Hello and Goodbye.

         Twice this year, we were given the gift of a new life, despite every effort of ours to prevent it. We knew it was all God’s plan, because it clearly wasn’t ours. We lost the first pregnancy at 7 weeks over Mother’s Day weekend. The pain felt almost too much to bear. Our hearts were ripped wide open. When we got pregnant again a few months later, we were mainly confused because we were the most consistent barrier method users there ever was. We felt a little less shocked because we knew this baby was just meant to be ours. We were supposed to have a fourth. We quickly, although cautiously, grew to love this baby; still holding our breaths every day until we hit the 8-week mark which I felt meant we were safe, since we’ve never lost a baby past 8-weeks before (5&7, but never 8). My belly quickly began to pop out which felt like a comforting reassurance that all was well, and this was going to be our rainbow baby. We weren’t sharing the news with anyone really, not even our kids, until we reached 12 weeks and felt the solace that came with hearing that heartbeat for the first time.

            The day finally came when I was 12 weeks, and I laid on my midwife’s bed (we’re on that level) while we eagerly searched for the heartbeat. Each minute that passed felt like a century. She tried so hard to find it for me, but just couldn’t get it. Naturally, I felt sick to my stomach, but tried to convince myself I just had an anterior placenta which was making it harder to pick up using the Doppler. I would go get an ultrasound and see the little babe squirm and hear the heartbeat and all would be well. As soon as I she squeezed the cold gel onto my belly and applied the ultrasound probe, I felt a sense of relief seeing how big and beautiful my baby looked up on the screen. It’s big head and face, long back, arms and legs filling up the screen made my heart skip a beat, but why wasn’t it moving? I remember seeing Jed on an ultrasound at 9 weeks, and couldn’t believe how much that tiny thing was squirming around. I quickly pushed that thought out of my mind as I stared at the screen. Any minute we were going to see and hear that heartbeat that I waited so long for. Any minute. That minute never came. Instead, the ultrasound technician’s face filled with sorrow and I heard the words I will never forget, “Unfortunately, I am unable to detect a heartbeat. I am so sorry.” I don’t know why I felt so shocked, because deep down I knew what she was going to say. All I could muster was, “Oh, okay” until I was alone in the room with my midwife. The wails and moans began to pour out of me from the depths of my soul. “Why?” was all I could manage to say. Why was this happening again? Why was I having to face this pain? AGAIN.

White roses from Nana to remind us of our babies in heaven.

            I soon learned that this was a pain that I hadn’t experienced before. Each pregnancy loss I’ve had has been so different, but this one… There is nothing quite like it. My body didn’t recognize the loss. I believe it didn’t want to. It was in denial, just like I had been laying on that ultrasound bed. Each day that passed, I swore my belly grew bigger. See, your uterus and sac will continue to grow just like it’s supposed to, even though the sweet life that filled it has been snuffed out. It was a painful reminder every day of the life that filled my womb. Our baby grew to be 11 weeks and 1 day when it’s heart stopped. Every day I battled in my mind with the idea of fast tracking the process so that I could “start healing” and wanting to keep this little babe in my belly where it was warm and safe and could possibly still feel my heartbeat. My now broken heart, which would let it know how much I truly did love it and wanted it. I ended up having a d&c scheduled for the 23^rd, two weeks after we found out our baby had passed. It felt like an eternity, but also scared me with how quick it was coming. After scheduling it, I quickly realized this was not what I wanted or needed. When I first found out, I thought there was no way I could see this baby leave my body. I wasn't strong enough. Every day that passed I knew a little bit more what I needed in order to begin healing. I needed to feel the pains of labor and hold my baby in my hand to feel like I was honoring this gift of the life we were given. I needed to know that my body had not betrayed me, and it still knew how to work just as it was designed to.

            Although it was the last thing I felt like doing, I prayed. I felt angry with God that He would allow this to happen twice now. Both pregnancies completely unexpected, and yet we were left to face this pain and heartbreak… twice. Within months of each other. I couldn’t wrap my head around it and I couldn’t understand why God would let this happen. I still don’t, and I don’t know if I ever will. I’ve been reminding myself that my God is the giver of life and not death, and this was not His plan for my baby. He weeps with me in my sorrow. He was the first embrace my baby ever felt, and that brings me some peace and comfort. I asked God that He would allow my body to bring our baby out into my hands on its own, in the serenity of our home. I prayed that I would be safe and there would be no complications.

