Each Child Comes At The Right Time

Looking back its amazing to see how each child of ours has fit in at the right time and with the right personality.

Tabitha was our first and was the start of our family. She couldn't have come at a better time. She helped determine who and what we were going to be.

Carston was our second and was like our reminder of our hopes and dreams and why we wanted to be a family.

Tayson was our third and came at a time that we needed to be show miracles, mercy and faith.

Teigan was our fourth and he came and pulled us together to make our family complete. A reminder that things don't always come the way we expect them to.

Each one of these kids has there one personality there own image. They are all different yet together blend so perfectly. I am so blessed and thankful everyday that I get to be there mom. Out of all the things I have done in my life being their mom is by far the best.  How did I get so lucky to have God trust me to raise these 4 kids?

Foster Care

Brandon and I have always talked about doing Foster care or Proctor care since the time we got married. We looked into it a couple times but it never seemed to be the right time. Once I went part time we decided that now was a good time to do foster care. We talked to the kids about it and they were over the moon excited.

In Spring of 2011 we started taking foster care classes. I think everyone should take these classes before becoming a parent, they are great.  There is a lot involved in becoming a foster parent. You have to take courses, pass background checks, have your house inspected and meet certain requirements. Once all of these are complete and you pass you can get your license.

In Sept. 2011 we had a meeting with our case worker and we had been approved. We had our foster care license. Brandon and I joked of how long it would be before we got the call for kids needing placement. He guessed a week or so and I thought at least a month. We only requested to get younger kids due to the age of our kids and our previous experiences we wanted Tabitha and Carston to be the oldest in the house. This is why I thought it would take longer because there are more foster homes for younger children.

3 hrs after getting out license I get a phone call welcoming us to Foster care. I thought this was just something they did to all Foster parents , that was not the case. The lady continued by saying " I know you said you only wanted one placement at a time but if under certain circumstances you would consider taking more". She proceeded to say we have three children living in the Christmas box house in Ogden that we cannot find a placement for. We have called everyone we can and nobody can take three. If we don't find someone to take all three their time is up in the Christmas box house so we would have to separate them...

The next call I placed was to Brandon. I remember telling him that we both lost the bet and we already had a call. I mumbled when I told him they wanted us to take three. After he clarified that I said three he told me I was the one at home so it was up to me. I called the social worker back and asked more details. She told me we could go meet the boys that night.

That night we went and met all three boys ages 11 months, 2 and 4. We of course said we would take them home and they told us to think about it over night. I thought what is there to think about we want to take them, but they seemed adamant we think it over.

We went home and told the kids all that we knew about the boys and they were so excited. That night I couldn't sleep. I woke up crying and scared to death. What was I doing? We only had three kids and they were old enough for the majority of things to be self sufficient.  How could I bring 3 tiny kids into our home and double the number of kids we had. I talked to Brandon and he assured me he would stand behind me whatever I decided.

After a very long night and morning I had made a decision... I was not going to be able to take care of these boys. I couldn't go pick them up. I decided to tell our kids my decision. That didn't go over well at all. Tabitha & Carston started to cry. They begged and pleaded that I change my mind. They told me they would be split up and how could I do that to them. Tabitha promised she would change every diaper. They both agreed they would do whatever it took to have these boys come into our home. I explained in detail how hard it might be and of course it didn't matter what I said they were all in.

A few hrs later we were in the car with three car seats going to pick up our Foster boys.

Surrogacy take 2! Part one...

The summer of 2011 I went to India. I had always wanted to go and provide service in a foreign country. I had a dear friend who went to India and it seemed like the perfect trip for me. Brandon had some hesitation about me going until we listened to conference in April of 2011 and then we both just knew I was supposed to go.

I needed to go to India. It helped me find me. It helped me to learn who I wanted to be. This I think was a blessing for me and for my family.

While I was in India I started having thoughts about surrogacy again. I tried to push them out but they kept returning. I even argued a little with God saying something to the effect of we tried this is didn't work. I am not really meant to be a surrogate. This was just a path to lead our friends to there daughters Fay and Lilly.

I lost the debate and told Brandon I felt like this was something I needed to do. He was fine with that decision and I started the paperwork. The paperwork is very intensive. You give them your medical history your family's, your personal history and you have evaluations and test. Finally after months of that the matching process begins.

At the end of November we received a profile. The day we read through the profile of our intended parents I was excited, nervous and a little confused. How would I know they were right for us? Should I have a feeling that they are the one or should I know right away if they aren't the right couple. They seemed lovely and we couldn't see a reason not to help them but the deciding factor we felt was she had, had cancer and my mother had, had cancer. Why was this the deciding factor? We hadn't really completely looped our family in on this yet. I knew my mom would have the hardest time with this. I felt like my mom could relate to her situation and this would help ease the idea.

We showed my parents the profile and my kids and we agreed that this was the couple. My mom may have been a little reluctant. Carston's only stipulation was if he got to hold them so we made sure that was in the contract.

Transfer got schedule for March. I am not a patient person so that seemed like such a long time. It ended up being great because we sent weekly emails back and fourth and got to know each other better.

We went to Boston for transfer and I was very nervous to meet our IP's in person for the first time. We arrived at the clinic a little early and found out the location of the transfer was actually to take place somewhere else. We made a mad dash to the new location and showed up a little late, What a great first impression. We meet them and immediately went in for transfer.

We got to spend the next couple days with our IP's and we had brought Teigan and it was wonderful to see them interact with him. We joked over dinner while Nicolina was feeding him that they would have twins.

I had no doubt that the transfer would work so when the blood work confirmed I wasn't surprised just excited. Then we went in for the ultrasound at week 6 to confirm the heartbeat. Again we were not surprised but very excited to tell our IP's that there wasn't one heart beat but two.

When it came time for the gender ultrasound our IP's had planned a trip to Logan. We met in Logan they went to a couple of the kids soccer games and then we headed to Yellowstone. What a great time we had with them. What a connection not only did Brandon and I have but the kids had with them. Tasyon was Christians side kick and Tabitha was Nicolinas.

The ultrasound would reveal they were having one boy and one girl. The expressions on there faces were priceless. We couldn't have been happier for them. That is when we decided to announce to our friends that we had done surrogacy and were pregnant.

To be continued...

Questioning Almost Everything

Do you ever have those days/moments that you feel like no matter how hard you work, no matter how hard you try, no matter how good your intentions are it just doesn't seem to matter? That about sums up the year of 2010 and the first part of 2011.

Since my nieces moved out we received nothing but negative from them, my sister and ex brother in law. It makes you question why we went through all we did in order to have things turn out that way. How were we the bad guys and their parents had hay-lows on. Had they forgotten all that had happened?  There were so many hateful things said I couldn't help but second guess if I had made a huge mistake by taking in the girls. Much later I would realize I hadn't but at the time I couldn't help but feel hurt betrayed and used.

While still having the emotion of everything that happened with my nieces draw out from the end of 2010 into 2011 I also hit another bump in the road.

I worked at a place called Feature Films for Families that by this point had broken off and also had a company called CallAssistant. I had worked for this company for 9 1/2 years. I started out as an agent and worked my way up from Agent Lead, Manager, Senior Manager to finally becoming Branch Manager. I though the 10+ hr days being on call from start of shift at 5:30 am to end of shift at 10:00pm had finally paid off. I was where I wanted to be and had worked so hard to be for years.  I had the potion I had wanted and worked so hard for, right?

Then it happened. Something I had seen happen over and over but this time to me. I was asked to train "the new guy". Not a big deal unless you work for the company I did. You don't train someone new to do what you do unless.... Well I pushed the thought out of my mind and did what I was told. Eventually I moved to the office down the road and started running it and Jason(the new Guy) ran the old office

One day the president of the company asked if he could meet with me. This seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary because I talked to him often. He started the meeting by thanking me for everything I had done. How thanked me for how hard I had worked on one of our biggest campaigns. He said he knew he had put me in a tough situation and I handled it well.... With that said he was going to be putting Jason in charge of everything and I could go back to being a Senior Manager of our biggest clients... I tried to fight back the tears. I asked what I did wrong and was told I did nothing wrong this was just always the plan. ALWAYS THE PLAN what does that mean? Who's plan? Since when was this plan created. Why could I not catch a break. Hadn't I been through enough the last year.

We shared some not so pleasant exchanges, professional but defiantly letting each other know how we felt.  I asked for some time off which was like pulling teeth. I sat through a meeting where they announced Jason would be taking over all campaigns and that I was on board with it. Right after the meeting I left.

I don't remember how much time I took of but I decided I was going to quit. The questions kept coming up... What had I done wrong? Why wasn't I given a real reason? Why did I ignore all the signs? Why had I invested so much time into this company. How did I let this job make me miss out on so much time with my family?

 We all have blessings in disguise. This by far may have been one of my biggest. I ended up not quitting because a friend of mine convinced me to stay and work part time.

I don't think I realized how much I had missed out on. How did I let this job take up so much of my time. How did my kids get so big. Its like all at once I was looking back at my life seeing how much time had past and standing there in disbelief. I had worked so hard to make sure my kids and my family had what I thought they needed that I had forgotten what they needed most, what I needed most. I lost time that I could never get back. I was determined to find out who I was and who I wanted to be. 

We would do it again.

For two years Brandon & I raised my two nieces. This was a very easy decision for us. One I don't think Brandon or I spent much time discussing. Our nieces needed a home and so we knew that we needed to step up an provide one for them.

At age 26 I had 3 kids of my own. Brandon and I were trying to figure our own life out. Where we ready to raise teenagers??? Absolutely not. Did we make mistakes??? Sure we did.There are many details I may go into during another blog post  but the emotion is still to raw.

Both girls didn't come stay with us at the same time. My younger niece came when her dad decided to move to draper to be closer to his girlfriend. My niece at the time was living with him in Tremonton. It was decided she would stay with us so she was still close to family and friends. My oldest niece and her mother decided she would come and stay with us due to some contention in there house. Both girls we would latter get custody of through the courts.

At the time we lived in a cheap little house in Millville. We were waiting to save enough money to build a new home. Our little house had 1 bathroom and 3 bedrooms. We immediately realized this was not going to work so we added on a Bedroom downstairs. We moved Cartson upstairs with Tabitha and Tayson crib was in the front room, although he just ended up staying in our room. Later we would end up buying a bigger house with more bathrooms...

Raising two teenagers wasn't easy. I don't think anyone would say it was easy regardless of the situation. Its tough to be a teenager so by rights its got to be tough raising them. We hadn't ever parented teenagers so at first we were kinda like puppets. We let their  parents tell us how to raise them. They would tell us what we should and shouldn't let them do. Finally we hit a breaking point. Why were we letting them try to tell us how to raise these girls when they weren't capable themselves of raising them that way. We knew how these girls were doing in school, in church, at home and socially we decided we should be the one deciding consequence for there actions, whether they should have a sleepover or go on a school outing. That is when things went terribly bad,

Once we weren't puppets we were the enemy. The girls hadn't seen there dad he wouldn't really come visit and this just made things worse. It made the tone of the calls to the girls worse and the tone of the calls to us worse.

We made a decision from the beginning to  treated these girls as are own. We felt we had to in order to give them the life & love they deserved. We didn't want to take the place of there parents but for the time we were acting as there parents so that's the role we felt we needed to take. We were still there aunt and uncle but we had to act like parents. We didn't get to be the fun guys anymore. We got robbed of that. We had to look out for them and there future at all costs. We helped them get there first cars, helped them pick out and buy some of there prom dresses and we grounded them. We had ups and downs. We made it work with very little support of any kind.

Unfortunately the court system who had put both of these girls in our care was a joke. They wouldn't keep to there word they certainly told us one thing and the parents another. They seemed to hold my sister on a finer line while letting there dad run free of any emotional or financial obligation to these girls. We were a free resource to them and we got used,abused and pushed around.

My oldest niece graduated high school and moved out a short time later and my younger niece moved back in with her mom at 17. Looking back I never could have imagined some of the ups and downs we faced.  I wouldn't have known my relationship with my sister would forever be changed and not in a good way. There were some high of highs while raising them and there was some low of lows, We got to experience first hand some of their accomplishment, achievements and milestones. We got to watch them grow and start to see who they were and who they wanted to be. Those are unforgettable moments. . We never really though about the impact this would have on our little family physically, emotionally, financially or mentally. This experience changed us. It changed my kids. They had there eyes opened up to the world before we were ready for them to.  Looking back.... There are a few things I would change but I wouldn't change taking them in. I wouldn't change how we treated them or our expectations of them. Through it all we love them and will always want whats best for them.

Two perfect little ones meant for someone else.

In January of 2011 we had the opportunity to have two beautiful little girls come stay with us. I had a friend who's girlfriend had battled depression and he had to take on the role of being mother, father and provider of these two girls age 3 months and 18 months. Without going into all the details the mother had mentioned adoption and this young man started to consider it. After a lengthy emotional conversation I asked him to reconsider keeping the girls because he had worked so hard to try and keep their family together. I told him if he needed help I could take the girls for awhile. 

