Providence

It’s hard to even start to explain the last week to you. Ben has been looking for a ministry job for months now. He has put out over 40 resumes, made countless calls, done a few interviews, and preached a few trial sermons, but nothing has worked out. We have been praying everyday that God would lead us where He wants us to go, and last week we started thinking we should try something different. Ben said that he was thinking he might really want to go to seminary to get his master’s degree. If he goes now while I’m in seminary, his tuition is half price, so we thought it might just be an ideal time for him to go. So last week, we started praying about whether we should continue seeking a ministry position or move back to Lincoln and pursue more schooling. We laid out our needs before the Lord. If we would move back to Lincoln, Ben would need a full time job that could pay our bills since I would stay home with Addy, we would need a house or apartment with three bedrooms (so we would have an office space for school) that we could afford and would let us have Daisy, and we needed the money to pay our costs of rent and deposit on the place. It seemed like a pretty tall order, and since every other door had closed on us, I figured either this would as well or God would move in a big way…and move He did. Early last week, we heard from yet another church that said they wanted someone with more experience—something hard to do when you are right out of college. Discouraged, Ben decided to call his old boss at Remington to see about getting a job there. His boss said he had just been writing up a newspaper ad for a full time position opening up and they would love to have him back whenever he wanted to start. What a relief after so much stress!! Right after that, Ben called about some houses available in the Lincoln newspaper. The very first two he called were reasonably priced and would allow a dog outside. So yesterday, we went to Lincoln so Ben could “officially” put in his application at Remington and so we could look at houses. In the end, we fell in love with a small house out in the country with three bedrooms, two garages, and plenty of space for Daisy to run. The landlords are very easy going. They said we could paint if we wanted and we could have a garden and pretty much treat the house like ours. And the big plus is that rent was VERY reasonable, about $50 more than if we moved back to our little two bedroom apartment we had before. The biggest problem we had was that they wanted us to move in by September 1st, and we didn’t’ know how to get the money for our first month’s rent and deposit. We figured that if God had provided this far, He would get us the rest of the way. We got home late last night, exhausted from our weekend, and in the mail was a check from my Grandmother for almost EXACTLY the amount we needed for our rent and deposit. She said that she had been praying for us and that God had led her to send that check….how incredible! God has blessed us so much! So now we start the packing process. We are planning to go over on the first of the month to spend a few days painting and cleaning and then finish moving in that next weekend. It will be crazy, but I am so excited to finally settle down for more than a short time. God is good!

Providence

Since I was in high school, I have had times that I really struggled with prayer. I enjoy spending time with the Lord, but I am all too easily distracted. One thing that really helped me was to write down some of my prayers in a journal. It tends to keep me focused, and it is great to be able to go back and read some of my prayers from the past. I have gone through several journals, but a few years back I bought a HUGE one, and I have been writing in that for a while off and on.


So today when I was doing my devotions, I took some time to read back through some of what I had written, and I was simply amazed! The very first entry was from the fall of 2006. I had really been going through a rough time, and wasn’t sure what God had in store for me. I was at a spiritual retreat that weekend, and I met a guy who caught my attention. Little did I know, that guy would one day become my husband. God had this whole amazing plan for my life, and I had NO clue!!

From there, I had written about our relationship and the journey that we started together. I wrote about our joys and our adventures, our struggles and our stresses. I was even able to read about the night I realized I loved him (I told God before I told Ben!). I had written at different points during our engagement, and then right before we got married. It was so incredible to remember back to exactly what I was feeling and what I was praying about during those special times in my life. In a way, my prayer journal chronicled my love story!

Later on, I wrote about a really difficult time in our marriage. We prayed for healing and renewal, and God blessed us beyond what we could have imagined. I prayed when Ben lost his job and we had no idea how we would pay our bills, and God provided a job that paid better than his first one within a week! I prayed about Ben finding an internship when his first choice fell through at the last minute, and God opened up the one in Catlin AND provided a free place for us to live.

Last summer I started praying about a baby. When Ben and I decided that we wanted to try to have a baby, I went to the doctor for a routine checkup. During that appointment, I found out that I had a problem that might make it difficult, even impossible to have a child. While I started treatment, I prayed so hard over the next few months that God would give us a child. In October, I found out I was expecting our little miracle, and she was born two months ago. Despite a rough start, Addyson is beautiful and healthy, and we are SO blessed beyond belief!

I had been so worried lately because we have no idea where we are going to end up. After 40 resumes and a few interviews, Ben still doesn’t have a job, and we need to move soon. We have enough money to pay the bills until the end of this month, and then we don’t know what is going to happen. This is even scarier now that we have a child to provide for. I had really started to worry and doubt God, but after reading though my prayer journal, I can see the incredible ways that God has ALWAYS provided for us. He has always met our needs, and I have no reason to start doubting his providence now! It has blessed my heart so much to be able to look back today and see how beautifully God has written the story of our lives, and I can’t wait to see where He takes us next!

