18 years ago today ~ you lit up our life ~ you continue to do so ~ whether being funny, sarcastic, sensitive or crazy ~ you have so many sides that sometimes I think there are two of you!

There is the nerdy book-side of you that is happy to read anything from the Magic Tree House Books to Charles Dickens. Then there is the you that plays on the floor with your sister and makes her face light up. There’s the you that writes crazy  songs about Frying Men and there’s the you that is quick with a hug when someone seems down.

There is the over achiever in you that likes to graduate early from school and make sure all things are lined up correctly even if that is just the empty coke cans you put in the kitchen but don’t quite get them into the trash. There’s the you that doesn’t study for hardly anything because you don’t really have to (which is annoying).

There is the you that loves classical music but also loves Pink Floyd. Then there is the you who loves Christmas music and knows almost all the Conway Twitty songs word for word.

There is the you that wants to travel the world and see everything and the you that loves to stay holed up in your room for hours on end.  There’s the you that loves with your whole heart and the you that doesn’t care to speak you mind when you believe in something.

I love all of these parts of you and they make you the best son a mom could ask for. So today, you are an adult. You can buy cigarettes and playboy magazines, lottery tickets and go to clubs. Thankfully, because of who you are, you won’t do any of those things and I love who you’ve been, who you are, and who you are becoming.

These gifts, these traits will take you far because you know who you are, you know what you believe and you won’t be swayed from what is the right path for your travels. It has been my honor to even have fostered any of these traits in you these last 18 years and I love you! It is my prayer that you have the best year ever and that you continue to grow in the grace and mercy of God and be the best adult Logan you can be.

Mom

Just because I’ve not been on top of my blogging game lately doesn’t mean we’ve stopped taking pictures or enjoying all the new things Cooper does on a daily basis. It is so hard to believe that in less than one month she will be one.  As she sits beside me jumping up and down and going from laughter to tears and back, I realize just how blessed we are with this fiesty, funny, emotion-filled, cuddler that brightens every single day of our lives.

Here are her 10/11 months Photos.

It seems like every day Cooper does something new. Like seriously, she can be throwing a fit with tears streaming down her face and then laughing like two seconds later. This child is really coming into her own and she is very opinionated.

Here are the last two months in pictures ~ Christmas, New Years and so much more. She now crawls everywhere and pulls up on everything. She is over 20 lbs now and can say Mama, Dada and Bye Bye ~ she says other stuff that only she can understand.

She would rather eat on her own than let you help her so meal time is always interesting. She still sleeps about 10-12 hours per night but her day time naps are few and far between.

As you can see, we’ve been pretty busy and now it’s time to plan for my birthday party coming up very soon!

Hope you’ve enjoyed catching up with us!

Shelly

I’m behind on this. I would like to say it’s because we had our 9 month check up and I wanted to update her stats with you. That’s partially true but it’s also true that I am just behind.

Today we had our 9 month check up and she is doing amazing and hitting the marks that make the doctor happy, especially with her being 4 weeks early.

Weight ~ 19lb. 3.8 oz

Height ~ 27.5 inches tall

We’ve had a busy month and it seems like she gains leaps and bounds each month on the things she is interested in and how much she grows:

• She now will go forward and backward in her walker
• She continues to love both baths and showers
• She would rather eat food than drink a bottle and at times will drink out of a cup
• Favorite foods are banana puffs but she doesnt really care for the yogurt bites.
• She got two teeth, the two bottom front within days of each other
• Table foods that Cooper has enjoyed this month include: french fries, green beans, mashed potatoes, biscuits, toast, oatmeal, rice, bananas, apples, banana pudding, chocolate pie, cream corn and cheerios.

Cooper likes to “ride dirty” ~ she acts crazy when you put her in her carseat or a buggy at the store. Here is a glimpse of her craziness.

We had our first visit with Santa and it went really well. She was intrigued with him and really took some good pictures.

This month was Cooper’s first thanksgiving and she spent equal time with my family and Brad’s family. Here are some picture of her and her cousin Portlin, He is 3 months younger than her but you can’t tell because he is a big guy.

We had our annual Ugly Christmas sweater party on Dec 7th and Cooper was surrounded by her her friends Aiden and Evie. Here are the three cutest ugliest sweater participants.

