Quick update

I'm going to be real short with this one but here is the update on the past month.

Charle is starting to explore and notice things now.  Mrs. Amy told me that she noticed that once all of her babies turned two months, things started settling down.. Charle fit pretty well into that curve.  I can actually put her in her bouncy seat for about 30 minutes at a time now and she won't scream her head off the entire time.  She likes to play with the toys on it now and look in her mirror.  Charle's also blowing bubbles galore.  She loves to smile now and interact with people instead of just looking at them.  Her swing isn't as much of a miracle worker as it was when my neighbor first gave it to me but most of the time, it still calms her or puts her to sleep.  Little bug is growing and is almost into diaper size 2!  I can't believe how big she's gotten in just this short amount of time.  She will be three months next Friday!! Charle still sleeps through the night (YAY!!!) and this week I took her off of formula completely. I'm so excited to have her back on full breast milk after two long months of adding formula.  The original concerns were that she was not gaining enough weight and that she wasn't getting any iron from me since I rarely eat red meat.  She's gaining weight rapidly so that's no longer a concern and this formula was giving her too much iron which made her majorly constipated and I'm sick of her not pooping for 6-8 days at a time and screaming in pain all the time. There is no reason a baby should have to be in pain 24/7 and be scared of pooping.  So I made the executive decision to take her off of it and just give her my milk (it's been working out pretty well so far.)  We are still working on the pooping part.. She's so backed up that she still won't poop without a suppository even though she's had nothing but breast milk since Monday. 

My Mom's parents are coming up from Florida to meet Charle for the first time tomorrow!  I haven't seen them in two years and I'm excited.  They are my redhead grandparents and they are quite a pill but as I'm getting older, I'm realizing that I'm just like them.  They aggravate the mess out of everyone with their personalities but I have the same one.. I just know when to keep my mouth shut but they are getting pretty old so I think they shouldn't have to sensor their opinions.. they've earned the right to just say what they want.

Here are some updated pictures of my Princess

These were all done by Abby Lee Photography.  I can't brag enough about how wonderful of a person and a photographer she is! Go check out her fb page.  We have another session this coming Friday for her 3 month pictures and her Hallelujah Night outfit.  I can't wait!!!!

 

Two weeks later..

I've been fussed at recently for not updating this thing often enough... SORRY.  When I started this blog, I really didn't expect many people to read it or to care but I get in trouble when I don't write a blog for awhile now (it secretly makes me feel special.)  Well update on life.. I was offered a job the day Charle turned 6 weeks and of course I accepted it.  I absolutely LOVE my job and wouldn't trade it for any other.  Charle also started daycare this week; she only went to daycare Wednesday and Thursday though.  She seemed to do alright but since Wednesday morning, she has refused to poop and she is in some serious pain right now.  Wednesday was the first day she was without me or my family all day and she wasn't too thrilled about it but she's gonna have to get used to it. I think she knew that I was starting work this week and needed sleep because Sunday-Tuesday night she only got up at 4am to eat and since Wednesday night, she has slept ALLLLL night!!!!!!!!!  I was so exhausted this morning that when she got up to feed, I just let her go back to sleep with me in my bed (I also wanted some Charle/Mommy time too.)
As some of you may know, I love to cook and experiment with new recipes or just create my own.  Today, I decided to take on enchiladas.. I would post a picture of them but there are no more left- I guess they were good.  I made chicken last night so I used the leftovers for the filling along with a clove of garlic, a shallot and some cheddar cheese.  Then of course I used enchilada sauce (red and green chili) and put lots of different kinds of cheeses on top.  If y'all don't know this already, learn it, I LOVE CHEESE!! I like every kind that I have tried so far except ricotta (I can't stand ricotta, I substitute cottage cheese in for ricotta in all my cooking.)  I don't really have time to cook anything fun during the week so I enjoyed being able to take several hours to cook today.
I need to get some pictures of Charle this week.. She was dedicated this past Sunday and I had someone take a video of it.  I was going to get stills from the video but for some reason my memory card wants to be a turkey and it decided to show an error reading for this video.  So I have no pictures from her dedication and no video.  I guess I will cheat and put her in her dedication outfit to get some pictures of it this weekend.

Frogs and Princes

My Charle bug and I have had some interesting past couple of days.  Yesterday we had a very special visitor.. I've been waiting on this person to get his stuff together and come visit for a very long time.  I'm not going to post who it is, those of you know know who it is.. don't fuss at me (no it's not my soon to be ex husband.)  I promised him that I wouldn't post the picture of him holding Charleston on Facebook but I didn't say anything about my blog.. sneaky sneaky ;)

So here he is

He was petrified of her the entire time.  Most guys are scared of babies though.. I'm more fragile than she is so I don't get it.  She was mesmerized by him the entire time he held her (I guess she thinks he looks funny.)  I was secretly super excited that he came over and sad when he left but I tried not to act like it because of our circumstances.

