Distant Memory

We can spend an eternity going over what happened in the past, its not gonna change anything. You just make sure you don't repeat the mistakes in the future, while not allowing the past to be a crutch.

Somethings and some people never change, while good for consistency, but unrealistic for moving forward in life.

In 2011, you will become a speck of a memory as long as you live in the past, because I've moved forward. Time to let go.

2011.....Be Prepared

Our son will be 2 in 2011........I can count on one hand how many times you saw him in 2010......you're requesting a dna test because you don't wanna pay child support? Lawd how many appointments did I set in 2009 for you not to show up.....you wait a damn year and a half later to want one? Where is the logic in that? I've laughed myself silly. We get the test done confirm that he's your's then what? What happens after that? LOL! Are you serious? That would explain why they're trying to lock you up....I had nothing to do with that, because I don't care if you're in his life or not. I stopped caring when you turned your back on your sick child. I don't talk negatively about you to him because you don't exist. You nor your pathetic family haven't come into my thoughts until I saw that the Attorney General is getting ready to go after you and saw that you requested the test. I pray nothing but God's mercy upon you, because once I get done, Lawd when I get done, lol. Not a threat but a promised guarantee...better bring your A game in 2011 because your sorriness just got old......I'm glad I know where my help comes from :)

Thankful

The year is coming to an end. This was a great year, I accomplished all of my resolutions for the year, set new ones for 2011. Made some new friends and lost some. This year flew by pretty quickly.
Im thankful for everything and in all I give thanks.

New Beginnings

So much has transpired since the last time I wrote. There are many new beginnings that are occurring right now as I type. I'm so happy that I continuously lean and rely on God, and allow Him to place people in my path. I've been friends with someone great for the past couple of months. I am determined to keep this as friends only, but daily he's doing something to tear down that wall that I have perfectly built up. It makes it easy because we both will be living in different state/cities. I'm extremely happy about the negativity God has removed. Once I get settled in, I will update

A Second chance at life: While the Dr. have the diagnosis, my God has the prognosis

August 12, 2009 6:00pm: After getting off of work I had been yelled at by a one of my residents because he was furious that him and his wife had to come up with more money for closing costs and needed to stay in their apartment longer. I explained to them that they would just have to pay a prorated rental amount until they needed to leave. He was furious, and for the life of me I couldn't figure out why that was my problem. He knew that I would be willing to work out a promissory note with him, so I was confused as I was cursed. I drove to check my mail, he followed me in his car irrate yelling out obscenities to me, I was six and a half months pregnant, by myself, going thru a divorce. I kept trying to calm my resident down, never raising my voice as the pain in my body started again from earlier that day. My maintenance supervisor called me to make sure I was ok because he could see the man yelling at me on camera. I was fine, nothing I couldn't handle.

What I couldn't handle were the sharp pains going up and down my back that were diagnosed the week before as "just Braxton Hicks". I just tried to breathe thru the pains. I drove home which was seconds away from the mailbox, I could've walked, but I was pregnant and I wasn't having it with those pains.

When I got home, the irate resident called crying to me about how sorry he was for the things he said. I just listened as he poured out his family issues to me. I'm breathing thru my own issues, I knew something wasn't right. I simply told him I forgive him and gave him numbers to different associations that would assist him in getting assistance with his closing costs and different agencies that would assist in paying his prorated balance for the extra days he needed to stay.

For some reason that evening I left my front door open, why, only God knew why. An hour passed I was on my bed in excruciating pain, and my neighbor just so happened to call me, she tells me how I was screaming in her ear it hurts it hurts something is going wrong. She rushed over to my apartment to an unlocked door saw me on my bed and new that she had to get me to the hospital quick. I was afraid to go, because they sent me home the prior week, and I didn' want to be one of those false call pregnant women.

For the past couple months prior to August I had been under the care of St Josephs Women's Imaging center to track Aden's growth, due to an injury I received while I was pregnant. I am not going to go into the injury, but the Specialist knew it caused some damage just couldn't figure out where. Ultrasounds every other week from the time I was three and half months pregnant.

