Good Friday '06 - Book Excerpt

We just got home from a white knuckled drive home from church.  Matthew had been asking a lot of probing questions about Jesus and becoming a Christian, so I really did not want to miss a chance to take him to see the Stations of the Cross that our church was having tonight.  The rain was coming down hard.  The kids were shouting over the rain so they could be heard.  Heaven forbid we ride in silence.

My phone pinged with texts the whole time I was driving.  Eric wanted to know where I was.  My sister wanted to make sure we were safe.  And then I saw a text from one of my sweet friends.  She is 11 weeks pregnant and has been cramping all day.  She sent a text to our little group of prayer warriors to pray over her and her baby.  She has had several miscarriages and a high-risk pregnancy, so she is obviously and understandably quite shaken.  I was immediately taken back to my own scare on Good Friday in 2006 …

“A couple of weeks after I found out I was pregnant I had a business trip to Cincinnati scheduled for a regional sales meeting.  It was the first time I had traveled since my IVF.  I couldn’t give myself the Intramuscular shots and had needed Eric to administer them to me each night.  By this time they had switched the progesterone I was getting nightly from a shot to a suppository.  I was excited to get to see some of my dear friends from work.  Eric left town as well to go audit a company in Dallas, Texas.

The industry I worked in was very male dominated. There were 23 of us in my sales region, and I was the only female.  I was blessed to work with a great group of guys.  I only confided in a couple of the guys, Mark and Andy, with whom I had a close friendship, that I was pregnant.  They were so excited for Eric and me to have the family we so desperately wanted to have.

One night the entire team went to dinner at a restaurant across from our hotel.  During dinner I felt some odd cramps that lasted a few minutes then went away.  Immediately it was like all the conversation in the background was 100 miles away.  I sat in my seat frozen and thought, “No. No. No. No!!!!!!!!!!!!”  It happened again.  It took everything in me to not burst into tears and run away.  I calmly excused myself and rushed to the ladies room.  As soon as I sat down, blood gushed from my body.  When I looked down I saw a pool of blood and a big clot in the middle.  “NO!!!!!!!!!!”  I stared at the clot and thought, “No God. Please don’t let that be my baby!”

I quickly pulled myself together.  I sailed by the table and told everyone I was feeling under the weather and rushed back to my hotel room.   I felt another cramp and ran straight to the bathroom.  Again blood gushed from my body and another clot came out.  I panicked and called Eric.  I was absolutely hysterical.  We couldn’t lose our baby after all this!  It took a few minutes for him to even be able to understand what I was saying through all the tears and hiccups.  He calmed me down and reminded me that my friend, Christy, had experienced bleeding in her pregnancy and that I should call her.

Christy was such a blessing to me.  She was also a nurse and she was able to calm me down and get me to think rationally.  She had me lie down and take deep breaths.  She then encouraged me to call my doctor’s after-hours number.

One of the on-call doctors called me back immediately.  He was so calm and caring with me and I was so grateful.  He had my chart and was able to look at my beta numbers.  The doctor told me they couldn’t really be sure what happened until I had an ultrasound.  He thought that because my beta numbers were so high that if I had indeed had a miscarriage, maybe it was one of the twins.  I got an appointment for ten o’clock the next morning for an ultrasound.

That night was the longest of my life.  Eric frantically tried to get on the earliest flight back to Nashville.  I quickly gathered all my things and drove from Cincinnati to my parents’ house in Louisville, Kentucky.  I barely remember the two-hour drive.  God again watched over me as I drove through my tears.  I cried on the phone to Eric and my friend, Kristen.  The only prayer I could even get out was, “Please, Lord, please.”

When I finally got to my parents’ house, my parents were waiting for me.  I will never forget the tears and hugs that met me.  I looked at their faces and saw broken hearts too.  Their hearts broke for their baby and the grandbaby they were so excited to finally have. 