Cooper also had her pictures done with Ms. Katie again and it was so much fun! We did our usual poses and then we did some super cute Christmas pictures as well as some of all three of us. Katie says that the pictures turned out so well that she is having a hard time choosing which ones to edit. Here is a sample of the ones she took and have showed us so far.

Cooper loves to be read to and a few weeks ago this was her and her daddy at Red Lobster reading a new book.

and while I get behind and I get busy and don’t post like I should, everyone knows that this little girls is definitely. . . . . .

This day has been building in me for a while, and by a while I mean about 33 years. 

My mom walked out the door to take a deposit to the bank.  On a good day, I was outside playing and would ask to go with her and usually get told no, I understand why. Can you imagine taking 5-7 year old Shelly anywhere and not wanting to beat me? Yeah, me either. Anyways, those were the days that I would ride my bike around the block and wait for her Blue Capri to pull back in the driveway. That was back in the days where I rode in the front seat standing up all around town until I was so tall my head touched the ceiling. It’s a miracle I wasn’t killed. Those were days when I was home free.

Those were the days I wasn’t molested.

But many days, I was in my room playing with some Fisher Price toy.  It was like a village because I had every toy, there was the house with the family and the playground and carousel they would visit. They might fall down and take a trip to the hospital, and lay on a plastic white gurney that had actual Velcro straps. Then the nurse with the big plastic red cross on her cap nursed the wound. If it was  pretty day, maybe they would get in the airplane and visit some far away place and ride on the Ferris Wheel. That’s  where I wanted to go on those days, far far away.

On those days, it was  a game of cat and mouse, a game of whether I could get to this door before this lock was put on it. I can tell you every single detail about this lock and door and only took a picture because it’s hard to really explain how just below the lock there is that darker wood and how there are  a few niches knocked out of the door frame by who knows what but that door is etched in my mind and forever seared with the hopes of getting to the other side before the chain slid on.

On those days, I was molested.

Those days that the chain beat me I knew it was time to play with my granddad. That’s what he called it, playing. What 5 year old doesn’t like to play, right? What 5 year old is defiant in all aspects of her daily life but plays these games and doesn’t tell. This one did and it changed her for life. The details of these dark days are not something I will put here, they are in my mind and I can see them as clear as yesterday. That is part of the secret, I’ve always said I don’t remember the details, but I do. There are things that I haven’t voiced to one soul in those 33 years. Things my eye can see in a second, textures that my hands believe are real in this moment, things I push back so far that sometimes I think that they are just a part of my imagination, but deep down I know, I know. Not all of them, but most I remember. I remember. I remember.

I’ve always considered myself to be open and forthright about being molested as a child. Like it was something that happened to someone else. A story I would relay when I was connecting with someone to let them know I felt their pain. I realize now, that I’ve separated myself from feeling my feelings about what happened.

At a recent family event, we began to speak candidly about what had happened and for the first time, it made me uncomfortable. It seemed like for the first time we were talking about me, about my life and that was pretty uneasy for me. I weaved myself in and out of the conversation, moving around the room to ‘check on cooper’ or get a refill on my drink. It was too much for me and honestly, that surprised me. The girl who talks about abuse like it’s a bad haircut that you had to live with for a few months was gone and in her place was me, raw and emotional but keeping that smile slapped on all the same.

The last few weeks have been building to this but it still took me by surprise that this is where my demons would rise. That this is where I would face them head on. I expected some church service about putting your past in the past to happen and me crying in the altar and giving it to Jesus ‘one last time’ so that I could be free of it all. I didn’t expect my aunt to say “so what happened, I never knew”. There you are, deer in the head lights wondering what you should say, what is crowd appropriate, thinking all the while you thought your whole family knew the sordid details and just pretended it didn’t happen. The urge to run from the room crying was replaced by saying to myself that this is the place and the time to let your heart heal. To share what you can and let someone else in so that’s what we did, my cousin and I. Mainly her, which is weird because I am the talker but that’s what I needed, to just be a part of it and hear it about me and be acknowledged that it was wrong and that we were loved.

So now, I feel like I can start to move forward but I still have my moments.

There are moments that I am still angry for that girl, whose family swept it under the rug by going to family counseling and moving on as if life were  hunky dory.

