1 one thousand....

She stops breathing….1 one thousand….2 one thousand…3 one thousand…4 one thousand…5 one (GASP!). She’s breathing again… I get up from my spot on the bed next to her. I snuck into her room just before heading to bed myself. I noticed she was on her back so I tried to roll her over but she was not having it. She stopped breathing shortly after that…my child stopped breathing. Any mother would panic and I do every time it happens and it happens… every night, multiple times a night. It’s been a week since her doctor told us that the results of her sleep study showed Grace has sleep apnea. My head spun at first because when I hear those words I think of an overweight middle age male…not my almost 5 year old daughter. I have not slept well since. Every time I wake up at night I go to check on her and I wait for the next episode. I am terrified because my child stops breathing at night. I use to stay awake and watch her for hours as a baby. When her first birthday passed I was so relieved because we had gotten through the “dangerous” part. Now at almost 5 years old we are back at the beginning. I can’t sleep because I am afraid my child is not breathing and I will be asleep through it. It’s every mother’s worse nightmare. My child stops breathing and all I can do is pray that the Lord watches over us until next Friday when we will hopefully get her some relief. Until then I will continue to sneak into her room…place my hand ever so gently on her back or stomach and pray that I feel the rhythmic movement of her breathing. If I don’t I start to count…1 one thousand….2 one thousand…3 one thousand…until I hear the most beautiful sound in the world again… my child breathing. 

For this child I prayed...

For this child I prayed….For this child I prayed….For this child I prayed. These are the words I repeat in my head over and over during the nightly struggle that is bedtime in our home. As I write this it is 10:25 pm….my 4 year old just fell asleep and my 2 year old is still laying wide awake in his bed. To add insult to injury tomorrow is Daylight Savings…that means the clock might as well say 11:25 pm. Connor has always been my trouble sleeper…although his recent fighting of bedtime is new. Usually it’s him getting up multiple times at night that’s the problem now a days it’s just getting him to bed that is the issue.  Grace however was a wonderful sleeper from 5 weeks old. I use to brag about what an amazing sleeper she was…yes KARMA… I know!! It wasn’t until about a year ago when her sleeping troubles began. I don’t know whether it was Steve being gone so much or her imagination taking flight that brought on the epic tussle that is her sleep pattern but something went terribly wrong.

During Steve’s last deployment I was sleeping less then 2 hours a night. Please note that does not say two hours at a time…that’s a NIGHT! Between Connor and Grace I couldn’t get any sleep in edge wise. I was a mess. This of course brought up the never ending venting on social media. It was during this time that I was told by a friend that I should really be careful how much I complain about my children, because I didn’t know what someone else was going through. While her words were well meaning and I know she meant no harm in her comment I was dumbfounded. First this friend is more of an acquaintance…a fellow mom who I met in a moms group at our last assignment. Well we got along I was never close enough with her to share my story. She didn’t know that I knew all to well the struggle of infertilely. She didn’t know that at 14 years old I was told children were not possible. Something I was told again and again through out my adolescent years. She didn’t know that I knew what it was like to pray day and night for two pink lines…to see negative after negative test. That the worse day of my life was in fact just 24 hours after what I thought was a day that I had beaten the odds and that crueler on this day I was having to smile and pretend that nothing was wrong because well Track Select must go on. She did not know my story. She did not know my struggle. Nor did she care.

Don’t get me wrong I have so many friends whose journey for children has been a much harder road then mine. Painted with failed attempt after failed attempt and far to often loss after loss. I know how truly blessed I am by my children. I thank God multiple times daily for these amazing tiny humans he has entrusted in my care, but that doesn’t mean the voyage of motherhood is easy. It can be a trying path although it is the most rewarding. Just because I have healthy babies doesn’t mean I am not allowed to vent when the going get rough or ask for prayers when I have reached my breaking point. Motherhood is hard… and if we can’t be there for each other in good times and bad then what’s the point of friendship? I need to know that when I am feeling like the worse mother in the world because my 2 year old just stood up screaming in his crib for the third time tonight (yea…that just happened) and I am about to rip out my hair because all I want to do is sleep myself. That I can go to my mom friends even it is through social media and go “SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME THIS WILL END ONE DAY!!” If you don’t like it don’t want to hear it or don’t care then by all means DELETE ME because we aren’t that good of friends anyways. My point is everyone has a story…just because they are in the place they are now does not mean their path there was an easy one. Thinking before you speak goes both ways. As for tonight I am going to go try and get my son down one more time and then try and sleep for as long as possible before my daughter gets up again.  For this child I prayed...For this child I prayed.... For this child I prayed. 

