Celebrating Audrey – Day 1

   

   

      I watched with excitement your pregnancy with sweet Audrey as she and Harrison were due so close together. She was born two weeks before him and I couldn’t stop looking at all of her pictures and how tiny she was and it made me even more excited for my own sweet baby to come. She looked just like her sisters and had a smile that was like a light in all of her pictures. The day I found out that your family suffered a loss that no family especially a mother should have to experience I was heart broken, my stomach hurt as I watched your heartache unfold over Facebook. I looked at Harrison and thought I will never take another second with you for granted, when you’re crying at night and all I want to do is sleep I will still feel grateful for your life. Reading your blogs which showed your heartache, joy, strengths, weaknesses, fears and every other emotion that can be felt by the human soul I was inspired. You have taken a beautiful short life and made it everlasting in those around you; although I didn’t get the chance to meet Audreys sweet face in person I will never forget the life she had and gave. I will always think of her on her birthday and how her life was so much more then that one day in July. Thank you for sharing your life with all of us, and Audrey lives on every day through you, her sisters, brother, father, extended family and all of us who got to be a part of her life in any way.

I think of her often,

Trista

  

   Whenever I can’t get Ellie to stop crying, I think of Audrey.

When I am exhausted and frustrated because Ellie hasn’t slept in days, I think of Audrey.

When she is getting into everything, pulling my hair, chasing after the cats, unfolding all of the piles of laundry I just folded, I think of Audrey.

When she throws her food all over the floor, high chair and herself right after her bath, I think of Audrey.

And why do I think of Audrey during all these frustrating times?? Because Ellie gets to have them. She gets to learn, to adventure, to grow, to laugh, and to love.

As you know, being a mom is very easy during the times when your little ones are happy, laughing and full of wonder. But often when those frustrating times happen, I hope they pass soon. I hope they won’t happen again. I sometimes think to myself “is this day over yet??” “I hope she grows out of this fast.” Maybe that makes me a bad mom, I don’t know.

But then I stop and think of Audrey. I know I never met her, but I saw her beautiful smile on Facebook. It was contagious. Audrey’s memory is with me everyday. She taught me that the time with my daughter is special, and I don’t know how long I have with her. Only God knows that.

So thank you Audrey. For teaching me to appreciate every single second. For making me a better mom.

With love,
Sarah Turpin

    I met Audrey through Zoe. Zoe our daughter also passed away from SIDS at three months old; three months before Audrey. Audrey’s life and death brought about a sweet friendship between Sarah and I; we understood one another’s pain, hurt, and ache of empty arms. There were so many days, that Sarah and I would encourage one another by the simple reminder that we weren’t walking this path alone. When I was having a hard day, I always knew I could message Sarah and she would get it; she has been such a blessing to me this past year. When Sarah shared she was pregnant with Asher, my heart understood the fear that came with that news; but I also greatly respect the courage she has had this past year and each day as she trusts God with all five of her precious children. Audrey, I’m sure you and Zoe have become great friends just as your mom has been for me! Thank you sweet girl for the gift of friendship!

Mackenzie Rollins

81 days.

                       

“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God – Connie Ten Boom”

    Since becoming pregnant with Asher, I often wondered what today would feel like. Since Ashers birth I have counted down the days until this very one….Today Asher is eighty one days old. Today Asher is as old as Audrey ever was. Today makes me both worry and give thanks for a tomorrow.

    As I sit tonight with my baby boy snuggled in my arms, I cannot help but reflect on the last two months and twenty days that I have had with him. In some ways it is if I have no idea what to do with the two months and twenty-first one. See, in some ways I have felt like this day may never come. I realized I have been going through life waiting for my infant to die. After two losses in a row I lost the ability to imagine life after three months. I lost the ability to think too far in to the future.

  But here we sit. 

   I remember my eighty first day with Audrey. Snuggled in a chair in a hurricane. We had no power but she managed to make life inside our little home so peaceful as she lit up our lives and warmed our hearts with her smiles and coo’s. I had no idea it would be her last. That I would go in to tomorrow without her…..that I would be sitting here a year later without her.

  But here I am.

    Today I reflect on my last day living in constant comparison. A day has yet to go by that I haven’t compared Ashers actions, coos, and timelines to hers, but tomorrow Ashers life becomes a new journey. Tomorrow, day eighty two becomes his own. 

    The days leading up to this one has been hard. I have grieved, learned, grew, and prayed. A part of me is scared for tomorrow….but as the sun rises, and the unknowns and emotions of my day begin to unfold before my eyes….I rest easy in the fact that I may not be in control or know exactly what I am doing, and that it is okay.

   Because God does.

When The Storm Rages On.

