Saturday, June 29, 2013

Juicing

Yesterday I almost had to rip the juicer out of the UPS guy's hands.  He asked what he was delivering and I said a juicer.  He said, "okay I'll keep it then".  NOOOOOO!

I know he was just flirting with me because of his smiles, winks and laughter but not my juicer!

I so can't wait to try processing an apple through this baby!

This morning I washed the juicer and made my first mess.

500g strawberries
500g organic blueberries
500g red raspberries

Quite tasty.  I put the pulp into freezer pops to use later on.



Friday, June 28, 2013

Finally Friday

Mom is still bleeding out from the surgery site.  I asked her today if they'll need to do a blood transfusion and she said it might come to that soon.  It is because of the fact that they put her on blood thinners of course.

My blood pressure has been dropping low of late.  Thinking of asking doctor if I can lower my dosage.  Last night my blood pressure was 111/57.  This morning it was 123/74 with a heart rate of 74 and irregular at 6 hours past taking my blood pressure medicine.  I'm also dizzy and really tired.

There have been several pregnancy announcements this month in the infertile blogging and military blogging community.  I'm very happy for all of them but of course sad because it wasn't that long ago I went through a FET and it failed.  I have the right to feel sad for me.  I'm going through the healing process again.  Hoping for a miracle.

My juicer should arrive sometime today and I'll pick up the grocery items for a cleanse on Sunday.

J has been working some really long days.  He school starts at 0550 hrs and he isn't home until 2030 the last few nights.  But I am glad he is home.  We are both looking forward to his graduation.


DPW for JBLM, D.K., called me this morning in response to my message I left him two days ago.  Seems as though his workers didn't post the message the way they should have to our doors.  And he said if it happens again he will have them bring round bottled water to the residents!  YAY!

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Family Life Update

Right now my dad is in a nursing home while my mom is recovering from a knee replacement surgery that was done on Tuesday.  Mom will be going to a nursing home, hopefully this week, though not the same one as my dad.

I called both yesterday but neither answered.  I'm guessing they were at physical therapy.

Today I reached my mom.  She is on high doses of codeine and is having complications with the knee.  She has been bleeding out to the point she told me it looked like she had her period but only from her knee.  That isn't good.

If you would please, keep them both in your thoughts and prayers.

On the closer to home note since I'm on the west coast and my folks are on the east coast I'll give an update with the husband.

J is doing quite well in his classwork and on his exams.  Earlier this week while at WLC he got to speak face-to-face with the Sgt.Major of the Army.   Pretty cool.

With any luck, and lots of long days filled with hard work J will be graduating from WLC next month.  This week he is squad leader; it changes out each week.

I am as fat as ever.  Thank you bloating from PMS.  If I eat any less I'll be starving my body.  My juicer will hopefully be arriving on the 28th and I'll be able to get the necessary grocery items this Sunday to start juicing on Monday.  Until then I'm still doing yogurt, salads and lean meats and proteins in the hope that I'll lose some weight soon.

One more day of boiling water and filtering it.  The water purification results will be available tomorrow.  Equity still sucks for shutting it off and not supplying us with proper warning or a non-contaminated water source to drink from.


Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Water Shutdown



Surprise!  NO WATER!  And they didn't state when it would be back on either.  Nice huh?  Oh and when it does come back on it won't be potable for 2 days.  Fun time for the residents on my street. 

Yes they knew when they would shut it off as the lucky guy that is now getting his driveway torn up has been put up in a hotel.  Screw the rest of us!!!!

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Just A Reminder To My Readers

This is my blog.

I shall write in what I want within the bounds of the law.

If you don't like what I write feel free not to read it.

If you try to be a troll with your comment I will refuse to publish it.  Or if I publish it I will either post an apology or a rebuttal to the comment.

With that said here is a vent about this morning.

I called my local RE clinic to find out if lab result number three was finally in.  I've been waiting on the results of the Beta2 Glycoprotein antibody test.

Me:  This is (me) I was wondering if you had the test result and would fax it to PNW.

Nurse S:  Who ordered the test?

Me: Either Dr. B or Dr. B.

Nurse S:  No.  Did PNW order the test?

Me: Yes but Nurse JF called PNW and had one of your doctors order the test through your clinic.

Nurse S:  I"m rather busy here with a person from another clinic. I'll call you right back.

That was over an hour ago.  Please do not say to me that you will call me right back if you have no intention of calling me within a reasonable amount of time.

