October Updates

We have had a lot going on and I have been away from blogging. I'm always coming up with blogs to write in my head but when I get ready to write them down I forget what it was I wanted to say. Here are some quick updates about what we have been and are doing. Now that I am not on Facebook, I'm hoping my family will find it easy enough to pop on over here to see what's going on.

House/Moving: We have moved into our temporary home. We had to move out of our other house because it sold. Everyone had a really hard time saying goodbye. We spent the last 6 1/2 years of our lives calling that little place home. For the little girls, that has been there only home. They took moving the hardest. It was unreal the day we moved all of our stuff out. It didn't seem like it was really happening. I know God has another plan for us, but saying goodbye to the home that held so many memories was difficult. It was a nice place to live, the neighbors were all wonderful. The kids were able to play outside with a bunch of other kids anytime without worry. Still, we really had a hard time living in such cramped quarters.

Our new temporary place is  a small place that belongs to a family at our church.  They were gracious enough to allow us to move in and "house sit" for a very little monthly.  They are planning on selling it right away, but offered it to us for as long as it takes us to find and buy a new home. It is SUCH a blessing. We are still able to save money while we are staying here. If we were renting a house we wouldn't be able to save. Renting here right now is more expensive than the mortgage payment on home.  We did lose a bedroom, but gained a bathroom. We only had 1 bathroom before and now there are two. This has been like a dream. It's funny though the kids still line up outside the bathroom door and wait. They have to be reminded there is another bathroom, they're not used to it yet. We have managed to make it very cozy, and comfy. We continue to go out every week and search for a home to buy. We did put an offer in on one house, but it was not accepted. That was a bummer for sure. Last night we saw a couple we liked, and hopefully will get a chance to see some more this week.

I am working on a Moving blog post, about my new moving system. It proved to be such a help and made it a lot easier. I'm so excited to share. I'm hoping to have that up later this week.

 Julia and Emily: Julia was the most excited to move at first so I was surprised when she had the hardest time. On the Monday after we moved, she was very upset and had a breakdown when Adam tried to leave for work that morning. He made arrangements to take the day off and he stayed home with her. I had a lot of running around to do with the older girls that day, so he was able to spend a lot of alone time with her. It was exactly what she needed. The next day she was back to her normal self and was okay when Adam left for work. The sweet little baby girl needed her Daddy. Whoever says kids don't need full time dads are doing serious injustice to their children. Everyday I see my children needing their daddy. Each day when he gets home he has a bunch of happy jumping screaming little girls to greet him at the door. Julia is very sensitive to attention from her dad. She wants  it and she needs it. He is so amazing with them, he loves giving his girls attention. He always tells them that he's going to love them so much that they wont need to run out looking for some stupid boy to love them. They will be protected and loved and able to wait for the man God has for them. It makes my heart melt to see him love them so much.

Emily has surprised us a lot with how well she is recognizing words and facts. I have not yet taught them to read. Most of it is intimidation on my part. They are very sharp little girls and I'm sure can pick it up quickly. So far I have an Abeka phonics book that I picked up at a rummage sale and we are working on short vowels. We are also doing sight words. Emily is a firecracker. She is a riot. She thinks she knows so much and likes to try to argue with me about things which she doesn't know. She LOVES learning and is very good at memorizing. When she needs to be taught about something she did wrong, I show her in the Bible what she did and what it says about it. She can retain the scriptures amazingly well. She also enjoys helping me cook and sew. I am embroidering some flour sack kitchen towels and she is right there next to me pulling the needle up and learning how to do stitches. She's very patient and eager to learn.

August and Kiley: They will be turning 12 next month, where does the time go? They are such wonderful young ladies. So sweet and loving. They have big hearts for God and are such a blessing to Adam and me. They are now in the 3rd month of 7th grade and doing very well. We are settling into homeschooling and loving every minute of it. We pulled out of public school last year to homeschool and haven't looked back since. For two weeks following my surgery and the moving, we didn't get much school work done. I was pretty stressed about it. We meet with an Education Specialist at our Charter School ever 20 days. They check the work, and ask if we need anything. They purchase supplies and text books if we need it. During our meeting with her last week I was worried she thought we did too little. The opposite was true actually. She was impressed with the quality of their work and how thorough they were. She said that she was surprised they do so much. I was so relieved. They do take a lot of different classes. In the 4H alone they are taking 11 different projects, along with the normal school subjects, and music lessons.

They are both in their 5th year of playing soccer. I was a soccer player as a kid and so I just automatically signed them up. They enjoy playing the sport. This year Kiley has been the goalie, while this is heart wrenching for me to watch those girls kick balls hard and fast at my child, she is really good at it. She is a phenomenal goalie. August has been the teams center halfback. This is a tiring position, but since she is very skilled and VERY fast she does well at this position. I don't know if I've seen too many children run as fast as she can, she almost like a bolt of lightning. When she was in public school she was the 2nd fastest in the whole school. Only 1 boy was faster than her. The soccer keeps them busier. It is only for a few months a year and then we don't play any more sports.

I am nearly 4 weeks (tomorrow) post surgery. At first the recovery seemed horrible but it has gotten a lot better. I still am not feeling 100% but each day it gets better. They give 4-6 weeks for recovery  so I'm still within that time frame. We did our move during the 2nd week of recovery. This was good and bad. The good was that I didn't have to lift any boxes or move one thing. I was able to sit on my little bar stool and direct traffic. The bad was I wasn't able to lift any boxes or move anything. This sort of made it difficult to unpack. The older girls were a big help though and we are pretty much all unpacked. We are not unpacking everything since we will be moving again in the next few months.

I have discovered a love for embroidery. I have been doing 30's style bonnet girls (like the one in the link) on the edge of flour sack cloths to use for dishtowels. Each of the girls picked out a girl for me to embroider so I also embroiders that girls name onto the towel. I'm trying to find a website who has a good bulk deal. I originally got them for the airplane to Tennessee and am really enjoying them. I'll take some pictures soon.

Me: My most recent change has been deactivating my Facebook account. I really have in the past enjoyed Facebook. I like being able to see photos and updates about loved ones who live far away, as well as old friends from school. I'm taking an indefinite break. I found myself constantly checking it from my phone and sitting down on the computer during the day. I would sit down to do something else on the computer and end  up on Facebook for an  hour. It has gotten out of hand. Sometimes it's best not to know as much about your family members. Facebook can get very personal. This was my only connection to some people and I hope they aren't offended by my hasty deletion of my account. Hopefully they will remember my blog and come here. This morning when I woke up I reached for my phone to check my FB, and I realized I had a problem. It's not okay when it's the first thing on your mind in the morning. So for now, I'm giving it up. I am not setting a time frame but as time passes I'm sure I will no longer have a desire to go on there. It has been such a time waster lately.

I'm getting ready to start gathering all of my handmade projects for Christmas. We are on a very tight budget this year, since we are buying a house so I am going to make a lot of the gifts for others. I wanted to make the book slings in the Family Fun magazine. I have also been wanting to make the little girls duvet covers out of vintage sheets or fabric, but I'm having such a hard time finding something I like. This will most likely wait until their 5th birthday. I was thinking of making all of the girls pillowcases with embroidery. So much to do so little time. I absolutely love vintage or Victorian style fabrics and linens. I wish I could decorate my whole house in a vintage style, but that would get pretty expensive.

I also just joined Swagbucks.com, and I'm still trying to figure it out. If anyone has any tips, I would love some help.

Adam: We finally have him back in the evenings now. For a couple of months he was building 2 bathrooms at our Pators house and he would be there all night after he finished at his regular job. It was hard not having him around most nights for dinner and the like. He was really missing the time with the family. A lot of the time he has side jobs after work and I know he is exhausted. He works so hard to take care of us. His birthday is this month and I'm still not sure what I'm supposed to get him. I'm going to bake his favorite dessert and cook a yummy dinner for him. He doesn't really care too much about gifts so I think just the family being around will be nice. We celebrated with his family over the weekend, and that was nice.

His mom is from Germany and I have been meaning to ask her about German type traditions. I would like to incorporate that into the kids lives. I should try out some German dishes maybe? She had a very nice family gathering for Adam and his brothers birthdays. The dates are close together so we did them at once. His parents are such wonderful people. I lucked out in the in-law department. They were there all day the day we moved helping and moving and working. They come out every weekend to watch the kids sports. I love having family all around. I feel sad for those who don't have that.
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I'm hoping to be able to blog more now that I am not spending so much time doing time wasting things online. I'm hoping to be able to spend my morning alone time to blog a couple of days a week.

Facebook

Wow, two posts in one day.

I have deleted my Facebook account. It was actually very difficult for me. As of right now I've reserved to only temporarily deactivate it. I had a very close friend tell me to get off of there. She's right. It seems like a lot of conflict comes up. I know I spend way too much time there.

If you're coming here to find out why I'm not on FB anymore, I have several reasons. For now, I'm taking a break. You are welcome to come here to see updates about our family.

Comments

I am wondering if other bloggers turn off the Anonymous comment feature? Some people are extremely cowardly and post some really awful stuff under Anonymous. Really, are you that awful of a human being?

It amazes me how nasty some people can be. It must be terrible living each day knowing that you are a disgusting individual. The same people are probably those who are accepting of the murdering of babies, the "marriage" of  homosexuals, etc. But very unaccepting of pepole who are Christians. Get a life. Evil is as evil does.

Romans 1:21-22 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,


THIS WORLD IS NOT MY HOME!

My internet is back up now after moving. I"m working on an update post, and an organized moving post since my new moving system proved to be so easy and a lifesaver.

From Tubal Ligation to Reversal - My Journey to end the Nightmare

There are several message boards set up for Tubal Reversals. It's more common than one may think. I never even realized it was possible. When I was at the end of a very tiring and long 2nd twin pregnancy, permanent sterilization sounded like a dream. I would have even paid them to rip out all my insides and throw them away at that point.

 I'm sure most women who just gave birth, never ever want to do that again. That may be even more so for a 26 year old unmarried woman who just gave birth to her 2nd set of spontaneous twins. In fact the day I found out they were twins I asked to be put at the top of the tube tying list. The entire time I was pregnant I said, "I'm getting my tubes tied when this is over." I delivered via c-section and had the tubal done at that time. I remember them asking "are you sure?" an I answered with a very certain and happy "YES I'M VERY SURE". I figured that was that. I NEVER researched it. Not once. This is very unlike me.

The babies daddy and I were married 2 months later. Here we were the parents of 5 little girls. Life got back to normal. Over the last 4 1/2 years after the tubal, my life, nearly half of the time is a living hell. It's gotten worse as the years have gone on.

Every month I am overcome with some of the worst feelings of depression, anger and rage. It's almost impossible to control. I've damaged and lost several family and friend relationships because of not being able to control this horrible demon. I think unless you experience it, it's very difficult to understand. A few innocent people were subject to the horrible me, and actually stuck around and forgave me. God love them. My poor husband has received the brunt of it, and still continues to love me unconditionally. Thank God for him or I think I would have lost all hope.

Why are you telling us all of this? Because some of you have seen it. Lived through it. Stopped talking to me because of it. Or, simply need to be informed about it. PTLS or Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome, is what it is called. It's not just emotional. It also has caused extreme changes physically

The next few paragraphs may be sort of graphic, but not disgusting as I describe symptoms. Just be warned.

I never had bad cramping before the tubal, but since then I have to take heavy pain killers every month to get through the first 2/3 days of each cycle. Where a normal cycle would last 3 to 5 days, they now last 7 or more. They were light before, and extremely heavy after the tubal. Despite eating healthy and exercising, I can't lose weight. I was never heavy before. I am about 40 pounds heavier than I have ever  been in my life and it keeps going up, never down. My hair on my head falls out, and some even grows in strange places on my face. I have insomnia, chronic fatigue, anxiety and dizziness. My skin is horrible. It used to be very nice. There are other problems pertaining to married life, but for the sake of modesty I'm not going into those. If you are a concerned woman and really need to know, you can send me a private comment and I can talk to you. This is all very embarrassing to put out there, but I hope I can help at least one woman not make the same mistake as I have.

My marriage is wonderful most of the month, but once the hell part starts I feel sorry for my poor husband. Bless his wonderful heart, he still loves me. He a true example of "for better or worse".

I started to research my symptoms. I asked Dr.s and was told I was depressed, or I had something called PMDD. The solution, was drugs. Anti-depressants and birth control pills. I didn't want either of those. That's why I had my tubes tied in the first place because birth control pills didn't agree with me, and I couldn't bear to think that perhaps one of my eggs was being fertilized and then aborted each month.

A while ago, my children asked if we could start going to church. I found our wonderful church and the kids and I got saved and became Christans. We slowly have morphed into our new life and we love it. After this change, I had even more desire to fix this post tubal nightmare.

At some point I discovered PTLS, and diagnosed myself as having this. It had to be this. I just wasn't the same as I was before the tubal. I've always been a little dramatic, but never psychotic. I found message boards with other women suffering from the same symptoms since having a tubal done. When I told my husband about it, he thought I was nuts. I told him I wanted my tubal reversed and he laughed. It did start out as just talking, but after about a year of talking about it, he realized I was serious.

I prayed and asked God to work on his heart, and I asked God to show me what His will was regarding this operation through Adams decision. When Adam said, "If that's what you think you need to do, do it." I almost cried. I was and am sure the reversal will help me to be put back to normal. Almost instantly the money was provided and the trip was scheduled. I have read testimony upon testimony about women who had PTLS then a reversal and were relieved of the symptoms and returned to normal. My quality of life is so depressing since the tubal, that the reversal is worth trying.

Last week I had my reversal. While it's still too soon to know anything, I already feel "different" maybe better. I feel relaxed and calm. I am still in pain from the surgery and have several more weeks of recovery ahead of me. I know I'm not much of a writer, but this is going to be one of my topics as I go through this journey. Something that has encompassed my life like this has, should be made known to other women.

The "world" doesn't want women to have more than 2 children. They will talk you into tying your tubes after your 2nd child. Don't believe me? One of my close girlfriends, just delivered her 2nd child via c-section. They asked her to have her tubes tied while they performed her surgery. Her answer to them was, "No way, you guys ruined Kimmie." Tubals are very popular. It sounds awesome too, if you don't want more kids and don't want to worry about BC. It needs to have a huge BUYER BEWARE, sticker attached to it.  

When you alter your body to do something other than what God has created it to do, you run into problems. Of course there are women who don't run into problems like PTLS. But many of them end up with hysterectomy's years following their tubals. I know 3 such women and one of them is still in her 30's.

If you are in a similar boat and want to have a reversal, do it. Save the money and do it. Here is the wonderful Dr who did mine, Dr. Lisa Rogers at the Jackson Clinic.

Psalm 127:3 Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord; and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

Surgery in Tennessee

After I had the little twins, 4 1/2 years ago I had a tubal ligation (tubes tied). It was a very hasty, un-researched decision. Since having this done, I have, what I feel is extreme PTLS. It took me a few years to figure out what was wrong with me. Many in the medical field do not think that PTLS is an actual problem. The treatment for it right now is antidepressants, birth control pills or a tubal reversal. The tubal reversal is not covered by insurance. PTLS is like living in a nightmare half of every month. It's one of the worst things you could imagine. I'm sure I've managed to ruin several relationships during the last 4 years because of this, and the extreme emotional psychosis it seems to cause.

About a year and a half ago I started to research the tubal reversal. I quickly learned in my state that it costs about $10,000 out of pocket for the procedure. There is no way I would ever be able to afford that. I have a friend who had a reversal done about 6-7 years ago. She told me about her Dr. and it sounded fabulous, the only thing is, I'd have to travel to Tennessee. After a little more research, I decided this was where I was going to go. I prayed a lot, since we didn't have the $6,000 or so I would need for this trip. The money was provided for me quite quickly. The power of prayer is amazing.

Last month I scheduled the appointment with Dr. Lisa Rogers at the Jackson Clinic. She took over for retired Dr. John Carlin who was a very successful Tubal Reversal Dr. The more I learned about her the more I knew this is where I was supposed to go. I was unable to find any other female Dr.s, or any others in this country who had such a low fee. She is the lowest in the entire country. She is a Christian pro-life Dr. and belongs to the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the Baptist Medical and Dental Fellowship.

Last Monday 9/13 my mother and I flew to Nashville, TN, and then drove another 2 hours to Jackson, where the hospital was.

My mom, in the waiting room at the Dr's office

The hospital

Me 2 days after surgery, in the rocking chair. The pain meds made it hard to open my eyes. Everywhere you went there were wooden rocking chairs to sit in. It was so cute.

More rocking chairs

Being in Tennessee was like a trip to another world. Everyone was so friendly and hospitable. It was so clean there, and the roads were nice. It seemed like all the people were dressed nice, and we didn't see junky cars. It was a very happy place. It had that family feel to it. Truthfully, I didn't want to leave, and if I could, I would move there tomorrow. There were more churches than Starbucks. At the hospital there were Bibles and devotional books in the waiting room instead of gossip magazines.

I was even more impressed with the Dr.s when I heard them praying with their patients before surgery. My Dr. even made accommodations to have only females in the operating room with me. She came to my bed before the operation and held my hand and prayed with me. It was the most wonderful hospital experience I've ever had.

The surgery took about 2 hours and then I had to recover for an hour before they would let my mom come in. For those who are going to send nasty comments about "where was your husband". I preferred my mother to come with me. He wanted to go, but sometimes a girl just needs her mom. Anyway, they had a bit of trouble getting my pain under control after I woke up, it really really hurt. I was surprised it hurt so much. They do a 4 inch incision across the bottom of your abdomen. It's no walk in the park. I was able to go back to our hotel that night after the pain was controlled. We stayed in Jackson for 2 more days and then flew back home on Friday. I got wheel chair service at the airport, which was sorta neat. We got to board the plane first.

We saw this man and his dog on a Harley, they both had helmets. It was really funny.

It's been almost a week now and I'm still moving very slow. I still have to rest a lot. My older girls have been angles helping take care of the house and the younger girls during the day. My husband has been a saint cooking dinners and serving me meals in bed. I'm a little restless not being able to do much. I still have to take the pain meds so I can't drive anywhere. I'm hoping by next week I'll be able to be semi-normal. I wont be able to help us move since I can't lift anything. I guess I'll be the director. ha ha.

Beautiful Tennessee

I wish I would have felt better so I could have seen more in Tennessee. I would love to go back someday and see more.

Me with Dr. Rogers after surgery

Now my hope is that everything will go back to normal the way God made me. I hope my PTLS symptoms will disappear and I can become human again. Thanks for your prayers.