Ephesians 3:18

November 29, 2012:  Whole day is a blur to me now, the only thing I remember is that that night before going to bed I go to the bathroom.  I find that I am spotting.  Right away I begin to panic.  I quickly tell my husband and I know he sees my fear.  He tries to reassure me and tells me "everything is going to be OK."  My mind is racing, I am in NO pain except the headaches still.  So we agree that if in the morning I am still spotting I will go to the doctor.   I toss and turn all night.  I pray that our baby is OK.  I lay hands on my stomach as I have each night, and fall asleep praying for my baby.

November 30, 2012:  I wake up and dash to the bathroom to check if the bleeding has stopped.  YES!!! There is no sign of any spotting - none, zip, zilch, nada.  Thank God!!!!  My husband asks me right away when he hears me come out of the restroom and I tell him I am OK. I know we are both relieved.  I get dressed and ready to drive to my sister's house to pick up my nephew.  Today is the day my nephew will begin spray painting the artwork in the youth ministry room.  I am so excited, I have been envisioning this day for years.  I have a ton of neon color spray paint in my trunk and  think to myself I wonder if I could get in trouble for having this in my trunk and driving in to the city?"  Can't wait to get started. After picking up my nephew, I get a call from my husband that he wants me to pick him up too so I drive back to the house to get him.  We kiss our little munchkin (Matthew) on his chubby cheeks (he is almost 6 month old now) and head out to church.

We begin working immediately.  My husband begins to work on setting up the wall where the projector will be located and my nephew and I begin discussing concepts.  Once the concepts have been sketched up, my nephew begins to spray paint, immediately my husband tells me I should not stay in the room due to my condition. Keeping in mind what happened last night (spotting) I agree to stay clear.  The remainder of the day I go back and forth into the room to see and guide my nephew with the vision in mind.  After hours of working on one wall my nephew comes to me and says you mentioned you wanted me to write something on the wall?  I tell him yes, but I was thinking that would be in a different wall, but when I walk over to the room and see the work I understand why it fits there.  I give him Ephesians 3:18 "May you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high and how deep his love is."  I find myself reading and re-reading this over and over.  I tell myself there is no way I can begin to understand why God's love is so profound.  As we head out for the day, I read this one more time.

I head out to the city with my youngest daughter and nephew to drop him off.  The plan is to head out to the "Unity Service" right after.  As usual I take the I 90/94, as we are heading there I talk to my nephew about the blessings of God.  I tell him, how I will need to get a bigger car soon.  He tells me, if I decide to sell mine to let him know.  After dropping him off, I notice I am cutting it close to the start of Service, but I am relieved knowing I am already in the city and I don't have far to travel.  It is about 6:40 P.M as I head back to I 90/94.

As I head towards at the church, my daughter and I are talking in the car.  I see the Irving Park exit and plan on taking it, I get involved in our conversation and her questions, that I accidentally miss my exit.  I think to myself "no biggie, I'll just take the next exit." As I merge onto the Kostner exit lane I begin to apply the break, but my car doesn't it feels like it is slowing down. I repeatedly press the break, to no avail.  The car is not slowing down.  Up ahead I see a red light for me and traffic flowing.  I now slam my foot on the break, still no luck.  I do this several times, the car still keep going. I think to myself "this is something from a movie."  At one point I second guess myself and think maybe I am pressing the gas pedal instead of the break, so I press the "other" pedal but the car accelerates even more! So I go back to pressing the break pedal with all my might!

The car has naturally, slowed down a bit but I am still traveling at about 45-50 mph.  I tell my daughter "the car is not stopping, make sure you have your seat belt on and grab on tight",  and she yells back "I'm scared mom, what should I do" I say to her "Pray baby girl, pray."  As I get closer and closer to the traffic flowing through in front of me and the red light up ahead, I begin to say out loud over and over again "Clear the way God, clear the way."  At about 20 feet from impact into the flowing traffic my only instinct is to throw the car into Park.  I tell my daughter "Here we go" and I think "God, make a way."  I feel the car swerve and tires screech but we make it about 5 feet before hitting a white vehicle going across.  The car still seems to be revving on its own even though it is in Park.  I then turn off the car and wait for a couple minutes.  I am shaking from head to toe.  I check on my daughter and in a low voice she says "I'm ok mom".  I say 'Thank you God, Thank you"  a few times.

