Operation: Get Rid Of The Ponytail

Many of you may wonder why I wear my hair in a ponytail 99% of the time. The truth is I lost a lot of hair during my stroke/lupus flare/premature birth ordeal. One of the symptoms of Lupus is hair loss. The only thing I could do with my thinning hair was to pull it back in a ponytail. I must say, for a while I didn't mind because let's face it, ponytails are huge time savers in the morning and sleep is precious. Since my Lupus is pretty much in remission my hair has been growing back, hence Operation: Get rid of the ponytail. My constant ponytail is starting to give me self esteem issues. As my blog from yesterday stated, it's been 21 months which really means my hair has probably been growing back for the last 12. The new hair is down to my shoulders now while the old hair is down to the middle of my back. It can be really awkward on the 1% chance I wear my hair down. I have a dilemma though. My new hair that is down to my shoulders is curly while my old hair is straight. Why can't anything be easy? So I asked my husband what he thought I should do. He said I should get a perm. What is this? 1995? My first mistake was asking someone who doesn't have hair for hair advice. My goal is to have the ponytail gone by the end of March. Hopefully by that time I will have figured out something to with my straight/curly, two different length hair. Fingers crossed.

It's Almost Been Two Years

It's almost been two years since our lives were forever changed by our sweet Liam. It still feels like it was just yesterday, but I also feel like we've come so far. It's been 21 months. Twenty-one months since I held Liam in my arms and felt him against my skin. I still think of Liam every day. Every. Single. Day. Sometimes I'm consumed with sadness that Liam is not here with us. Sometimes I feel so blessed for the gift he gave me. Other times I have no idea how I'm supposed to feel about the loss of my child. It's still a roller coaster of emotions.

While I think about Liam daily, I'm not able to look at his pictures very often. I don't need to. I have him memorized. I remember his little folded ear. His tiny hands. His lips that looked just like Isaac's. His smell. Everything. I am so grateful that we have such beautiful pictures, but sometimes seeing them makes me so unbelievably sad that he's not here with us. I miss him so much it hurts. I selfishly want him here with me. I know I will see him again one day, but sometimes that doesn't even bring comfort because I want him now.

Nick and I have been talking about another baby recently. Sometimes I get so hopeful about baby number 3. But, sometimes I get mad at that thought. I don't want a 3rd baby. I want my second baby. I want Liam. And talking about baby number 3 almost feels like I'm trying to replace Liam although in my head I know that's not true. We are scared. Scared to forget about Liam. Scared to risk getting hurt again. Scared for my health.

We don't know what God has in store for Team Zumwalt. All we can do is pray and hope we are willing to hear the answers. And we will continue to be grateful for our tiny gift who had a pretty big purpose.

Parenting Fail #978

So Nick and I had a major parenting fail yesterday. While it's a little sad, it's also a little funny so I thought I'd share so you can not only feel better about yourself as a parent, you may giggle a bit too.

Isaac came home yesterday and while he was putting his backpack and coat up he very angrily told me that I had made him eat an old sandwich for lunch. I quickly told him that Daddy took him to school so it clearly wasn't me, and then reminded him that they were having chicken at school and Daddy and I told him he was going to eat in the cafeteria. He clearly forgot. And Daddy clearly didn't check Isaac's backpack before sending him to school as his lunch pail was still in his backpack from FRIDAY and since Isaac saw it, he assumed he had "brought his lunch" to school. So yes, my son ate his leftover peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch yesterday. And that's all he ate, since there was obviously nothing else in there. At least he had milk, and in kindergarten they still eat snacks in the afternoon. I can't imagine what Isaac must have thought as he opened his lunch pail only to find his half eaten sandwich from last week. I hope none of the teachers saw his poor excuse for a lunch as I'm sure they would have called the welfare on me.

See, now don't you feel better about yourself? I bet you've never fed your kid 3 day old partial sandwiches. Needless to say, Nick and I felt horrible when we found out what had happened. Poor Isaac. He forgave us, but was a little bummed he missed out on chicken yesterday.