Moving on.. Today my sister came over and helped me with my sanity by keeping Charle calm.  I let her feed her and take care of her while I had some time to just breathe and not worry about every little thing.  We ended up going to Cracker Barrel for lunch and stayed for two hours.  I honestly enjoy spending more time with my sister now that we don't live together and the fact that I don't get out much or see anyone except at church.  I told her today that I am surprised at how well she does with Charle and she takes care of her better than I thought she would.  I'm just so stinkin' proud of her.

Here are some pictures from today

I had to get a picture of one her her tantrums!



Time is Flying By

While Charle is napping, I figured I would take a few minutes to update (She's been napping for 4 hours now too...) Yesterday my baby girl turned a whole month old!! I can't believe it's been that long. Little bug had an appointment today with her cardiologist because she had a heart murmur. I found out that she's a gained almost two pounds in the past two weeks; Charle now weighs 8lbs and 13oz. Also.. AMAZING news.. the dr. couldn't hear any murmurs!! He wants to see her back in a few months to make sure that they really have closed up. I wasn't worried about it but it was nice to get the good news this morning. Her dr. was also giving me all sorts of advice about her colic and he told me that it should go away by the time she is 3 months old. Today, Charle's colic wasn't as bad as it has been but she did fight me every time I tried to put her in her crib while she was napping so she's been taking her naps on her mat all day.

This past Saturday I went to all the yard sales (as usual) and found some pretty nice deals again.  I bought two brand new tops for 50 cents a peice.  A large oval wall mirror for $2 that I'm going to use in my room once I have finished painting it.  I also bought Charle two books for 25 cents a piece.  Once of them is a fishy book that is cloth and has some type of sound button in it that is supposed to sound like the ocean.. well after I put it through the washer, it hasn't stopped making sounds.  It's starting to creep me and my mom out because it really sounds like someone breathing really hard.  My mom is almost to the point of cutting the book open and pulling the button out.. I told her to wait and see if it dies soon (I doubt it.)

Here are some pictures from her 1 month birthday!!

Things are looking up

As most of you know from my facebook status, Charle has had a rough week.  Last week she started crying all day long then she started spitting up most of what she was eating.  By Monday of this week, I was frustrated and stressed to the max.  But while she was doing all of this, she was taking regular naps in her crib and sleeping in it at night after at least one feeding.  On Monday night, I started giving her gas drops and they seemed to help with the fussiness but not with the spit up.  Yesterday she was still spitting up over half of what she ate so my mom encouraged me to call her Doctor and he said to give her 1-2 bottles of Similac Sensitive formula a day and if she wasn't doing better by next Monday to call him back.  I gave her one bottle yesterday and one today... AND... WE ARE DOING MUCH BETTER!!!!! I was able to take her to the mall, Target and Varsity tonight with minimal fussiness.  Hopefully she keeps on improving and I get my happy Charle bug back. :)

Right now she's next to me passed out on her boppy

My sister has been coming over about twice a week during the day and she has been a total lifesaver!  (I never thought I would say that)  When she comes over, I don't have to hold Charle when she's crying and Sarah holds her long enough for me to eat and shower too!  Sarah came over this afternoon and I was able to get that stuff done and then we went to the mall and target to get out of the house.  While we were at Target, I was making my way around the store just browsing clearance sections and looking for red stickers.  We made it over to the shoe dept after I didn't find anything $5 or under in the clothes.  I wasn't really looking for anything but I saw a bunch of cute stuff that I can't wait for them to go on clearance.  I was about to walk out of the she section and move on to baby stuff when a red tag caught my eye.  This red tag was attached to some really cute black heels that I like (my size too!!!!) and the sticker has a price of $4.98 on it!!!!!! I tried them on and said yes please! I can't wait to wear them!!

While I'm talking about amazing deals, this past Saturday, I went to a bunch of yard sales with my Aunt Shell and got really great stuff.  I bought a BRAND NEW play mat for Charle for $5.

I also bought 3 pairs of old navy shorts for 50 cents a piece, 4 express tops for 50 cents a piece, a silver belt- 50 cents, a pair of heels- 50 cents, and.... a nice brown blazer for $1.  I was looking for a swing for Charle too because my mom said that the swing was a miracle worker with me but the only one I saw, the lady wanted $40 for it and I wouldn't have paid more than $10 for it so no swing this week.