I turn the car back on (I am in the middle of the expressway exit) and the car quickly begins to rev up again. I tell my daughter I just gotta move it out of the way and get closer to where I can call your dad.  I end up having to throw the car back into Park 2 more times, but by the Grace of God, the car is out of the way and I call my husband.  I explain everything to him and he rushes over (he was already at the church where I was suppose to meet him).   While I wait for him, I get down by the car pedals and push on both the accelerator and the break (with both hands).  My daughter says "Mom, what are you doing?" I explain to her "I am just checking something" I take the carpet out and make sure there is nothing underneath the break to prevent me for going down when pressed, nothing...

My husband arrives and I explain to him how the car will rev up on its own when he turns it on, and that as soon as he puts in drive it will take off.  From a distance I see him, get in the car, turn it on,  and sure enough I hear the car rev up, then suddenly when he presses the accelerator the car goes back to normal.  The revving stops, the breaks work, the car is "fine."

We head towards the church where our youth group is waiting for us.  I praise God even more that evening for protecting my daughter, my baby and I in what could have been a hideous accident.  There is no explanation as to why this happened or how it suddenly stopped revving   My husband explains you just needed to press the gas pedal, but I know this is not true. I did all of that.  That did not work when I did it.

All through out the day I keep asking God to keep my baby safe.  Every time I use the bathroom I pray there is no bleeding (and there isn't-none for the entire day).  As the day progresses and I think about our day tomorrow I get excited all over again.  I think about how we were not planning to have another child, but I recognize that this was God's plan. I think about if its a girl, I will begin shopping right away, I've already seen a dress that I really want.  If it's a boy we will be OK for a while, since I have been holding on to ALL of Matthew's clothes.  I think about how all this started with me freaking out and where I am today.  

I am so grateful to God.   I come to understand that what it is to have your plans that we  push  and forget that God knows what is best for us.  I think about how it will be so much fun and will def be a challenge to have two small children, one teenager and a preteen.  I get excited and nervous at the thought.  At this point I don't even care if we are all sandwiched in our (what now seems to be getting smaller and smaller) home.  God will make a way, he always does.  I don't know where we will end up in ministry, but I tell myself it's ALL in God's hands.  We have always been taught to have our hands "open" in ministry and be ready to pass on the baton. 

Throughout the day I think of the scripture on the wall  "May you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high and how deep his love is." Eph 3:18 I think to myself God I know you love me, but I still believe I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of really understanding how great your love is.  I want to know more and more of this love God. 

That night I  make sure our stuff is ready to go, so we will be on time for our appointment.  Can't help but smile.  I fall asleep thanking God over and over for our safety.  For clearing the way, for stopping the car (not once but three times), for helping me keeping it together and not panicking.  God is good.  Yes, His love is so much wider, longer, higher and deeper than I could ever understand. 

What is Happening?

November 11, 2012 - My husband returned from New Jersey.  I could tell that the Lord had used him and rest of the men in a powerful way.  I saw pictures of them and hundreds of others, helping those that had gone through the storm. The body of Christ was alive in them.  I recall two things when he came back.  One Matthew was overly excited. He had just turned 7 months, how quickly time was flying.

The other thing I recall was that my husband looked at me and said "turn around, I want to see your stomach"  when I did he smiled and said "Yeah baby, we are having another boy."  I playfully argued back with him "Nope, it's a girl." He rubbed my stomach and then told Matthew.  "You are going to have a baby brother, I don't care what your momma says."

While watching TV, this evening  I felt a strong flutter.  "There you are"  I told my baby and rubbed my stomach. Shortly after Matthew woke up from his nap.  Thoughts of how we would handle both infants crossed my mind.  When I saw Matthew's face lite up with a smile I thought, it's going to be a joy to have two little ones running around.

