The Story of You & Me

My friend & co-worker, Mama Karen, gave me a MOTHER/BABY journal in October. I wasn’t pregnant yet and she knew of my struggle to get pregnant and had been praying for us for months. She said God told her to give it to me that day and I have to be honest and thought it was a little weird since I wasn’t an expected mother yet. Little did I know, I would literally conceive a baby THAT VERY WEEK. Since then I have learned to never question Mama Karen’s sanity (haha) and I’ve written a little bit about my experience as a pregnant woman in that journal. But there is something that isn’t in the book that I want to write about- the story of me and this unborn baby and how he/she got to be here.

There aren’t any pictures on this blog entry. Just a bunch of writing for my unborn child. So if you skip this blog entry, it won’t hurt my feelings. This is just a reflection of all that God has done in my life to get me to this point today. I wanted to write this down and really capture the story of me & this person that I’ll meet in July. So here goes.

Ecclesiastes 3:1 “There is a time for everything, a season for every activity under heaven”

 Dear Baby Craig,
Over the last few years, Ecclesiastes 3:1 has become one of my favorite bible verses. There is such truth in it and I feel like for you to appreciate how you came into this world; you need to know a little bit about your mother’s different seasons of life. It’s these seasons of my life that made me the person, woman and eventually the mommy that I am today. So here is the story of you & me even before you were born.

My desire to be a mommy started when I was 4.5 years old. That’s when my little sister Nichole (your Aunt Colie) was born. When Nichole was little I pretended like she was MY baby. I’d help my mom changes her diapers and feed her. I’d always hold her and LOVED to make her laugh. I remember doing stupid things like playing “Alf” where she would say the word Alf and I drop down on the ground and pretend I was dead. No clue why that made her laugh but she loved it! Once I was a big sister, I knew that one day I wanted to have a baby of my own.

Mommy was fortunate to have LOTS of babies around growing up. Your grandmother (Momma T) is one of 11 children which meant that I have 30 first cousins. I was # 15 so that meant that there were always new babies being born when I was little and it also meant that eventually there would be new babies when my older cousins starting having children. I remember when my older cousin Kristi had her first child in 1999. I went to the hospital hours after Lee Lee was born. As a 19 year old, I remember thinking there’s nothing else I want than to be a mother. I had no boyfriend & certainly no chance of becoming a mother then (Thank God) but these feelings would eventually change and I would move into another season of life.

Once I got to college and into my mid 20’s, my heart started to change. God would eventually take that strong desire/want to have kids away because He knew that the season of actually having children wouldn’t come for awhile. College didn’t come easy to me so I had to study really hard. My college friends were all getting engaged our senior year and again I had absolutely NO hope of marriage so I just focused on school. After graduation from Texas A&M, I reluctantly moved across the country to upstate New York which turned out to be one the BEST things I could have ever done. I had never really lived far away from home and there was such a different culture in NY. In Texas, if you’ve graduated from college & don’t have marriage on the horizon, then there’s something wrong with you. But not in NY! New Yorkers didn’t marry until their 30’s and the lived it up! I had some of the best experiences, traveled the world and met some of the best people in NY. The thought of having a baby during that time never crossed my mind. I just focused on me and all the fun things I was doing. I suggest the same for you. Everybody needs a time in their life where they can live in a different state/city, travel and just have fun. I can’t actually believe I’m saying this but I will encourage you to move across the country and try something new. You’ll learn so much. You’ll grow as a person. You’ll meet great people that you would never meet otherwise. And hopefully it will shape you into an independent, strong man or woman.

Although NY was a great for me, there was a downside. I had broken up with Jesus when I got to NY. I kind of did my own thing and my relationship with the Lord suffered. When it was time to move again, I knew that I needed to get my life back on track and rededicate my life to the Lord. So when I moved to North Carolina, I started to go to church again. I found the most amazing church and it took me about a year, but I eventually got plugged in and that’s when things started to change.

Although I was in church, there was also a season of waiting and lots of pain. I yearned for a husband and a family so badly that it made me down right depressed. I cried and prayed for years for God to send me a mate. Often times I felt like God was saying NO when actually he was saying “WAIT”. It’s not time for that yet. It’s not the right season. I didn’t know that at the time and it was only through the continuous prayers of Momma T and the support of the most wonderful friends in the world, that I made it through what I like to call “a very dry season”. You see, I wasn’t ready to meet my mate yet. I needed to do some growing and just work on trusting the Lord. It was during that difficult season that I managed to change my view about God. I no longer saw Him as someone who was withholding good things from me but I saw Him as someone who truly loved me and wanted the best for me.

That very difficult but very necessary season ended in August 2009. Convinced that I would never meet anybody, I wanted to try my hand at missions so I took a mission trip with my church to Belize in Central America. NEVER did I believe that I would meet my soul mate & your daddy on that trip but I did! Six months we were married (yes I said 6 months and NO you cannot marry someone you have known for 6 months so don’t even try) & I was the happiest girl in the world. God had finally given me my heart’s desire and I was a wife!!! But the desire to be a mother was something that stayed suppressed for awhile. I felt like I had waited so long for your father that I didn’t want to share him with anybody else (sorry! Once you’re married, you’ll understand). I loved being his wife & having his full attention. We traveled a lot during that first year of marriage and had a ton of fun getting to know one another. It was that first year as a married couple that I got to see your daddy with all of my Sunday school girls and his nieces & nephews and I saw how wonderful he was with children. (P.S. You’re really gonna like your daddy. He’s super funny (comedian funny) and he’s really a 5 year old at heart so yall will do lots of playing together. I can already see that he’s gonna be the one you like the most. I’ll be the disciplinary one & he’ll be the fun one. Oh well) I also saw daddy’s heart & his strong desire for kids and if you think I waited a long time for you, just ask daddy how long he’s waited for you in his life. My wait doesn’t even compare. Gradually my heart began to change and after our first wedding anniversary, God gave me back that desire to be a mother that He had given me when I was 5 years old.

So after our 1st wedding anniversary, we made up our minds that we were going to start working on having a family. After 8 months of lots of practice & lots of prayer, you were conceived in October 2011.

So why do I tell you all these things? Because I want you to know that I have wanted you since I was 5 years old. I have waited 27 years for you to come into my life. So when mommy is mad & upset with you one day, I can look back on this story and it will remind me that I brought this on myself and that a bad day as a parent beats a good day as a single lady without you in my life.

Seasons are a part of life and they will happen to you. You need to learn at an early age to embrace the good ones with the bad ones because they will shape your personality & character. Daddy & I hope to teach you that. And no matter what season you will endure in your life, always know that I will be right beside you during the good and bad times. Because like I tell daddy, you guys are “stuck like chuck” and I’m not going anywhere. Because you’re mine! My very own gift from God.  A sweet reminder that God's timing is perfect and good things come to those who wait.

I love you BIG BIG like the world! Can’t wait to meet you in July!
Mommy