Stressful Day

Today has been quite stressful. Yesterday, Charle wasn't eating like she should, she was latching on perfect but would sit there and let her mouth fill up with milk then break latch and spit it back all over me. After an hour of that, I put her in her chair and she screamed because she was hungry. Well her doctor wanted me to start supplementing formula if she hadn't gained weight by today so I decided to try a bottle of formula. She ate it all up but.... today was a disaster from it. We think the formula upset her little tummy because she hasn't had as many poops today as she normally does and she screamed and cried alllllllllll day long. I think that it is the added iron in the formula that is messing her up. I am anemic and was told to stop taking my iron pills until my 6-week postpartum check-up so I know she's not getting iron from my breast milk. When your body isn't used to iron, it will constipate you once you get it in your system so I think she might be constipated. :(

On a good note, Charleston is sleeping in her crib right now!!! I gave up the battle with the bassinet because she hates it and I found out the other night that it has been recalled. Hopefully I will get around to breaking it down tomorrow and putting it away because it is just taking up space now. This morning after I changed her diaper, I sat her in the crib so that I could organize and tidy up her changing table and she stayed in the crib for about 20min without fussing. After that, I decided to put her in the crib after every diaper change to get her used to it and she took an hour-long nap in it this afternoon and is now sleeping in it. YAY!! Hopefully this means I will be able to sleep at night without her soon! I was nervous about putting her in her crib before she was 6 weeks but I'm ok with it now, I know she will be fine. Oh! Charle is three weeks old today! Time flies fast. She's already getting so big and she's starting to stretch her legs out more instead of curling up in the fetal position constantly.

I love sleeping with my bug but I would like for this to end..

 Her nap in her crib today.. she sleeps on her side all curled up exactly the same way that I sleep :)



Break The Cycle

I know that I've already shared my story and I'm not going to go into detail again about what happened.  I was just watching Dr. Phil this morning and the show was about abusive teen relationships.  My relationship wasn't a teen relationship but the abuse was the same.  Dr. Phil mentioned a website that he's teamed up with to spread awareness about teen abuse so I looked up that site.  The site is breakthecycle.org.  I found a page called dating violence 101 and I was shocked; I had not realized that he had done all of those things to me like he was following a book. His pattern of behavior followed the diagram perfectly and the power of control diagram described EVERY thing that he did.

"Anger/Emotional Abuse:

Putting him/her down

Making him/her think he/she is crazy

Mind games"

"Using Social Status:

Making all the decisions

Being the one to define men's and women's roles"

"Intimidation:

Making someone afraid by using looks, actions, gestures

Abusing pets"

"Minimize/Deny/Blame:

Making light of the abuse

Saying the abuse didn't happen

Shifting responsibility for abusive behavior

Saying he/she caused it"

"Threats:

Making him/her drop charges"

"Sexual Coercion:

Manipulating or making threats to get sex

Getting her pregnant

Threatening to take the children away"

"Isolation/Exclusion:

Controlling what another does, who he/she sees, and talks to, what he/she reads, where he/she goes

Limiting outside involvement

Using Jealousy to justify actions"

"Peer Pressure:

Threatening to expose someone's weakness"

As I read all of these, I was literally checking all of these off as things he did and are still trying to do today.  I've been working on moving past all of this since he disappeared and to stop living in fear of him.  Even though I'm at a good point to where his antics don't work on me anymore, my heart still breaks that people can be like that.  I truly believe that controlling/abusive people are  mentally sick and need lots of help but most of them are in such denial that they refuse to get help.  I really want to believe that they can change but without lots of rehabilitation and Jesus, there is no possible way that they will change.  I'm the type of person that see's a sick person and wants to help but when someone doesn't want it, the best thing is to stay far far away from them.  I want girls (and even guys) to realize that you don't need to stay in an abusive relationship for ANY reason.  If you are in that type of relationship, get help.  Call the National Dating Abuse Helpline at 1.866.331.9474 or if you feel in immediate danger, call 911.  Don't try and stay in the relationship to fix the abuser because it won't work (I tried.)

 

 

 

20 Days

I can't believe my little bug is already 20 days old! This week I've been working with her on sleeping in the bassinet again and it has been a back and forth thing.  Last Friday, she slept in it during every nap but once it was time for bed that night, there was no way that she was sleeping in it without throwing a huge fit and Meme (my mother) would come get her out to hold her. 

I look like an idiot but who cares, Charle looks pretty pleased with herself that she got her way.

There was no sleep for mommy that night so I tried again to get her to sleep in it during her naps on Saturday but that was not working either and again didn't work out Saturday night.  FINALLY Sunday night she slept in it twice out of the four times we slept so we were getting somewhere again.

  Since then, she hasn't slept in it until now.  She just took a nap in the bassinet!!!!

Charle is starting to stay awake for longer amounts of time now so we are working on getting her on a schedule.  As of right now she eats, plays in her bouncy seat for a bit then takes a nap or eats, sleeps then play.  She hasn't figured out which schedule to go with so it's different almost every time.  She is eating on a pretty strict schedule though, she eats every two hours and we are working on getting her to eat for twenty minutes each time.  As of right now, she eats for about ten to fifteen minutes each feeding.  Hopefully when I take her to get weighed on Thursday, she will have gained weight and I won't have to supplement formula. 

I've got Charle in her bouncy seat right now and she's reaching for the toys for the first time.  It's so neat to see her discover them and watch herself in the dangling mirror.  She's making the cutest faces at her toys; it makes me wish I knew what she was thinking. 

Too much play time

Her second Church outfit. Mrs. Frabott made this pillow case dress for her.

SHE'S HERE!!!!

I guess I should start with her birthday and all that info since everyone has been bugging the mess out of me for it.  Charleston Elizabeth Radclyffe Hess was born 7/21/11 at 12:12pm after only 4 hours of labor.  She weighed 7lbs 3oz and was 20in long.  When the doctor held her up for me to see her, all I could think about was how much she looked like my baby pictures.  She's now starting to look like Sarah's baby pictures more.  Charle's hair has been strawberry blonde since birth but some days it looks more red or blonde than others.  She also has these dark blue eyes that match mine perfectly.  The cutest thing is her birth mark; it is on her right wrist and it is as sideways heart. 

our first picture

Today Miss Charle is two weeks old and I can't believe that it's only been two weeks.  Her first week was a breeze; she slept all the time and didn't fuss for anything but food.  This week.... TOTALLY different story.  On Sunday, my sister cooked lunch for us and it ended up giving the little one a belly ache all Monday and a diaper rash showed up Monday night.  Now she has her nights and days mixed up, she refuses to sleep anywhere except in my arms or in her car seat (car seat only works about 20% of the time), and she hasn't been eating enough this week.  When we went to her two week check-up today, we found out that she had lost 3oz since last Thursday and the Doc said that if she hadn't gained weight by next Thursday that he wants me to start supplementing formula.  I'm not a fan of that but it has been my fault that she's not getting enough food; I have allowed my divorce to stress me out more than it should and that has effected my milk supply this week.  This coming week we are going to work on getting her to sleep in her bassinet again, getting her on a set schedule and relaxing more.  Charle and I do have a new best friend called the paci... I've read and heard not to give her a paci in her first 6 weeks if she's breast fed because it can cause nipple confusion but she still latches on perfect and that little paci makes her world so much better.  She freaks out when she pulls or spits it out and can't get it back in her mouth.  I wish that I had more time for this blog but she's getting hungry and fussy so I need to wrap it up there.

Here are some cute pictures of her

She disliked her first bath so much that she pooped on me twice and I decided that bath time was over after the second time..

So Sorry to Keep You Waiting..

I know it has been a while since I've updated my blog and I've gotten fussed at several times so I guess I need to get to it.  This will probably be my last blog before baby and I'm going to try and keep it simple.  Let's start from where we left off almost three weeks ago (It's hard trying to think back that long with my mommy brain.) 

On 6/27 I turned 21 (woo hoo!) and the only thing I wanted was a caramel cake from Freedman's Bakery.  Well I got a baby shower instead and I had a great day.  I didn't get my cake because the Bakery is closed on Monday's and I was promised that I would get one the next day but I'm still waiting... Every one gets all excited about their 21st birthday but when you don't drink and are 37 weeks pregnant, it's really just another day.  My mom did get me a card that made me cry and I guess it's because I'm about to have a daughter and the card was a very heart felt mother-daughter card.  I've never really appreciated that bond that I have with my mom until I found out that I'm having a girl and I realized that I want to have that same relationship with Charle.  My mom and I have an unusual bond because my dad wasn't home when I was a baby.  Most girls bond with their dads more but my father was sent on a Military training mission when I was 3 days old and then sent to the Gulf War when I was 10 days old so I didn't get to spend much time with him until I was about 18 months.  When he was alive he tried to make me a daddy's girl but I was always moma's baby and ever since then I've always been my mom's daughter.

Speaking of Charle, she's growing and happily being stubborn in the belly.  She's been very active throughout the entire pregnancy but yesterday she barely moved all day.  I thought I was just being paranoid but I called the Dr. anyway because that's what they instructed me to do if this were to happen.  My Doc sent me to the hospital to get monitored and as soon as they hooked me up to all the machines.... Charle became an acrobat.  She passed the discharge test in 15 min but they needed 20 min of data so I had to stay for 5 extra minutes.  We were out of the hospital in 30 min (record time!!)  The nurse did get all of my information in the computer so when it really is time to have her, I don't have to spend 15 min in pain answering a bunch of questions.  I really wanted to have her this week and being in the Labor and Delivery room last night made me want to get her out now but she has her own plans.

This is completely random but I was so excited about this earlier in the week that I have to share.  Remember those jeans at Target that were $10 a couple of weeks ago and I was bummed about not knowing what size I will be post pregnancy?  I was in Target getting some last minute things and decided to go browse the clearance racks and found them for $4.98!!!!!!! So I bought two pair in two different sizes.  I used to be a size 3 in that brand so I bought a size 5 and 7 because I know I will never be able to fit my rear in a size 3 again.  I have 30 days to return them so they are still sitting in the bag with tags on and in 30 days I will try them on and see which pair fit and return the ones that don't.  You just can't beat $5 jeans.  And along with my jeans, I bought a perfect tee for $2.  The shirt is black and I try to avoid buying black but it was the only color and my roommate last year got away with my black perfect tee so I did need another one.

I'm going to end everything there because I need to get back to writing my affidavit for court.  My lawyer wanted it by Wednesday but I just got my information packet from him on Wednesday.  As you can tell WE FINALLY HAVE A COURT DATE!!!!!!  Praise Jesus!!!!!  Please pray that the judge keeps Charle's best interest in mind throughout this process.  God has great plans for this little girl and I don't want her father to try and hinder them for his own personal gain. 

As I stated earlier, this will probably be the last blog before baby so be expecting news soon of her arrival!!!

I'm not sure how many of you are frugal shoppers but I'm always looking for a good deal and here is a site that I use.  (I'm not big on advertising for companies but there is an incentive in this.)  No More Rack Daily Deals post new deals every day at noon for a fraction of the cost that you would pay in store.  It's free to sign up and if you click on the link above you and I will both get a $10 credit.  The only time I buy anything from them is when I can get it for free using my credit.  So go check it out and sign up!



Great Week

I thought this week was going to be uneventful but it ended up being just the opposite.  I've made it to 36 weeks and that means now I get to go to the doctor EVERY week.  This week the Dr. checked me and said my cervix had thinned out immensely which is a good thing I guess and he said she's still being a good girl and keeping her head down.  I also noticed that she "dropped" early this week and now my belly looks like it doubled in size from last week because of this. Charle is still one active baby; she likes to push her butt up into my right rib cage and then kick her feet out of my left side and sometimes she does it so hard that it truly hurts.  I know I've said this about a million times but I'm ready for her to just be here so I can hold her and secretly I'm really sick of being fat.

On Wednesday Kerri and I celebrated that she never has to write another English paper again!! I told her I'm such a nerd that I actually miss writing English papers and I was really good at it too (you probably can't tell by my blog with all the grammatical and sentence structure errors.)  We swam at her house for about an hour and a half and didn't get sunburt! I got a lot of freckles from it and it made me really excited.   We watch 'Sweet Home Alabaam' and she made her 'perfect' boiled peanuts (they are perfect because she is perfect- says her. lol)  It was nice just to relax and have a redhead day before little one is born.

Yesterday was a big day... I GOT TO GO TO THE BEACH!!!!!! I haven't been to the beach since April of last year.  My soon to be ex husband didn't allow me to go to the beach last summer.  I was raised loving the beach and it is one of the most relaxing places for me to go.  I love the waves, the sand, the hot hot sun, and the salty smell, oh and the seashells of course; I always have to get some while I'm there even though I have a million at home that are just collecting dust.  I asked the Dr. if I could go to the beach this week when I went to see him and he said that this was my last week that he would allow me to travel so that I should enjoy it and trust me, I enjoyed it!  I did call yesterday morning to check if I could still go because I have been spotting all week since I saw him and he told me to stop worrying but if I went into labor to get my little butt back here asap (Thank God that didn't happen.)  We planned this trip two weeks ago because I've been craving Atlanta Bread Company's loafs of soup and I wanted  to have some before I have Charle because I won't allow myself to consume that much food after I have her.  Well that didn't work out, they didn't have any sourdough loafs or sourdough for sandwiches which bummed me out but I still had a good lunch there.  Then we went to Once Upon A Child and I sold them some clothes that I know I won't put Charle in.  I love that store; they had polo dresses for $5 and they had a whole clearance section outside 50% but it was too hot to go and browse so I decided that I wouldn't buy anything this trip... it's not like she really needs anything right now.  We only spent about an hour at the beach because my sister actually hates the beach and an hour was our compromise.  Her husband sat on the blanket the whole time and guarded our stuff because he didn't want to get in the water while Sarah and I sat at the edge of the water and dug for seashells the whole time.  We put lots and lots of sun screen on but I still got just a hint of pink but it doesn't hurt so I'm not complaining because I got some color!!  After the beach, we went to Barefoot landing and ate dinner.  We were headed home right after because it was storming but it took us forever because we had to stop to get Tyler some Dairy Queen.  DQ has gotten WAY too expensive so Sarah and I had Rolo McFlurrys instead and I thought it was just as good and we got more and two for about the same price as Tyler's Small Blizzard.  We finally got home sometime after nine last night and I was exhausted but supper happy that we had a good day.  This morning I slept in later than I have been able to in a long time, I was still wiped out from yesterday.  Yesterday was definitely the best day of summer so far (the only thing that will top it is the day Charle is born.)

Here are some pictures from the beach

 I have an outie now..

 I had too many shells and I needed to bag them

Week 36

I have now been confined to staying in air conditioning at all time.  The heat index today is supposed to be in the 100s and by 8am tomorrow it will be in the 100s (Welcome to South Carolina!)  I love the heat but not so much while I'm 36 weeks pregnant. Isabelle, my dog, and I are allowed to go outside long enough for her to do her business and then we are both to come right back in.. I'm pretty sure this is how the next four weeks will be.  So I'm stuck inside and I can't hang out in my room much because for some reason, my room is the hot room in the house and is always about 10 degrees higher or more than the rest of the house in the summer.  Laying on the couch is pretty much what I get to do today (oh joy.) 

The cute thing is though that every time I go to a new room, Isabelle follows me and lays on the floor until I go to another room and then the same thing again.  She's gotten way over protective of me since my husband left and I'm nervous that she will be the same with Charle.  I don't want her to start getting so protective to the point that she gets mean.  She never growls or barks at anything unless she thinks there is danger but recently, she growls and barks at anyone who walks by our house.  She's not a big fan of guests anymore unless she's previously met them.  When the Time Warner guy came out to mess with our Internet, I locked her in my mom's room and she put her head through the cat door and growled at him the entire time he was here.  I reassure her constantly that mommy is ok, Isabelle is ok, and Charle is ok; she normally stops once I start talking to her and put my hand on her face.  I guess that is a wait and see thing that we will find out once we bring Charle home from the hospital. 

Today is going to be pretty boring. My sister was supposed to come over to help me organize Charle's clothes but she decided to go to the beach instead.... her husband has a job interview but I'm still just being a sour butt about it because I want to be today.  I might cook something new for dinner tonight to keep myself entertained today.. 

Procrastination Saturday

Today has been a day of procrastination... I got to sleep in this morning so I tried as hard as I could to actually sleep but I gave up at 9am.  Sleeping is getting harder to do these days.  My bed has become too uncomfortable; I threw out my memory foam top because it smelt like my husband and now the mattress is too firm for me to sleep.  The only place I can seem to get comfortable is our couch but I wake up a lot because I toss and turn.  So sleeping has become a task.
I was going to work on the nursery today and I started to but I kept getting distracted by every little thing. I always seem to find distractions when I'm overwhelmed by a task.
Check out my why..
Shoes that I need to sort and finally did about ten minutes ago

Boxes and tubs full of clothes (3m+) that I need to sort... still haven't done

 

Jackets that I need to hang.. still not done





90 Hangers worth of clothes that I need to reorganize.. still haven't done.

see all those onsies and sleepers on the shelf? I need to box them up because they are all 6m+ but I haven't gotten to them either..

I've been extremely blessed and can't express enough thanks to everyone who has given me stuff for Charleston.  This child will not be a child in need of anything because people have blessed her greatly.  I believe that if you bless other people's children then your own will be blessed in return and I've tried to live by that for many years even though I did not have one of my own; now I'm reaping the harvest of seed that I have sewn.  I think I have spent a total of $20 on Charle and everything else has been given to me for her;  I was given all the furniture for her room, all these clothes, and all of the organizer baskets I have in her room.  God is truly Great and no one can convince me otherwise. 
I think I'm going to tackle reorganizing the closet tomorrow and leave the boxes for Monday. Hopefully I can have this all done before my 36 week checkup this week!!! I can't believe she's almost ready to come out! 
All I can keep singing in my head is 'We Have Overcome' by Israel Houghton

Thanks be to God
Who always causes us
To triumph in His Name

Thanks be to God
Who always causes us
To win, yeah

Thanks be to God
Who always causes us
To triumph in His Name

Thanks be to God
Thanks be to God

We have overcome
Hallelujah Hallelujah
We have overcome
By the power of Your Name

Jesus You're the One
Hallelujah Hallelujah
The One who made a way
For us to triumph in Your Name

We've got the victory
Everything will be
Alright, alright

We've got the victory
Everything will be alright
Cause we're on the
Winning side

My Story

Experiences are not excuses for your actions.  I live by that belief everyday.  I do not let my actions be excused by my past and I take full responsibility for everything that I have done.  There have been times in my life that I have let my past dictate my present but when I come back to sanity, I always recognize and change.  I have recently heard some women excuse their bad choices for men by saying that some guy ‘changed’ them and they can’t help but pick bad men.  I don’t buy it at all.  Choosing a relationship partner is a conscious decision and people need to realize that no one forced them to do it.  I’m not an extremely open person so this particular blog is not the easiest for me to write but I’m going to finally share my story.  I can honestly say no one knows this full story except me because I have only shared small bits to different people.  I hope that by finally telling my story that I can be a testimony of not playing victim to situations and taking control of your life and actions.  There are many details that I will not share because I’m not ready for people to know about them and I’ll leave those for counseling. 