Oh and as for yesterday's now missing blog post.  Whomever you were that decided to be a bit of troll, well if you had read the blog and had been reading it for any length of time you'd know that I read each and every blog post to my spouse when he is mentioned in it.  In this case I did post that I was going to email him the blog link for the day.  Now please do get off my back.  My blog is a place where I will write whatever I want and vent freely.  Without venting, since it is such good and cheap therapy, I would probably have had a second heart attack by now.

To make that troll happy I removed the blog post.  Will I do that again?  Highly unlikely.  I mean come now, who hasn't had issues with a spouse's dirty laundry, dirty dishes or dirty vehicle raising one's hackles a bit?  Troll, are you such a paragon of virtue that your life is so perfect that you have never, ever aired your dirty laundry to another person?  If you are so perfect then let me applaud you and ask why you are still on this earth and not in heaven with wings and a halo?

Gossip is an art.  We air our dirty laundry in a semi-secret way here on our blogs to get insight into the lives of others and so that we know we aren't alone.  Every one of us non-perfect humans can be a slob and has been a slob sometime in our lives. 

Oh and if you know me personally troll and decided to be anonymous;  well shame on you for being such a weakling and not coming right out and being blunt with me.  I prefer a person to be truthful with me.  I accept well meant criticism because it is given to help improve my life. 

However, if given assvice I will of course ignore it and consider the source it came from.

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Sitting on the Fence

Last night J and I sat down and did our dialogue.  It is something we learned to do while on the Worldwide Marriage Encounter.  We haven't had the chance to actually dialogue in weeks because he has been in school and studying so much.

We discussed:
  •  not continuing treatment. 
  • doing donor embryo
  • getting matched outside of PNW or Madigan for donor embryo
  • going ahead with a small set of donor eggs and taking our chances
  • doing the guaranteed 2 embryos.
Honestly I'm tired.  I told him if his test came up with bad results we could choose the donor embryo program or decide to discontinue all treatments.

I'm not sure just how much more I can do.

If do one more treatment I'm going to say that is it.  If we are lucky to get several embryos then I'll do FETs until they are gone and we have our family.

I'm tired of not being able to afford jack because every spare dollar goes into the savings account.  I don't think it is selfish at all to want to start looking forward to using the savings account for something other than infertility treatments.  We have no retirement plan.  I'm going to be 44 next month.  Rather scary to even think about considering  I have no children.

I'm not going to say that I won't mourn the loss of hope if I do end up walking away from treatments.  I went through that with my first marriage.  It was hard.  I gave away all the baby stuff I had made and bought over the years in hopes of having a child.  Or I had thought I did.  Turns out I still had three baby shirts left that I had made by hand.  Those went into my chest of hope for this marriage.  I added in a single onesie I purchased, a free bib and a free bowl (given out by companies as promotions).

Truthfully, it is hard to see my life without a child.  I'm not sure why considering I've lived it this long without one.  I do know that this whole infertility adventure has almost wrecked my marriage.  No sooner did my spouse come home from Korea and I was having him do a SA.  Yes, the day after he got off the plane he got it done.

Between Korea and Iraq he was home for 6 months and we tried to conceive.  No luck.

After Iraq we still didn't have success.  No true pregnancies according to the doctors.

Much as I'd love to adopt I have to realize my health would be under the microscope.  What pregnant gal would willingly give up her child to someone like me?  I would, after all, be the primary caretaker of the child while J is away for training and deployments.  Not being negative Nellie here but I am being realistic.  Many of us know the hoops an adoptive family has to jump through just to be looked over by a pregnant gal.

Adoption has not only become a money making industry I swear it is like applying for a job or a loan where your application just sits on the desk and collects dust.  Let us not forget those videos the adoptive parents have to make too.

No adoption isn't for us unless a pregnant gal offers up her child to us without some agency being in the picture.

I worked with an older gal in her 50's back some ten years ago.  She couldn't have children and her truck driver husband and her wanted a baby in the worst way.  She told me they went through adoption agencies but because of his job and their advanced years they wouldn't be accepted.  So sad.  The gal was a nanny to my own cousins years ago.  She kept praying for a miracle like what happened to one of her friends.  Her friend was given a baby to adopt.  A teen couple came through her line regularly and one day brought in their infant and said to her, "take the baby, we can't raise it".  She called up her husband and her lawyer and started the paperwork immediately.  I doubt my co-worker ever got a miracle like that in the ten years since I last saw her.