Procede with Caution

I’ve heard many women say they “just knew” when they were done having children. I’m not there. My husband is, but I am still hanging somewhere between feeling our family is complete and hell why not one more.  As you can guess this a source of contention in our marriage right now. Sure we talked about how many children we wanted before we got married. In fact when Steve met me I had said I wanted six. That number has since changed dramatically. However in the years we dated and were engaged the number of children we wanted flexed between 3 and 4. Once our daughter was born that number flexed again to 2 or 3. When I found out we were having a boy next I knew that getting my husband to sign on for number 3 would be a lot harder then if we had another girl. In fact after a difficult and almost fatal delivery of our son I felt like everyone had made the decision for me. Even the doctor told me that he would not recommend trying for a third with the amount of scar tissue I had. Random strangers tell me "Oh you have a perfect set".  I have found myself saying the same thing. With my husbands career he is gone a lot and I am often overwhelmed with the two young children I have now. My daughter turned 4 just over a week ago and my son will be 2 in May, but I know that this difficult time is temporary and that life will get easier. 

When I first approached the topic this weekend with my husband about having a third. I tried to proceed with extreme caution. I knew he would feel blindsided. For 18 months the talk has essentially been that we were done. That was until a recent pregnancy scare got me thinking again. Even though I tip-toed into the conversation it blew up in my face. I know I handled it wrong. I approached at the wrong angle. Rather then trying to open a discussion the words just flew out. I didn't even know how to explain my thoughts properly. He was defensive right away...remember in his mind this was a closed topic. I knew all his arguments as to why not to have a child already... 

In today's world it's just financially smarter to have two.  
Why be more outnumbered then I already am most days?
I have two healthy children why take the risk of having one that isn't as lucky. 
We can see the light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to sleep deprivation. and so on... 

In fact I can tell you a hundred reasons as to why not, but I only have one as to why. I feel called to have another a child. I feel a void and I know that this is the missing piece. I know that I will never regret having a third, but one day I may regret not having one. I may wake up one morning feeling like someone is missing from my life and at that point it will be too late. 

There is nothing about having more children that I don’t want. I long to be pregnant again even if my first two were horrible.  The experience of giving birth thrills me. I ache to witness wobbly first steps, first smiles, first giggles. From hearing the adorably poor grammar of toddlers to envisioning huge Thanksgiving dinners when the kids are home from college with friends, my dreams of having a big family are vivid and resolute. I will not give up. The more we argue, the deeper the issues get. 

Are our views on children just too far apart? After almost a decade together, we are no stranger to compromise. But it’s simply not possible in the debate of whether or not to have more children. No amount of understanding, empathy or cooperation will allow us to meet halfway. Nor is there a “choose for yourself” option here, as there can be when deciding whether to or not to go to church, or vote Democrat or Republican. This is a yes-or-no question that requires consensus. It’d be one thing if God had determined that two children was the right number for us. We would feel as blessed as we are today. Absent that intervening force, this battle between husband and wife ends with a “winner” and “loser.” We stand our posts on opposite ends of the spectrum, proceeding with caution, waiting for the other to cave. 

I use to be a good mom.

First I know it's been a while, but tonight this particular topic hit me hard.  I want to start off with first saying this is a not a I need a pat on the back blog. I  know my kids are healthy and happy and in the end that's all that matters. This is not a make Katie feel better about herself post.  I know I am doing my best and considering that 60% of the year I am doing it by myself that's pretty dang good in my book. This is a my kids deserver better blog.  My children deserver my best not "I am doing the best I can".

