This is hard. It's the hardest thing I've ever had to do. A parent should never have to let their children go.
I know that I am a strong person and I know a lot of people have looked at me right now and wondered how I've been as strong as I have. I think that has finally caught up with me.
I have days now where I feel like I can't get out of bed, so I don't. I have days where I just want to cry, so I do. I have days where I just feel weak, so I am. These are all decisions that I make for myself. I can't control what happened to us, I can only control how I react to it. I wish that I could forge on to a normal life, but I can't. Because I'm not a perfect person.
I know that there will be a day when the phone calls and emails stop, and the cards stop coming in the mail. I'm glad that day hasn't come yet but I know one day it will. The world will go on, people's lives will go on, and we will be left still hurting. These are the days I dread. These are the days I don't know how I will do it.
I went back today and read through every post in this entire blog. It is so strange some of the things I said at the beginning of this year that are so applicable now but in a totally different context. Maybe deep down I knew about this all along. Maybe those words were written for encouragement then but also knowing I would need them now. It's hard to hear those words now even though I know them to be true.
I've talked about how God's ways are not necessarily our ways.
I've said "God always has a plan for us even when we can't see beyond what's right in front of us. We can only pray that He would open our eyes and show us His purpose."
I've said "that I would walk across fire time and again just to be able to have a family with you."
I've quoted: "I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me". Phillipians 4:13
And I said "I have had to let go so much of myself in order to do this and, no matter what the outcome, I don't regret any moment of it. There is no price I wouldn't pay. We grew this child in our hearts long before it will ever grow in my body. "
Do I still believe these words? I do. Do I want to be reminded of these words even though I am so angry? I do. Do I regret any moment of this? Is there any price I wouldn't pay? No.
I held two precious babies in my arms. One baby girl who had her mom's nose and mouth and her daddy's long legs and one baby boy who had his dad's nose, his mom's chin and his mom's brown hair. Two precious little faces that mirrored our own. I NEVER wanted to give them back to God so quickly but what if I NEVER got to see the faces of our children. That I would have regretted.
So today I am so angry but that's ok. Because I am not a perfect person.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
thank you, thank you, thank you
There is so much I want to say, so much both of us want to say but we'll just start with Thank You.
We needed to take some time to just "breathe" after the service for Lila & Cole. We left town and holed up in a cabin and just tried to support each other. I think it was the right thing to do but I found it wasn't any easier to breathe there than it was here. This is not something that we can or even want to run away from. It's something that we want to learn to live with.
That's where all of you come in.
We had so many phone calls to us and our parents and so many cards of people saying "let us know if there is anything we can do". When we finalized the plans for the service and knew we were giving only one days notice, I figured we would have about 30 people be able to come. When we walked in that chapel and I saw at least 75 faces staring back at me, it literally took my breath away. I know there were even so many more that wanted to come and couldn't and we completely understand. To those of you who did come at the drop of a hat, we don't even know how to begin to say how grateful we are. One of the only things you can do for a parent in this situation is acknowledge their children. That's all we could ask and so many stepped up and did that for us.
This is how we will learn to live with this. With a lot of faith and knowing how much our children were loved and wanted and will be remembered, we will begin to heal.
I do want to ask something else of everyone and that is to please stay with us on this blog. Our journey took an unexpected turn, but it is NOT over. Lila & Cole are a part of our journey and they are an important part of our family tree. As we wait for answers and pray for guidance, we are going to continue on our journey and we still need your prayers and love and support.
We have no idea what God's plan is for us and what His timing will be. Regardless of our feelings right now, we will always turn to Him and we believe wholeheartedly that He has a plan for us and that He had a plan with Lila & Cole. We believe that there is a reason we had to go through this and we are dedicated to finding out what our purpose in all this will be.
With so much love and gratitude,
Sara and Steve
We needed to take some time to just "breathe" after the service for Lila & Cole. We left town and holed up in a cabin and just tried to support each other. I think it was the right thing to do but I found it wasn't any easier to breathe there than it was here. This is not something that we can or even want to run away from. It's something that we want to learn to live with.
That's where all of you come in.
We had so many phone calls to us and our parents and so many cards of people saying "let us know if there is anything we can do". When we finalized the plans for the service and knew we were giving only one days notice, I figured we would have about 30 people be able to come. When we walked in that chapel and I saw at least 75 faces staring back at me, it literally took my breath away. I know there were even so many more that wanted to come and couldn't and we completely understand. To those of you who did come at the drop of a hat, we don't even know how to begin to say how grateful we are. One of the only things you can do for a parent in this situation is acknowledge their children. That's all we could ask and so many stepped up and did that for us.
This is how we will learn to live with this. With a lot of faith and knowing how much our children were loved and wanted and will be remembered, we will begin to heal.