November 12-25, 2012 (approximate dates):  In the next few days I began getting daily headaches.  As the days passed they seemed to worsened.  My phone App informed me that at 15-16 weeks expectant mothers can get headaches due to the increase of blood. Morning sickness was almost completely gone. I could eat whatever I wanted on most days and be okay, the only thing that was bugging me were these headaches and lack of energy.

My husband and I began rethinking names.  I had an urgency to find a name.  All the names we both came up with, one or the other disagreed on it.  The girls also mentioned a few, and we could not agree on any of them either. My husband then says have you thought about who the "Godparent's" will be.  "Oh, No!!" I responded.  "That in itself is going to be another long topic".

November 22, 2012- Thanksgiving day.  Had a great time with the family.  Everyone is talking about how big I am already.  My mother in law even asked me, "are you sure you only having one baby?".  There was ONE awkward moment for me, my nephew's girlfriend was there.  We were both suppose to be pregnant at the same time.  But now she wasn't and I was.  I felt bad for her, I tried staying out of her way so she would not be reminded.  I prayed for her and asked God to give her peace. I took one Tylenol to help with the headache and was able to enjoy the rest of the evening.

That night I briefly mentioned to my husband the look on K's face when I walked in.  I was very grateful at that moment to still have my baby.  I was thankful that I was blessed to be able to "carry" a child.

November 24, 2012 - I missed my appointment.  Ugh, can't believe I missed it.  Totally bummed out and disappointed.  God only knows when I will be able to reschedule my appointment for.  I told my husband I would call first thing on Monday to re-schedule.

November 25, 2012- After church someone (can't remember who till this day) says to me, "you look great".  "Awe, thanks" I respond.  They say to me again, "yeah, you REALLY look great, nothing like with Matthew." I respond, "yeah, I know, I feel totally different too, i don't even feel pregnant."

At then end of the week (according to my phone app) I will be 17 weeks!! My husband and I decide it's time to call First Peek.  We want to to find out once and for all, if we were having a a girl or boy.  My husband then mentions to me that he wants to do a photo shoot where we reveal the sex of the baby on Christmas cards for the family. We mention the idea to our sitter (someone will need to photograph us) and she loves it.I will be scheduling that appointment this week.

November 26, 2012- I called the doctor's office and rescheduled, next appointment is not available until   almost mid December. Ugh!

I then go online to schedule the appointment for First Peek.  I confirm with my husband for Sat, Dec 1st. Due to a core leader's meeting at church at 10:00 a.m. I schedule the appointment for 8:30 a.m. We decide we will not mention to the girls where we are going, we will just surprise them on Saturday morning (they got to go with us to with Matthew, and loved it, so we knew they would be thrilled again).

The urgency of finding a name was getting stronger and stronger, i figured it was because we would see the baby in 5 days again.  Had not felt another flutter, but I did not worry. I remembered I did not feel Krystal until much later.

November 27, 2012-While at lunch I surfed through the internet for baby names (again).  After some time Iran into the name KATERINA.  Fell in love with it.  Now if only my husband would like it.  That evening I presented the name to my husband and after him saying it out loud a few times.  He looked at me and said "OK" I like it, it's done. KATERINA....if it's a girl.  We tried agreeing in on boys name.  Again to no avail. I mentioned the name Mark, he was't crazy about it, but did not dismiss it either.  Good we are closer now.

Lying on my bed one night, I begin to wonder. "What is happening?"  I don't recall ever having these many headaches with my other pregnancies. I rub my stomach as usual. I lay my hands again on my stomach and hope that maybe tonight I will get to feel the baby move.  In just a few more days I will see you again. 

I thank God for his Grace and Mercy and as usual pray for my family, my friends, the youth and the lost.  I specifically find myself praying to God about this child as thoughts of the last ultrasound pop into my head. "No weapon formed against you will prosper." 

God you are in control of everything pertaining to us.  Help us raise our children in a way that it will be pleasing to you.  Guide us and direct us in the big and the small, in and out of our homes.   I pray for K and her situation and ask God to forgive all us for at one time or another destroying instead of building, resenting instead of forgiving, acting on our own instead of doing His will, doubting instead of trusting.