In those seven days I pleaded with God, the God I had heard everyone speak so lovingly about, the God I was told was good and helpful—the God that clearly either didn’t know me or didn’t exist. I only ever spoke to him out of desperation, not truly believing that my words would reach anywhere. If he was listening, he had heard me only in times of need. I pretended to believe in him when I thought he could help me. I didn’t give him thanks for any of the blessings he had given me, and I never prayed just to pray. I had never prayed out of obedience; I always had a motive. I never even thought to speak to him unless I was worried or needed him to rescue me. I spent seven straight days begging him to forgive me, making promises to him that I knew I wouldn’t keep. If ever I wanted him to know my name, to truly know who I was, it was now. I knew that he wasn’t happy with the life I had been living but begged him not to hold it against these babies. I promised to change, and this time I didn’t cross my fingers. I didn’t live a life that deserved to be blessed with such abundance, but I held out hope that God had a better plan than the one I had been living.
We made it through the week and prepared ourselves for the appointment where they would finalize the loss of our children. Our friends and family offered what they could and asked if we needed anything. Our only request was that someone take care of our oldest daughter, so she wouldn’t know our sadness and it wouldn’t interrupt her sweet and innocent world. We hadn’t told her that we were pregnant but had told her that we were going to try for a baby. She had bowed her head and prayed, “God, please put a baby in Mommy’s tummy.”
When we arrived at our appointment they led us down the same hall we had gone down the week before. Our first trip down the hall had been full of hope and excitement. Our second trip was full of sadness and loss. I stepped behind the curtain and changed into the paper-like gown and made my way onto the table, so they could once again put a picture on the screen of my failed attempt at carrying life. I was angry at the doctor for making us go through another sonogram and just wanted to get it all over with. My husband sat as close as he could but knew I wasn’t in the mood to be coddled or touched. He sat still and silent with his eyes once again fixed on the screen. I stared at the wall without so much as a glance at it.
The tech was different from the one we had the week before, and she did her best to keep the appointment as routine as any other pregnancy appointment. She was cheery and bright, but it didn’t change anything for me or Brandon. Once again the cold gel hit my belly and we held our breath just to make it through what we already knew.
After a minute or so I heard a familiar noise, the swishing of a tiny heartbeat growing inside of me. I had heard it before with my daughter and nothing can ever erase that sound from a mom’s memory. I swung my head toward my husband and could see by the look on his face that he knew the sound too.
There was a heartbeat.
“Is that a heartbeat?”
“That’s two strong heartbeats. You’re definitely having twins.”
The two heartbeats that were lost a week ago were somehow now beating loud and strong. We could see the tiny little specks on the screen pulsing with each beat, quickly supplying life to our two new little babies. Our entire world had completely flipped in a matter of minutes. Our emotions were all over the place, and we could barely communicate with each other without fumbling over ourselves.
Brandon, who had been standing next to me with a tight grip on my hand, sat down to gather himself. The tech continued to measure the babies and check on all the things that come with being pregnant with twins when she suddenly froze.
“Oh my God, there’s another one.”
“There’s another what?”
“There’s another baby. You’re having triplets. I need to get the doctor.”
I’ve never been at a loss for words; not once in my entire life have I been left speechless. I always have a quick-witted comeback or something funny to say. But I lay there completely stunned. Before I knew it the room had filled with the entire office staff, from the doctors to the receptionist. I was suddenly surrounded by three doctors and a handful of nurses all glued to the screen where they watched the movements of three tiny babies. Some were giggling because it was just so crazy and some were in complete shock. Everyone in the room knew we had walked in there thinking we had lost two little lives. But now, all of us were watching three lives in me thrive.
After what seemed like an hour of measuring and counting again, the doctor asked to speak with us privately in his office. With full hearts we took our seats across from his desk and readied ourselves for a plan of action. We were aware that this was going to be a long and dangerous road. We knew that we would need to take extra precautions and monitor this pregnancy more closely than a normal one. But we weren’t prepared for his speech. He explained that the previous week he had seen one small sack and one large, neither with heartbeats. He had assumed that one stopped growing, which would explain why one was bigger than the other. But the lack of heartbeats was because we were too early into the pregnancy.
We then sat in stunned silence as he told us he was going to put me on light bed rest starting now and full bed rest from twenty-five weeks on. His plan was to deliver the babies at thirty-two weeks no matter what and that we would be in for a weekly sonogram.
After detailing what our pregnancy with triplets would look like and all that could go wrong, he suggested that we terminate one of the babies in an effort to give the others a better chance. Two of them were in one sack and categorized as identical twins, and the other was in a separate sack and categorized as their fraternal twin. He gave us the option of reducing it down to either the one that was by itself or the two that were together. He referred to it as selective reduction. In that moment, I knew that we were without a doubt in the wrong place with the wrong doctor. After everything we had gone through in that short week, this man sat across from us and suggested that we end the life of one of these precious babies. I wasn’t angry. I was hurt and confused and just wanted out. We thanked him for his time and left, and before we had even made it to the elevator I was on the phone with the doctor I had trusted all my life, the doctor who had delivered me and my daughter. I knew he would make the right decisions for us. We set an appointment with him for the following day.