As a mother, I am outraged at the thought of someone doing that to my child and them still having breath in their body, let alone still living in the same house with said abuser.

There are moments when forgiveness bursts within in me and I realize that my abuser was abused and thankful the pattern stopped there and that I didn’t become an abuser.

There are moments that I feel so badly for my mother because I know she regretted then and still does today that she made the choices she made.

There are moments that I don’t really care how she feels and only care about my damaged emotions and how it has taken me years to feel half way put back together.

There are moments when I hold Cooper and look into those blue eyes and wonder why on this earth people can be so cold and callous toward a child and sleep at night.

These are the moments when I am glad that this world is not my home.

These are the moments when I thank God He kept me through it all, that he gave me a husband who loves me through my emotional messes and never gives up on me.

Why here, Why now?

Why tell this? Who really cares after all these years? Normally I would say (and mean it) that I am doing it show others there is hope and freedom after abuse. Normally I would say that everything happens so you can help others through their problems. While all that is true and noble, that is not why I’m doing this today. I want to face these demons and let them know that they don’t control me anymore. Through prayer, faith and the strength of my family I am free and this is my final note to make it know, I AM FREE. The chain on this door will never ever hold me back again, it will never keep me from being free.

This is how the door will always look in my mind, and you can take that to the bank.

Last month was a busy one ~ and mainly you are going to see our vacation photos because although it was only for a week, we packed as much as we could into it. This is as much a family blog today as an 8 month blog for Cooper. Cooper is doing new things every day. Sitting up better, rolling to where she wants to go, eating more food than I think is possible for her little body. She is still such a good girl unless she is tired, hungry or dirty.  For that, we are very thankful. With as many photos as I had, I didnt really have the time to blog on each photo so I will just give a bit of information about each one. This one needs no introduction though:

We went to California Oct 13th -20th and we were able to spend some much needed time together as a family. We left on Saturday afternoon and headed out west. Here are some pictures from before and on flight. By the time we got to our room that night, we were spent and no more photos were wanted and or needed. Cooper was an awesome traveler, it was just a long way and the rental car took forever and then we had over an hour to travel after we actually got our car to make it into where we stayed in Santa Ana, California.

Sunday morning we slept in a bit and got our luggage arranged a bit better and headed to  Huntington Beach to meet some old friends and some new ones. We Took family photos on the beach and then got in some more comfy clothes and hung out for a while there. It was a cool day so we kept Cooper pretty bundled up. We were able to spend some time with the West’s and with Regina and Morgan, all old friends from Tennessee we haven’t seen in years. We also met some new friends and Caitlin went Boogie Boarding with them.

Here are a sample of our family pics:

And here are some of Cooper’s first experience with the ocean. She loved looking at the waves and the seagulls were facinating to her. But, she hated having her toes in the sand or ocean. . . and she made that clear. LOL

After spending much of the day at Huntington Beach, we took the scenic route up Pacific Coastal Highway to Santa Monica Pier. We ate dinner at Bubba Gumps and then we took Cooper on the Ferris Wheel. She loved looking at all the lights but she was asleep way before we got to the car. The day had wore her out.

Monday we took the kids to Holly wood and honestly, it was disappointing for them and us. We thought it would be neat for them to see the walk of stars and all the touristy things but it was dirty and hot and street hawkers (not walkers) were everywhere. We did manage to get Cooper a cute sun hat though and we ate some awesome hamburgers at a little hamburger place there.

Tuesday morning was family day and we had the best time with all three kids. We started the day in San Diego. We ate lunch on the beach at Kono’s and headed over to Balboa Park. These pictures are of Balboa Park.

After Balboa Park we went to LaJolla Beach to let the big kids look for sealife in the tide pools. Here is my favorite picture of Cooper mesmerized by the sand and sea an surf coming in.

We left LaJolla and started the scenic route back to Santa Ana as the sun began to set. We stopped at a beach side restaurant and watched the sun set as we ate dinner and these pictures were made right after the sun set.

Wednesday morning we had to take Caitlin and Logan back to the airport and then we just chilled after we got back. Logan does such a good job with photographing Cooper in her own elements. He took these series in the car seat on the way to the airport on Wednesday.