Elisa, my neighbor gets me to the triage, they immediately take me back to a room. As soon as they strapped me to the machine that shows the movement of the baby/contractions the nurses were in shock. I was having full blown contractions. I could remember the nurse asking how far along are you? I was only six and a half months pregnant. She immediately called my Dr. who in turn told them I'm too early, see if they can stop the contractions with an injection. They injected me with a needle of fluid, I started losing oxygen. They gave me an oxygen mask at that point. The nurses kept asking "do you feel that?" In the back of my mind I'm thinking "HELL YEAH I CAN FEEL IT! I'VE BEEN FEELING THIS ISH FOR OVER A WEEK NOW!!!!!" The contractions were getting worse the medicine wasn't working. Immediately I was sent to have an ultrasound where they found what they were looking for, the placenta had separated from my uterus causing my baby to also lose oxygen. My Dr. was called back, the news was in. "Ms. Thurman-Young we are scheduling you for an emergency
c-section now as soon as your Dr. gets here. We are going to prep you now". At this time 1:00am, I'm scared shitless, the only person there with me was one my residents. I had texted a friend what was going on, he didn't come. I called my mother, she was half sleep, I told her that I was having an emergency c-section, her reply was "ok call me when you're done".......I was hurt but I was hurting more from my uterus hardening. I called my best friend Natalie, she didn't come either. I was there alone with Elisa. My mom called back maybe five minutes later sounding like she had woke up...."Tamica did you just say you are about to have an emergency c-section?" I told her yes and what the nurses and Dr. had found. All I could hear was her screaming for my brother to wake up and pack his clothes "Tamica, baby, hold on, I'm getting on the road now, we will be down there asap!" My mother lives in Tallahassee, Florida and I live in Tampa, Florida......that's a three hour drive. Hold on for three hours for a c-section......my Dr. wasn't hearing it.

While I was about two months pregnant I had this dream that I was visited by three of God's angels. They told me they were gonna take out my baby and make him better but I had to be put to sleep. I cried and cried in the dream begging them for them not to. I was afraid of losing him. A soft voice whispered in my ear as one of the angels but her hand over my face telling me "It's going to be alright, I will be here with you every step of the way. It is my promise that I will never leave you nor forsake you, I just need you to have faith in Me" I felt a comfort come over me. I was placed into a deep deep sleep. I kid you not I had an out of body experience I saw them take my son out of me mold him, love him, and nurture him, and tell him also that he would be okay and they would always be there. They put him back inside of me. Something went wrong. At that moment I heard that whisper again "I'm not going to let you die, I'm not going to let him die, this is my promise to you." I felt my body drop while I was lying in bed when I woke up. I woke up to tears in my eyes. I immediately called my mom and told her of the dream. She simply said "That was God telling you something, He's preparing you for something" I reflected on the dream more that day remembering more and more of it.

They prepped me then had Elisa put on scrubs. I had heard nightmares about epidurals, so I was terrified when they said they were gonna give me one. When I saw that long ass needle, I about fainted. They did the injection, numbed me from God knows where down to my feet. They did the first test, "wiggle your feet" for some reason I remember thinking that it was funny. I wiggled my feet. So they did something behind a huge big blue tarp. My Dr. asked for me to "wiggle my feet again". I'm giggling uncontrollably at this point. "Ma'am wiggle your feet". "Doc I am" as I wiggled my head to the same tune that I was wiggling my feet. They moved the tarp and asked me to wiggle my feet and look at them........my head was moving my feet were not.....you would have thought the worlds best comedian was in the operating room because that was funny as I don't know what. I can't remember laughing that hard. The tugging began "Wait what are you all doing" I asked as three nurses appeared in my view out of nowhere. They caressed my face and assured me that everything would be alright. It was all too familiar. My life flashed before me. I didn't know what was happening. I just kept hearing "Remember My promise, everything is going to be alright". It takes Elisa to tell you how it feels holding a lifeless hand. Life had left my body and that of my son. I was first to be resuscitated, "Ah thank God" is what I first heard my Dr. and the nurses say when I opened my eyes. I looked over to my left Elisa was staring at me I remember her face being pale and tears flowing from her face. I was weak, but I can remember whispering "Where is my baby". I turned to my right and something ordered me to look up. My baby....on a table.....with three nurses around him resuscitating him back to life. At that moment I begin to panic. As soon as that anxiety built up, it was subsided with a faint cry. It was my baby. His cry was so weak. They rushed him over to me laid him across my neck so I could kiss him, and that quick they were taking him away. Me not realizing I was losing more and more blood.

