My littlest angel boy,

Yesterday was my 20-week ultrasound, and it was the best day I’ve had in a long time. I saw your sweet profile, I saw the valves and chambers of your perfect heart, I saw you reach for your toes only to have the tricky things get away. Your daddy and your two older brothers were next to me when they told us that you were healthy and that you were a boy, and you probably heard us laughing as Oliver gleefully exclaimed, “I KNEW he was my brother! Look, Andrew, he’s your brother, too!” I forgot everything else as I smiled and squeezed daddy’s hand in gratitude. You must have known how very much we needed you. We belong, the five of us, in the most wondrous way.

No matter what else changes before you arrive, you are our silver lining. I love you with all my heart and I can’t wait to hold you.

Mommy

Our house will officially be on the market in four days and I still can’t believe this whole moving thing is really happening.

If you had asked me five years ago (or even last year) where I thought our family would end up living, my answer probably would have changed week by week. I learned to smile and nod each time my husband came up with the next Perfect Place. We have entertained many, MANY ideas, but only about half a dozen were given serious consideration:

1. Denver, CO
2. Chicago, IL
3. Washington, D.C.
4. Charlotte, NC
5. Boston, MA
6. Philadelphia, PA (not really our idea, until he got a great job offer from a company there)

You might notice a certain place is not on that list–as in, the place to which we ARE relocating. George mentioned it once, a couple years ago, due to its proximity to my parents. My confused response was, “Pittsburgh?”

It wasn’t that I didn’t like Pittsburgh. It’s a beautiful city; my dad actually grew up about half an hour north of there. I have fond memories of driving with my family almost every summer to go to Pirates baseball games and the Carnegie Science Center. We would all gasp at the view every time we came out of the Fort Pitt Tunnel. But… moving there? Staying so close to Ohio? I didn’t see the point in moving two hours east to Pittsburgh JUST to move Somewhere Else.

The Almighty knew better, of course, for reasons that were not apparent to me until last year. Now we’re grateful all our other plans never worked out.

George gets his Bigger City without paying the scary housing prices or higher costs of living we looked at elsewhere. For the kids, it’s very safe and the schools are excellent. We already have some family (on my dad’s side) and friends (hello, Burgh ladies! plus a high school friend of mine) who live nearby. Most importantly, we’ll still be close to my parents: depending on exactly where we end up, 60-70 miles, so a little over an hour’s drive. And hey, it’s also two hours closer to the ocean than we are now! That’s two fewer hours we’ll be in the car with the kids! DEFINITE BONUS.

I’ll miss certain things about Ohio, though. Things that I can’t really put my finger on. It’s about more than a state or city. More than just the sidewalks I walked as a child, as a wife, as a mother. More than the exact place on my driveway where I stand to see the constellation Orion. Pittsburgh isn’t that far away, but it’s still under a different place in the sky. A new view; a new life.

It wasn’t our original plan, and it may take a while before I can sincerely call it home, but I think we’ll end up loving Pittsburgh. Maybe we couldn’t find the right place until now because we had to wait for the right place to find us.

So how about a slightly lighter post today? Since this pregnancy is already nearing the halfway point (!!!), and especially since it is my last, I should backtrack and catch up with the story of Baby Number Three… beginning with WHY ON EARTH we would get pregnant AND try to sell our house and move out of state at the same time. At first I wondered the same thing!

This timing was not exactly planned. Even last spring, we were still undecided about having a third child at all. But facing a crisis makes you think about Life and it can change your mind about a lot of things. My mom’s pre-surgery diagnosis in May 2011 was ovarian cancer, and since family history would put me at higher risk, I was ready to take preventive measures–possibly even surgery. And that raised the obvious question: Was I SURE we were done having kids? The answer, suddenly clear to me, was: not yet.

I got pregnant right away in June, shortly before my mom’s surgery and diagnosis of a different, terminal type of cancer. After an early miscarriage in July, followed by two erratic cycles and annoyingly unsuccessful marathon-like efforts, George and I almost put things on hold because he was interviewing for a job in Pittsburgh. If he got the job, we’d have to sell the house and move, and of course that would be too hard if I was pregnant, HA HA.

The other discouraging factor was the miscarriage (my third overall). My OB offered to refer me to a specialist for testing, which would mean No More Trying until they sorted things out–and it would still not guarantee any answers, because in many cases a specific cause cannot be determined. The fact that we already have two healthy children made me think we would probably land in the Cause Unknown category (and might disqualify us from insurance coverage for testing anyway), so I declined the referral.

I did, however, research ovulation prediction kits (OPKs), albeit mainly out of curiosity. I’ve never used birth control pills; I charted my freakishly regular cycles for many years, successfully avoiding pregnancy when that was the goal and easily getting pregnant when we tried. I felt I already knew my own body extremely well. Plus, OPKs can cost $15-25 or more PER CYCLE. I just wasn’t convinced we needed extra help yet.

