The Next Two Years…

If you haven’t followed Our Story, you might want to start at the beginning.

We had our boy and our girl, life was good. Everyone was thrilled with the ultrasound mistake, except we didn’t have a boy name. We spent the first night in the hospital looking through the hospital’s copy of 10,000 Baby Names for the perfect name for our baby.

I was excited to have a boy, but I was also confused. Several times during my pregnancy I had very vivid dreams about our family. It was always Sailor, myself and three little girls. I was sure God was showing me a glimpse into our future since so often I had no hope of a future with Sailor. I was confused as to how these very real dreams could be totally wrong!

I was thrilled with our little boy though and we soon agreed on a name and brought him home from the hospital.

All was well in the world until our sweet little boy was about three weeks old.

I do not remember much about the next four months. Our little boy was very, very sick. We were at the doctor’s office every few days. He would regularly stop breathing in our arms and he would choke and projectile vomit during almost every feeding. He didn’t smile, roll over, gain weight, or even make eye contact.

We were desperate. Our little girl had never been sick or even cried. She only went to the doctor for well check-ups. Our little boy had his own wing at the pediatrician’s office.

Not only did he suffer from chronic ear infections starting a two months old, thrush, failure to thrive and several other odd medical problems he had colic. He cried every night from 5 pm until 2 am. Not just cried but screamed, screamed until he threw up, choked, or stopped breathing.

No one would babysit him because they were afraid he would choke or stop breathing while we weren’t home, so there was never a break. Sailor didn’t handle the crying very well so I grew resentful that I was stuck with this sick, screaming baby, 24/7.

Finally when he was about four months old the colic stopped. The thrush went away and a few of the other issues were remedied as well. He was still very delayed, but at least he wasn’t turning blue and screaming all day.

After being confined to the house for almost five months, except for doctor’s visits, I decided to enroll in college to finish my last year of school. Sailor and I arranged our schedules so that we didn’t need a babysitter except for a few hours one day a week when our classes overlapped.

This new life worked. We didn’t spend much time time together so it was easier to get along. We made friends and reconnected with a few old friends.

About a year after our little boy was born our friends were babysitting while Sailor was at school and I was gone. Sailor got home before me and called to tell me to come home right away. Something was wrong.

I arrived home to find Sailor holding our son (wearing nothing but a diaper) in front of a portable fan. He didn’t look quite right. Sailor told me he had taken his temperature and it was 107.6. I told Sailor our thermometer must be wrong, but he did seem very, very sick.

He gave him a dose of motrin while I waited on hold for Tricare to give us permission to take him to the ER. (We had taken him to the ER previously without approval and ended up with huge co-pays that we couldn’t afford to pay) We finally got approval for an ER 20 minutes away instead of the one that was 3 minutes away. We put him in his car seat and raced across town to the ER.

I honestly didn’t think he would make it to the ER. During our ride his eyes fluttered and rolled back and he was unresponsive.

When we got to the ER his temperature was 106. I don’t really remember what happened that night in the ER, except that I went out of the room because I couldn’t stand to watch them start an IV on him and learned that Princess Diana had been in a car accident and died.

After several hours and numerous tests the ER doctors and nurses had no real answer for our son’s high fever. They told us they didn’t know if he had any brain damage from the fever and that we probably wouldn’t know for several years. We took our little boy home and watched over him for several days, worried the mysterious fever would return.

It never did and life continued. I graduated from college and settled into my role as a mom and wife. I learned to cook and clean (sort of) and was busy with my two kids. I got a job at our church with the children’s ministry and once again Sailor and I settled into our routine of being gone when the other was home. It worked.

One of our favorite family activities was going to garage sales on Saturday mornings. We would load the kids up in the car and drive around town with a newspaper and a map looking for great deals. During that time I learned about a little website called eBay. I couldn’t believe people were selling junk online and people were buying. I spent my free time researching how eBay worked and quickly realized that selling items I purchase at garage sales on eBay was an easy way to earn money.

My first sale, a pair of ceramic siamese cat salt and pepper shakers. I paid $0.05 for them at a yard sale and sold them for over $50 on eBay. I was hooked.

I quit my job at the church and devoted most of my free time to eBay. It was nice earn extra money, especially with all the co-pays we had for our children with chronic ear infections, asthma, and other illnesses.

My working from home was not the best thing for our marriage. With Sailor going to school full-time he had a lot of free time at home. It was hard to figure out how to get along like normal people. We had many fights that lasted for days. We ended up in counseling, again.

One day in December we got into an exceptionally bad argument. Sailor’s anger seemed worse than usual and he was so spun up during the argument I was concerned he might do something stupid.  Then all of a sudden he collapsed to the floor. I was secretly happy that his yelling made him pass out, but scared at the same time. I yelled at him to get up and he said he would…. in a minute. But he couldn’t get up. He told me he was “taking a break” from arguing. I told him that no one takes a break from arguing and lays flat on the floor.

He finally got up and the argument was forgotten. I told him something must be wrong with him because no one yells loud enough to fall down. He said he would see a doctor soon.

A few nights later we were at a Christmas concert at church. In the middle of the concert Sailor leaned over to me and whispered:

Sailor: After the concert is over I need you to take me to the ER.

Me: What????

Sailor: I think I’m having a heart attack.

Me: What????

Sailor: A heart attack.

Me: If you are having a heart attack we need to go right now!

Sailor: I don’t want to make a scene.

Me: It will be a bigger scene when the paramedics drag your dead body out of this auditorium.

Sailor: Fine, but we’re going to miss the finale and you love the finale.

Me: We are going now!

I then leaned over to my dad and said, “After the concert pick up the kids and meet us at the ER, Sailor is having a heart attack.”

By the time we had walked out of the building half my family was following us. I told them not to worry and we’d see them soon.

We headed to the ER and were admitted immediately, apparently “chest pain” is the keyword for getting to the front of the line at the ER.

They admitted him for a few days and ran every test possible. He was totally fine. They couldn’t explain the chest pain or the earlier collapse but suggested it might be stress.

After Sailor was discharged I was afraid to leave him with the kids. His behavior was erratic and I wasn’t sure if he could handle a two and four year-old alone.

One day, against my better judgment he convinced me to go Christmas shopping while he watched the kids. I had been gone about 45 minutes when I received a phone call to come home immediately. Apparently Sailor had been talking to my aunt on the phone and all of a sudden the phone went dead. No one could reach my house. My mom was headed over there to see what was wrong but I needed to come home too.

I rushed home and opened my front door to find Sailor lying face down on the ground and my two year-old screaming next to him.