Tonight I was cleaning up the house from having some friends over and I as put away some of the books that were pulled out I realized I haven't read to Grace or Connor in two days. These past two days have been filled with running here and there. Getting home just in time for nap or bed with hardly minute to spear in between. Both kiddos usually exhausted and a fed up mommy so its usually bath and bed. I can't tell you the number of times the words "I can't do this anymore" has rattled around my brain these past two days.  How just done I am.When Grace was little I was such a great mom. We did so many things through out the day story times, played the park, craft times, etc. Now we are lucky if we get a good 10 minutes of just us time and even then its usually us snuggled up on the couch watching TV because I just want her to stop moving for five minutes. My nerves are shot now a days and I hate that. I wish I had the patiences of a saint, but I just don't. Then tonight as I am putting stuff away I realize that me being done has hurt my children. Tonight Connor went down without a bedtime story. He will be a day older tomorrow and I will never get today back. I did not take the time to be the best mom I could be today. Just five minutes of my time is all it would have taken but instead I put him down so I would have one less kid to deal with for the night. Now all I want to do is rush in his room and rock him in the rocker and read a story and I can't. I need to start remembering that these are the moments that I will want back so badly one day it will hurt. So I need to take the time now to make them happen.

Life should come with a restart button.

So when I sit down to write about today and I think of all that has gone wrong. I release that not one thing was really all that terrible. It was more of just that it happened one thing after another.  I know it’s pretty petty to complain about a day like today. I really should be grateful. It truly wasn’t that bad of a day, like I said nothing really awful happened and for that I am thankful.

So where did my day start? Today actually started at 2 am this morning. When Grace finally gave in to sleep. Of course I can’t sleep knowing she’s still awake and I am not one of those people who can fall asleep the moment their head hits the pillow. In fact I take forever to fall asleep because everything I have to do the next couple of days runs through my head. So finally about 3 am I doze off. Thankfully neither child woke up again until 7:30, which is the time I normally get up on school days anyways. Of course today my loving husband decides to take to long in the shower and I am left to shower with both kiddos awake, which is a dangerous combination.  So I opt to skip the shower and go to the gym from drop off. So I am racing around packing snacks and drinks for school and the gym. When I look up at the calendar and realize it’s the 28^th, the day of Grace’s Pumpkin Festival at school. I wouldn’t have time to go to the gym since I have to accompany her at 10:30. So now I really must shower.

            I race into the bathroom, throw my contacts in, and hop in the shower hoping to get in and out in less than ten minutes. That’s when the burning starts! My contact solution apparently did not neutralize like it was suppose so I basically just shoved 3% hydrogen peroxide in MY EYES!!  In the panic of trying to open my eyes enough to get the contacts out I hear the dreaded thud of a human body hitting the floor.  Sure enough the screams start about 10 seconds later. So I still have one burning contact in and am now running into the living room soaking wet. Luckily Connor had just rolled off the couch on to the carpet and wasn’t injured just surprised by his fall. So I get him settled all while trying to dig out the STILL BURNING CONTACT.  I was able to finish showering and get dressed without anything else eventful happening but contacts were a no go today as my eyes where still pretty soar and red when I left the house.  Of course that is when my exhausted three old year decided to throw a tantrum because she “didn’t want to go to school” or she ”didn’t want to wear Izzy costume to school.”  I finally told her “FINE, we won’t go to school today” and begin to text her teacher to tell her we won’t be making it today. When she suddenly has a change of heart and want’s to go to school, of course the costume is still a no go. So I just throw it in her school tote and head out the door about 10 minutes later then usual.