Aden was born officially at August 13, 2009 at 2:45am at 3lbs.

I woke up the morning of August 13, around 8:00am. They had me heavily sedated My supervisor and co-worker where my first visitors. They later on told me that they couldn't understand a word I was saying and were dismissed out so that I could get more rest. My mother made it. She....was....a...mess.....My mother never cries. Never. Ever. Ever. She began to ramble..."Halfway here I got a call from a Doctor saying that they lost you and my grandbaby, I was already on the road, I thought I was coming down here to bury you. I was praying for a miracle...." She was so thankful that we were okay. I remember her looking at my iv and all the medicine that was pumping into me. She held looked at one of the bags and burst into tears, It was blood. I was on my second bag at that point. She continued to thank God.

I wasn't allowed to see my son the first 24 hours so he was named "Baby Young" I remember them coming up with a picture of Aden in his incubator. I lost it. No one was allowed to tell me what was going on with him until I was on my seventh bag of blood and they were sure that I was going to be okay hearing the news. "Your son is a very premature baby, his lungs are underdeveloped, his heart is underdeveloped, and so is his brain. He has a third degree brain bleed which means he will have developmental problems IF he makes it. One of the valves in his heart haven't fully matured. His lungs have a hole in it that usually closes by the time a baby is full term and the mother is ready to deliver. He has a hemorrhage behind his left eye which means IF he makes it he won't be able to see out of that eye. We have him on a oscillator that is breathing for him. His nervous system isn't mature. He may be mentally retarded IF he makes it. We're not sure if he is going to make it." I was crushed.

The day that I was discharged I was prepared for him to come home with me. Keep in mind I wasn't allowed to go to the NICU and see him yet. My mom walked down with me to the NICU to see him. She had seen him several times throughout the duration of my hospital stay. When I saw him and everything that he was hooked up to I felt horrible. The nurses saw it and ordered for me to sit down. I didn't want to, I wanted to look at him and hold him. But I couldn't hold him. The way they explained it to me is that when a baby is a preemie very little physical contact is needed or it will aggravate the baby, because they are supposed to be still developing in the mothers womb. He had these little purple eyeglasses on that were bigger than his body and several lights on him. His liver wasn't doing all that great. He wasn't going home with me.

He stayed at the hospital for two and a half more months after the c-section, being diagnosed with Medical NEC, collastasis, malabsorption, on top of everything else he had going on. I made friends with a couple of the nurses and three other NICU parents, Kara and Sean, Nilni and Gianni, and Deidre who were experiencing similar issues with their sons and daughter. We became a tight nit cluster looking after each others children when someone was absent. The worst was when Kara and Sean would drive to Tampa and they would have a new admit in, that meant no one was allowed in that cluster until they were done, which was equivalent to about four to five hours at the most. It became our daily routine to go up to the NICU, bringing clothes blankets anything from home with the smell of mommy on it. I remember having to wear a "titty buddy" I call it in my boobs for 3 days straight so that it would have my sent on it. I remember the nurses giving it to Aden putting it under his arm as he slept. My mom stayed a couple of days, and requested that my Natalie and Kris please watch over me. It became Kris' job.........He would be right up there with me everyday making sure Aden was okay and to get the update from the Dr.'s. I couldn't ask for a better support.

The drama of the NICU is long story. Long story short, his biological father made a huge deal about seeing him even though restraining orders were put out. Only to not even be in his life til this day.

