Fate

6 years ago the stars aligned perfectly and fate was set in motion...

6 years ago I was finishing up my physical therapy clinical in Naples, FL.  My sister, Laura, flew down for a week to hang out on the beach and then help me with the drive from my clinical in south Florida to my next clinical in Tupelo, Mississippi.  The drive from clinical to clinical would be about 17 hours so we decided to book it to Atlanta where we could spend the night and take in a Sunday night Braves game during our short layover. Laura and I spent about 13 hours driving from Naples to Atlanta on a muggy August day with a tropical gulf storm underway.  Laura was less than pleased with this trip since it was hot, humid, hung-over and exhausting.  To top it off the air conditioning in my car had broke on my move down to Florida and I never had the money to get it fixed.  

We arrived in Atlanta shortly before the start of the game and since we didn't know the city at all we picked a hotel right next to the stadium (turns out this is not the safest part of town, especially for two young girls with a fully packed Camry).  

We showered, changed and walked over to the stadium where I purchased us two nosebleed student tickets for $8 a piece.  The heavy black clouds that followed us on our road-trip were rolling in just as we passed through the turnstiles.  We were making our way to the top deck at Turner Field when crowds of people were making their way back down and warned us that the sky was about to unload buckets of rain.  Within minutes the field tarp was being rolled out and the game was being delayed due to a torrential downpour.  Since it was a Sunday night most patrons left and took the offered rain-check but since we were only in town for this night with nothing else to do we decided to stick it out.  We bought some stadium food and a giant refillable soda to share and parked our butts at a high top table overlooking home plate.

At one point I went to go refill our 64oz soda when I felt this guy move into line behind me that seemed to want to talk to me.  He was very cute but I was very embarrassed by my giant soda so I maintained my stand-offish stance and made my way back to Laura without talking to him.  To kill time Laura and I took pics and chatted with interesting local folks.

After seeing us talk with every walk of life, that cute guy from the soda line worked up the nerve (after 4 Budweisers) to come up to us and introduced himself.  He had a very thick southern accent which made him even cuter.  He asked us to join him for a drink at the outfield restaurant so we did.  He left his group of friends to kill time with us until the game finally started 2 hours later.  

  He convinced an usher to allow us to sit in decent outfield seats and so Laura and I spent the entire game hanging out with Heath.

To say I was awkward was an understatement.  I could tell this guy was into me but I had no idea how to act around a guy like that, besides I was only in Atlanta for that night.  I was headed to Mississippi for the next 3 months and back home to Wisconsin after that.  I didn't put much stock into this guy but Laura convinced us to exchange numbers before we parted ways at the end of the night.  

Well, fate was set on August 16, 2009...

Heath and I kept texting and calling each other while I was living in Mississippi and he finally invited me over to Atlanta for a Kings of Leon concert in September.  I agreed and we had a really fun time together.

Never in my life could I have imagined meeting the love of my life on a 12 hour layover trip in Atlanta.  Never in my life could I have imagined building a relationship over the course of a year living 4-12 hours apart the entire time.  Never in my life could I have imagined moving to the South to start my career and see where this relationship was headed.  Never in my life could I have imagined marrying a man from Alabama.  Never in my life could I have imagined buying a house more than 800 miles away from my family.  Never in my life could I have imagined being so lucky as to meet the love of my life and my best friend in such a romantically fated way.

And as the stars aligned 6 years ago, I never could have imagined that this sweet southern man and I would one day endure the greatest tragedy together.  Together we built a family and became mommy and daddy to the sweetest, most beautiful baby girl, Millie Clara.  We endured the loss of a baby at 14 weeks pregnant and then we buried our second child, our daughter, 11 months later.  This is a fate I never could have possibly imagined but one I would never, ever change.  Our 23 days with Millie are worth every moment of heartache we continue to feel.  Our 23 days with Millie confirms our love for each other and confirms our love as a growing family.  While we have been blessed with tremendous support there is no other person that lifts me up, comforts me and supports me like Heath. 

We were blessed 6 years ago when the stars aligned to bring us together. We were blessed 5 years ago when I decided to move to Atlanta to develop this relationship.  We were blessed 2.5 years ago when we were newly engaged under the stars at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. We were blessed 2 years ago when we celebrated our marriage under the Caribbean stars in Jamaica.  We were blessed 2 years ago when we bought our home in Acworth, Georgia.  We were blessed when 1.5 years ago we learned that we were going to start a family.  We were blessed 1 year ago when the heartache of our first loss was replaced with the joy of being pregnant once again.  We were blessed 6 months ago when we brought beautiful Millie Clara into this world and 14 days later when we got to bring her home.  

