GIVEAWAY for March of Dimes ~ Team Mackenzie Noelle

I know I am shamelessly copying Nolan's mommy, but it was a brilliant idea! :) Hope you don't mind, Ashley!

This giveaway is in effort to raise money for the March of Dimes. I am the team captain of Team Mackenzie Noelle and we will be walking in Mackenzie's memory on April 24th here in Texas. This is our first year to get involved, and although Mackenzie was in no way premature (overdue in fact), I still feel compelled to support this cause because a loss is a loss. Not only that, I know so many of you amazing women in blog land lost your precious little ones due to premature birth and that makes this cause even closer to my heart. Since this is my first year, I only set the team goal at $500.00. Of course if we could raise more, that would be fantastic! I'm the team captain and yet one of my team members is totally kicking my butt in the donations department, so this is my way of boosting team morale and doing my part :)

I will be giving away a $30.00 gift certificate to my favorite Etsy shop, Mama Mia Custom Handstamped Jewelry. You can use the gift certificate towards anything in her shop and she does amazing work customized to suit your personality. I actually won Tina's giveaway to her shop last week and she made me the most beautiful necklace for Mackenzie!

$1 will earn you one entry into the drawing, but the more you donate the more chances you have to win. I will get an e-mail with each donation, but please also comment here so I can make sure I count your donation. I will also give one additional entry for anyone who posts the giveaway to their blog, Facebook, or Twitter. Just comment and tell me where you posted it.

I will keep this giveaway open until midnight on Friday (March 19th) and will announce the winner on Saturday.

Follow the link below to see my personal page and click Donate Now. If you're donating less than $10.00 just click "Other Amount" and type in your amount in the box.

http://www.marchforbabies.org/teammackenzienoelle

Thank you in advance for any and all donations!!! <3

Very Disturbing Dreams :(

These past few nights I have been having really disturbing dreams. If the following description of my dreams is going to give you nightmares or upset you then just stop reading now. For real. They are sick and horrifying to think about...but this is MY blog where I get to let out what I need to say. I'm warning you. I just feel like I need to write them down somewhere and get them out of my head before they make me crazy. I wake up in the mornings and recall the dreams and they really eat at me and mess with my head. They make me sad and sick and basically just ruin the start of the day.

The first dream, well...I can't remember how it started, but basically my family had Mackenzie's body wrapped up in a sheet. We unwrapped her and it was obvious she'd been dead a while because her skin was just falling off all over. We were trying to clean her up and we washed away the skin with a water hose (we were outside). Then my mom was trying to get a piece of grass or something off of her face but ended up peeling a piece of the skin off of her face, too. My mom started to get really upset but I was calm. I told her it was ok...let's just keep cleaning her up. There was a bin of clothes and I decided to pick out an outfit for her to be buried in and while looking in the bin I remembered the closet of hers...full of clothes...and I decided I wanted to go look there. I wanted everyone who saw her to think she looked beautiful. Then my mom reminded me that we already had her funeral quite a while ago...and that no one would be there this time when we buried her. I just really wanted people to be there. I really wanted to make her look beautiful for everyone to see. And that's all I remember...

Last night I dreamed I was pregnant with our second baby (the one we lost due to the recent ectopic pregnancy...who I secretly call Skyler and refer to as a boy b/c that's what I think it was) and that, like Mackenzie, Skyler had died and I had to give birth to him anyways. Only it was obvious that I wasn't very pregnant. It was just like my ectopic pregnancy only instead of surgery I had to deliver him naturally. I delivered him at my house and he looked like a little tiny tiny tiny baby...but definitely a baby. Not just a little round thing like in the pictures I have. I held him and he was very white, not discolored like Mackenzie had been. I thought he looked perfect and I just held him and admired him. I wanted to show him off to my mom but she wasn't coming quickly enough so I went to get here and left Skyler there. Before I found my mom I had some paramedics check me to see if the placenta came out too and it hadn't so they delivered that real quick. Then I went back to find my mom. When I found her I told her to come see him and that he was so beautiful. I also told her I wanted to dress him up in an outfit with a hat and socks, too since I didn't get to dress Mackenzie. She told me she'd hidden all the clothes when Mackenzie died so I wouldn't see them and be sad and that she'd have to get them out but that it would take a while. I was so annoyed and I told her that by that time he wouldn't look this way anymore and that he would be purple and discolored from being dead so long. It still took her forever to get the clothes out, but then I picked out the outfit, hat, socks, and diaper and took them to where I had left him. It was only then that I realized that all of these things were infinitely too big for him. He was like the size of a Barbie doll...this wasn't going to work but I was going to try anyways. When I went to where he was I couldn't find him and my husband told me they'd already buried him. I was pissed. I didn't get to dress Mackenzie and I didn't get to see her before they buried her so I was not going to let them take that from me with Skyler so I had them dig up his coffin. Not only did they dig up his, but they dug up Mackenzie's too. They opened the lid to her coffin and I was surprised at how much better she looked than I'd excepted only they had put a wig on her that was ridiculous and I was really confused at why they would have done that. I was going to go ahead and put a hat on her as well, but I decided to just leave her as she was. I tried putting the clothes on Skyler but of course they were outrageously too big so I just wrapped them around him. Instead of having them bury Skyler and Mackenzie separately again, I had them place Skyler in the coffin with Mackenzie because I thought they'd like that. When they went to situate them together Mackenzie's legs were moving and it was just freaky. I knew even then that she wasn't alive but it was weird that she was moving anyways. And that's pretty much all I remember of that dream...