            The drive to school was also uneventful mercifully as I pulled Elaine Benous trying to get her “house guest” to the airport during rush hour moves on the highway. Like I predicted as soon as she gets to school and sees everyone in costume she wants hers on.  So I am dressing her in the middle of the hallway when I reach in her school tote and feel something gel like that is definitely not suppose to be there. I pull everything out and on the bottom of her tote is a 1-inch thick layer of a white gel like substance that SMELLS LIKE DEATH. Grace’s teacher of course is being very helpful despite being in the middle of drop off by getting me some Clorox wipes and holding Connor while I scoop out whatever this disgusting mess is into the bathroom trash.   It wasn’t until later in the car that it hits me….it was week old milk!! Connor must of spilled his bottle in there too when he was pouring milk on everything the other day. No wonder I didn’t find as much as I thought I would around the house. L

            So now it’s time for me to waste an hour before going back to the school for Grace’s Festival. This is when things actually get a little better. I was going to just walk around the BX for a bit and maybe look at their shoes but I ran into my friend KC who works at the golf shop and was able to vent a little bit about my day and waste the time without having to lock Connor up in a cart. Then back to Grace’s school I go. The festival itself was great and unexciting except for two almost meltdowns from a very tired Grace.  At this point we head home and Grace begins to ask for “(Mc)Donald’s” for lunch.  I am TOO tired and worn out to fight with her so I say SURE.

            Home, Lunch (and Chia Tea since Steve was sweet enough to bring me one home)  and off to nap at 1:30. I force Grace to lie down in my bed with me so I know where she is and I doze next to her while Connor sleeps. The next thing I know it’s 4 pm and both kids are sound a sleep. So I freak out waking Grace up because there is NO way I am going to stay up with her till 2 am again! Wake up Connor and frantically start the meal I am suppose to be bringing one of our squadron families who just a baby. Luckily I woke up with plenty of time to get dinner in the oven and Steve gets home at 5:30 like I begged him to three times that day. I am in the middle of getting our own dinner in the oven next to the meal about to be pulled out when I notice the jar of pesto that is suppose to be on the chicken I am cooking to take is still UNOPENED on the counter. I forgot the MOST important part of the WHOLE meal!!! So I freak out pull their dinner form the oven and just stare at it a minute. Then I said to Steve….I can FIX THIS!! I begin scooping the cheese and tomatoes off the top of the chicken, place the chicken in a new pan, heat the pesto over the stove really quick, pour it on the chicken, replace the tomatoes, cover with more cheese and broil on high for a couple of minutes.  BOOM dinner saved!! OF course that left me with minutes to spare to get out the door. So I throw our dinner in the oven and leave Steve with instructions on what to do and run out the dinner at the last possible minute to make my 6 pm drop off on time. Again Elaine on Rockaway Blvd. moves but dinner gets to where it needs to be on time.

            Expecting that the be the end of any surprised today is really to much. I won’t go into how poor Steve misheard what I said (and wrote down) but needless to say dinner was much later tonight then expected. So far things have been quite since then BUT it’s still technically early. Hopefully I won’t have to add anything else to this post and bedtime will come early and without much fuss! Tomorrow I have nothing planned so I am going to spend the day in pj’s with the kids, catching up on laundry and housework, and “resetting” this week. I could really use the do over. L

Don't feel sorry for me.

I hate breastfeeding. There I said it!! The idea of walking around with my boob hanging out all the time just bothers me. I am not comfortable BF in my own home and I am sure as hell not comfortable doing it in public. With Grace I thought I had such a hard time with it because she didn't latch and we ended up having to use a sheild which just makes everything that much harder. Especially in public. After 12 weeks of trying to make it breastfeeding with Grace and some complications with medicine I gave up breastfeeding and switched her to formula. Of course life was ten times easier for me. I didn't have to worry about trying to get her to latch while in public without dropping the nipple sheild and having milk run down my front. I just packed the bottles and formula and I was good to go. I got some nasty looks from fellow moms and even a lecture or two about how I was destroying my child's health. I never let those get to me though. We were a much happier family without the breastfeeding. Until I hit the checkout every week. My goodness formula is an expensive little powder. We spent upwards of $40 a week on her formula. So when we decided to have Connor I was determined to make breastfeeding work!