When we got into the car we took a deep breath and tried to process all that had just happened and what we had ahead of us. We each took a minute to text our families, who had been nervously waiting for us to get out of what they thought would be the worst appointment of our lives. I texted my brother’s wife and told her that we were pregnant with triplets. Her response: “Holy cow, you’re having a litter!”
And technically we were.
When we got home we sat my daughter down to break the news to her. I reminded her of how she prayed that God would put a baby in my tummy. I took her hand and told her that her prayers had been answered and that God had put three babies in my tummy. She took a deep breath, dropped her shoulder, and looked up at me.
“Am I in trouble for praying too hard?”
My little girl, whom I had failed to raise in a Christian home, knew without a doubt that God had not only heard her prayers but also blessed her three times over. In that moment, I knew I wanted what she had. I wanted faith like the five-year-old little girl who confidently sent her prayers to heaven. I wanted the faith of a child.
A Downhill Spiral
After thirty-five weeks of a fairly uneventful pregnancy, we delivered three healthy baby girls, each weighing over five pounds. And after a short stay in the NICU, we had the whole family home nine days after they came into the world.
Seeing their sweet little faces made my heart ache. This huge and rare life event was something that brought great joy, but I was missing something. The fact that I had given birth to spontaneous multiples was a blessing that was passed down to me through genetics. My dad was a twin; it ran in his family. In some way these three babies were a gift from my dad’s side
of the family, and I wanted him to share in the joy. I wanted pictures of my dad and his twin brother with arms full of our precious new triplets. I wanted to document the amazingness of my dad and my children being multiples. Deep inside I knew it could never happen, but I ached for just a glimpse of it. My children and my family were surrounded by love and well cared for, but the truth was that I still wanted my dad. I searched for glimpses of him in the eyes of my three newborn babies and hoped that one day I could heal and be brave enough to let him meet them.
We had prepared ourselves the best we could for our family to double in size in just one day. Our families lavished us with gifts and everything we needed for them to come home. We had a freezer full of food, and a pantry stocked with necessities. For the first two weeks we had a revolving door of people coming over to feed a baby or wash clothes. Some even let us take a nap here and there. The two of us created our own routine of nighttime feedings, allowing the other to sleep. We seemed to have it all under control and appeared to be thriving as a family. We were well fed and the babies were well held, but what others didn’t know was that our bank account was dwindling and our marriage was falling apart.
After the babies were born, Brandon was let go at his job. What followed was a string of bad job choices and hard knocks. He began to grow bitter from working so hard and never gaining ground, and I was growing bitter from being home alone with three infants most days and several nights. We were both mentally and physically exhausted beyond anything we had ever faced before. The sleepless nights gave way to neglecting each other physically as husband and wife. The financial struggle resulted in fear and stress that gave way to hardened hearts.
Our first few years as a family were spent dog paddling, trying to keep our heads above water, desperate to reach solid ground. We were stuck out in the middle of the ocean during an epic storm, and there was no dry land in sight.
It didn’t take long before we lost touch with each other and became simply two people living in the same house. On very rare occasions we would get moments to ourselves, and we could hardly think of anything to talk about. If we talked about the babies, we were sabotaging our free time; if we talked about our marriage, our hearts grew hateful. We had somehow gone from two lovers dancing alone in the dark of the restaurant to two people trying to keep our lives from completely deconstructing.
eight
God Turns Sand into a Solid Foundation
A year into our marriage I started to take the kids to the church across the street. I wasn’t trying to be a good mom. I just needed the break it gave me from the kids. My cousin had also signed our oldest daughter up for choir, so I was forced to take her to practice.
Every Wednesday night I would stick two of the triplets in a double stroller and balance one on my hip. I would drop their big sister at choir and then I would drop them in childcare. Once there were no longer children hanging on me, I would go to the lobby of the church and just sit. I placed a book in front of me but never read a single word. (The book was simply to deter others from approaching.) I sat with a blank stare and did my best not to cry. I didn’t want to make friends there; I just wanted to sit and be silent. I had no intention of getting involved or becoming “one of them.” I wasn’t like them, and I knew I never would be. If they tried to create a relationship with me, it would only be a matter of time before they saw how dark I was and what a mess I had made of my life. In my eyes, the people who walked the halls of the church had their lives together. I didn’t fit in and so didn’t try.
After a year of going every Wednesday night, I started the same routine on Sunday mornings. I would sneak in, as much as anyone can with three babies and a seven-year-old, and after dropping them off I would tiptoe to the back of the worship center and listen to the sermon. Out of respect, I stood when the hymns played but never opened my mouth. I bowed my head as if to pray but my mind was empty. God blessed our marriage with these babies, and we were making a complete mess of it. Why now? Why would I believe after all this that God was going to come in and fix everything? I thought back to those seven days I had lain in bed and made promises to him, and I knew he was looking at me with disappointment. I had broken every promise I had made. Just like every other time in my life, I had failed miserably and didn’t want God to see me this way. So I hid in the shadows and took a break from the world for one hour each Sunday morning without a single expectation of getting anything from it.