I do want to ask something else of everyone and that is to please stay with us on this blog. Our journey took an unexpected turn, but it is NOT over. Lila & Cole are a part of our journey and they are an important part of our family tree. As we wait for answers and pray for guidance, we are going to continue on our journey and we still need your prayers and love and support.
We have no idea what God's plan is for us and what His timing will be. Regardless of our feelings right now, we will always turn to Him and we believe wholeheartedly that He has a plan for us and that He had a plan with Lila & Cole. We believe that there is a reason we had to go through this and we are dedicated to finding out what our purpose in all this will be.
With so much love and gratitude,
Sara and Steve
Monday, August 24, 2009
Memorial Service
A memorial service for Lila Mae and Cole Christopher will be held tomorrow at 2:15pm at Calvary cemetery at 1600 Newburg Rd.
Thank you
Steve & Sara Yager
Thank you
Steve & Sara Yager
Saturday, August 22, 2009
I don't even know how to do this...
On Thursday, August 20th, our precious babies came into the world a little too soon.
Lila Mae Yager was born at 3:33 pm with no heartbeat. She was 15.1 oz and 12 inches long.
Cole Christopher Yager was born at 6:39 pm and was with us for a very short time. He was 14.8 oz and 11 inches long.
This was so unexpected and is still so very hard to understand. Our hearts are so broken and we have no idea how to function right now. We appreciate everyone's support and prayers. We will continue to need them so much at this time as we have to go through the agonizing process of burying our children.
We don't have all the details ironed out yet, but I will be sure to let you all know as soon as I can.
Lila Mae Yager was born at 3:33 pm with no heartbeat. She was 15.1 oz and 12 inches long.
Cole Christopher Yager was born at 6:39 pm and was with us for a very short time. He was 14.8 oz and 11 inches long.
This was so unexpected and is still so very hard to understand. Our hearts are so broken and we have no idea how to function right now. We appreciate everyone's support and prayers. We will continue to need them so much at this time as we have to go through the agonizing process of burying our children.
We don't have all the details ironed out yet, but I will be sure to let you all know as soon as I can.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Week 22
Nursery Update!!
We had a very productive weekend. We cleaned out our exercise room so we could officially turn it into a nursery and we cleaned out my home office so it can officially be a guest room.
We assembled the cribs and set them up so we could get a feel for how much room they would take up. We actually have more room than we anticipated, so now we can pick out the rest of the furniture for the room.
It was a family affair:
Proud Daddy:
We had made another trip on Saturday to the baby store and every time I go in there I look at this one bedding set and I always think to myself how cute it is. It never occurred to me that it might be an option for us because it goes against everything I had in my mind that I wanted. I knew that I didn't want to commit to any "characters" or themes. I just wanted to do stripes or polka dots or just something geometric that would coordinate the same pattern in two different color schemes for boy and girl. I also knew that I didn't want pink and blue. So when we went in Saturday, Steve and I (and Mimi Lois) took a really good look at it and looked at the coordinating set for the girl and realized that we really did like it. And we didn't have to special order it and it was half the price of everything else we looked at:) So Mimi surprised us and treated the babies to their new bedding:) Here is a sneak peek:
Auntie Hannah helping put the bedding on:
Monkeys for Baby Boy:
Flowers for Baby Girl:
And put it all together:
I'm very happy that I got to use a pink/green theme and if you look closely, they both have polka dots and stripes on the sets so I didn't completely compromise. The longer they're in there, the more I like it. I still have to come up with some decorating ideas for the wall decor and paint colors. We have more accessories for Baby Girl right now because her set was clearanced so we had to go ahead and get everything we could for her while it was still in stock. We bought Baby Boy's bedding set just so we could set it up and make sure we liked it all together. The accessories for him are still current so we can register for the rest.
Everytime I walk in that room it is still so surreal to me that in just a few months there will be TWO babies in that room!
I have a doctors appointment this week so I'll be sure to let everyone know what our status is. I've been having some dizzy spells for almost two weeks and I think it's due to low blood pressure. I've been dealing with more frequent back pain as well. The babies are kicking up a storm now and I've been able to feel Baby Girl more and more everyday. We're moving right along!
We had a very productive weekend. We cleaned out our exercise room so we could officially turn it into a nursery and we cleaned out my home office so it can officially be a guest room.
We assembled the cribs and set them up so we could get a feel for how much room they would take up. We actually have more room than we anticipated, so now we can pick out the rest of the furniture for the room.