Today we are blessed to have our own personal star shining down upon us every single night.  Tonight we will celebrate our fateful meeting under the stars at Chastain park listening to the comedian Jim Gaffigan give us a reason to feel joy and laughter after enduring our greatest heartache.  I am really looking forward to a date night under the stars exactly 6 years after our fateful meeting under the stars at Turner Field.  

I love you Heath Spencer King. Thank you for our beautiful life together, thank you for our beautiful daughter Millie Clara.  Thank you for walking under these stars with me hand-in-hand.  

6 Month Birthday

6 month birthday

july 27, 2015

It was a Monday, a Monday that I had to spend at the Cobb County courthouse being prepped for jury duty.  I was not thrilled about this out-of-the-ordinary event in my normal schedule but frankly I didn't care either.  I just really couldn't believe that this is what Millie's 6 month birthday looked like for me.

July was the time we were mentally preparing for as a beacon in Millie's future when her little body would hopefully be big enough to tolerate the interventional radiologic surgery that would cure the AVM in her brain.  Before she was even born we were planning to cut maternity/paternity leave short in order to have extra time available come July when she would start needing surgeries.  Getting her safely to 6 months old was what we prayed for continuously before she was born and before we learned just how sick she really was.  We prayed that the physicians could help slow her heart failure and other organ failure long enough for her to tolerate surgery in July.  This really wasn't a question in our mind, we knew God would provide and our baby girl would begin the path to being cured in July.

So here it is, July 27, 2015, and I am sitting in a courtroom having to present my personal history to some lawyers to determine if I will be a good fit in judging their civil lawsuit.   When my turn came I was to stand and recite my name, profession, husband's profession, number of children, years living in the county and area of county I reside in.  I was the 19th potential juror, so while the jurors before me went, I recited my information in my mind and felt tears streaming down my cheeks every time I had to recite my answer to number of children. I knew my answer was 1 but it was a very painful 1.  And I felt lonely crying in the middle of a courtroom over the answer to a seemingly basic question.  These strangers don't know how difficult this question is for me, they don't know my pain and they don't know how fresh this wound still is.  They don't know just how freaking painful it is to be sitting in a courtroom instead of sitting in a hospital waiting room nervous about the pros and cons of a very necessary surgical procedure that my daughter should be having.  A scary and risky procedure but one that would help her to become healthy if everything went as planned.

Heath and I had met with the interventional radiology surgeon on Dec 31, 2014.  He was the first and only person to even bring up the remote possibility of death given the limited knowledge we had from Millie's fetal MRI.  I lost it in his office that day when he mentioned this possibility but I never truly thought of it as a reality.  We knew our baby girl was sick but Heath and I believed so strongly in the power of being positive, so we prayed and hoped for our girl to be as healthy as she could possibly be given what we already knew.  We never once thought to pray to God that He let our daughter live, just that He let her be healthy.  
But on July 27, 2015 I wasn't sitting in a hospital waiting room praying for our daughter to live because that unfathomable fear had already become our reality.

It was hard to sit in a courtroom on July 27th and remember that my reality could have been us sitting in a hospital waiting room praying endlessly for our daughter to survive the surgery and to recover well.  Millie's surgeries would have been emotionally exhausting, extremely nerve-wracking and always a fear of wonder whether we were making the right decision or not for our sweet girl.  Heath and I were always fearful of causing our child undue pain and suffering. 

So I spent the morning of July 27th alone in my emotions, stuck in a courtroom, but by noon I was struck from the jury so I treated myself to a lovely lunch in the warm, bright sun on the Marietta square. Then I went home to my loving puppy and napped with her on the floor of Millie's room.  Our dear friends had us over for dinner later that night and then Heath and I went to wish Millie's godfather a Happy Birthday.

It was never, ever how I could have pictured spending Millie's 6 month birthday but when you're blissfully and naively pregnant you only ever envision positioning your baby for the obligatory 6 month photo shoot with the baby's developmental update.  When you learn in advance that your child will be sick you grieve that you won't get to have the blissful "normal" 6 month moment with your baby and will instead be planning for surgery for your very sick baby, praying it goes perfectly.  When your sick baby is born breathing, crying and moving you never imagine that you'll spend her 6 month birthday with empty arms and broken hearts.