            On October 19^th, 2018, at 13 weeks and 3 days gestation, I woke at 4:30 in the morning to what I thought was a gush of blood. I soon realized that it wasn’t blood, but my water which released. Moments later, my itty-bitty lime-sized baby was born right into my hand. In the quiet stillness of that morning while everyone slept, I held my baby for the first time outside of my womb. I had no pain or bleeding. I kind of lost track of time as I spent each moment relishing in the beauty and perfection of this tiny human. Our tiny baby boy. I soaked in his little face; eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and tried to imagine who he would have looked like. Would he have had his Mama’s eyes or his Daddy’s dark hair? I counted each of his tiny fingers and toes and sat in awe of how perfect he was. So small and SO perfect. I held his tiny hand on my index finger and dreamed of how it would have felt to have his hand wrapped tightly around my finger or to kiss his piggies. Would he think it was hilarious like his brothers and sister did when I’d sniff his toes and squeal, “Caca-Poochee”. I remembered how Joni's face lit up as we were sharing the heartbreaking news with them. All she heard was that there was a baby in Mommy's belly, which she had been wanting for so long. Hot tears of confusion quickly followed when it registered that the baby in Mommy's belly wasn't alive anymore. I thought about how I imagined our first embrace would feel like when a rush of oxytocin took me on that unexplainable “birth high”, holding him on my chest as he searches for the comfort of my breast. I so badly wanted to be able to comfort him like that, the only way I knew how to comfort all my babies, but I didn’t need to. He was already being held by the Comforter, and that thought comforted me. The labor pains began to kick in and my body took over to complete the job it had to do. I labored for a few hours in my bath tub. The contractions becoming closer and stronger, until finally it brought out the placenta.

"For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb." 

Psalm 139:13

            I felt so much peace and comfort being able to go through this mini birth and know that my baby was with me and his family. God answered my every prayer regarding how I wanted this part to go. In doing so, He reminded me that I am not forgotten. He still hears me. He still sees me. He still loves and cares for me and my precious baby boy. I am the only one to have laid eyes on him, and I feel like that is a special gift I was given. We plan to bury him with a tree in our yard so we have a new life to remind us of the one we lost. Chris and I decided to name him Shilo, meaning “to the One with whom it belongs”. And so it is. Our baby boy, Shilo Hope Latham, is with the One to whom he belongs.

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Thanksgiving 2013

I'm going to attempt to update this blog with our holiday season. It was Joni's first Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year/1st Birthday so I definitely want to document all these things. It's been a busy few months to say the least!

This Thanksgiving we stayed local which is always nice not having to battle through traffic going out to Orange County to see my family. We ate cinnamon rolls and watched the Thanksgiving Day Parade, cooked a few dishes and headed over to my in laws for dinner with the Latham/Vasquez family. I made a craft for the kids to do together and we had a sweet time making memories as a family.

Joni Leona Grace: When We Met

So I am going to attempt to clear my frazzled mom brain for a little bit to write about one of my favorite days ever. The day we met our sweet baby girl.

So I guess I will start in the very beginning. My husband comes from a long line of boys. All boys. At least three generations straight of boys. My father in law's father was one of six boys, he went on to have two boys, one of which was my father in law, who then went on to have three boys. So basically I knew when I married Chris that we'd most likely have all boys. I was perfectly okay with that and got pretty comfortable with the whole stinky dirty rough boy routine after having our two. When Cruz was probably about a year and a half old I just got this strong desire in my heart to have a daughter which was very new to me and unexpected. One day I was talking to a friend of ours from church who raised four children: three boys, and one girl. She told me that after she had her three boys and was told she'd never have anymore children, she prayed to God and told Him the desires of her heart to have a daughter. Not long after that, they welcomed their baby girl. That day I told God about my desire to have a daughter and prayed that if it was His will, that He would someday (not anytime in the near future) bless us with a daughter. Shortly after that, despite every effort to not get pregnant, we found out we were in fact expecting another lil Latham. Immediately when I found out I was pregnant I thought it must be a girl, but that thought quickly disappeared when I thought of the incredible odds that were against us.

We decided to keep the sex of the baby a surprise which was the best decision ever. We also planned for an unassisted homebirth for this baby as long as I had another healthy no risk pregnancy like the first two. My due date was somewhere between December 31st and January 3rd. We were of course hoping for a 2012 baby to be able to get that extra tax break. Ha.