   

“He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.” – Mark 4:39

    The last couple of weeks have been some of the hardest weeks since Audrey’s death. When the lingering grief and my mounting anxieties collided with the exhaustion of a newborn and the daily tasks of running a household, I watched as my ” I got it all together ” bubble completely popped before my eyes. I would like to think it came without warning, but that would be a lie. It has been coming for sometime now.

    Instead of asking for help, I pushed it away. After all…. I could handle it.  To me, admitting that everything was now very quickly getting the best of me was admitting I was weak.  It was admitting that maybe….just maybe I didn’t have everything as together as it seemed. All of a sudden it was as if looking out became a whole different picture than what people seen looking in. My smiles continued to hide the pain and the thoughts of my never ending mind. I began to ask God if this was ever going to end. I began to question if he was still even there. If he could still see me, or hear me…and if so then why was he so silent in this.

   Then as I was sitting in his presence this week, I came across a story in the book of Mark. In the story, Jesus and his disciples were sailing in a boat across the water. Jesus decided to lay down and rest and while he drifted off to sleep, a huge storm crept up and threatened to sink the boat. The disciples became scared as the waves crashed over them. They ran down in to the boat to wake up Jesus and asked him “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown.” In return Jesus says ‘” Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” See, the disciples had been so concerned with what was going on around them, that they had forgotten who was in their boat to begin with.

   As I read this,  tears immediately filled my eyes as I felt the spirit began to fill me. I was being just like them. In that moment it wasn’t about proving how strong I was or by having it all together. In fact, the times that I have grown the most has been at my most broken. God’s not always going to shout loudly at me the minute things get hard, sometimes I need to sit in him and listen silently for his wisdom.

   What I learned this week is just what the disciples had forgotten. That through the good days, the cloudy, or the out right storms in my life. Whether I can hear him loudly or as a quiet whisper. Whether he calms my storm or allows it to rage on a little longer…..I need to remember the fact that he got in to my boat in the first place, and that he knows just what he is doing.

Because Being You Is Enough.

“Don’t concern yourself with the opinions of those who judge you. That is placing on them an importance they do not have.” – Donna Lynn Hope

    I remember when I became a mom for the very first time. I was not only young….but totally oblivious to the fact that parenting doesn’t always work the way you have planned. I had done the classes…I had read some books…..I had it all planned out. Breastfeeding was beautiful. Breastfeeding was what everyone did. I was going to breastfeed. Done deal. End of story. 

    But that wasn’t the end…

    My daughter was born…. and after six weeks of her crying, me crying, and repeated weight loss, I was encouraged to supplement. A bottle? What do you mean? Why could my body not nourish my child the way it was made to do? In ways I felt like a failure, inadequate even….. and later that day as I walked through the store to purchase infant formula, embarrassment kicked in as I quickly picked up the case and practically ran to cash to avoid being seen. 

     When my second, and now fifth child came along..I once again found myself determined to breastfeed. Each time I chalked up my previous “failure” to being young and inexperienced…but this time, this time I was an experienced mom. This time I surely would be able to nurse my baby without the help of added formula…but each time ended with the same results. Each time a new sense of embarrassment crept in as I found myself once again walking in shame down the formula aisle. 

    But why?

     Why did I spend the first year of my childrens lives trying so desperately to hide their bottle from the public eye? Why did I feel proud to nurse my baby in public, yet once they had finished and were left unsatisfied was when I brought them to the car to give them their bottle? Why did I panic whenever someone asked me if I breastfed or if I saw some breast is best article on my news feed? Why did I feel that feeding my baby no matter what way was something to be shamed for?

   Recently as a nursing session with my son ended with an unsatisfied child as it normally does, I walked to the kitchen to prepare one of those plastic dreadful things that taunted me each time I walked by. As I sat down on the couch and cradled my baby in my arms to finish his feeding….. I looked back down at the same little boy who had just nursed at my breast and in that moment I realized something. HE didn’t look at me in shame. In fact… he looked up lovingly at me with the same big blue eyes with a bottle in his mouth, just as he had done on my breast.

   Wasn’t he who mattered?

    Wasn’t his happiness, his contentment, and his health my priority…not the people at the grocery store.  Wasn’t my success, my pride as a mother based on my love and my ability to raise a happy, healthy child…..not to impress the women at my playgroup. He accepted each nipple whether made from skin or plastic the exact same way……not to make me feel better…..not to prove to the world that I wasn’t a failure……but because he needed it and it nourished him. But because whether you can breastfeed or not….or whether you choose to breastfeed or not…your child has to eat to grow.

    As I continue to look into those very same eyes feeding after feeding and day after day, as I have continued to watch my son not only grow but thrive over the last amazing eight weeks, the stress…the hiding…..and the feelings of inadequacy has melted away. I am a mom. A mom that loves her children. I am no different, no less because of how my child receives his food needed to live. He loves me the same.

  Breastfeeding is beautiful……bottle feeding is beautiful.

  But being a happy, healthy, and confident mother…..is the most beautiful of all.