I honestly don't know where the past 6 months have gone, they have been the most amazing, blessed, painful and challenging 6 months of my life.  We have also never been so enveloped in love, comfort and support in our lives.  We continue to be so grateful for our 23 days with Millie and the beautiful memories that we were able to make with her.  We are beyond blessed to have been the parents to such a beautiful baby girl that exuded so much pure love.

My Darling, My Angel, My Star
My Love Will Find You Wherever You Are... 

We love you and miss you sweet Millie Clara,

xoxo

mommy & daddy

House Full of Family

House Full of Family

June 30 to July 11 was a house full of family for Heath and I!  My parents came to visit from 6/30 to 7/6 and then my cousin Amy, her dad, Uncle Mike, and her two kids, Aleah and Ethan came to visit from 7/7 to 7/11.

Both visits were jammed pack full of really fun events.  Heath and I got to be tourists in our own town...

July 1: Heath took mom and dad to the Booth Western Art Museum while I worked.  Dad enjoyed it for the wonderful history and Mom enjoyed it for the beautiful art.  Heath enjoys it every time because he is so proud of his southern heritage and a lover of history.  I then met the three of them at a local craft brewery tasting.

July 2: Heath had to work so I took Mom and Dad to visit Millie in Alabama.  We took Coalie along for the ride which was a riot as Dad was stuck riding in the back seat with her. Being the Velcro dog that she is, would only be comfortable extremely close to Dad!

We also stopped in Gadsden to view Noccalula falls and have lunch before heading to Glencoe to see Millie.

Look at my parents with their cute dog :)

This garden stone was a mother's/father's day gift from my sister Kathryn.  I decided to place it at Millie's resting place until we decide on an actual headstone for her.  I absolutely love this stone and was so happy to place it with her.

Coalie bear got to visit her sister for the first time since she last saw Millie in our home.  It really meant a lot to me to be able to bring her to see her sister again.

 

 

 

 That evening we went to a Braves game.  This is the first baseball/Braves game that Heath and I have been to this year.  I am a huge baseball fan but this year I've struggled to pay much attention to the sport.  Last summer Heath and I were at a Braves game when I became certain that I was pregnant.  I was so certain that I bought a little Brave's shirt that our baby would be able to wear this summer.  Heath and I met at Turner Field so it only made sense that I would realize we were expanding our family while at Turner Field.  I took a test the next day (Father's Day) that confirmed my suspicions.  So here we are going to the game with my parents and I had no idea just how hard this event would end up being for me.  Almost like walking into a brick wall, I was struck with jabs of pain as I watched so many cute little families enjoying the thrill of America's pastime with their kids.  It was a very painful reminder that I would never get to share my joy of baseball with my daughter.  The most painful part of the night was when the Braves did a little commercial break fun that mimicked 'Kiss Cam' only this was called 'Simba Cam'.  The tune Circle of Life began to play as I watched the Jumbotron and saw parents hold their babies up to the world as Mufasa did with Simba.  This was so painful to see that I had to look away from the screen but ended up looking out into the crowd of hundreds of parents doing the same thing.  I completely lost it and sobbed into Heath's shoulder. I think this was the first time I completely lost it in public.  I've been brought to tears in public before but never sobbing.  This was one of the moments where as a parent of childloss you are completely blindsided by heart-stabbing pain.

 

July 3: The weather was super cruddy but we decided to head up to Chattanooga, TN to hang out in mine and Heath's favorite little town.  We enjoyed good food and drink, walked around art galleries and the Chattanooga Choo Choo, crossed the walking bridge over the Tennessee River and did a little shopping.  My parents were pleasantly surprised at how much this cute little town has to offer.

Haha, this is 1/2 of where I get my fear of heights from!

July 4: Again dodging bad weather we spent the afternoon walking around historic Marietta square and in the evening we went to Acworth beach to watch the fireworks.  We were lucky enough to have a torrential down pour start right at 9:00pm as the fireworks started.  The drenching only lasted a few minutes but we spent the remaining 20 minutes watching great fireworks soaked to the bone!

Our visit with Mom and Dad was definitely peppered with moments of sadness that Millie wasn't there with us to enjoy this family time and "firsts" but overall we had an absolutely wonderful and fun-filled time together.

July 6 Mom and Dad started their drive home while my cousins and uncle started their drive down south.