Then I went to Target. And we all leave Target with something that wasn’t on our list, right? Wandering over to the Pee Stick Aisle on a whim, I found some OPKs marked as 50% off. Hmmm. George hadn’t heard back about the job yet (we later found out the company doing his background check was really backed up, leading to long wait times–a blessing in disguise?) so October was still fair game. But in case this was our last shot for a while, why not?

I followed the kit’s directions precisely, so I was a little frustrated after six days of Negative… Still Negative… Seriously, Forget It, Just Ask For A Back Rub Instead. I naturally concluded the kit was marked as 50% off because it was faulty/old/stupid. Great, I thought. We didn’t try all week and now we’ll probably have to wait until next spring.

The next day, I showed George the positive result on my last test stick, shaking my head with confusion. “It should have been four days ago. This can’t be right.”

Less than two weeks later:

BOOM. Who’s faulty now?

So, um, I humbly retract previous claims to being the expert on my own body. I don’t know why it changed, but four days is a big difference in Egg Time.

When George finally got the job offer a few weeks later and asked me whether or not moving was an option anymore, I just laughed. (I also cried at certain points, but I laughed, too. Hormones are fun!) We looked at the situation from every angle and we still had no idea HOW we could make it work. We just… trusted that it WOULD work, somehow.

As crazy and stressful as the timing is, we decided that if this baby was up for the adventure, then so were we. We could have waited until after we moved so I wouldn’t have to switch doctors in the last few months of my pregnancy or pack boxes with a big belly in the way. But how boring would THAT be?

My last post was over a year ago. I thought I was done here. And now, I’m not sure where to begin.

It might be easiest to start with a recap of the last seven months of 2011.

June: My mom had exploratory surgery (which she barely survived); we found out she has a rare type of cancer in an advanced stage. George and I decided to try for a third child, and I got pregnant right away.
July: My mom almost died of sepsis. I had another (third) early miscarriage but decided against seeing a specialist for further testing. Oliver turned five.
August: My mom finally came home and hospice care was initiated. Oliver started Kindergarten.
September: We took a family road trip to Philadelphia, where George had a (fantastic) job offer; he turned down the job because we didn’t want to move that far from my parents. Soon after, he interviewed for a job in Pittsburgh.
October: I organized a special birthday party for my mom. I got pregnant again. George had follow-up interviews for the Pittsburgh job.
November: Andrew turned two. George got the Pittsburgh job. We were relieved to see the baby’s heart beating at my 7-week ultrasound.
December: I made it to my second trimester and, in preparation for selling the house and moving, I resigned from my part time job as a nurse. George started commuting daily to Pittsburgh (2 hours each way).

Now it’s the end of January. My mom’s condition is worsening day by day. My 20-week ultrasound is scheduled for February 8, and our house will officially be on the market beginning February 9.

It’s a lot to handle at once, physically and emotionally. I often feel uprooted, scared, lost. At the same time, there is an underlying sense that this period of my life is also incredibly meaningful. The truth is that it’s not all bad; there have been beautiful moments, too. Oliver and Andrew seeing the Atlantic Ocean for the first time. My mother smiling and surrounded by family on the day of her birthday party. A tiny heartbeat flickering on the ultrasound screen. Silver linings and laughter and thankfulness and love. So much love.

I guess that’s why I’m here. I want to keep a better record of 2012. Something that will carry over, after everything has changed.

For now, we’re still in the Before. I don’t want to close my eyes, I don’t want to look ahead, I just want to look around. I want to remember how the good parts stand out.

My current goal is to blog through our future second child’s first birthday, which would be sometime in 2010, and then publish my last post on my 32nd birthday that year (since this blog begins on my 27th birthday, which would make exactly 5 years). I think that will be enough for me. We’ll see…

I wrote that a year and a half ago. Last Saturday, I turned 32.

This blog now contains the 5 best years of my life, from finding out I was pregnant with my first child on my 27th birthday through what will be my second child’s 1st birthday on November 3. It’s been quite a journey! And I honestly believe these years–and my life–were even more special because of all the incredible Internet Friends I’ve met along the way.

But the timing really fell into place naturally. I no longer catch myself writing blog posts in my head as funny or crazy things are happening. I no longer have the time to write on my own blog most days, let alone read all the blogs I want to read. This might be “enough” for me, at least for now.

I’m afraid that if I’m not blogging, friendships will fade. I hope not. But maybe that’s only natural, after all. And I’ll definitely miss THAT part.

So where does that leave my blog? I’m not sure. I’m leaving the door open for now–there are some potential things on the horizon that I might want to share (a Certain Big Decision is now leaning towards MAYBE POSSIBLY YES…!), but many of us are connected elsewhere (Facebook, Flickr, etc) and I hope we can still follow each other there. I’m grateful for all of you and I’ll still be laughing with you, crying with you, and cheering you on through all of YOUR adventures.

In most ways I still feel like I’m 27, but I’m 32 now. I have 2 sweet little boys and a wonderful husband, and I hope the next 5 years are just as beautiful as 2005-2010, whether I’m blogging about them or not.

My wish is the same for all of you!

xo