October Update Letter

Dear Friends,

Sorry I have not updated in so long! A lot has been going on. My last letter was sent the end of January. I definitely did not intend to wait until October to send another one!

At the time of the January letter, I had just found out I was pregnant with what would have been our seventh living child, following two miscarriages last summer. The pregnancy went along uneventfully through the spring and summer, with our 20-week ultrasound showing a healthy girl, who we named Hannah Grace. We were eagerly anticipating her arrival around the end of September. However, as most of you already know, we instead ran into some complications resulting in a stillbirth August 26, four weeks before Hannah’s due date. We had her funeral on the 28th, and I ended up back in 9/1 with eclampsia for a week, followed by another stay the end of September for blood clots in both legs and both lungs. I am now recovering, with most of the issues resolved. I still have an issue with my eyes and possibly a pinched nerve in my neck that I am praying will resolve over the next few weeks, though I’ve been told it can take up to a year.

The children weathered the time without mom (and without dad, to some degree, since he was with me) pretty well. Bobby pretty much took over the business and Rachel ran the household, and both did wonderfully.

Other things that have happened since the last letter include:

In February, I turned 41.
In March, Sarah turned 3.
In April, Bobby turned 19.
In June, Bobby graduated from high school officially.
In September, Robby turned 46 (while I was in ICU… what a birthday!) and Rachel turned 18. We had an ice skating party for her in between my hospital stays— I am so glad we were able to do that!

Rachel has also seen amazing improvement in her health since May. We are pleased with her progress.

Additionally, Sarah has shown interest in John Luke’s schoolwork (he is in 2nd grade), so I tried doing “Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons” with her — and so far, she is doing wonderfully with it! We are only on the 4th lesson, but she is having no problem doing the sounds of the letters. The two littles may BOTH be reading by the end of this school year!

Oh, and another side effect of being in the hospital half of eight weeks, and unwell the other half — I have lost over 40 pounds. I intend to continue to eat right and get exercise, in hopes of losing about 60 more. So far, so good!

I hope you are doing well. Thank you for being patient with me and my lack of communication over most of this year.