My mom laid in bed with me that night and prayed with me.  She wrote down a scripture to encourage me.  The scripture was Psalm 147:13.  “For He strengthens the bars of your gates; He blesses your children within you.”  I kept that scripture next to me and prayed it continually.  That note is still in my Bible today.  A calm came over me.  I had so many people who were praying for me that night that I know it gave me the peace I needed.  I was finally able to pray something more.  I prayed, “Lord, please look after my babies.  Please put them where it is best for them to be.  Whether it is here with us or in Heaven with You.  And please help us be at peace with that.” If they weren’t in my arms, they would be in His.  My tears slowed down and I fell into a deep sleep.

The next morning my parents drove me the rest of the way to Nashville as I laid down in the passenger seat.  My mom and I talked on the way.  She said, “Stephanie, you know that God is in control but that doesn’t mean that the Devil doesn’t intervene to try to hurt you.” I pondered that a minute and then said, “Well then the joke is on him because I have prayed more than ever and turned to God during this time!”

Eric got on an early flight.  I got to Nashville Fertility Center (NFC) before Eric.  I was already back in the ultrasound room before he got there.  He came back a few minutes before I had my ultrasound.  We clung to each other and cried all the tears that we missed the night before.  We gripped each other’s hands and prayed with all our might for God’s protection over our baby.

Dr. Whitworth came in and did our ultrasound herself.  I laid back with tears streaming down the sides of my face as I gripped Eric’s hand.  I prayed Psalm 147:13 in my head over and over as she moved the wand to try to find a baby.

And then she did.  She found a baby with a heartbeat!  Then she found another baby with a heartbeat!  And then she found a sub chorionic hemorrhage (SCH) that was right next to my cervix.  It was also right next to one of the babies and was twice the size of it!

I dressed and we met with Dr. Whitworth to discuss the ultrasound.  We were so excited.  We had not only one, but two babies with heartbeats!  They were alive!!  However, we were anxious to hear about the SCH.  It looked like a huge blob that was ready to gobble up my babies and I was scared.

Dr. Whitworth told me that I had to take it easy and let it heal.  It could take a couple of weeks or months.  With time, hopefully the clot would heal and be absorbed into my uterus.  I would go home on bed rest and come back the following week for another ultrasound.  She also switched me back to taking progesterone via an IM shot until the end of my first trimester.

Another long week of bed rest and lots of prayers.  I took my doctor’s orders very seriously.  I stayed in bed except to shower, potty, and throw up.  Yes, my morning sickness finally reared its ugly head!  I still cramped and spotted some, but it gradually lessened.

When I went back for my follow up ultrasound, we saw that the babies had grown to twice their size!  The SCH was still there, but it was getting smaller.  It was still way too close to Twin A.  I went home and did the same thing again, hopeful for better news the next week.  By the end of two weeks the SCH had been completely absorbed by my uterus!

We were so grateful.  Finally I felt like I could enjoy being pregnant.  I also let myself really think about and revel in the fact that we were going to have twins!  I had been hesitant to think about it too much before because I was so scared that we were going to lose one of them.  People ask me all the time what I thought when I found out that we were having twins.  I felt nothing but absolute, pure joy."

And to think that this was just the first bump in the road for us during my pregnancy !  Not to mention the years of bumps just to get pregnant.  To learn more about how I survived infertility twice, go to:   www.amazon.com/dp/1503370879

Please take a moment to say a prayer for my friend to calm her anxious heart and for her baby to be healthy.

Greers Unplugged

Have you ever driven 12 + hours with three kids in the rain where you hit a huge pothole every 5.8 seconds?  I have.  With white knuckles, I navigated from Brentwood, Tennessee all the way to Roanoke, Texas last week.  My sister invited me to come and share my testimony with her women’s group.  Since the kids were about to start their Spring Break, it was a no-brainer to bring them along.

Well a no-brainer except for the whole driving 12 + hours with kids.  I heard a few grumblings about why couldn’t we “just fly” there.  I said we could ... if they had a couple of thousand dollars in their piggy banks.  After rolled eyes, I assured them that even though hopping on a plane was quite commonplace in our area, for the vast majority of the world flying is a luxury that most do not have.  Eric loves to remind them that his first flight was in college to Cancun for Spring Break.  Preemptive Parenting:  No!  You cannot fly to Cancun when you are in college!!!