So here I sit on the fence, I swear it is a picket one and it is sorely stuck up my bum, trying to figure out where do we go from here; while we wait on test results that have yet to be even drawn.

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Decisions Pending

J and I are still mulling over our options to for the next part of our trying to conceive journey.

I finally got the andrology report.  It is as we feared.  Our procedure took more eggs and created less embryos.

The first two of my labs came back and looked good.  I'm now waiting on the Beta2 Glycoprotein test results. 

For J we are still waiting for him to find the time in his busy Army life to get the karyotyping done.  Just because he has plenty of sperm and they look great, for the most part, under the microscope doesn't mean he is the problem or isn't the problem.  But the andrology report kind of points a bit of a finger in his direction as to the why it might have failed.

I'm just hoping it was a fluke.  I'm hoping, believe me I'm truly hoping and praying, that the karyotyping reveals all is well. I'd hate to think that my husband is going to blame himself for the last cycle failing where we all know there are a lot of variables in a pregnancy.  Anything can go wrong after they are transferred.

If we do the donor embryos again it looks like our best option will again be the two guaranteed blastocysts.  Again I'll opt to put both back to up my chances of pregnancy. 

If something is really screwy with the karyotyping we'll opt to go donor embryo.  It is way less expensive than adoption but we'll only be getting one embryo. That kind of bothers me.  At my age I'd like to have two embryos due to better odds of having one implant.

For now it is all pending.  Most likely the karyotyping won't get done until next month.  Then we are going to take a much needed vacation in August if all goes well.  Maybe in September we'll make the final decision of what way to go from here.

Oh and still no period.  CD 27.  Do I think I'm pregnant?  Not highly likely.

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

CD 26

Still not testing until next week.  Though my breasts do now hurt it could very well be PMS.  Yes, yes I know I had pink spotting last week which could very well be implantation bleeding.  But I'm not going there because if I do it is one slippery slope of pee sticks to the trash can of misery at this point.

I've lost two followers.  Most likely because I've announced that I'm on a break from TTC and have bored them to death with my pictures of the garden growing.  But other than my waistline I have nothing else growing that I know of yet.

Last night I cooked a fantastic dinner for my spouse.

I made bondage bird.
Yeah look at that bird dripping juices.  J loved what I made him for dinner last night.  As you can see the chicken is in bondage as well it makes for a juicer bird.

To accompany the chicken I made up a potato salad from scratch, including the dressing for it that had coffee flavored marscarpone cheese, mayo, dried mustard, vinegar and other herbs.  I also steamed some fresh picked green beans.

J is taking with him the left overs for his lunch.  Gee I hope he has enough food to eat today considering 2/3 of a chicken was left and that was a 5 pound bird to start with.  Must be so nice to weigh 147 pounds and still eat what ever you want!

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

CD 25 and I've Got Nothing

I'm not testing early because well, there is just nothing to test for.  No symptoms.  Not even spotting.  Think I might wait until next week to test if AF holds out that long.  No clue when the new cycle will start.

So here is a picture or two or more of my garden and how it looked yesterday before the pink larkspurs opened up.
Delphinium has started to open up.
Hollyhock is even taller than last week.  No clue when it is due to bloom.
Yarrow is now in bloom.  The white stuff.
Purple larkspurs have opened.  Pink ones are open today too.
Carnations in bloom next to my rhubarb.

The dahlias will hopefully open up later this week or maybe next week.  I'll take photos of them later on.  My garden needs some serious weeding too.

Monday, June 17, 2013

Housing Inspection

For some reason our housing inspection wasn't done on the anniversary of our move-in date.  Every year in January we would have our housing inspected.  Not this year.

Housing inspection is today.  We were given a 48 hour notice on Friday.  I posted said orange notice to the white board on the fridge.  I told my husband that certain things would have to be moved out of the way. 

Did he move stuff?  Well, actually he did move the folding partition away from the hot water heater.  So I need to give him credit for that.

Did he move his things off of the top of the fridge?  No.

Did he move the empty box collection he has in the garage away from where they need to put a ladder to access the crawl space in the attic?  No.

So guess who after less than three hours of sleep got up at 0337 hrs with her spouse?  Me.

While he was getting his stuff ready for his second week of WLC (warrior leadership course) I was cursing at him for not helping out over the weekend.  Seriously he could have put away his newly purchased stash of muffins and donuts into his snack cabinet and not left them on the counter up tight to the fridge.

