anymore. It’s amazing how true God is in his promises and answering my question to Him; “How is having another baby going to teach me patience and guidance as a mom?” It has and it’s proof that He is the author our life stories and in the midst of the utmost fear, He teaches us to trust and listen because He has everything under control. This past year has been a rough one, with all the challenges we've face with Landon. The stress, the frustration and confusion. But this year more than ever I have truly found and felt Joy. I’ve always used the word in a sort of future tense that maybe someday I might find the Joy in “this” or see the Joy of “that”. You can always look on the bright side of something and stay positive, but have you ever felt true, pure Joy? My Joy was found in Quin. A child that I didn’t know I was going to have and one that I didn’t plan on having; we were “good with two”. Someone bigger knew that we needed something in our life, or rather someone. Quin has brought something to our family that is unexplainable. The only thing that makes sense is God knew what we were to face with Landon and he gave us Quin to make it through. You can't possibly have a bad day, moment, week, night and see Quin and him not turn it all around with his infectious smile! He truly has a special and unique relationship with each person in his life...truly. Since having him, ALL of the fears and concerns of having three kids has been lifted the moment he arrived into this world. Now 11 months later, I can truly say that I have felt Joy for the very first time. This is a different feeling than just being happy. This is a feeling that I never knew I didn’t know that I had never felt. Quin is such a happy, calm, and joyful baby. I have had such a peace over my life since he was born and truly the only word that I can explain this feeling with is Joy. And I think it’s because it is now in my life, I know what that feels like. Such a wonderful gift God has given us, and it only took having a third child for me to feel something that God has felt for me MY whole life. A feeling that God knew I was missing and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect.