Our story........

As most of you know we lost our twin boys one day short of 20 weeks just over two weeks ago. I want to thank everyone for the ongoing support! Max and Benjamin! The cards, emails, phone calls, text messages and flowers have been such a help. To know that we have so many people out there who love and care for us really helps! Sorry I have not responded to most of you. I have been a complete mess and shut myself off. I went back to work this past Tuesday (6/2) and I am trying to slowly get back into somewhat of a "normal" life. I also started going to a grief counselor and Aaron is going to join me this week. So far I think it is helping a little, just really hard to see the pregnant woman & babies as the office is at a womens clinic. I cried until I was seen this last time, hopefully it will get easier every visit. Some days are better than others, we just have to trust that god has a plan. We take comfort knowing we have two angels in heaven that look down on our family! I had my first doctors appointment this past Friday. (6/5) We had a nice long talk with our doctor and got a few answers. I have an incompetent cervix that is usually not diagnosed until what happened to us happened. There was nothing we could do this past pregnancy but we are going to fix it for our next pregnancy. Our doctor has a very aggressive plan to help insure that I carry our next pregnancy to full term.

I wanted to share our story. While this is one of the hardest blog posts I have ever had to write hopefully it will bring me some peace.

On Thursday May 14th my mom, Sierra, Aaron and I went in for our 19 week ultrasound to find out their sexes, it was going to be one of the happiest days of our lives. The ultrasound looked really good and found out our two fraternal boys were healthy and couldn't stop kicking each other! We felt so blessed! At the end of the appointment they measured my cervix (which they had not done since my 7th week ultrasound) and said that she needed to get the doctor. It went downhill from there very fast! Come to find out my cervix was measuring at 10-13 mm when a "normal" pregnancy should be 40 mm. At 25 mm you are put on full bed rest. I was then looked at by the doctor who said I was dilated to one and was having pre-term labor. We had no idea why or how this happened. I was then instructed to head directly to the hospital. Once there they put me on medication to stop the contractions and said that I would be there until Monday to see how we all were doing. My doctor said that she was very scared for the babies and it didn't look good. I was on strict bed rest and would be for the remainder of the pregnancy. We needed to make it to 24 weeks to give the babies a chance. Before 24 weeks they could not survive.

We made it to Monday (thanks to the many visitors!!) and had another ultrasound to check me and the babies out. We thought we were in the clear! Again the babies were healthy & had great heartbeats yet my cervix had not changed, which was good and bad. That afternoon they sent us home said there was nothing they could do but put me on bed rest and wait. If we made it to 24 weeks they could put me back in the hospital in case they were born early. It never crossed my mind that they wouldnt make it until at least then. We went home and got me comfortable for a long stay in bed. The next day I woke up and was starting to have some cramping pain. By 3:30 I could not get comfortable, my back was killing me. I thought it was just our soft bed. When Aaron got home at 3:30 he called the doctor and we were on our way to the hospital again. I was having contractions every two minutes. By 4:30 I was back in the hospital in full labor and it was too late. They tried to stop labor but my body couldn't. By midnight I was dilated to a ten and chaous erupted. The next 4 hours are a complete blurr but Aaron was right by my side. I could have not done any of this without him! Our twins were born on May 20th at 1:34 am and 2:11 am. We named them Max and Benjamin. (Two very strong family names) They both lived about 10 minutes before heading up to heaven. I am so very sad that we lost them but it makes me happy knowing that they had each other. We got to hold them the next day and spend some time with them. They were perfect in every way!! Ben looked so much like his dad. We also had the Chaplin, Kate, say a blessing and then said our goodbyes. We wanted to go home as soon as possible but I didnt want to leave the hospital with out them!!! It felt so wrong! Why, why, why just repeats over and over in my head! We are heartbroken. Loosing our two boys is the worst thing in the world! We had them cremated and have planted some flowers in their memory. (thanks kate and lindsay!) We are also planning on planting two Japanese maple trees and then spreading their ashes in our yard so they will forever be with us. We have many mementos (like their baby blanket that they were wrapped in together) from the hospital and looked at it all this past weekend. So very sad but so wonderful to have a few of their items to hold with us. Good Sam was so good and did everything they could to comfort us and the boys. I am looking into taking pictures for families of their little ones that have passed to early. If anyone knows of any organizations or people in hospitals I can contact please let me know!!!

Again thank you for all your prayers and thoughts. It means so much to our family during this difficult time!

(This is the last group of pictures that Katie took of me pregnant. It was Thursday May 14th, I was 18 weeks and 6 days. This was the day of the ultrasound, that day that changed everything! I can't thank her enough for documenting my boys growth. It means the world to me to have those images! )