It was a family affair:
Proud Daddy:
We had made another trip on Saturday to the baby store and every time I go in there I look at this one bedding set and I always think to myself how cute it is. It never occurred to me that it might be an option for us because it goes against everything I had in my mind that I wanted. I knew that I didn't want to commit to any "characters" or themes. I just wanted to do stripes or polka dots or just something geometric that would coordinate the same pattern in two different color schemes for boy and girl. I also knew that I didn't want pink and blue. So when we went in Saturday, Steve and I (and Mimi Lois) took a really good look at it and looked at the coordinating set for the girl and realized that we really did like it. And we didn't have to special order it and it was half the price of everything else we looked at:) So Mimi surprised us and treated the babies to their new bedding:) Here is a sneak peek:
Auntie Hannah helping put the bedding on:
Monkeys for Baby Boy:
Flowers for Baby Girl:
And put it all together:
I'm very happy that I got to use a pink/green theme and if you look closely, they both have polka dots and stripes on the sets so I didn't completely compromise. The longer they're in there, the more I like it. I still have to come up with some decorating ideas for the wall decor and paint colors. We have more accessories for Baby Girl right now because her set was clearanced so we had to go ahead and get everything we could for her while it was still in stock. We bought Baby Boy's bedding set just so we could set it up and make sure we liked it all together. The accessories for him are still current so we can register for the rest.
Everytime I walk in that room it is still so surreal to me that in just a few months there will be TWO babies in that room!
I have a doctors appointment this week so I'll be sure to let everyone know what our status is. I've been having some dizzy spells for almost two weeks and I think it's due to low blood pressure. I've been dealing with more frequent back pain as well. The babies are kicking up a storm now and I've been able to feel Baby Girl more and more everyday. We're moving right along!
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
21 Weeks
****UPDATE****
Steve felt the babies kick for the first time tonight!!!
***************************************************
Well this has been an eventful week.
We endeavored on our first ever shopping trip this past weekend and I have come to wonder how anyone ever afforded to have a baby, let alone two at the same time? Just processing the information alone was exhausting not to mention all the dollar signs adding up. There are so many products on the market that I'm sure are silly (ex: piddle pads in case baby tinkles while in the car seat and it happens to leak through the diaper) but I'm sure I'll register for every single one of them:) Piddle pads are on my registry by the way...
Now that we know for sure we're having a boy & a girl, it takes some of the pressure off since we can finally forge ahead with nursery themes and get to start preparing the nursery.
We made our first purchase (which was actually a gift from Grammi and Grampy) this week. We found some cribs that we really liked and picked a night that was pouring down rain to go purchase them and try to squeeze them into our car. Nice.
Here is a picture of what our cribs look like:
We got two of them exactly the same and they will convert into toddler and full size beds so that we'll get plenty of use out of them as the babies grow. On the way home from the store, Steve told me the story of when Hannah was little but she was ready to move into a big girl bed. One night, her mom & dad took her out and Steve changed her crib into the big girl bed and had it all set up and decorated and he surprised her when she came home. He said she was so excited and I could tell just by looking at him while he was telling me that story that it was a great memory for him. That melted my heart when he told me about it...aaahhhh
We had picked out a changing table too that we liked but we were disappointed when we were trying to lay everything out in the room today because we just don't seem to have enough space to fit everything in. It would be fine with one crib but two is just a tight fit. We might have to pick out a different table and see if we can come up with a different configuration. We would also like to put a rocker in the room and ideally we would have two rockers but that's not even an option at this point.
We also are going to dismantle my home office and turn it into a guest room so that we'll have a nice room for any grandmas who might want to have a sleepover. Needless to say, we will be busy for a while, renovating two bedrooms and rearranging our room to have a place for the babies for right when they come home. I don't know if I will be able to sleep if they're in the other room right off the bat but we'll play it by ear.
I'm trying to decide on bedding sets so we can get to painting but I'm having a hard time finding sets that coordinate, aren't cheaply made, aren't outrageously priced, and are in stock. I'm not crazy about doing pink and blue simply because I don't think those two colors always go together, but that's mostly what I'm seeing so we might have to go that route. I've narrowed it down to about three sets, none of which are exactly what I wanted, but will probably turn out nice. If I had my preference, I would buy these sets I saw that you can custom pick all your fabrics and have the bedding monogrammed. I LOVE monogrammed baby items! Unfortunately, those sets run well over $500 a piece and I can think of a lot more things that I need instead of monogrammed bedding:(
But how cute are these!!!??!!
I'll save more of my stories for later as we continue on our new journey, "Adventures in baby shopping".
Steve felt the babies kick for the first time tonight!!!
***************************************************
Well this has been an eventful week.
We endeavored on our first ever shopping trip this past weekend and I have come to wonder how anyone ever afforded to have a baby, let alone two at the same time? Just processing the information alone was exhausting not to mention all the dollar signs adding up. There are so many products on the market that I'm sure are silly (ex: piddle pads in case baby tinkles while in the car seat and it happens to leak through the diaper) but I'm sure I'll register for every single one of them:) Piddle pads are on my registry by the way...