He should have put away his dog bowl too.  Yes, he has a dog bowl from which he eats from.  I bought him a special one, think Jacob Black from Twilight books, with the Army decals and his last name on the ceramic dish.  He brings it into work from time to time just to eat from it too.  He might be getting his dinner in it tonight!

On the gardening aspect of things: 
My hollyhock is now almost as tall as I am.
The delphinium out in the back garden is now in bloom.  I"ll have to take photos later today if I remember or am not comatose from lack of sleep.
The larkspurs are starting to open up and the dahlias now have buds on them.

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Head Cold

Meh, I'm tired.  I feel like I have a head cold.

Last night I had the oddest pain.  Left arm pain radiating into my chest and my jaw.  Then my hand went all numb and tingly.  Breathing was fine so I told J that I think my fibromyalgia is acting up again.

Today I feel like crap.  So I'd say, yeah its a fibro flare day.

Friday, June 14, 2013

Happy Birthday US Army

With all your budget cuts I'm proud to say that you are staying strong!

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Flip Flop

I couldn't sleep last night.

I blame it on the fact that I didn't take the melatonin or my nightly bath.

I won't be making that mistake tonight.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

One Week Makes A Difference

Here in plant land one week sure does make a big difference.  Yesterday I posted photos of the garden from last week.  Since last week my hollyhock has grown more than 6 inches. 

last week
Of course it isn't the only thing more in bloom.  The snapdragons are full on bloom too.
I can't wait for the hollyhocks, larkspurs and dahlias to show their colors.  I have buds on all.  The white plant out front is the yarrow that is now in bloom.  I even have strawberries!

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Normal Day in the Neighborhood

Not much going on here today in my neighborhood.  I'm thankful for that.  Last night an emergency truck and ambulance were parked down my street with their lights flashing.  Not sure who was being picked up or what happened.  That was midnight.

My plants are doing well.  I have more out.
One of my hollyhocks.  I took this photo on the 3rd and it is already about 6 inches taller.  Can't wait for it to bloom.
More of the plants have opened up since I took this picture last week.  Don't mind the clutter in the breezeway as I had just finished potting some plants and hadn't cleaned up the clutter yet.
So yes, this is my small house on post but I'm lucky to not have to share walls. 

Monday, June 10, 2013

Seeing Triple

Okay I'm not going nuts.  As the days grow longer I'm finally getting the chance to see more of the cats that are deciding what I put out tastes so good to them that they are now telling their friends.

First we had one small black cat.  Then I noticed a tiger stripe cat.  Last night the black cat meowed to a friend down the street and it called back.  I then noticed the friend was also a long hair black cat.  Great we are now feeding three strays.  Good thing I bought another case of wet food and 6 pounds of kitty kibble yesterday.    Still I'm hoping to get these strays to a vet and find homes for them.  Not sure that will happen as they seem to be fairly skittish.

On the ttc front, though I'm not really trying to conceive but just have fun.  Odd things are happening to my body.  I have that fun thin whitish discharge that is known to go along with endometrin use.  Only I'm not on the endometrin right now.  It is everywhere just like when on that medication.  The other night it made me leave a wet mark on my sheets.  Ugh!  So at 0300 hrs I was stripping the bedding down and decided to stay up and start the house cleaning early.

I have insomnia.  Well that worked out in my favor with the above aforementioned cleaning.

My yogurt tastes weird.  Could be that it might have gotten frozen when pushed to the back of the fridge.  Could be that it went bad before I even cracked it open for the first time which was today.  I just bought it yesterday.  Could also be that it is a different brand though same plain Jane Greek style.

Sex drive has increased two fold.  My husband is happy right now.  But then wouldn't most guys be happy if they got jumped while trying to sleep?  They can just roll back over to snore when finished. 

Oh and last odd thing to share.  My arms and backs of my hands have broken out in a rash from the sun,  polymorphous light eruption are what my doctor 11 years ago called it.  Every year when I try to activate my Vitamin D for just 15 minutes in the sun daily I break out in a rash on any part not covered by clothing.  Just the reason why I try to keep my head down with a big floppy hat on my head as a rash on my face is so not becoming.  Though I still do have a slight rash on my face as the hat doesn't block out all the UVB.


Sunday, June 9, 2013

CD 17

Somewhere in the past week, most likely about 5-7 days ago since I ovulate early, I ovulated.