Diaper Drama

My child has a unique talent.  She can go through more diapers than any other child on the planet!  When she was first born, this talent extended only to her "sneaky" peeing whenever we changed her, but for the last week, she has perfected this talent.  My daughter has been able to poop out of her diaper EVERY day this week!  In fact, yesterday, Ben woke me up saying he needed help.  When I went into Addy's room I found her with poop up her back, down her legs, and all over her stomach.  And to top it off, she had peed while he was changing her, and that was all the way up into her hair.  Needless to say, we had to put her in the bathtub to get her all cleaned off.  Then, when we went into the living room, we realized that not only had it gotten all over her, it was all over the couch where she had been sitting next to Ben in her boppy.  What a mess!  We have tried a few different types of diapers with no success, so I'm starting to think this may be a fact of life for us.  I guess we will just have to make sure we keep some spray and wash on hand at all times and bring LOTS of extra clothes and cleaning supplies wherever we go!

Feeding Miss Addy

From before I knew I was pregnant, I knew I wanted to breastfeed my kids. I had read all of the information. I knew it helped with immunity, it was more easily digested, it was always handy, and most importantly, it was FREE!! While I was pregnant, I made sure to invest in bottles that made it easy to switch back and forth, a really cute nursing wrap, and found out my insurance would pay for a nice pump. I thought I was all ready to go.


Unfortunately, things didn’t exactly go according to my plan. First of all, Addy was born early, and since she had some breathing problems, she was taken to the NICU before I even had a chance to feed her, and she was given formula in bottles before I was even able to see her again. So I started pumping every 2-3 hours starting the night she was born (which was extremely difficult to work in between feedings in the NICU). We were only able to nurse occasionally because the NICU staff was worried that it was tiring her out since she wasn’t getting much, and I was told that if I nursed more than once a day, it would take longer before she could come home. My milk was very slow coming in, and after pumping around the clock for over a week, I wasn’t getting more than half an ounce per time.

Naively, I thought that once we came home and she was able to nurse full time, we could stop the bottles, and I could get my supply up for her. Unfortunately, there were two problems with that plan. 1) Addy was so used to bottles that she had no interest in the slower process of nursing, and 2) my supply would never increase more than it was.

I have tried everything I can think of to increase the amount of milk I can produce. I have pumped around the clock as much as once per hour. I have taken several different kinds of herbal supplements meant to increase production (none of which have helped significantly). I have tried a supplemental nursing system (a device which feeds her formula while she nurses). She screamed like I was killing her the entire time we used it, and we ended up with formula all over her and me.

I finally decided to call on some professionals. I called my doctor to see if they could help, and they basically told me there was nothing they could do. I called a nurse from the WIC office, and she told me that Addy wasn’t really hungry after nursing, and that I should stop giving her formula and only nurse. I tried to explain that I only produced about 4 ounces per day, but she insisted that if Addy were nursing I would get more. Finally, I went to the breastfeeding clinic at the hospital. The lactation consultant there spent about half an hour trying to get Addy to nurse to no avail. She told me that the most likely reason I was having trouble having enough was that I’d had PCOS before I got pregnant. She said that about 1/3 of women who have PCOS will have trouble breastfeeding. She told me that I was doing everything I could and that I would probably never get more than I was getting now, and that I needed to decide what was best for us. She said that as long as nursing was beneficial for both of us, we should continue, but that if we wanted to switch to formula, that was ok too.

In a way, I think that was just what I needed to hear. I needed to know that I was doing everything I could and that it wasn’t my fault I couldn’t feed my child. After that day, I decided to keep pumping as long as I could, and I would give her as much as I could each day. I even read that when a mother has a low supply, the antibodies in the breast milk are more concentrated. So I figured that if I could even give her a little bit, that would benefit her. My plan was to keep trying for 6 months.

So here we are now. Addy is 2 months old. I’m still pumping every three hours, and getting maybe ¼ of an ounce each time (lately it’s been even less). She does nurse at times (if she’s not too hungry and impatient). Whether she nurses or I pump, it typically takes almost an hour to feed her when all is said and done, and with the recent decrease in what I’m getting, I’m starting to question whether it’s even worth it anymore. It is completely exhausting, especially at night when I have to feed her and then pump, and it seems like I get less every day.

I’m just not sure I’m ready to stop. I’m struggling feeling like I’ve failed my child. Parenting is such a big job, and I’ve failed her already on this most basic thing. There is so much pressure to breastfeed coming from every direction. I’ve read articles comparing formula to poison and even saying it should have a warning label on it. I’ve even read that breastfed babies have higher IQs than those that aren’t. So am I limiting my child’s intellectual abilities if I give up on breastfeeding? I know that breastfed babies are sick less often. So am I causing my child to suffer more illnesses if I stop? Am I just being selfish? It’s just such a heartbreaking thing for me, and I’m struggling to know what the right thing to do is. Being a mom sure is a hard job!