So they're sick, right??? WHY am I having these dreams??? The dreams do have truth to them. Mackenzie did have a circle of skin missing from her right cheek when she was born. It was like that when they handed her to me though. It's not like we did that to her or anything. I did not dress Mackenzie while I had her in my arms. She was wrapped in the hospital blanket but I never dressed her because in my shock it did not occur to me to do so. I also did not see her in her coffin because my parents told me they thought I should remember her the way she looked in the hospital and that she looked really different and not like herself and I agreed (in the shock I was in at the time). I'm so sick of having these dreams. I live my daily life knowing she's dead and that she's buried...why do I need to face it in my dreams, too??? Especially in the morbid way of seeing her body in that condition...in and out of a coffin??? Can I not have the luxury of dreaming of her alive or at the very least not dream of her at all? When I'm awake I can control my thoughts and not let my mind wander to those sorts of things. When I'm asleep my mind is out of control. I don't even know why I'm having these dreams all of the sudden. Nothing has happened to spark this kind of insanity. Am I the only lunatic having these horrible dreams about their precious children?

:::sigh:::

Just a Thought

I was thinking the other day about my friends that are pregnant right now and how I like that I can still give my input and advice to them (only when they ask of course) because I have been pregnant and I already know what they are going through. I went all the way. I went a week past all the way. I know "pregnant." After that though, once they have their babies...I'm out. I'm out of the loop. I have no idea what it's like to have a baby to raise. I don't know what age babies do what. I don't know what's "normal" at all the stages in their lives. I'm useless after pregnant.

But then something else hit me. Hard. The thought that...these girls probably don't even want my advice, do they?? Why would they want advice from someone who got it wrong? Someone who did NOT bring a live baby home. Someone who buried her child. Someone who lost the next pregnancy after that even. These girls probably take what I say and do the exact opposite! They probably laugh behind my back at all the things I did or didn't do with Mackenzie because they obviously did not work. She's not here. All of my avoiding lunch meat, tuna, diet soda, artificial sweetners, fetta cheese, baths (I took showers), etc. Well, as careful as I thought I was being she died anyways. I guess if these girls are thinking this about me then I can't blame them. Who would take advice from someone who didn't get the outcome everyone wants? Would you take driving lessons from someone who totaled their last two vehicles? Yeah, me neither.

So that just fucking sucks. I don't know pregnant either. I know what it was like when I was pregnant and I can share my stories but what good are my opinions and facts and advice since they failed me??? I'm useless.

Mackenzie's Shelf + Need Advice

I've been meaning to post a picture (click on it to see it bigger) of the two shelves on our bookcase dedicated to Mackenzie. I'm sure since this picture I have added to the ladybug collection and I know I've added a few things to her shelf as well. My husband calls it Mackenzie's shrine. Sometimes he says it like that might be a bad thing, but to me, it's all I have. Her nursery door is always shut and when there is another baby (God, please let there be another baby) her room will not be her room anymore at all. So I think it's fine for me to dedicate this space in our house to our little girl. Frankly, if she were here the whole house would probably be dedicated to her by way of toys, clothes, bouncer, swing, etc.

Oh and one more thing. I've been struggling with what to do about my most recent angel baby. I don't even know what to call him/her. How do I refer to this baby now? I don't know if it was a boy or girl. I didn't get much time (2 weeks) to even really accept that I was pregnant before it was all taken away from me in the blink of an eye. I guess what I'm saying is that I'm good at being a mommy to a 9lb 7oz stillborn baby girl that I got to know for 41 weeks and hold after she was born, but I just don't know how to also be the mother of a baby lost at only 7 weeks. It wasn't even a miscarriage. This baby's heart was beating all the way into surgery ~ that part I've forced myself not to think about. So I don't know where I fit in having an ectopic pregnancy and I don't know how to refer to this baby or where this baby's place is in this family. I don't mean to sound like there is no place for this baby...there most certainly was/is...I just need some advice here. I don't know how else to say it without sounding anymore insane.