About this time last year, I moved away from Florence and I swore it was the last time and that I would never be back… and yet here I am a year later saying that I will never leave Florence again.  I was at a new job and madly in love with my boyfriend but I had some internal issues that I hadn’t worked out and I let them get in the way of that relationship.  Here is a quick version of what happened. I cheated. (the end)  There was mistake number 1.  Mistake number 2… I stayed with the guy who I cheated with..  I had it in my mind that I had done something so terrible and I didn’t deserve to be happy and I wasn’t happy with my choices.  I was put in a horrible situation because of my actions and ended up moving in with him because I had no where else to go at the time (3^rd Mistake.)  I was scared already and allowed myself to be manipulated by him to do whatever he wanted.  Then came the abuse.. it started off small with him verbally harassing me 24/7 if I didn’t do the smallest thing his way.  So to get it to stop, I let him control me but it ended up making it worse; I became his little puppet and the verbal abuse got worse with every day.  After a couple weeks of the harassment and allowing him to control me came the alienation from my friends and family.  All while this was going on, he would tell me that he was a good man and I was lucky and he would take care of me no matter what and no one would love me as much as he did… allllllll lies.  By this time he had spent all of my money and promised to take care of my bills but he didn’t so my phone got shut off, my car insurance was cancelled (can’t drive anymore), my health insurance was cancelled and my student loans became delinquent.  To top everything off, he is a hacker and had some sort of program downloaded on to my computer so he could see every keystroke I made and my computer took screen shots every second to record what I was doing.  I was trapped, I couldn’t call any one and I couldn’t email anyone about what was going on.  All I was allowed to tell anyone is that life was good and full of roses kind of stuff.  My family HATED him and he would use that against me constantly and he wouldn’t allow me to talk to them because of it.  All that was going through my head at the time was that I had deserved this because of what I did but no one deserves to be treated the way I was treated.  By this time I started shutting down physically and emotionally; the only thing I had to look forward to everyday was seeing my kittens but he tried to control how much time I spent with them too.  Every night there was a new fight about something and one night I walked away from him because I had had enough… that’s when the physical abuse started.  He came into the living room and told me that if I didn’t go back into the bedroom that he would make me. Of course I wasn’t going to do what he wanted so he grabbed me by my wrists and dragged me back there and then slammed me against the wall and held me up by my throat.  He then got in my face and had this evil look and told me to never walk away from him again.  I thought he was going to kill me and at that point I had hoped he would.. but then my roommate came to the door and yelled that if he didn’t leave me alone she was going to call the cops.  He dropped me and went to the door and told her that I was fine and she asked me if I was ok but I just responded that I wanted to be left alone.  Later that night he said he was sorry, it would never happen again, no one could love me as much as he did, and that it was really my fault because I walked away from him and I knew that it would set him off.  I lived like this for months; I was a walking corpse, I did everything he wanted and was still abused in some form day after day.  My mom didn’t know what was going on but she knew something was wrong when I disappeared for over a month.  My grandmother tried to convince her to place a missing person’s add out for me because it wasn’t like me to not contact her everyday.  I was finally able to contact my mom at the end of October and that’s when she went on her campaign to try and get me to come back home.  He would make up lies and tell me that she just wanted to control me to convince me to stay with him.  Then on Thanksgiving I found out that I was pregnant.  I had known for about two weeks but I waited on taking a test as long as I could.  I was ashamed, scared but also relieved; I knew that this was my way out.  We had been engaged since August and ended up getting married less than a week after I took the pregnancy test.  My mom had finally come up with a plan to get me home that he agreed with and he only agreed because I was pregnant.  That first month home was hell because he was here with me.  Even though I was back with my family, he still tried to control every little thing about me.  As he noticed that he was loosing control over me, the abuse got worse.  My mom left one weekend and my sister went and stayed with her fiancé leaving him and me alone at the house.  We had a fight that ended up with him choking me in the foyer of the house.  I remember seeing him pull back his fist because I was fighting back and I though he was going to punch my face so I closed my eyes but he ended up punching a whole in the wall directly above my head.  I ended up with bruises and fingerprints all over my arms but I covered them up by wearing long sleeves for the week.  When my mom got back from her trip he gave her some lie about what happened and I just refused to answer why there was a whole in the wall (I wasn’t going to lie to her and if I told the truth, he would hurt me.)  The next Sunday, he threw fresh coffee all over me so that I wouldn’t drink it.  The doctor told me that week that I could have one cup of caffeinated beverage a day and I wanted some coffee before church so I fixed a half of a cup but he didn’t want me to have it so me came in the kitchen and threw it on me.  After church my mom took me to lunch to talk to me about leaving him.  I told her I wanted to try and work things out.  When I got home, I told him that he had three weeks to get into counseling or I was kicking him out.  He told me that he would do anything because he loved me soo much but he never even tried to see a counselor.  That next Friday he had two episodes before noon and the second one was the scariest one ever.  He trapped me in my room so that I couldn’t get away from him, he slammed me against the wall and choked me several times (keep in mind that I was 15 weeks pregnant at the time), he smashed my cell phone so that I couldn’t call the cops, he finally let me out of the room but wouldn’t let me out of the house (every time I would get the door cracked I was screaming help at the top of my lungs and he would slam the door shut), he choked me against the door to the point that I blacked out and then I started to fight back.  I gave him a black eye, kneed him several times, and bit his arm so hard that I broke skin.  I finally got away from him and ran to my neighbor’s house and my neighbor calmed me down then called the cops.  By the time the cops got there, my husband was gone and all he took with him were my two laptop computers and all of my SD cards so that I couldn’t take pictures of what he did to me.  The cops put out an arrest warrant for him and I went to the courthouse to have file a restraining order against him.  The next Monday, I filed for divorce.  I haven’t seen him since and all I get from him is threatening emails.  He wants me to still live in fear of him but I’m not scared of anything he can do.  The scariest part was calling the cops because I didn’t know what he would do when I wasn’t there to semi control what happened to me.  The hardest part about leaving an abuser is leaving because there is a loss of knowing what is going to happen but I’ve just had to tell myself that he’s not worth worrying about.

