Finding a new normal

(from Rob)
Having cheese and crackers before dinner is nothing remarkable, but somehow finding a way to do it while feeding three infants seems like a true achievement. (Especially given that Ginger was breastfeeding two at once. At one point, she was not only nursing Wes and Charlie, but she was popping a cracker in my mouth at the same time. Feeding three at once! I would have thought it was impossible.)

It has only been in the last few days that we have begun to reincorporate little bits of life back into the routine of caring for babies. A little cleaning here, some school work there. Neither of us ever assumed that vacuuming would make us feel so accomplished.

It is certain that we have a ways to go before we get to our "new normal" (after all, someone actually will need to work at some point to feed these little bedbugs), but at least it seems that we are on our way. Just having hope that we will get there goes a long way toward making the days doable. Many thanks to our families who have been incredibly supportive as we take the baby steps necessary to getting back on top of life. God bless you for your goodness to us.

(from Ginger)
Trying to get back to "normal", I have found pleasure in the simple things. I've enjoyed things that I hadn't since May, such as taking a walk around the neighborhood with Rob and Julep, getting my hair cut (my first excursion out), sleeping in my own bed (we had moved downstairs to the guestroom), or even just sleeping on my back! I'm sure Rob is sick of my saying "I haven't done this in 4 months!" But it's nice to start to feel "normal" again...

A number of you have kindly asked for updates on my health. Physically, each day is better than the previous. Each day, I am able to walk a little more upright and a little faster. The first two weeks or so I still had a tremendous amount of swelling from the fluids they had to give me during/after the emergency surgery. The excess fluid made it feel feel like I was walking on jello, or made it very difficult to bend my knees to step into the shower. But thankfully, that is about 95% gone. (It was great to wake up each day and lose 5lbs of fluid!) I also left the hospital slightly anemic so I feel tired, but I have to think much of that is due to the sleep deprivation. It's been easy to think I'm entirely healed, but I'm reminded every now and again with pain that I need to take time to heal. But it has only been 4 weeks, so I need to just be patient.

Emotionally, I feel so blessed to be alive and not have had an emergency hysterectomy (which we were told, and I believe, would have been definite if I were under any less skillful doctors). But this has also left me trying to piece together what happened. I am constantly asking Rob to recount the events between the birth and the days following. I don't remember much of it, and what I do, my memories are all over the place. I just saw a photo of myself from my first visit to the NICU, the night of my emergency surgery. I barely recognized myself and had no recollection of a large board that was strapped to my arm to cover all the IVs. But I do remember going to the NICU and holding the boys for the first time, and that is a memory I will cherish. I am still trying to deal with the weight of the experience and try to understand not only the facts, but the emotions behind everything that happened. It will take a long time to fully process everything, and I'm thankful that Rob is able to do so with me. It was frightening, to say the least. Not just for myself, but for family and friends. Thankfully, God got us through. And now I must rely on him to understand and find peace in order to move forward.

We promise the next post will have photos of the munchkins... :)