We did a little shopping on Thursday and went to eat dinner with our friends, Shane and Dana. They live in the High Desert area and it has a beauty quite different from the beaches. There are mountains everywhere and it is so gorgeous.

Friday was our last ‘day’ so we decided to head to one more beach. We went to Balboa Island and took a ferry over to a small island with very cute shops and restuarants. Cooper had on her sun hat as it was windy but very hot. Here she is modeling it for me:

After that, we headed for our final sunset in California and what a pretty one it was, I am thankful for the family time we had there and the memories that we made. Here’s one last look:

We got home and discovered that while we were gone, it had gotten cold. We had to get a hat for Cooper and on the first blustery day, she was sporting it for some super cute pictures. These pictures show she is not always into having her photo taken:

Knowing how stressed  I was from all the running we did this month, my mom took mercy on me and came and stayed with us for a week. She did laundry and we went through all of Cooper’s clothes and packed up what is too small. We headed to Murfreesboro for lunch with Caitlin and to see her new apartment.

Finally, we enjoyed Cooper’s first Halloween at the Green Hills mall. Nichole, who graciously provided Cooper with this adorable costume, went along to see her enjoy it. She smiled at all the attention she got and we all ate her candy, not gonna lie about it.

October was crazy busy and November has not slowed us down any at all, so I am going to try and do better about taking notes through the month so I wont be behind on my blog at the turn of the month. I can’t wait to share with you pictures from Cooper’s first Thanksgiving and of special time spent with friends and family. Until next month. . . .

This month has flown by ~ it is sad that Cooper is now closer to being a year old then being a baby. The rest of this year is going to be filled with so much business with vacation in October and then the holidays in November and December so I can’t imagine how fast these next five months will fly by.

Here she is, pretty as she can be, getting her 7 month picture done

There are so many new things that Cooper experienced this month. She sat in a buggy at the grocery store and sits up pretty much unassisted. Cooper still has no interest whatsoever in tummy-time and will let you know it is not where she chooses to be.

This month Cooper learned to push her walker backwards and can reach with both hands for anything she wants.

Cooper now reaches for someone she wants and whines for them to take her.

We had Katie Lecher take Cooper’s six month pictures and here are a few sneak peeks she has sent to us already. We also had family pictures made that same day. Wearing sweaters on a hot day in front of the fire place was a challenge but it’ll look good on the Christmas card, right?

Cooper had a cat scan to make sure the bones in her brain were fusing correctly and the results came back that everything was fine. When she came out of sedation she was drunk for about five minutes and she would switch from laughing to crying in a matter of minutes. This is us right as she was put to sleep.

We went to Wendell Smith’s for lunch with Uncle Chris and Aunt Leigh and Cooper sat in the high chair for almost the whole meal ~ she ate mashed potatoes and gravy and really enjoyed it.

We also got to spend some time with Cooper’s friend Evie ~ remember the picture from when they were about three months old? Well here they are today, Cooper has finally caught up with her as far as size goes.

Cooper spent three nights away from home with Aunt Heather and the girls in Kentucky. She came back much spoiled and quite loved.

This past weekend Daddy married Lauren and Johnathan, two of our Eklipse kids. Here is Cooper all dressed up and later in her PJ’s. She danced with Uncle Gus and will all the Eklipse girls.

We are headed out to California for vacation in four days so we will have lots to talk about next month. See you then!

I’m a few days late documenting Cooper’s 6 month for several reasons. I’ve had computer problems and she’s not slept very much since last Wednesday. All of a sudden, she no longer sleeps all night. We are trying to figure it out so hopefully we will all get back to a full nights sleep.

Another thing that held me up was that I wanted to do a 1 – 6 month photo and a few photos I had to really search for. But here she is, each month. It is amazing how much she’s grown in six months.

Cooper had her 6 month check up  on Friday and she’s grown so much ~ she is now 17 Lbs and 25 inches long. She is now in the 75th percentile and doing awesome. She is hitting all her developmental milestones right on track even though she was 4 weeks early.

This month had a lot of first for Cooper. She traveled to Kentucky with Logan and Caitlin and spent the night with her Nana for her first night away from home. She got her ears pierced and she attended her first Kari Jobe concert.

Nana came and spent four days with us and she spoiled Cooper and Mommy alike. All the laundry was done and the house was clean and the baby was loved on, all in all, a really great visit.  Gran Gran, Maude, Aunt Leigh and Uncle Chris came down and visited and we went to dinner at Jim and Nicks. You love your family so much and they love you too.

Speaking of being loved, here are some pictures of some of the people who love you so much! You sure do enjoy being with them.

You have discovered that your new best friend is your stuffed monkey. Here are some pictures of Cooper and her new love.

Lastly, as the month winded down, we got some great pictures of you on your actual 6 month birtday. You are 1/2 a year old. You are closer to being 1 years old every day and I wonder where time has went. I stood by your crib the other night, Cooper, and I cried as I looked at your sweet face as you slept. God has blessed us so much and I don’t want to take one day for granted. I love you sweet baby.

That warm day in May the boulevard was not very crowded as I drove up and down looking for my next target. Being in outside sales is tough, and being new is even tougher. You don’t have a list of monthly regulars to draw on and you hope to land a new business before some one else does. It’s the game and that’s how it’s played.

The only advantage to being a girl in sales is sometimes when your shirt is cut a little lower or that extra button is undone, at least the manager will talk to you. This of course, doesn’t mean he will buy from you either but at least he’s listening, or pretending to. On this day I chose a cute white sweater with a keyhole neckline and some navy pinstriped pants. I’m telling you, it matters.

As I passed the Nissan Place a bright red, white and blue sign caught my eye on the left hand side. BINGO was spelled out across the old building but being I’d lived here my whole life, I knew it was something recent. Passing it up, I made a quick UTurn by Jade Palace  and headed back to the BINGO sign.

Looking in the mirror and making sure my make up was right, I fought back some tears. Going through a divorce is hard, my kids were scared and so was I. This job meant a lot and making some sales meant even more. The last thirteen years of my life were gone and now I was starting over, into a world where I had never lived without either my parents or my husband. I was 30 years old but I may as well have been 17, figuring out how to navigate through life.

I pushed back those tears and adjusted my mirror back. I got out of the car and put on a smile, there were sales to be made and bingo halls made lots of money, right? They needed our demographic of listeners, the country music lovers of the world played bingo, didn’t they?

As I walked through the door, there sat the person we sales people rarely see, the illusive owner. For a salesperson, that’s money. You don’t have to hope the manager shows him your special of the month and you may get to interview him and really get a good feel for the business. I rubbed my hands on my pinstriped navy blue pants to make sure they weren’t clammy and walked on up to the table.

Jade Palace chicken fried rice wafted over and although I hated Chinese I just smiled and introduced myself and he asked me to sit. We talked about Bingo Halls and radio and demographics and how I didn’t look old enough to have an 11 year old. He made me laugh and was very open to me making a spec spot for his business.

I wanted it to be just right, the spec spot; I put in all the highlights we had discussed. I made sure the music was just right and that in that 30 seconds, the listener would know they had to visit his bingo hall versus the others that decorated that side of town. I watched his face as he listened to the spot and I could tell he was impressed. So much so, he would fill out an application for credit and think about running it on our new station that would debut the following month.

Being the keen salesperson I was, I went through the application with him and noticed we had the same email carrier. This was mentioned in small talk and I closed out the visit by letting him know I would submit the application and be in touch. I felt pretty good about it because I felt that if this drew response, this would be one of my first regular accounts I had scored on my own. This would prove I could make it on my own, I could do this thing.

Weeks went by and I continued to visit the client, it always seemed to be bad timing financially or not a good fit for what they were looking to do but it was always a good time. There was always laughter and jokes and I never left there feeling like I was defeated because there wasn’t a purchase. I was patient, and knew I would land the client at some point.

The client, on the other hand, had other ideas. He wasn’t interested in radio, he was interested in spec spots or commercials. He would just ooh and ahh over whatever I brought in and pretend that in the next week he would have the money, all the while he was trying to land something entirely different.  The subject of our email came up again one day and he asked if he could email me. Somehow, this ended up in us talking on the phone for hours on end and going to dinner at O’Charlies.

From that day, he had my heart.  The Shelly who was going to be wild and free after my divorce just faded away and all I wanted was this life with him. It wasn’t the life I was used to, one filled with teenage band, color guard kids sleeping on your living room floor and sleeping on gym floors on air mattresses was not what I had envisioned for my newly single self.

