Mar©ia the younger has written a poem to share with us.
She has asked me to type the poem AND post a picture of the poem so we can see her handwriting.
Here it goes:
Marcia’s Family
I have a dad.
He is glad.
I have a mum.
She is Fun.
Hinckley is my bro.
don’t you know?
Whith corban;
there is no bordom.
Marcia is me.
that makes us 3!
I have spent a lot of time around little humans. All my life. The older I get, the more I wonder what is going on in their heads.
There are (few) moments that I catch a glimpse of a memory that lets me remember a hint of what was in my mind as a kid.
I often ask the little people in my home what they are thinking. I always ask what they dream about, when I go wake them up.
Mostly they don’t answer. However sometimes they do!
There was a stretch of time that Marcia the younger would look at me, grin really big, and say “rainbow aliens.”
The best I could understand, after asking her to describe them, was she was dreaming about light fractals, as seen on The Magic School Bus. Hooray for Ms. Frizzle!
Now, she mostly tells about dreams that involve her kindergarten classmates. And her teacher. Oh, how we wish her teacher could move up to first grade with her…. More stories from kindergarten are in order. At a later date.
As far as the youngest goes, he never answers. Mostly all I can figure is that Corban dreams of milk and Daddy. And probably of trying to be like the older two, too.
Hinckley, though, he always has an answer. And recently, he has to tell me all about his dreams before I can even ask. Sometimes he insists that he has to tell me all the details before I am allowed to say anything. At all.
This morning was one of those mornings.
He dreamed about roller skating. With Marcia. And it “was the best dream ever!”
We have a baby! Corban Yaroslav Thurman was born today 13 April 2016 at 3:37 PM, weighing in at 8lb 8oz, 20.75″ long. Mom and baby are happy and doing well.
first picture
siblings
with daddy
with mommy
with mom and dad
WOW!
Just WOW!
So, here is where people can make guesses on Copyright 2016’s birth stats.
Categories are Time, Date, Weight, and Length. We already know the sex of the baby. He was cooperative when we went searching. Though I suppose you are entitled to make a prediction if you think he will surprise us and be a she…
Anyone may make a guess in a comment on this here page (this is better for record keeping than facebook), so that we will know a winner, or as close to a winner as possible.
For some background info that may make this as “informed” of a guess as possible:
Marcia the elder was born July 12th was due on August 12 (but my mom said she knew I would be born in July), born at 4:55 pm, 7 pounds 3 ounces, 19 1/2 inches long, girl.
Jacob was born July 18th was due on July 5th, born at 11:39 am, 7 pounds 5 ounces, 20 inches long, boy.
Mar©ia the younger was born December 3rd was due on December 7th, born at 7:17 am, 6 pounds 7 ounces, 20 inches long, girl.
Hin©kley was born November 20th was due November 22nd, born at 5:56 pm, 8 pounds 4 ounces, 19 3/4 inches long, boy.
Copyright2016 due April 9th.
Oh, and the most recent belly picture. At 37 weeks then again at 39 weeks:
What say you?
(There will be a prize for the person who guesses closest without going over.)
If you would have asked me 28 weeks ago if I thought we’d see this, I’d likely have laughed at you. And probably cried a little inside.
Yet, here we are, officially third trimester. It has not been easy. At my check-up yesterday, I’d finally gained some weight. I imagine we’ll see more of that happening.
I have been afraid to jinx things, so I have avoided taking pictures and talking much about this pregnancy. I am trying to keep the anxiety at bay.
Here is the other picture I have taken, at 20 weeks or “half-way” there.
In two weeks we go in for another in-depth ultrasound. Keep checking on us.
I just want to share a few lines of “Boundin'” from Disney’s Pixar Short
“…
Now sometimes you’re up and sometimes you’re down,
When you find that you’re down well just look around:
You still got a body, good legs and fine feet,
Get your head in the right place and hey, you’re complete!
…
Now in this world of ups and downs…
So nice to know there are jackalopes around.”
We are here. We are still here.
Here we were on Halloween:
Yes that is a third shark.
For more information, watch this video:
Why do we feel the need to share about our miscarriage?
There are multiple reasons.
1-I find some kind of relief in writing about my feelings in regards to this.
