For as long as I can remember Ive always wanted a boy and a girl, a girl first as a matter of fact. It just so happened that I got lucky and things turned out the way I had hoped. 

Erik and I were both 19 when we got married. We found out that I was pregnant with Emalyn just 5 months after saying I do. He missed the majority of the pregnancy plus her birth due to a deployment and let me tell you right now, theres nothing like standing on a cold ass pier handing your husband his new baby for the first time. It was strange really. Since he missed the birth, I knew that once Emalyn had gotten older that I wanted to have one more. I wanted to experience having a child with my husband. I wouldn't exactly say that he was on board at first but after talks and talks of the pros he agreed to try again while we were still on shore duty. Turns out, I got pregnant with a boy... and we're done. Our family of 4 will never be a family of 5. [ If someone does their job correctly. ]

I personally don't want our whole marriage to be about babies. 

That might make some of you gasp but hear me out... Like I said above, we chose to get married young and accidentally started a family sooner than we wanted. We took responsibly for our actions and quickly jumped into mommy/daddy mode. The reason why I say that I don't want my whole marriage to be about babies is because I want to experience something with Erik other than having kids. I want to see rated R movies and go out for drinks. I want to have a night home alone with my husband. [ We've never lived close enough to family for that to be a option. ] I want to do whatever it is that married people do and I don't think that makes me selfish in the least bit. 

I want to be Erik's wife. Not just the mother to Erik's kids.

Can I still be his wife and have more kids with him? Sure, but when your done... you just know. 

Is a part of me sad that I will never experience pregnancy again? Yes and no. But deep down I know that I can't just get pregnant for the sake of hearing a heartbeat or seeing a baby on a screen. Theres so much more that goes into all of that. We are going to have so many "firsts" with Emalyn and Jonah. They are both so young and have a whole lot of growing to do. I want to be able to give them both the attention that they deserve while also giving my husband "wife" time. Even if Erik was to get out of the Navy [ which he isn't ] we still wouldn't want more kids. Our decision has nothing to do with the military. Our decision has to do with whats best for us, regardless of the military and other peoples opinions. 

We are in a good place right now in our lives and we feel good about keeping our family as 4. I feel happy knowing that I have a good husband, 2 awesome kids, a brand new home to move into and the fact that I will never be a mini van mom also makes me happy. 

Proud To Be A Military Wife

This is for the young women that are waking up at 6am every morning with small precious children that they have been left alone to care for. This is for the pregnant military wife wondering if her husband will make it home in time to watch their miracle happen. This is for the military wife, living in a town or on a base alone where she is a complete stranger to her surroundings.

This is for the women that feel like a third leg when they go out with their friends and their husbands. This is for the military wife that cancelled all of her plans to wait by the phone and even though the phone broke up and cut off every time she spoke to him, she waited anyway. This is a pledge to the women that cry themselves to sleep in an empty bed. This is to recognize the women that felt like they were dying inside when he said he had to go, but smiled for him anyway.

This is for those of you that are faithfully in that long line at the post office once a month handling two large boxes and two small children like a pro. This is for the women that decided to remodel the house to pass time and then realized that they had no idea what they were doing and sighed and wished they had a little help. This is for all of the lonely nights, all of the one person dinners and all of the wondering thoughts because she hasn't heard from him in days.

A toast to you for falling apart and putting yourselves back together. Because a pay check isn't enough, a body pillow in the bed is no consolation and a web cam can never compare. This is for all of you, no matter how easy or hard this was for you.

Our military men are brave, they are heroes, but so are we. So the next time someone tells you that they would never marry a military man, don't bother explaining to them that you cant control who you fall in love with. Just think of this and nod your head, know that you are the stronger woman. Hold your heads up high, hang that flag in your front yard, stick 100 magnets on your car and then give yourself a pat on the back. Be proud to be the woman that you are, be proud to be a military wife.

Emalyn's Hospital Stay

November 10th is when everything went down hill really. Emalyn started to get a fever that kept going up and down along with the chills. Her temperature got to 103.5 and we decided to take her to the emergency room. According to the dumbass doctor who saw her, we didn't need to bring her in until her temp was 105/106 since she had no other symptoms. Um, what? We were shortly released and were told to continue with the Tylenol. Her fever went up and down until Monday.

Tuesday she went to school and was just fine, the fever was gone. When she got home that day, she complained of her head hurting, and again on Wednesday so both days she received Tylenol and was good after that.

Thursday and Friday she seemed good. She was her normal talkative happy self. She had no complaints of a headache.

Saturday morning she started throwing up and could not keep nothing down. And I do mean nothing.

When Sunday [ 11/17 ] morning came I went into her room to check on her and she told me that her legs felt funny. I stood her up and she could not walk. She could not balance herself to even take a step without falling. She is six. Erik and I had thought maybe her legs were asleep or she had a cramp in them so we didn't think to much of it and we helped her down the stairs. She continued throwing up and still could not hold anything down. We finally said this is enough, we are taking her to the emergency room. She was given fluids, had blood drawn, did a urine test and had a cat scan done all to figure out why she could not walk. After receiving the fluids she quickly became her normal self, stopped throwing up but was still not able to walk and balance on her own. No one could figure out why. We were transferred to Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women and Children later on that night. Since the doctors didn't know if it was contagious or not, Jonah had to leave. Erik stayed with Emalyn in the hospital and I took Jonah home.

Monday I went back up to the hospital since they ruled it out as being contagious. Emalyn started physical therapy and saw a neurologist. They did a MRI and that came back perfect. They did more blood work, that also came back normal. She did not have a fever, she was no longer throwing up and she did not have any pain… anywhere. The question still remains, why can she not walk on her own?

Tuesday her walking improved slightly but she still needed a lot of help. They told us it was called Acute Cerebellar Ataxia which is a disorder of the nervous system. It is marked by the sudden onset of disturbance in muscle coordination. The cerebellum is the part of the brain that controls balance and coordination. It does not function properly in the case of cerebellar ataxia.

Basically her being sick [ fever, chills, headaches and throwing up ] is what caused the part of the brain [ cerebellum ] to not function correctly. My first question was how long would this last? Their reply was days, weeks or even months. If it turns into months she will need to do another MRI and have a spinal tap done.

Late Tuesday night she was released from hospital. Until she can fully walk on her own and not fall, she has to stay out of school. She needs help walking every single time she wants to get up and walk. Its honestly been challenging but we are making it work. We were told to let her be a kid, let her walk, let her play just help her so she doesn't harm herself.

In a couple of weeks we will need to go back to the Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women and Children to check in with the neurologist and the physical therapist to see her progress and then we just go from there.

If this doesn't make sense to you, how do you think we feel? One day our six year old can walk on her own, then one morning she couldn't even stand on her own two feet without falling over and it's all from a fever, headaches and throwing up.

I really hope this goes away very soon so she won't have to do more tests. So far she hasn't been able to walk on her own for a full week. Wish us [ really her ] luck!