After Matthew asked 26 times if we were in Texas yet, we finally pulled into my sister’s driveway.  We had such a sweet visit with their family.  We don’t get to see them often, so we packed as much as we could in our two-day visit.  We went to the Fort Worth Stockyards, made smores and played games.

Sunday night I had a chance to visit with her friends and share my testimony about the near ten-year journey I endured while battling infertility.  It was such a treat to meet some of my sister’s fellow prayer warriors.  I got a chance to say thank you for all of their prayers for me.  It was the prayers of them and many others that sustained me through many dark times.  As I recounted my 12-week hospital stay when I pregnant with Ethan and Ella, tears came to my eyes.  It was evident that the only way I had the strength to face another day was on the wings of prayer.

Before we knew it, it was time to load up and travel back to Tennessee.  We had already scheduled another short trip for later in the week.  Every Spring Break we rent a cabin with some of Eric’s childhood friends and their families.  I desperately needed a couple of days to recover before we headed out of town again.

As we were loading Eric’s truck up with all our supplies for the cabin, Ella came up to me and told me that the kids had all decided that they were going to leave their Kindles home.  They wanted to be 100% electronic free while we were at the cabin.  I was shocked.  Although I try to limit their electronics, Minecraft is still one of their favorite things in the world!  I reminded her that we were driving her Daddy’s truck and that meant that there wouldn’t be a TV to watch on the drive either.  She shook her head resolutely.  They were ready to “rough it.”  I told Eric and we planned to stow them away just in case.  Then we promptly forgot to pack them as we loaded what seemed like the rest of our house in the back of his truck.

Eric’s friend, Patrick, is always in charge of scouring VRBO to find us an awesome cabin to call our own... or at least for a long weekend.  He did not disappoint us this year.  We had a sprawling house that was built in the early 1900s complete with a water wheel on the side.  It sat nestled between a mountain and a huge creek that you could hear rushing from the inside of the house. 

There was a huge yard where the boys got a baseball game going with all the kids.  The kids didn’t care that it was cool outside and that the creak was even colder.  The stomped and splashed until they were all soaked.  When the sun came out, we finally agreed to let them put on their swimsuits.  At night, we sat by a fire, roasting marshmallows, and took turns telling scary stories.

But the best part was the cave that was on the property.  I assumed when I saw that on the description, that it would be a little cave.  I was wrong!  We hiked almost an hour one way into the cave before we turned around and came back out.  We saw stalactites, stalagmites, bats, and several underground creeks.  It was by far one of the coolest things I have ever done.  I was excited that we were able to take our kids on such a unique adventure.  This was something that they would remember forever.

There were a lot of good reminders for me on this trip …

Lifelong friendships are to be treasured and nourished – even if you have to wait until Spring Break each year to visit.

God blessed us with an amazing, beautiful world that should be treasured too – you don’t have to get on a plane to see His beauty.

The memories that my children will treasure are the times that we spend playing ball, creek stompin’, and exploring a cave – all of which are free and unplugged.

What Mamas Do

Overwhelmed.  That would be the one word that accurately summarizes how I feel right now.  When I published my book in December, I thought the hard part was over.  Wrong.  So it is on Amazon now... along with a gazillion other books too.  My job now is to market the book.  If I don't do it, no one else will.  I hate to self promote.  It was one of the things I loathed about being in the business world. Yet here I am.  Facebook page.  Blog.  All trying to promote my book and me.  Goodbye Comfort Zone...

Last week I auditioned for a local show in Nashville.  It is a wonderful format where 10 women share a 5 minute monologue about motherhood.  I had been encouraged by several friends to give it a try.  I have had zero experience in theater.  The opportunity to reach so many people was just too much to pass up.  I worked tirelessly the last 6 weeks perfecting my monologue.  I wrote, practiced, cut, re-wrote.  Do you know how hard it is to keep something to 5 minutes when you wrote an entire book?Auf Wiedersehen Comfort Zone...