I didn't write this today to play victim or to get sympathy from anyone; I want people to know that you can go through literal hell and get back up from it to live a blessed life.  I know people who have been in abusive relationships and they use that as an excuse to act a certain way but I'm living proof that you can live a normal, God-filled life after abuse.  I encourage anyone who is in an abusive relationsihp to seek help; there are women't shelters that will help keep you safe and help you get back on your feet.  Being abused is not the end of the world and you can have a new beginning.  I've got my beautiful beginning and I can't wait to give birth to her in just a few weeks.  

Flag Day

Today is a very special day to my family, not only is it flag day but it is my grandmother's birthday!  Her name is Elizabeth but because she was born on flag day, her nickname is Betsy like Betsy Ross.  We have this long tradition of Elizabeth's in the family and I was blessed with the name as well and we all have our own nicknames.  Mine is Lizzie and I've tried changing it to Liza but only people from SEU call me that and my family just refused to switch.  My grandmother of course is Betsy and her mother's name was Betty.  The Elizabeth's skipped my mom's generation but it is my mom's middle name.  I've added it as one of Charle's middle names (yes she has two) and I'm not sure that if I ever have another girl that I could name her Elizabeth.  We'll have to wait and see on that I guess. 

Back to Flag Day, last year I went to Philidelphia with Elliot and his family and we went to Betsy Ross' house.  It was a very special moment for me because my family has always made a big deal about plus I just love history.  I took tons of pictures while outside but we weren't allowed to take any inside the house and my husband deleted them off my computer because he was overly jealous.  It bothers me that I didn't fight back on some of those because he deleted a lot of things that I wanted to keep that had nothing to do with exboyfriends but he felt that it did.  He deleted the pictures of my first fish and my first fish that I got to clean even though there were none of Elliot in them, he just couldn't handle it. Enough about his problems.. just a taste of why I'm in the middle of an ugly divorce.

I haven't done anything special or patriotic on this flag day which is a bummer.  I did however recieve a bunch of stuff for Charle!! This past Sunday, Meridyth brought over a bunch of stuff that Emory has outgrown and I finally finished sorting all of it by size and outfits yesterday.  Then today my Pastor's wife brought over so much more; I started to go through some of it but it was too exhausting.  She gave me Emily's stroller and car seat that she said was faded but it looks brand new to me plus two tubs of clothes and three more boxes of baby stuff.  She also gave me her pack-n-play and bumpo seat.  I can't begin to touch on how God has truely blessed Charle and Me.  Everyone is asking what I need for Charle and really all I need is Diapers, Wipes, Bath towels and newborn clothes.  I have all the furniture and 3m+ clothes.  This little girl is probably not going to get the chance to wear the same thing twice with all the clothes that have been given to me for her.  All I have to say about this is God is Amazing!  And I'm not just saying that because I've been blessed, I've been blessed because I've put God first and worked on my relationship with the Lord.  I've always known that the closer I am to God, the more I will be blessed and yet there were times where I was ignorant and in those times, life was more difficult.  I never want to go through life without God ever again!  I don't always share my relationship with God to everyone but I don't see why I should hold back; I want my friends to have the blessings that I have and have the relationship that I have.  I'm a big prayer and I can tell when my spirit man needs more and lately I just can't get enough!  I love spending time with God and praying; I go to our All Church Prayer Meeting on Sunday nights but I try to make it to Monday morning prayer and Pastor's Wednesday morning prayer service everyweek too.  I've noticed such a change in my life since I was filled with the Holy Spirit when I was 12.  When I let my relationship with God and prayer life get pushed to the side, I've noticed that that's when I get depressed easily.  Like I said, I don't want to go through that again and I'm working diligently to stay on top of my relationship.

This started off as a Flag Day blog but quickly turned into how amazing God is.. I love it :)

If you are looking for a great Holy Ghost Filled Church come visit Family Worship Center this Sunday at 10:30am and 6:30pm.  Here is the link to our website:

http://fwcflorence.com/

Take a look around the website and see what we are about!

Here are some more pictures from this week of CJ

He thinks that he is the baby.. all 25lbs of him!!