Well, of course all these weeks have gone by since finding out that we’re having triplets and I’ve been dying to find out whether I was having boys or girls. In my heart of hearts, I did not believe that it could possibily be having 3 more boys. So I knew that there had to be at least one girl in there. With how long I have been longing for daughter (even as far back as high school and maybe even longer!) And in addition to that I’ve been praying for a girl for so long..and of course the lesson that I learned earlier is that when we desire something like that, it is usually God that puts that desire in our hearts and not the other way around. So I knew there would be at least one, and actually I thought there would be two girls and one boy.
I had an appointment scheduled for April 27th and at that time I was about 15 1/2 weeks. Just far enought along to see what the gender was. However, there is no guarantees at this point, because it’s about the earliest possible to be able to tell. So Josh came with me to that appointment in hopes that we would find out what the babies would be. I was so anxious that morning..I wanted my girls so bad and I was so anxious to hear the words “it’s a girl!” My heart was pounding the entire time! Well it took forever it seemed..the ultrasound tech (whom I loved) was down there for a long time looking and baby A kept putting it’s hand down between her legs. Finally she said “okay, I think it’s a girl.” Josh said “100%?” She said no, but that she wouldn’t say it unless she was pretty certain. Tears immediately came to my eyes and I just really wanted to sob out of happiness. But I was trying so hard to hold it in so I wouldn’t jiggle the ultrasound machine! While looking at the next baby she suddenly stopped and giggled and said “it’s another girl” I grinned from ear to ear! The last baby I totally expected to be a boy..so we were very surprised to hear her say..”well, you’re going to need a lot of pink!” I was completely caught off guard!
Over the past couple weeks I have just been delighting myself in the fact that God not only answered my prayer and longing..he answered it threefold. Way more that I could have asked or imagined. Isn’t God good? Now..on to a very girly room and more pink than most people can stomach!

Apirl 9th finally came along and it was time for my first prenatal check-up at about 8 weeks. I was excited about it because it almost doesn’t feel like you’re really pregnant until you start going to the doctor. (Although I had been feeling really sick for about 2 weeks already and that should have made it real enough!) So I went to the doctor (who at your first appointment at Kaiser has to be a midwife). We talked for a while about pregnancy symptoms, etc all normal stuff. I mentioned that I thought I may be carrying twins because I seemed to be bigger and showing already. She kind of discounted that because she said that after having c-sections your uterus sits up higher and you show faster. She also checked the size of my uterus and said that it really didn’t feel much bigger than normal, it was just in a different position. So I kind of lost hope that there would be more than one baby in there. ( I was by the way, hoping against hope for twins.) Well, she pulled in the ultrasound machine to do a routine ultrasound just to get the exact dating, etc. As soon as she turned the machine on and got the first picture, her eyes got big and her eyebrows went up and she gave me a funny look and without saying a word, she held up two fingers. I said “what? what does that mean?” She continued to stare at the screen and she said “there’s definitely two babies in here and I think there might be three.” “What?!” I exclaimed. “Three?!” She continued to try to get a good picture of them. She showed me for sure that there were two babies and they each had heartbeats, but she was having a difficult time being 100% sure on the third. By the time she was done though, she was probably 95% sure that there was three babies in there and my head was spinning. I could not believe it. She finished the ultrasound and said that she was going to go and call a doctor at the hospital where they send all the high risk pregnancies to schedule an appointment and another ultrasound to confirm it. She left the room and I started to get dressed. Meanwhile, my entire body from jaw to toes was shaking with the news. I kept saying over and over “Oh God, Oh God, what are You doing?” That’s all I could do, I couldn’t process it. I finished up my appointment with a trip to the lab to do blood work and I just couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I had to get to my husband’s work to tell him what they found. He also was in a state of shock and surprise, but recovered well and ametuer photographer that he is said “we’re going to get lots of great pictures!”

A couple days later, I was sitting down to lunch and was trying to take my vitamins when I choked on a vitamin and started gagging and dry heaving. As my stomach was convulsing, I felt a gush and thought maybe a little urine had leaked out. But after I recovered I checked and found a gush of red blood. I sort of panicked and went to go change my clothes as I was standing there without clothes from the waist down I looked down and blood was pouring out. I really started panicking then. I called the advice nurse and she advised to get to the hospital immediately. That was a hard and stressful few hours. It turned out that there was nothing wrong, I probably just burst a blood vessle down there during the heaving. However, I did get another ultrasound by a professional ultrasound tech. Immediately he found all three babies and all three heartbeats and said they were all doing great. He also got a great picture of all three of them together. I’m posting the picture here. It kind of reminds me of the Brady Bunch! If I hadn’t accepted the fact at that point that there were three babies in there, I certianly did after all this. I realized how strongly I felt about each an every one of them and were already so attached to them and was so sad about the possibility of losing one or all of them. It was at that point that I became a mother again and again and again.

Several months ago, my husband Josh and I decided to start trying to add to our family. We currently have 2 boys, Bryce who will be 6 in July and Jayden who just turned 3 in March. Both of us were very much wanting to have a little girl. Especially me, who has not only aspired to being a mother all my life, but always had pictured myself as a mother of at least one daughter. All my life I’ve done things to that end such as saving all of my prom dresses from high school and my cheerleading outfit from senior year for the intent of giving them to my daughter(s) to use for dress up someday. I’ve always pictured making cookies together in the afternoon and imparting all of my baking “wisdom” to her as she grows. Of course you can do that with boys, but it’s just not quite the same.

Well, to make a long story short, we didn’t get pregnant when I thought we would. With both of the boys, I got pregnant either by accident or with only one attempt, so my expectations were that the same thing would happen this time as well. But my expectations were wrong and it took several months. Looking back however, I am glad for the time. God really worked on my heart during those months. He taught me some valuable life lessons that I will remember and carry with me for the rest of my life. Among those things was this: One of the verses that we Christians quote to ourselves on a regular basis when we want something is Psalms 37:4 “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” I had always interpreted that as long as I was delighting myself in the lord (whatever that means) that I could get whatever I wanted. Well, I learned that I had it backwards. I found that when you are connected to the Lord and there is something that your heart desires that is good and true and pure, what I learned is that He is most likely the one who put that desire in your heart. And there is a reason for that.

Well, I finally got pregnant. And I was thrilled, so was Josh. More to come later in the story…