I have learned some things about myself in this process. I should say learning, because I am still learning from this. One thing I have learned is that I am a private person. I knew this before, but I did not realize just how private I am. This has made me keep pretty extra closed off. Along with that I’ve learned how nice it has been to get my thoughts out of my head and “on paper.” It has helped me to think things through. It has helped me to not only have it in my head, thus making it easier to not only dwell on my thoughts and emotions. I have also learned that I can do/endure hard things, and having the experience written down allows me to go back and read it to find that strength again when I may be feeling less than strong.
2-I hope to be a support or help or whatever the word is for someone else.
I have discovered that reading about other people going through a miscarriage has helped me feel a sense of unity. I may not know exactly what they feel in any given moment, but I can empathize. And there is a comfort in knowing that we are not alone. And if by telling our story, maybe we can help anyone else, that (would not “make it worth the experience”) would mean I have found something positive to come out of the experience.
3-I want there to be a documentation of my experience with this. For my own record keeping. For anyone out there who will search for what to expect. For my daughter to someday read.
Like I said in the first reason, I will be able to read my own words and gain strength when I might need it. And if for some reason I have to go through this again, I may be a support to myself. I want this to be out there for others that will go through it in the future. When we discovered that the pregnancy was in danger, we both searched the internet looking for stories of what to expect. I only found one person’s account of her miscarriage that had any detail. And even that was pretty vague. I wanted to know how painful and what kinds of grossness was I likely to see. I could not find it. I will share it. Don’t worry I will put a warning at the beginning of the section when I get to that point. I guess my son can read it someday too, and he probably will, but not likely until he has a baby on the way and gets curious. Mostly though, I want my daughter to know that miscarriages are real, and they happen, and they are sad and hard, and if she ever has one she will have support and if/when any of her friends have one she will know to be kind and love them along the way.
4-I want to tell our story because I hope that someday someone might read this and feel some compassion. Maybe for me. Maybe for their sister. Maybe for a person they barely know.
I want the world to be a better, kinder, softer, more loving place. And if we can find compassion in our hearts for the suffering of those around us, we can improve the world one person at a time.
5-I hope that in telling our story we might be able to encourage others to share their stories.
I searched and searched for days trying to find any stories that might help me get mentally prepared for what was about to happen physically. I know it is private. I know it makes us feel vulnerable and exposed. I get it. But I still wish I had been able to find more information. Miscarriages are way more common than we think. When I made the last post, I also put it on Facebook. I won’t post the exact number, because some were private messages to me, but there were many replies of women who have been there. I have been pleasantly surprised at the supportive responses. And I just have to ask myself how much more support and love would I have been able to feel if I had let people in throughout the process. Please, if you have been there, share your story too.
6-I want to share right now because we hope to try again.
Obviously we do not know when we might be able to achieve pregnancy again, please don’t ask us. If/when the time is right we will share. With that said, we both felt pretty early on in the miscarriage process that we should write about it. We kept it very private for a couple months. And because we wanted to share it I want to have it out there before I attempt to be pregnant. I don’t want to be ruminating over what was lost while hoping for what might be.
7-The last reason why that I will mention is that I feel so bad for the person who had the misfortune of being the first person to ask me if I was pregnant since we lost the baby.
And maybe, just maybe this will help another person not ask. A good rule of thumb is to wait and let a pregnant lady tell you herself.
My body was not interested in cooperating.
I became pregnant anyway.
We got our hopes up.
Our baby was due February 4th.
We had our hopes smashed.
Our baby died and we have had a miscarriage.
We were almost 11 weeks along.
It is sad.
We are recovering and surviving.
This is the short story. We will be sharing the long version of the story in multiple parts.
one month old
still one month old
Mar©ia wanted to play in the snow, first thing I saw her doing was trying to drive her car.
Jacob showed her how to make a snow angel
she had fun making one herself
the went “sledding” in our back yard
she loves the snow
she made her first snowman
the next snow fall, she asked if she could help shovel
meanwhile, Hin©kley was inside warm and happy
then when I looked out the window, they were standing next to her second snowman
family shot after Hin©kley’s blessing
I like this one because Mar©ia was holding Hin©kley’s hand
happy little guy
this is a better shot of the outfit
Mar©ia really likes to play inside boxes these days
she was hiding “where’d me go?”
“SURPRISE!”
two months old
he has been working so hard to get his hand to his mouth
about half the time now it ends up in his eye, poor boy
happy guy
great smile
even when the picture turns out blurry