When Connor latched on in the hospital with no problems and "ate" like a champ I was thrilled!! After all my biggest anxieties with BFing Grace were due to her latching problems, right? Wrong! When we got home and my milk came in things went down hill pretty fast. Connor was a cluster feeder from day one. I am talking the kind of kid who wanted to be attached 24/7! It was the only other time he wasn't crying other then when he was asleep. The first couple days weren't bad since I had Steve to help, but when he went back to work at 7 days pp all hell broke lose. Connor never wanted to be put down but he also didn't want me moving during his feeding. No sling would do either. Soon he only ate in football position also very difficult to do in public! Then my letdown was to strong and the kid choked every time he ate which was all the time and soon he started refusing the breast. It would take 2 hours to get a full 10 minutes of him latching because he just kept popping off. Poor Grace was losing it. Daddy was working 12-14 hours usually when she was awake and mommy always had this little thing attached to her. She began to cry every time Connor did knowing mommy would have to feed him.  My heart was breaking! About two weeks PPD I told Steve that's it I can't do this anymore! I was completely miserable. Not only did I feel like I was letting my toddler down I was comfortable all the time and not just because of my crazy oversupply! I never wore a shirt it seemed! I was always walking around naked from the waist up and when I did go out in public I always had those stupid nursing covers on which he HATED!! I couldn't just stop BF! I was determine to get him to at least 12 weeks. So what do I do?

It was on a day trip to Lawton OK when I got my answer. In order to avoid pulling over every ten minutes just to sit there for 30 while he ate I took along my breast pump and pumped every three hours. I realized quickly that both he and I were much happier. When we got home I made an appointment to see the LC here in Altus. After talking with her we determined two things. First I had an oversupply and an over active let down. These were the reasons for Connor's sudden lack of interest in eating and more then likely the same reasons Grace had latching issues. Second although it was possible for us to keep trying and as he would grow his ability to adjust the flow would also grow. I was honest if it was going to take a lot of time and effort I didn't know if I could mentally handle that. As I said earlier Steve is training on a new aircraft meaning he was working 12-14 hour days starting and ending at the weirdest times. I was also a lot more depressed then I let on and I knew any more stress would send me back down the dark road I had been after Grace. So we talked options. Of course formula feeding was one but I refused. What a waste? I had friends who gave anything to be able to provide their child with BM and they just couldn't. Here I was with an abundance and I was just going to quit? Umm..No! So next was pumping. She warned that it might be harder then I thought. At first you have to pump every 2-3 hours for 20 minutes. I could tell that she was secretly thinking how pumping would be just as much work then just waiting it out, but she wasn't the one who had her heartbroken every time she had to feed the baby because her toddler was getting left out for hours at time. So I decided I'd give it ago. I had exclusively pumped the last 3 weeks with Grace I could at least try it. Little did I know what an amazing thing it would be.


After a week and a really good transition bottle suggestion from a friend Connor was fully on bottles. I can't tell you how much happier the Bostwick household was. Grace loved that mommy wasn't always wrapped up with Connor. I could pass him off to Steve if he was home and we could have a little girl time. Connor was happier too! He would eat a lot more since it wasn't being shot into his mouth like fire hose. I get annoyed sometimes as I am standing over the sink washing the plethora of bottles, pump parts, and storage bottles, but then I remember how much better life is and it's all worth it. I am determined to make it to at least 6 months pumping. I'd love to make it to a year but small goals work better for me. So what I tell you that I exclusively pump don't feel sorry for me. I am a much happier person knowing that I don't have to be miserable to breastfeed my son. Sure I wish I was one of those women who loved breastfeeding, but I am not. I do still however want my son to get the best nutrition he can so this is what I have to do. It's whats best for both of us.

Oh What A Year!!

      I can't believe it has been a year since my last post. I thought maybe six months or so but a full year? Where did that time go? It's amazing how it all just gets away from you so fast. In fact it just hit me in this very second that we are more then halfway through with 2014 already! Holy COW!! So let me catch you up on the last year of the Bostwick Clan.