July 8: Heath and I took the day off to spend with Uncle Mike and the Franks.  We spent an amazing day hanging out at Stone Mountain.  We hiked to the top which was quite the feat for two little kids and my uncle with two bad hips.  The kids climbed around the water gym, we had a ball fight in a barn, rock-climbed and I was convinced to participate in the high-ropes adventure.  As I mentioned earlier I am very fearful of heights and feel no need to challenge gravity but if everyone else could do it then I should be able to too.  I started out very hesitantly on the 12 foot level, always choosing the route with handholds.  Then we advanced to the 24 foot level and with less handholds to chose from I always made the more stable choice. I was then marched up to the 36 foot level where there was only 1 choice...always a scary choice!!  It was very, very frightening for me but I did have a little mantra in my head going "if you survived the loss of your daughter, you can certainly survive this safety harnessed height challenge" and I did!!  It was actually very fun once all was said and done and my feet were back on solid ground :) 

July 9: Heath and I had to work so the group went to the Georgia Aquarium and Coca-Cola for more fun.

I'm not as creative as the kids

Aleah is amazingly talented!

July 10: We decided to take it easy.  We started with a museum tour and hike at Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield followed by a day spent at the beach with the world's largest inflatable slide!  Heath's cousin Zach and his daughter Aubry joined in which was great since she is the same age as Aleah and Ethan.  The kids and the big kids (ie Heath and Zach) enjoyed the slide for a full hour before spending the rest of the time cooling off in the water and taking our kayaks out.  We relaxed throughout the evening.  The kids introduced me to making garden stones and they made me the sweetest stones for our garden.

 

 I really enjoyed sharing these days with my uncle, cousin and cousin's kids.  Some of my favorite moments were when Aleah and Ethan wanted to talk about Millie.  Ethan even requested to spend quite awhile looking at pictures and videos of Millie with me.  He really enjoyed watching the video of Millie's bath time.  It warmed my heart so much to have them ask me about her and express their regrets that they didn't get to meet her because "she was so cute"!  Ethan also told me that he was happy that we were planning to have more kids and he hopes to meet our next babies :)

So to conclude Heath and I have to express a HUGE thank you to our family for coming to spend so much meaningful time here in GA and in our home with us.  It was such a tremendously memorable and fun time, even if there were moments of sadness.

Landon's Legacy Activities

Here is more from Landon's Legacy...

Meeting and spending time with beautiful mamas from all over the world:

*spending time at the lake shore hanging out together, canoeing and kayaking

*Working on our personal growth by journaling, shouting our emotions to the world and celebrating together

 *we went on a hike to a spiritual area of Petroforms which are rock formations made by native Indigenous Peoples.  This was a very meaningful hike where we made medicine bundles that we offered to the spirits in honor of our babies.  We also met Ron, an elder that is the keeper of the grounds, who taught us a lot about this spiritual place just down the road from our resort.

Ron teaching us about this 4 sided rock/animal spirits

The Grandmother Rock

So emotional to connect with Millie's two great-grandmothers that she is named after via the Grandmother Rock

My medicine bundle that I made in honor of my sweet baby Millie Moo

We entered this sacred circle, walked around it in meditation and then performed a smudging before presenting our medicine bundles wherever we felt moved to provide our gift to the spirits

I found this horse mama watching over her baby pony and I felt moved to leave my baby's bundle here

My Millie Moo

Our group after this very meaningful trip to the Petroforms

*Hiking to beautiful waterfalls while racing the threatening weather

L to R: Savanna from Oregon, Krista from Saskatchewan, Kat from San Fransisco, Maria Elena from Yucatan, Mexico

Yoga Posing L to R: Kaiti from Manitoba, Me, Sai from Los Angeles

Emma from Vancouver and Julia from Frankfurt

Karin from Sweden and Jenna from Austin

Kaiti, Karin, Julia and Wardy from Texas

*Closing ceremony, honoring our beautiful babies, strong mamas and so much growth

My memento of Millie for our altar was a picture of my precious girl smiling.  She got so many sweet compliments from other mamas about her cute smile and it always warmed my heart!

The bittersweet moments watching the sun set as we prepare for our closing ceremony

Our beautiful altar to all 25 of our hearts in heaven

Writing our baby's names in the sand

Offering rose petals to travel the waters and winds

The entire group of mamas that were brought together by the loss of Landon and the loss of each precious baby.  We are part of a group that we never wanted to be a part of but a group that understands our rolls in this new life better than most.