Last night I started in with a biting like pain in the area of my uterus.

Right now I hate my body.  I hate it because if I am having implantation I know it won't stick.  My eggs are old.  I had sex just for fun.  I wasn't taking all those supplements or medications I would normally take for a real cycle. 

So in about 12 days if I miss AF, which I highly doubt will happen as she always finds me sooner or later, I'll take a trip to the bathroom with a hpt.

Would I like for this to be really able to happen and get pregnant? You bet I would.

Am I that lucky?  Hell NO!

Saturday, June 8, 2013

Two Cats and other Stuff

Okay last night a second cat showed up.  Well that would explain why the rest of the food disappears after the black cat is done eating.

The second cat is a short hair, orange and black tiger stripe with a pretty white bib on its neck.  Big ears and big eyes too.



On the reproduction front.  No clue where I am in my cycle these days.  Still getting the EWCM.  Still baby dancing for fun.

Had the  Cardiolipin antibodies, Beta 2 Glycoprotein, and Lupus Antibodies test done yesterday.

While at the hospital I stopped in to visit a friend that had been admitted for chest pains.

Sorry I haven't been reading blogs much.  I've been busy.  I'm in the midst of finishing up another blanket for the wounded soldiers program here on our installation.  I just need to sew together the squares and finish off the edging.  I'll post a photo of it when I'm finished.


Thursday, June 6, 2013

It Figures

I walk the mile to the hospital, I need exercise, only to get to the lab and be handed a pee cup.

Me: What is this for?

Clerk: U/A

Me: A U/A wasn't ordered for me, just blood work. 

Clerk: The blood work has to be done at the office.

The clerk then hands me the cup and tell me I can bring it back any time.  Then she hands me three other lab slips.  I go to a chair and look over what was ordered. Again this is blood work so I'm kind of scratching my head about the clerk's response.  The slips state:  ABO/RH, CBC, E2/P4.  Great the labs that were done last month at the ER weren't taken out of the computer.

I go back up to the desk.

Me:  Who ordered these labs and when were they ordered?

Clerk: Last month and by the doctors on the slips.

Me:  They must be the ER draws that were already done.  Is there anything else in there for me from this month, say this last week?

Clerk:  No.

I walked down to the Army RE office and chat with Chris, the male receptionist.  Chris is a nice guy.  His reaction to Juicing was, "don't do it.  It will make you fart a lot!".  LMAO

Chris goes into the back and gets the IVF nurse for me.  I go into the back with her and sit down.  She NEVER GOT THE REQUEST from PNW.  Great!  I told her what to look for and who to talk to up there.  She is best chatting with Jacqueline first as she can direct her to which nurse up there to talk with next.

I mentioned my dad's clotting disorder so that JF knows they ordered that blood work and the karoytyping for my husband as well.

If there is something wrong with J's karoytyping, I really hope not and that it was just a fluke, we'll eliminate donor eggs and move to donor embryos or adoption.  If I have a clotting factor issue that can be fixed easily enough and J is fine then we'll do donor eggs again.  If we are both wonky we'll just move on to adoption.

Update on the Kitty.  No clue what sex but it's fur is matted in places so I'm guessing it is an abandoned cat and not a feral.  Last night I got the front screen door open and was talking directly to the cat when the neighbors spooked the cat.  It came back later on and finished its food up.

Newest kitty photo with the light on in the breezeway.
It devoured the canned chicken and gravy cat food last night.  All my cats have always loved chicken.  

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

WTF Appointment #3

So we had our third WTF appointment today.  Third non-loss.  Third no answer session.

It was a phone meeting.  I'm kind of glad it was via phone and not in person nor through video conference too.  I'd rather not have the doctor see the faces I was making though I'm sure if he was listening he could probably hear the tone of my voice change a bit.

I had to fight to get even three tests ordered for myself and one for J.  The good doctor didn't think any tests were necessary as it "wasn't a pregnancy".  It didn't call for repeat pregnancy loss testing. 

Now you can guess why I was getting angry.  Don't they think I already know it wasn't a "real" pregnancy.  But dammit anyway there were embryos put back!  They didn't take!  So I want answers not just a "it happens".

It has "happened" now three times!