It’s been almost eight years since that day in May where I held back the tears and smiled to try and sale a radio ad to some stranger. I smile at my desk as I listen to Cooper cooing in her crib, waking up from this afternoon nap. Where the years have gone, I don’t know. There have been good times and bad times for sure but I’ve never been more thankful for the BINGO sign on Fort Campbell Blvd. than I am today, surrounded by love and life and the magic of who we are and where we’ve came from.

So one day, Cooper can read these words and know that her Dad and Mom fell in love because of BINGO, the radio and of course, that white sweater.

I awoke the other morning, early, as always with Cooper ready to eat that first bottle. She sucks it down so fast sometimes I wonder how she doesn’t make herself sick. As I watch her fall back into that full-bellied, morning sleep, I get ready to lie back down and get a few more hours for myself. Sometimes I just sit there for a while and rub her sweet little peach-fuzzed head. Other times, in pure exhaustion, I lay her right back down and climb back into bed.

On this particular morning, I started thinking, which means I won’t go back to sleep for a while or even at all. Since I’ve shared my story of the depression I have been facing, I have been so surprised and encouraged by the comments, emails and facebook messages from those who know the struggle first hand and from those who simply care for what I am facing. It is empowering to share that kind of dark situation and as each email or text or message would come in, it would make me feel lighter. Just knowing someone stand with you can make a difference in how you feel.

Today is not such a good day but it seems now that my good days slowly but surely are outweighing the bad days in this fight.  I wanted to share some things I’ve been doing that have helped me. Sharing the blog helped so much; just getting the words on paper and out of my head seemed to help me more than I could have imagined it would.

While there are days like today when I am feelin’ a lot like Eeyore, my depression manifests itself more in anxiety and anger. There are times that once I get mad, I cannot seem to get myself settled down and get back on track. I have a good friend who has battled depression for years, obviously not postpartum but depression none the less. He gave me some good tips for handling anxiety attacks and what to do at the onset of feeling the anger start. The things that have helped me the most is to play music LOUDLY in my headphones at my desk and to just get up and walk away from the office and take five minute walks to clear my head.

On that particular morning, as I lay there trying to go back to sleep, God kept showing me a sky filled with balloons that had been released. I remembered a Sunday morning where my friend Alicia came up to me and prayed for me and spoke some truths into my life that I needed. There were parts of me that I truly was not trusting to God and not only did I have to give Him the battle I am facing, but I have to trust Him that He knows what is best for me, depressed or not.  As we prayed together, I felt a release in my spirit. I knew that while the depression did not disappear or miraculously go away, I released the hold it had on me. I released the grip of it telling me I can’t make it through this storm or that when I have two or three ‘bad days’ in a row it means I have failed or lacked faith.

As I watched those balloons racing toward heaven, I wondered why we can’t let go of fear and anger and stress like those balloons and let it float away. The Bible teaches us in Psalm 121:1 “I will lift up my eyes unto the hills, from which comes my help.” When we let go and look up, that is where our help is. Instead, usually, we are like those little kids at the fair who get a balloon from the electric company and let it go and as soon as it’s out of arms reach, they start to jump for it, to bring it back to them. They cry and fuss and don’t understand that unless your dad is pretty tall, when you let go of it, it’s gone. I want that, I yearn for that, I want that sweet release where it all just floats away and I don’t try to grab it back because it’s familiar. I don’t want to be seen on the sidewalk jumping up and down trying to pull it out of the sky because trusting God is harder than holding onto anxiety.

I’m not totally there yet, and to be honest, I don’t know when I will be. I don’t believe that depression is just a ‘spiritual’ or ‘mental’ thing. It makes me sad when people equate depression with ‘craziness’ or someone who needs to get the devil off your back. I believe the life we’ve lived and the things we’ve endured shape our brain and our hearts and sometimes, life is just too much and depression is the result. So today, while I am feeling all Eeyorish (pretty sure that’s not a word) I’m going to look at my babies face and smile anyway. I am going to close my eyes and picture visions of those balloons floating away and let my sadness go with them. I am going to do what I do every day, put one foot in front of the other and carry on.