Now that we know for sure we're having a boy & a girl, it takes some of the pressure off since we can finally forge ahead with nursery themes and get to start preparing the nursery.
We made our first purchase (which was actually a gift from Grammi and Grampy) this week. We found some cribs that we really liked and picked a night that was pouring down rain to go purchase them and try to squeeze them into our car. Nice.
Here is a picture of what our cribs look like:
We got two of them exactly the same and they will convert into toddler and full size beds so that we'll get plenty of use out of them as the babies grow. On the way home from the store, Steve told me the story of when Hannah was little but she was ready to move into a big girl bed. One night, her mom & dad took her out and Steve changed her crib into the big girl bed and had it all set up and decorated and he surprised her when she came home. He said she was so excited and I could tell just by looking at him while he was telling me that story that it was a great memory for him. That melted my heart when he told me about it...aaahhhh
We had picked out a changing table too that we liked but we were disappointed when we were trying to lay everything out in the room today because we just don't seem to have enough space to fit everything in. It would be fine with one crib but two is just a tight fit. We might have to pick out a different table and see if we can come up with a different configuration. We would also like to put a rocker in the room and ideally we would have two rockers but that's not even an option at this point.
We also are going to dismantle my home office and turn it into a guest room so that we'll have a nice room for any grandmas who might want to have a sleepover. Needless to say, we will be busy for a while, renovating two bedrooms and rearranging our room to have a place for the babies for right when they come home. I don't know if I will be able to sleep if they're in the other room right off the bat but we'll play it by ear.
I'm trying to decide on bedding sets so we can get to painting but I'm having a hard time finding sets that coordinate, aren't cheaply made, aren't outrageously priced, and are in stock. I'm not crazy about doing pink and blue simply because I don't think those two colors always go together, but that's mostly what I'm seeing so we might have to go that route. I've narrowed it down to about three sets, none of which are exactly what I wanted, but will probably turn out nice. If I had my preference, I would buy these sets I saw that you can custom pick all your fabrics and have the bedding monogrammed. I LOVE monogrammed baby items! Unfortunately, those sets run well over $500 a piece and I can think of a lot more things that I need instead of monogrammed bedding:(
But how cute are these!!!??!!
I'll save more of my stories for later as we continue on our new journey, "Adventures in baby shopping".
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Week 20
We've made it half way!
It was so exciting to wake up this morning and know that we've made it through our first 20 weeks and we're still in one piece:)
Alot of things have happened in this past week. We had our Level II ultrasound and are so happy to report that everything is just as it should be. I wasn't sure at all what to expect going in and I was hesitant when we got to the hospital because they sent me to the same office where we had been 4 years ago on the day we found out my last pregnancy was ectopic. It literally took my breath away to stand in that office again and have the same exact ultrasound tech call me into the room. It's amazing how just being there could bring back every emotion I had of that day. It seems so hard to believe that was 4 years ago when it feels like it wasn't so long ago. I'm so glad that we made the decision back then to take the chemo shots instead of having surgery. My mom had told me then that by doing that, my baby would always be a part of me because the cells just absorbed back into my body. As anxious as I felt when they started the ultrasound, it was almost as if our "angel" baby was there with us.
They took a lot of measurements of the babies bones, head, bladder, etc. and checked out their hearts. They were able to see everything they needed to and told us everything looked great. And most exciting, they confirmed to us that we were having a boy and a girl! The girl is Baby A which is the one closest to my cervix and the boy is Baby B who is right above his sister. We also got to see baby girl kick baby boy right in the head! I couldn't believe my eyes and he didn't even budge. I guess there will be alot of that going on from here on out. I just hope he gets to get his jabs in too...
We got to look at our babies for an hour and a half and it was wonderful and relieving to be able to walk out of that place that gave us so much pain before, with so much joy.
Another exciting thing that happened over the weekend was that I felt the babies kick for the first time! It was at 2:00 in the morning and I was half awake and felt a little "thump". I wasn't sure if that's what it was until I felt another one and then I knew for sure. I jumped up and told Steve and we sat there and tried to feel for it again but the show was over. I woke up again at 6:00 am by another "thump" and I got a good "whop" about 8:00 am. I think it was baby boy every time because the "thumps" felt a little too high for it to be baby girl but I guess I can't be sure. It was just the sweetest thing and I know that it will probably get on my nerves down the road when they won't let up but it was so special to feel that for the first time.
And last but not least, today is a very special day for our furry baby, Elly. Today is her 3rd birthday!
I can't believe my little girl is getting so old. For her birthday, she got a brand new bone which she Loves to chew on. She also got a cake (but she's not allowed to eat it).
I think she liked it anyway:)
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