     The summer of 2013 was pretty uneventful for us. Steve upgraded to Instructor Pilot in the C-21 in May. Not much in the way of June that I can remember. We spent fourth of July in Dallas while Steve had some simulator training. I didn't remember just how much I love the state of Texas until we were there. I really could move to the Dallas area and be perfectly happy. In fact it is a conversation that comes up a lot now in the household. Grace and I ended up with a terrible stomach bug causing us to cut our trip short but it was still fun while it lasted. In August Steve pinned on Captain and we found out that he would be spending the end of year deployed.  Grace and I took a trip to Washington DC and got to FINALLY meet my adorable nephew Ben! September was a big month for us....on the 25th after months of trying we found out we were expecting our 2nd child! We spent the month of October preparing for Steve's upcoming deployment. Due to the fact that I was expecting and it was the holiday season we decided that Grace and I would return to Georgia for majority of the deployment. Shoveling snow and trying to make it to doctor appointments alone in Colorado was just not something I was looking forward too. Grace and I flew in to the homeland on the 26th and Steve joined us two days later with the puppies. He was able to spend a week with us there in Atlanta before returning back to Colorado. November and December were filled with the typical holiday fun. Grace and I became really familiar with I-75 as we made the track from Atl to Valdosta quite a bit. We rang in the New Year in Valdosta with a visit from Brittany, Alex, and Ben! It was great to see them again so soon. As busy as the end of 2013 seemed it had NOTHING on what the first 6 months of 2014 would bring for us.

     In January Grace and I returned home to Colorado. As wonderful as it was to spend time in Georgia with the family it was so nice to be back in our house and that much closer to Daddy coming home.  I was looking forward to getting settled back into our routine and finally being able to start processing our pregnancy.  In October and November we had two separate scares with bleeding, but as far as we could tell everything was ok. In December we found out we were having a boy. At each of these events I felt very detached. As excited, as I was to be pregnant I didn't feel like it was all really happening because Steve was not around and I wasn't in my home. So getting back to Colorado in January I felt like it would all start to hit me. Then Steve dropped the biggest bomb on me one night in February.

    We had been talking on FaceTime before he went to work and I went to bed. It wasn't 30 seconds after hanging up that my phone began to ring again. When I saw it was Steve I knew something was up because I had just told him I was exhausted and really needed to go to bed. When I answered he said "So...listen to this.." then he proceeded to read an e-mail from virtual MPF telling him that he has been selected for an assignment at Seymour Johnson AFB in NC. The idea of getting a assignment was not a shock as we had been waiting to hear about what we though was going to be a summer move as our SQ was closing in June. He then read the dates.... April 21st. I am sorry what?? Instantly I started doing the math.... how many weeks away was that.... how far along in my pregnancy would I be? I had moved in my third trimester with Grace and I had vowed to NEVER do that again. HA! Was this even real? Everyone else had been told about his or her new assignments from the SQ Commander not though e-mails. Plus they had said that none of us were leaving until after we were closed anyways this must all be a mistake. So Steve emailed his SQ and I settled in for a very sleepless night. When we talked again the next day Steve told me it was legit. We were leavingColorado in 8 weeks and I was going to be moving at 34 weeks pregnant. There goes processing this pregnancy...I was going to be too busy getting ready for a PCS for any of it to start to feel real.

     Steve got home February 22 and that's when the whirlwind began. All our plans for his two weeks R&R went out the window. We needed to use that time he had off to start getting the house ready for the move. Before I knew it two weeks had passed and Steve was back to work. March and April was filled with going though the house, cleaning, packing, and figuring out healthcare stuff for when we got to our temporary training in Altus Ok where we would be until September.  It took a lot of help from some amazing friends, but on April 20th we hit the road for Oklahoma. After getting settled into our little 2 bedrooms TLF here I finally found time to get ready for our new arrival. In just 5 and 1/2 short weeks our little trio would grow to a quartet. That's where we are now. Connor Milton joined our family on May 28th at 8 am via c-section. Going from one child to two has been quite the journey especially in a tiny apartment with Steve working 12-14 hour days at times. We are surviving though and everyday it gets a little easier. Sometime at the end of August we will pack up here and start the last leg of this PSC to North Caroline where we will finally get to settle down for a good 3-4 years...hopefully!