I received a phone call a short time later and the girls came and stayed with us. We all feel in love with them right away. They were perfect, adorable and oh so sweet. After sometime the decision was made and these two little girls were going to be placed for adoption. I was asked if I would adopt them. Of course I would if that's what they wanted but  I had a request first. I asked them if they would meet the couple that we had done surrogacy for and see if they felt it was a good fit. 

They question now was do we call our friends and give them another possible false hope for completing their family? I was chicken so Brandon made the call. The couple told us they were still looking at other agency's but they wanted to know more about our friends. They created a profile and we passed it along and then they decided to meet for dinner.We all went to dinner together and heard the mom explain why she was considering giving up her babies. This will always be an unforgettable event for me. To get to witness both sides of this process was a unique and touching experience.

The decision  was in and they picked our friends to adopt their girls. What a bitter sweet day. On one hand I was watching a great guy make one of the hardest decisions of his life. On a the other a friends dreams were coming true. 

Who new that right in the middles of all that sadness and happiness we were witnessing we would also feel a void and loss that we didn't plan for. Our friends came to pick up the girl a little earlier than we had planned. We finished packing up their belongings and saying goodbye. We watched them leave and then we all broke down in tears. We (Brandon & I ) knew the girls weren't meant for us but telling our hearts that was another thing. Watching Tabitha during this was so hard. She wanted the girls to stay with us so badly

Just because you know something is the right thing doesn't mean its going to be easy or pain free.. 

What is Surrogacy? Our first Journey.

Surrogacy what a Crazy idea. What weird people become surrogates? What is surrogacy? Doesn't that only happen in the movies? Just a few of the thoughts that came to my mind one morning after I had a dream about surrogacy. Before that night the only reference I had to surrogacy was the show Baby Mama.

My dream wasn't of me being a surrogate or having any sort of revelation per say that I should be a surrogate more of a thought/idea that got planted. For the next few days I found myself thinking about the word surrogacy wondering what it was. After a few days I decided to take to the internet and do a Google search on surrogates. A couple weeks went by and I would do a little more research. Finally after about 3 weeks I told my husband I wanted to be a surrogate. His response was something to the affect of okay sounds good. A few days later I found an agency that I wanted to work with. I told Brandon and I think at that moment things got real for him. He then wanted to do some research and had a lot more questions...

I started filling out the necessary paperwork to become a surrogate. In the meantime, my husband mentioned to a dear friend of ours that we had made this decision. That friend asked if we would be their surrogate. This was a pretty easy decision for Brandon and I. This couple was truly amazing and we wanted to help them have more kids.

I had know doubt in my mind that this would work. I started all the medications. There was more medications involved than I originally anticipated. Transfer time came and we were left with the feeling that the transfer was most likely not going to be a success due to the quality and number of embryos. We did the transfer in Dec. 2010. I still had know doubt that the transfer would work. I couldn't wait for the blood test results so I cheated. I went and bought an at home pregnancy test. It tested positive. Filled with excitement Brandon and I discussed telling our friends the results. We decided against it and waited for the blood work.

 The results where in... The levels were to low. They were almost certain it didn't work. I cried hysterically. There was no way it didn't work. With all three of our children we decided to get pregnant and did with in one to two months each time. I took to the internet which said that the levels I had could still mean I was pregnant. I was again reconfirmed that I was pregnant. That just wasn't the case. The second blood test came back negative.

I felt so bad. How could I take their dreams away. What did I do wrong?  These thoughts repeated over and over for weeks. How my heart ached for this family.  I was left with the question. Should we not have tried?

Becoming a Blogger

I decided to start blogging. This is something I am not very good at. I have read a few blogs and they always seem to be so articulate. Don't expect that when reading this one.  I don't keep a journal (I know I should). I am not doing this to have people follow my post, if you want to great if not no big deal. I am doing this because the truth is one day I may not be here. Hopefully that's not for a very very long time but I want some place that my kids can go to look back on my life, our life, my thoughts & my dreams. This is something I wish my dad would have had.

I have a few posts that will be back dated and then hopefully I will add something new each month.

Kiddos,

I want you to know you can be anything you want to be. Its never to late to change who you are or who you want to be. Its never to late to learn, whether that be from going to school, research, experiences, friends or mistakes.Its okay to ask questions or to learn from someone else. Don't hesitate to be a leader. Sometimes your faith may waver done forget you can borrow and lean on other peoples faith to help pull you through.

Always know your mom and dad love you more than you can imagine. We are your biggest fans. We are proud of you. I know its hard now but learn to be your brothers and sister's best friend. They will always be there for you. You'll have many people that go in and out of your life but your family will always be here for you no matter what.

Love,
Mom