But God doesn’t work that way. He doesn’t watch a mother in despair show up in his house every Sunday without doing something about it. I might not have spoken a single word when I was in that building, but God doesn’t listen to our mouths. He hears our hearts, and mine was screaming for mercy. My heart was pleading with God even though my head fought it. I was so tired. I had nothing left in me. I hadn’t fully accepted the fact that God was real and that he loved me, but every time I showed up to that church a little piece of me was changed.
My life was a mess and I needed help. My husband had no desire to ever attend church with his family, and I didn’t want to be married to a man that wouldn’t make that sacrifice for me. He was tired too and had given up on me. I gave everything that I had to our children and completely neglected him as a man. I failed him as a wife, and even though I knew I was doing it, I didn’t know how to change it. I had made him feel small and insignificant. It wasn’t intentional; I loved him. I just didn’t know how to survive what we were going through and let him be the man of the house at the same time. Our marriage was spiraling out of control, and I didn’t know how to fix it.
Quicksand
In the spring of 2010, one of our triplets was diagnosed with autism. Even though we had known it in our hearts, seeing it on official documents completely broke us. We had reached a point in our marriage where we no longer knew how to comfort each other. This was another hit that we couldn’t seem to recover from. We rallied to make sure we made the right choices for our daughter and gave her the best chances at life, but we could barely look each other in the eyes. How were we going to be the parents she needed when we couldn’t even be good people to each other? Something was about to break, and our kids would be the ones to feel the snap.
On Father’s Day, June 20, 2010, we loaded the kids in the car and tried to act normal. We attempted a family outing to go see a movie and did our best to be polite to each other. We both knew our marriage was dry and we had nothing to hydrate it, but we played nice for the kids’ sake. As we drove past the church I had reluctantly yet faithfully been attending, I turned to him and said, “At least I’m not making you go there today.”
At a red light when the car had come to a complete stop, he turned his face to mine and with absolutely no emotions responded, “I hope you know that I will never step foot in that church and I hope you know why.”
There was something different in his eyes that day. I knew he had thrown in the towel and was completely at a loss with me. Not even the little ears that were listening from the backseat were enough for him not to put me in my place.
I’m not sure that either one of us spoke another word to each other that day, and our children bore the brunt of it. They went to the movies with a mom and dad who refused to speak to each other aside from ordering the snacks.
We both knew it was coming. On July 13, 2010, at six in the morning we stood face-to-face in our kitchen discussing divorce. Our hearts were bitter and our pride was crushed, but neither of us so much as raised our voice. That was the day I found out infidelity had hit my marriage. Even though I knew we were struggling and had lost our connection with each other, the reality of it stole the air from my lungs and made me want to pass out. All my life I had considered this the number one deal breaker but standing face-to-face, while our children slept in the next room, an entirely different feeling came over me—complete loss. Realizing what we had done to our marriage over the years turned my anger into deep sadness. I knew that the level of forgiveness we needed to save our family was more than e
ither of us possessed.
There was no yelling or fighting. We were both deflated and completely exhausted. I put all the blame on him because it was easier for me, and he took it. He had completely given up. I understood why but my instinct was still to point the finger. We had so much to discuss, but we both just stood there and stared at each other, neither of us able to fully pull the trigger.
In the middle of talking about dismantling the family that I had literally begged God for, I began to sweat. The heat in the house was intense, and both of our shirts were wet with perspiration. In the Texas summer heat, our air conditioner had completely quit on us. We were forced to stop talking about divorce and start working together to figure out what we needed to do to get the kids to day care and get someone in the house to fix the problem. The problem in our marriage was put on the back burner while we faced yet another hit in life.
For three days we were without AC, and the house reached unbearable temperatures. The only room that was cool was the master bedroom due to a small window unit capable of cooling only the one room. We made a makeshift bed on the floor in our room and all piled in for movie night and to sleep together in the only cool place in the house. Brandon and I were forced to pretend like everything was okay. He couldn’t bail on us and sleep on the couch; it was simply too hot. I couldn’t make him watch TV in the other room; I was mad, not cruel. So, for two nights we were shoved into that room—in the middle of the worst moment in our marriage—and forced to treat each other with respect and kindness for the first time in a long time.
On the third night while I lay in bed waiting for Brandon to come home from work, I heard God speak to me for the first time in my life. From the moment we decided to divorce, I had been pleading with God to fix what was broken. I asked him to give me an out and not make me the bad guy. I questioned why he had put us together in the first place and why he would allow this in our lives. He spoke to me but told me what I didn’t want to hear.
The Con Man's Daughter Page 8