Mackenzie's First Christmas (Pics)

I know it's late, but I wanted to show some of the ornaments that were on Mackenzie's Christmas tree:

Mackenzie's Tree

An ornament I had made thanks to Peyton's mom :)

I got this when we were on vacation in Fredericksburg. It says "Daughter, you're a prayer come true"

Baby's First Christmas - it's a jingle bell

Mackenzie's Baby's 1st Christmas Ornament ~ Hallmark

Ladybug Ornament I ordered off Etsy thanks to a suggestion by Tina :)

Angel Wings from Lea (and Nicholas)

A butterfly from Bree (and Ella)

A baby bootie from Christy (and Leila)

A frog family ornament that I had to get because one of the kid frogs had a ladybug on it :) Bailee & Tyler are my stepchildren, fyi.

The ornament we received at the M.E.N.D. Walk to Remember.

It says "You are loved beyond words, Missed beyond measure, Your life was a blessing, Your memory a treasure." Makes me want to cry everytime I read it.

Received at the M.E.N.D. Christmas Ceremony

The Hallmark series ornament I'm going to start collecting each year for Mackenzie. My mom used to do the same for me & my brother every year and then gave all my ornaments to me when I got married.

This is actually one of *my* Baby's First Christmas ornaments from when I was a baby, but I was just AMAZED at the fact that it had ladybugs on it. I'd never noticed before. I put most of *my* Baby's First ornaments on Mackenzie's tree this year.

*My* Baby's First Christmas ornament that has my first pic with Santa.

The orament my mom gave me with a pic of Mike, Me, and Mackenzie <3

Our family's stockings

Mackenzie's Stocking

The little one next to Mackenzie's was for the baby I was pregnant with at the time :*(

Mackenzie's Christmas present from my parents. It's a ladybug piggy bank :)

If you've read my previous posts you know we announced to my parents that I was pregnant again by giving them a card. Above is the front and inside of the card. Everyone was insanely happy about this grand announcment, but again, if you've read my previous posts you know that I have since lost that baby, too.

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Overall it was a nice but bittersweet Christmas, and a shitty New Year. Here's hoping that 2010 gets its act together and brings us some joy to ease the heartaches.

Home Alone...Again

I'm home from the hospital...empty handed again. I got home yesterday at noon and I've just been resting and watching TV. Feels a little bit like deja vu at this point, but instead of scouring the internet for anything or anyone to reach out to...I already know where to go. I just wanted to write down the story of how another little one got away from me.