The weekly phone calls for me to rush to the NICU and say my final goodbyes to my son because this was going wrong, or that was going wrong, was nerve wrecking, especially seeing parents around us pulling the cords because they didn't want their children to suffer or they believed their child didn't stand a chance.I was told that Aden wouldn't make it to his first birthday. So when I finally got that call that he would be released, I think I was in the middle of a meeting and walked out and said see you all later, my baby is coming home TODAY!!!! October 22, 2009 Aden was released to go home. His original due date was October 20, 2009. He was ordered to see a Neurologist, Gastrointestinal Dr., Chronic Illness Pediatrician, and an Eye Doctor. As of August 9, 2010 he has been released from all specialists. When I took him to his last appointment one of the Dr.'s was present and had to eat his words. "Looks like he is gonna be just fine after all that he has been through"

I give God all the glory for keeping His promise to me, that we would be fine, God has truly strengthen the both of us just in this past year. I am thankful for my miracle baby. I thank God for showing me that man will let you down every time. God has been there thru my good and my bad unconditionally. It has only been God who has kept me on this journey despite the naysayers. God has truly shown favor not only over my life, but my son's life. If He never moves another mountain, He has done more than enough.

Happy 1st Birthday Aden!!!! Words cannot express how much I love you and how thankful I am that God gave you to me. I am blessed to have you as my son. We made it doodabug!!!!!!!!

Untitled

I wonder how some people can sleep at night doing the things that they do and saying the things that they say. My son never asked to be here and I never want him to feel like he is a burden to anyone. He is the love of my life and I would sacrifice anything for him. I don't get how a man can put himself on child support and not pay, then put his needs and wants before his childs needs. It's just not fair. I didn't make him alone. But I guess life is not fair. People have come and go in our lives promising to be here for him no matter what. I guess no matter what has come and gone and like I felt, I'm here standing alone to raise a little boy. I wasn't blessed to grow up with a father in my life, so I don't know the first thing about being a father to him.
I'm just now learning that people do things for show "just to say they did it" not really meaning it.
I don't mind going without so that my son has. But it truly sucks when I can barely buy him a $4.00 truck and have to keep using the excuse of "it's his first birthday he won't remember it" instead of I don't have the money to do anything for him. We have to have somewhere to live, means to get to and from work, school, and the dr. And I refuse to deprive him of time by getting a second job.
I know some other people's situations are worse and I believe that's what keeps me going daily.
It hurt like hell when obtaining Aden's christening certificate they asked for the fathers name.....I requested for them leave it blank or omit the field because he's not in his life. He shows up for 12 hours at the most and disappears either behind his family or into the wind, nine times out of ten both.
I won't get started on the dude that wanted to declare that he was Aden's father to step in his biological father's place and "be a man", epic fail. That was the biggest joke ever. People fail to realize that whatever happens....there is still a child involved. That was why I did the things I did, to show him that he wouldn't be there thru the thick and the thin. Sometimes you have to test people to see them for who they really are. It was fine, dandy, and peachy while he was in the NICU the moment he came home, everyone scattered.
Almost a year later, I can say I've embarked on this journey of parenthood alone, only God carrying me and my son. Because I know had it not been for Him I would be relying on man to help me, out in the streets somewhere with nothing.
I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night worrying and may toss and turn a bit, but thankfully God blessed me with a beautiful spirited little boy that wakes up even if I don't make a sound and gives me that look that says I'm doing something right then he rests his head on my face grabs my shirt and holds on tight and falls back to sleep causing me to fall asleep too. I'm so thankful for him.

Eyes wide open

If my eyes haven't been open in the past they are definitely open now. I'm just now starting to see people for who they truly are. I probably give others too much credit, but that's just me wanting to see the best in everyone. I try my best to cater to everyone's needs and emotions not to tarnish relationships regardless the level. I think it's only healthy to say after being stabbed in the back by those that say they care the most its time to let them go. They always have said, keep your enemies closest, didn't realize that I was hated that much. I've come to the realization that you can't and won't please everyone. Tah well
People are quick to label you once you have them figured out, smh, nah I won't be stupid anymore