I requested karyotyping on my husband.  I requested the RPL full panel.  But what I'm getting is three tests to include the antiphosolipid and two other tests he didn't mention but not one will be about clotting disorders.  I did mention my dad's heart problems and got cut off before I mentioned that he does bleed out and has anemia.  The good doctor said the heart is not a problem in the clotting factor. If only he had let me continue and not cut me off mid track.  Nor did I get to remind him that I have arthritis and eczema which are autoimmune disorders and should be checked with that blood panel too.  I have no clue if the ANA will be one of the three tests that he has ordered.

As for the karyotyping the good doctor said that it might not be allowed by the Army as the test costs about  a grand.  Well consider the fact that we have paid out of pocket for two IVFs and now one donor cycle and well lets not forget all those IUIs and still not one pregnancy to show for it I think my husband is a good candidate to have this test done.  Not that I'm blaming my spouse but it is possible that something could be wrong since the good doctor kept saying how perfect the donor was and that sometimes something could be wrong with the sperm. 

That's right keep contradicting yourself doc.

I had to beg with the good doctor to get the testing done for my peace of mind.  I'd rather we know something good but I'll be prepared for the worst too.

Of course I asked again how many eggs it took to make the blastocysts and he still didn't know.  I've asked the clinic via phone and in emails many times to have the information ready for the WTF appointment.  It wasn't there.  The doctor didn't even have J's sperm report handy.  Seriously how was the good doctor even prepared for us.  15 minutes late in calling us too.  Not like J has anything better to do right?  He had to come home from work for this appointment.

On a lighter note:
The stray cat I've been feeding is eating quite well.  I feed it a 5.5 ounce can of wet food and 1/2 cup of dry each day.  Last night I finally got to see what the cat looks like.  Long haired, most likely domestic, black.  No clue as to the sex of the cat.  Here are some crappy pictures because I didn't want to use flash and scare the critter off.


It was after 2130 hrs when I took the photos.  Still fairly light out but I was taking them from a tunnel of sorts being my breezeway.

Monday, June 3, 2013

Those We Love Most

Those We Love Most by Lee Woodruff brought me to tears and made me laugh.  This book was truly a tough read for me, not because of the lexicon but because of the emotions.

While reading this book I suffered through a miscarriage.  At first I had troubles even getting through the main character's loss of her child.  My thoughts were at least she had that time with her child, something I might never even get to experience.  Once I swallowed that elephantine sized pill of bitterness I really got into the book.

The death of her child brought back memories of the first time I dealt with death.  I was a really young child and it was the early 1970's.  We didn't wear helmets when we rode our bikes down the street.  We were lucky if we even remembered to put on shoes.  But we did know enough to always look both ways.  Sometimes even knowing the basics won't save your life.

Jonathan was my best childhood friend.  He would ride his bike up to my house, which was just up the hill and maybe a quarter of a mile from his own house, to play in the woods with my brother and I almost every day.  We were always home when the street lights came on.  Jonathon was on his way home one night when a drunk driver ran him down.  No helmet would have saved his life.  My father and my next door neighbor rushed out of the houses when they heard the tires squealing on the pavement.  Mouth-to-mouth was given but there wasn't much face to give it too.  He was gone.

After the loss of my friend I gave up on learning how to ride my bike, rather I was still at that point walk/ride it down the road.  My parents wouldn't even let me leave the driveway with my bike after I did learn to ride it years later until I was twelve.

From the perspective of a child losing a friend at such an early age is devastating.  Jonathan's parents had closure, I can only assume, but I did not until many years later.  The wake and funeral were for family only.

Jonathan's younger brother, Adrian, and I would forever after, until his family moved to Pennsylvania, sit next to one another on the bus.  Adrian confided in me many things one of which was that his mom and dad were going to have another baby.  I asked him how he felt about that he told me he felt like they were trying to replace his brother.  Maybe they were in some small way trying to fill that hole that was now in the family? Or maybe they had always planned on having another child?  Before the baby was born Jonathan's family had moved and our community had a bigger hole in it, one that would never be truly filled.

Jonathan still remains my best childhood friend because he never got older, he never lived to earn my mistrust as so many people have in my lifetime, he never lived to learn to hate.  Jonathan will always be that faded memory of happiness short lived, the one I loved the most.


This post was inspired by the novel Those We Love the Most by Lee Woodruff. Every family has its secrets and deceptions, but they come to surface a tragic accident changes the family dynamic forever.. Join From Left to Write on June 6 as we discuss Those We Love the Most. You can also enter to win a live video chat with Lee Woodruff! As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.