Saturday morning my husband and I went to the Imaging Center at the hospital for my ultrasound. It was supposed to either confirm that I was just too early pregnant to see the baby on a regular ultrasound or locate the baby in my tubes. I was probably on the ultrasound table  for 45 minutes. The tech was just taking picture after picture. I never really saw anything that looked like it might be a baby. She turned the sound on, and told us she was just listening for blood flow to the ovaries, and she was. She turned on some coloring effects on the screen and I could see a colorful flutter towards the top right of the screen. I wondered if that could be my baby. She placed the cursor over that area and turned the sound on. The rest of you mothers know that once you've heard a baby's heartbeat...there's not mistaking it when you hear it again. This time it wasn't blood flow to the ovaries. It was a heartbeat. I asked the tech "what's that?" and she just said "oh, I'm just taking some pictures." I looked over at my husband...I think we both knew. The nurse asked me to get dressed but not to leave the room because she was going to talk to a radiologist. I told my husband, "you know it's bad news when they won't tell you anything. We've been here before." We had waited about 15 minutes for the doctor to finally come in and confirm that Mackenzie had passed away...what a nightmare. This time, the tech had some compassion and said "I'm not supposed to tell you anything, but I know your situation and well...that was a heartbeat you heard. You have a live ectopic pregnancy, but you can't leave because it's life threatening. You are either being admitted directly into the hospital or going to the emergency room." I cried when she confirmed that I had heard my baby's heartbeat. What a cruel cruel world. My last ultrasound with Mackenzie there was no heartbeat, and with this baby I heard the heartbeat but in less than 5 hours it would be no more. Honestly, for the past 2 weeks of knowing I was pregnant I was expecting to miscarry. I don't know why...I guess the horrible mind games that you play with yourself after you've lost a baby, but I was just waiting on the worst. I honestly never expected an ectopic pregnancy. That's just another thing you think only happens to other people...like stillbirth. Well, I've got quite a statistical nightmare under my belt now. Anyways, the ultrasound tech put me in a wheelchair and wheeled me straight from the Imaging Center over to the hopsital and up to a room. I texted my dad and Mike called my mom. I was dreading seeing my mom because I didn't really want another sob fest like last time...but luckily she was composed. I cried a little when I saw her but not much more after that. The on-call doctor came in to tell me that the baby was in my left fallopian tube and that sometimes they could use methotrexate (chemotherapy) to end the pregnancy but that the baby was too big so I would need surgery. She told me they would try to save my tube and my ovary but there was no guarantee. At this I cried again. Little by little I'm feeling the hope of having a baby at home in my arms slipping away. A nurse came in and tried to put my IV in. Fail. Another nurse. Fail (in fact she blew the vein). The first nurse tried again. Fail. Another nurse came in and refused to try because she said she couldn't see any veins. Now they call the anesthesiologist. Fail. Then I tell him I think he should try a vein up near my elbow that the lady who drew my blood earlier pointed out. He seemed put off that I was telling him how to do his job (as the lady warned he would be if I told him) but he tried it and got it on the first stick. I have 5 holes in my arms where they tried to get my IV in. They stuck me in the same hole 2 times so TOTAL it was 6 attempts to put my IV in. That was HELL. It hurt so bad. And the one lady who refused to try because she didn't see any veins, pissed me off by saying "You are so PALE...is that your natural color???" I wanted to punch this bitch. Yes, that is my natural color, thank you. Get the hell out of here. At first we thought we might like this nurse because her name was Noel (like Mackenzie's middle name is Noelle, spelled differently) but that didn't last long. Anyways, once they got the IV in (I'm sure that anesthesiologist visit is going to cost me) this scary tall black guy came to wheel me into surgery. I was about to cry because I was being wheeled down the hall alone but then in the relector on the ceiling I saw Mike following behind me. I am so glad he followed us :) The guy wheeled me into this waiting area that had like no lights on and there was not a soul in sight. It was freaky. The nurses for surgery came and talked to me and told me I had to take my contacts out. I was freaking out because I'm pretty much blind without my contacts and I told them I didn't want to wake up without being able to see because I was afraid I would think I was blind. I told Mike to have someone go get my glasses while I was in surgery or else he had to sit next to me when I woke up and tell me first thing "you're not blind." LOL I just hate not being able to see. So practically blind without  my contacts they wheeled me back into surgery and I was nervous because there were so many people in there and the machines looked huge & scary (blurry and all). They told me they were giving me oxygen and put a mask on my face...and that's the last thing I remember.

As soon as I woke up a nurse asked if I wanted my glasses and I said yes and she put them on my face. It took a while for me to finally come to but I was so ready to go back to my room and see my family. While I was waking up I listened to the two nurses discussing one of their wedding registrys and the older nurse was explaining to the young engaged nurse what a charger was and how she could get white plates and colorful chargers. Whatever...just get me back to my room. I remember looking at the clock and noticing it was 5 PM already. I thought the surgery was only going to take 30 minutes. That made me think something had gone wrong. When I got back to the room Mike explained that they had to take out my whole left fallopian tube, but that my ovary was fine. That still makes me think I'm going to have hell trying to get pregnant again, but the doctor said it shouldn't affect my fertility. We'll see. She also said she couldn't see any reason why I would have had an ectopic pregnancy. She said my insides looked fabulous. She confirmed that I just have really shitty luck. She told me I should wait 3 months to get pregnant again. I'm kind of scared to even try. What if this happens again? What if I lose my other tube? What if I die next time? But I can't not try. I have to have a baby. Why can't I just have a baby?????

So I'm home for a week resting/recovering. This New Year has been shot to hell already and it's only the first week. I'm going to get back on the couch now because my belly is getting sore from sitting up like this. Thanks for all your comments on my last post. It means a lot to know you ladies care. Weird how much these over the blog friendships can mean...but they really do mean a lot and are very comforting.

One last thought: I wonder if this baby was a boy or a girl? I'm too scared to even know. If I was to find out it was a girl I would be devastated because I'd be sure it was my last chance at a girl. Sometimes it's better to just not know. I'll find out when I get to Heaven and my little babies greet me <3

It's an ectopic pregnancy. A live one. I heard my baby's heartbeat. But I'm in a hospital bed now getting ready for surgery at 2:30 PM. It's over. And it only just began. What the hell is wrong with me? Another angel baby waiting on me in Heaven.