 New Year's Eve came around and giving birth was the last thing on my mind with a house full of sick people. Chris was up most of the night with a high fever. It was awful. 7:00am rolls around and Chris wakes me up to tell me his fever finally broke and we go back to sleep since our boys rarely ever sleep past 7:00 am! A few minutes later, I felt my first contraction. The week prior I had been having random contractions so I blew this one off as well. They were only coming a few every hour until around 9:00am after we ate and cleaned up breakfast. I told Chris I might be in labor and he got busy cleaning the house, blowing up the birthing tub, and getting the boys squared away for the day just in case. Around 10:30 I was really having to focus through each contraction and they were now about 6-8 minutes apart. I decided I'd better give our family and friends who were coming over to help a heads up. So I sent out the text, "I think this is it, but if it's not don't hate me!"

My two friends and parents arrived at 11:15 as Chris was filling up the tub for me. With Cruz's help of course. The warm water felt so amazing. I was leaned over the side of the tub majority of the time in the tub. No other positions felt as good. My friend, Lenna, was the master of lower back massaging during each contraction. She also poured warm water on my back that was also just delightful. My friend, Emily, the master of photography, was making me crack up in between contractions and at some points it seemed like we were all just hanging out while I'm half naked in a pool in my bedroom. Not weird at all.

Excited Daddy

My Mom prayed over me and was amazingly helpful

Kisses from my boys

Cruz tried taking his chonies off to come "swim" with Mama. 

My poor sick hubby was so supportive and calming to me

Laughing, having a grand ole time

Anywho, my contractions stayed about 4-5 minutes apart up until about 12:30 when they got to 3-4 minutes apart and were much more intense. At this point I didn't really think anything or anyone was very funny anymore and I remember saying, "Actually Cruz's labor sounds prettys good right about now." (He came in 20 minutes total. A crazy manic 20 minutes might I add.) My water broke at 12:46 which felt gloooooorious.

My first pushing contraction came at 12:59 at which point the baby's head was born. At this point I sat back and reclined against the back of the tub and felt baby's head to see if baby was still in the posterior position like it had been the day before. Baby came out anterior! Another reason chiropractors are the bomb! Chris even reached down and felt the baby's head, which I didn't even realize until watching the video later. So proud of that weak-stomached man of mine.

I gave another push and out came baby into the warm water. We cleaned the baby off for a minute and I brought her up to my chest and just rejoiced over our newest blessing. I was so happy to have my baby in my arms that I forgot to look to see if we had another boy or a girl. Chris kept saying, "Is it a boy or girl? Boy or girl?!" He waited 9+ months, what's another two minutes?

I lifted baby up and peeked down and saw we had ourselves a baby girl! My heart was overwhelmed with joy. This baby girl was the answer to my prayer. I cried like I never cried before. 

                                     

 Our boys came in just moments later and were so mesmerized by their baby sister. Again, they tried to take their chonies off and get in the tub. Even with delicious birthy matter in it. Yum.    

 We moved onto the bed after a good half hour of gazing into eachother's eyes. Seriously, this girl gave maybe one little yelp and that was it. She was perfectly at peace and so content in my arms. It's the closest to heaven one can ever be. Jedidiah helped Daddy cut the cord and the five of us cuddled together in our bed. Another favorite part of the whole experience; not having to leave my big babies at home.

  

My sweet Jedidiah lifting his arms and saying, "Halleluiah"

her first smile

This whole experience made me love my husband even more for supporting my desire to bring our baby into the world how I wanted. Even if that meant it just being us with no medical help or interventions. He was amazing. I love him. 

 Daddy got to weigh her in the super sweet "fish scale" (as I like to call it) and she came in at a whoppin' 8 pounds even. Exactly the same as her brothers. 

 I did her newborn exam. Everything checked out just perfect. 

 Jedidiah couldn't wait to do skin-to-skin with his baby. 

Joni Leona Grace

January 1st, 2013 1:00pm

I loved everything about this birth and would do it a million times over again. We named her Joni Leona Grace. Joan was my husband's grandmother; everyone called her Joannie. Leona was my Nana's middle name. Grace is just the greatest thing ever, so we tossed that in there as well.

She is the greatest surprise that's ever happened to our family and we feel so blessed we were able to give her the most incredible start to her life.