Saturday I practiced one final time with my iPhone propped up on my kitchen counter with a Clorox wipe holding it up.  I walked out of my house confident that it was the best to my ability.  At the audition, I sat in a room waiting my turn with a couple of people who were in the theater business.  This was old hat to them.  After wishing one of them luck, I learned very quickly that you really are supposed to say "Break a leg!!!"  (You would have thought I had kicked her in the tummy!!)  I gave myself a gigantic pep talk in my head and prayed like crazy before I auditioned.  I stood in a room and gave it my best while trying to disguise my shaking hands.  Arrivederci Comfort Zone ...

After a long few days of waiting, I found out today that I wasn't selected.  It wasn't a huge surprise.  Close to 100 people auditioned and they only chose 10.  Rejection still stings.  I have a long car drive tomorrow to Texas where I can really ponder it and maybe I will have a future blog post with all my life lessons and pontifications.  Not today.

Today I decided that I cannot keep it to myself.  Maybe it isn't meant to help someone just in Nashville.  Maybe it is meant for someone in Seattle.  Baltimore.  Australia.  San Fran Tokyo (aka - San Antonio as my daughter called it).  So here it is.  I am not just sharing it with Nashville.  I am sharing it with the world.  Au Revoir Comfort Zone ...

A baby in each arm ...

This monologue was just a small taste of my story in "Full Heart Empty Womb:  How I Survived Infertility ... Twice".  To learn more or buy your copy, go to:
www.amazon.com/dp/1503370879

Don't Get Your White/Gold or Black/Blue Panties in a Wad!

Last night I was winding down ready to go to bed early.  Then I saw it.  The DRESS my friend, Rachel, posted on Instagram.  Like her, I saw White & Gold but her whole family saw Black & Blue.  What??  Black & Blue are no where near the same colors as White & Gold!  How could this be?

I read some suggestions.  I stared at it and stared at it.  Yep.  Still White & Gold.  I put it away and watched some Rehab Addict.  Picked it back up.  Yep.  Still White & Gold.  Eric came home from work and I asked him to look at it and see what he thought.  Black & Blue.  What I say again??  And he thought I was completely crazy for thinking it was White & Gold.  How could two people looking at the same exact picture see it so completely differently?  We adjusted the backlight on my iPhone.  That just solidified our positions on opposite sides of the debate.  This was two hours of my life last night!  I never made it to bed early.

Eric even polled his buddies.  All but one were in the Black & Blue camp.  (Thanks Eric C.  You were always my favorite ;)  We polled each of our kids separately.  We had one Black & Blue.  One Blue & Brown.  And one Lilac & Black.  (You can guess that the one girl child is the one that said Lilac.  The boys wouldn't even know what color that was!)  I could not even wrap my head around the fact that no one saw it as White & Gold.  I knew that it was White & Gold and it was just taken in a shadow so it was not really bright.  I demonstrated this for Eric in my white shirt as I stood in my closet (in the shadows) then jumped out in the light.  Over and Over.  "See!!  It is still white even if I am in the shadow!!!"  The debate was intense and heated in my house, but we also laughed so hard that we were in tears.

While I was getting ready, Eric came back to tell me that "the Dress" was headlining on the Today Show,  CBS and ESPN.  What?  How crazy!  Apparently just like us, a number of people got momentarily sucked into the great Dress debate.

Now there is a another debate.  A debate on how ridiculous and what a waste of time this whole thing is. Is it ridiculous?  Sure.  Did I waste two hours of my life last night and even more today by writing about it?  Absolutely.  But who cares?  Why do you care??  We spend time talking about very worthy causes...ISIS, Vaccines, Allergies, Sex Trafficking, etc.  I wrote a book on Infertility.  I think that covers my "serious quota" for at least a little while  ;)  Sometimes it is nice to just be silly and forget for just a second about all the junk going on in all the world.  If you don't, it can just bog you down and depress you.  Laughter is a great way to recharge your batteries so you can get serious and tackle the real stuff of life.

So in closing, I saw the "real dress" in all its Black & Blue glory.  Eric had a TON of satisfaction that he was right and I was wrong.  I contend that this is a conspiracy to sell lots of Black & Blue AND White & Gold dresses ;)

Snow Days and Turtle Tips

Last week I got a rare middle of the day text from Eric:

“Monday.   8 -12 inches of snow!!!”

Yea. Right.  We live in Nashville, TN.  It always goes north of us.  We never get that lucky!  And that was days away.  Anything could have change.

Then I watched the weather myself that night and heard the excitement in the weatherman’s voice.  It was contagious.  They even talked about Nashville on The Weather Channel!  That’s big time, baby!  It wasn’t a matter of if we would get snow, but how much!!!

With a newfound faith in Eric and TWC’s forecast, I went on a mission for snow pants and snow boots.  We were finally going to get our snow day!  I even broke my cardinal rule of parenting  - I told the kids.  Eric was furious.  He was convinced that I jinxed it and the huge winter storm Octavia was just going to change course to teach me a lesson.  He told me if we woke up to nothing on Monday, he was going to high tail it into work and leave me with the fall out.

Well Octavia did slap my hands for being overzealous by withholding the snow and instead raining down 2 – 3 inches of sleet.  But we showed her!!  We had a blast anyway.  It turns out that sledding on sleet is way more fun than ice.   We sled for hours.  Shed our clothes.  Rested.  Threw them in the dryer.  Got dressed again and went for round two!

Today we were blessed with about an inch of that elusive snow.  It was so beautiful to watch it fall at a rapid rate this morning.  Right after breakfast we dressed again to enjoy some of the powder.  Eric went into work late in order to give the roads time to clear, so he was able to play too.  They all worked hard on building a snowman.  The snow wasn’t the best for it, but we made the best of it.

Just as we were finishing up, I received a text from my Dad telling me that my grandpa, Papatch, passed away.  It wasn’t a surprise.  His health had been deteriorating over the last several months and had progressively gotten worse over the last few days.  Even when you have been preparing yourself mentally for a while, to know that they are really gone, it is tough.

I think back to my best memories of him growing up.  We didn’t live close to them.  We were in Houston and they were in the panhandle of Texas.  Most years I would see them at Christmas and maybe another trip during the year.  But the time that we had together was always so sweet.

We loved to play games together.  He and Grandma we kids at heart.  We would play spoons, Canasta, Solitaire, or any card game.  Grandma would usually “cheat” and we would laugh and laugh.  He had the best laugh.  A belly laugh that usually ended with a “Woo Hoo” as he rubbed his round belly.

I remember going and staying with them one summer when I was little.  Papatch had his new Super Nintendo all ready to go for me.  I was determined to finally save the princess.  He tried to teach me how to get turtle tips so I could get a gazillion lives.  I never could get it.  He would load me up with a ton before he headed to bed.  I stayed up all hours of the night using all Papatch’s turtle tips trying to save that dang princess.  The next morning he woke me up.  "Did you get her, Steffer??"  Nope.  So he just got me more and told me to keep at it.  For the record, I still have not saved the princess.

We almost lost him a few years ago when he had a debilitating stroke.  For a while we didn't know if he would wake up.  When he finally did, we didn't think he would regain the use of the left side of his body.  Less than a year later, he was playing golf with my dad for the first time since the stroke and got a hole in one.  The 8th hole in one in his lifetime!!  

It is times like these that I am so thankful for my faith.  It is a faith that has been passed down to me from generation to generation.  It was such a comfort to be able to share that with my children... the next generation.  As sad as I am to say Goodbye to Papatch, I know that he said Hello to His Heavenly Father today.   There is not a question in my mind.  He probably played a few rounds of golf with his son, Gary.  And I imagine he, Grandma and Uncle Gary are playing a mean game of Canasta and laughing until they cry.  I wonder if Grandma gets away with her cheating in Heaven?

Yes I know that he is in Heaven with many of our loved ones and I will see him again when we all go to Heaven.  As he would say “Sho Nuff.”