Brothers

Brynn is an amazing big brother. He gets just as excited as Jon and I do when Iann does something new. "Mama," he'll say, "Iann just scooped food on his spoon for the first time. Isn't that great???"

While he is aware that Iann is behind the other 2 yr old's he knows, he hasn't ever complained or been bothered by it. This may not always be true, but we'll take it for now.

After loosing Alex, Jon and I didn't want Brynn to be an only child; he needed a brother to keep him grounded. This was a big reason why we started the adoption process, and why we wanted to adopt a little boy. Brynn has loved Iann since the day he came home, and kept asking when they'd share a room ... which they do now. Iann won't settle down until Brynn is in bed, and Brynn sleeps through all of Iann's night wakings. It is a beautiful thing. Oh, and Brynn reads to Iann after we leave the room.

To be honest, there have been moments of anger regarding Iann's diagnosis, and one of the issues that can upset me is the idea that a child with some level of cognitive delay wasn't they type of brother I wanted for Brynn. A child who takes up lots of my time, and who I have to focus on more closely than Brynn. But Brynn's innocent acceptance of everything Iann does shames me out of these feelings. This is the brother God gave Brynn, and I believe that having Iann as a brother can only make Brynn a better person.

Now, don't get me wrong, they argue and Brynn pick's on him, just like any other sibling set. Right now, for example, they are in their bedroom with the door shut, playing while Mama 'works.' I hear the occasional whine coming from Iann, and I am sure that Brynn is choosing to play with whatever toy Iann has shown interest in. And, now I hear a giggle from them both. What are they up to in there??

This morning I was emptying the dishwasher and I heard Iann belly laughing downstairs. Brynn had turned off the Wii and they were supposed to be coming up for breakfast. As hard as it is for me not to rush downstairs to see what is happening (Iann has been known to laugh when he's getting hurt) I reminded myself that I don't want to be a 'helicopter' mum to Iann any more than necessary, so I forced myself to stay out of it.

A few minutes ago, Brynn showed me what he was doing to Iann downstairs earlier on today:



Brynn is sitting on Iann, rubbing his chest and making him laugh really loud. Brynn has seen Jon straddle Iann like this to force liquid medicine down his throat, and he knows Iann's SLP, BM, has asked us to vibrate up and down Iann's chest to show him how long he can make noise for. Iann HATES when Jon straddles him with a medicine syringe in this hand, but loves when Jon vibrates his chest. Brynn has somehow combined the two into a game Iann loves!


End-note, I now know what they were doing in there ... Bryn just came out of the room:

"Mama, look at me." I looked up and he is wearing a diaper! "Don't worry, mama, I have my underpants on underneath."

Sigh. Maybe I should go and instill some order in there.

Jon and Brynn go sledding

Living in a place where we tend to get loads of snow each winter we have tried to interest Brynn in sledding for a few years. However, hehas never been too interested. Until this year. When he heard that Iann and his twin cousins went sledding last week while he was at school, he started a campagin for Jon to take him out. Both Brynn and Jon were home on Monday, so they went up to Cerio Summit. It was President's Day and all the schools in the area were off, so they expected the sled run to be quite busy, however there was only one other family there - another plug for small town living :)

The morning started off with Brynn a little nervous of going too fast, sitting on his sled and controlling his speed:

By the end of the morning, he was trying to go as fast as possible:

I think we need to get a better sled for next year, one that will let him go really fast!

Jon handed Brynn the camera at one point, to let him try and get some pic's of his dad sledding. Here are a few of his best efforts:

Is that the time? My budding phographer will be waiting for me to pick him up in 2 mins and Iann is still asleep in his crib. Opps!!

A week in the life of Iann

Iann has 9 hours of therapy each week. This is nothing compared to the twenty hours a child with autism is 'supposed' to have, but it's very good for where we live! The men and women who work with Iann are all fantastic, so I am going to give a little description of what each of them do, referring to them by their initials for their privacy :)

First, occupational therapy. Iann's OT, LL, is fantastic and has been working with him for almost a year. I am already getting sad for when Iann starts pre-school in the fall, in order to receive therapy there, and we will no longer be able to see LL. Unless the autism waiver comes through by then ... please let this happen God! LL is working on increasing Iann's cognitive abilities and helping him regulate his sensory system. Iann is a 'sensory seeker.' What is that? Good question and exactly what I asked!!! It means that his nervous system has a difficult time organizing, and telling his brain exactly where all his body parts are. Also, Iann has a really high pain tolerance: he trips over a lot and I rarely worry b/c he pops back up and runs off. Even when he has blood pouring down his face! When he does cry, I feel like it is more the shock of what happened, as opposed to any pain. So, one of LL's job is to help him learn how to get the sensory input he needs so that he can concentrate and learn. Also, LL works on things like him be able to feed himself (which he is starting to do), stacking blocks and scribbling.

Iann's first speech therapist (SLP), KK, was awesome too. She did all the hard work of teaching Iann the power of communication. Sadly, she moved away a month ago and now can't see the results to her hard work. After KK let us all know she was deserting us, um, I mean moving, the search was on for a new SLP. It is amazing how there are just no SLP's willing to work with the Early Intervention program, within an hr's drive to us! Anyone looking for a career change might consider becoming a SLP, b/c there is a real shortage of them!

Before leaving, KK started to talk about Iann to a SLP who lives over an hour away, finally convincing him to take Iann on. So, Iann has a new SLP, a man who comes through our town on his way to work with various school districts. Iann has seen him twice and already we are seeing results. A mixture of KK's hard work laying the groundwork, and BM's amazing way with kids has lead Iann to start babbling more than ever and even try to say some words.

Iann also has 2 other SLP's he sees, who work at the Pediatric Rehab center. Obviously, speech is hugely important right now. These ladies both have different approaches to BM, and between the 3 of them we are seeing results.

And then there is the autism/behavior therapist, AM. This poor lady lives closer to two hours away from us, but has another kiddo she sees here twice a week, so comes to Iann after him. We are working on increasing her hours with Iann but I am having a rough time receiving any feedback from her employer! Argg, very frustrating! AM's type of therapy is the one we were told Iann needed twenty hours of a week in order to have the best chance at life. And she comes two hrs a week. Like I said, this isn't what either of us want, and we are trying to increase her hours but her employer is in Denver, and we are out here in the Western Slope. The best way to understand her therapy, is to understand that she is getting Iann ready for pre-school; teaching him to sit down and pay attention to her, and make choices between toys. Obviously this is a very broad sketch of what she does!

Finally, Iann goes to gymnastics twice a week. He used to see the world's most amazing physical therapist, but that was costing us $50 a week, where as gymnastics is $88 a month. He goes to a mommy, daddy and me group once a week and has a private lesson once a week with an wonderful coach. This man has years of experience and has working with Olympic level gymnasts. He has a real interest in kids with Special Needs, and is truly great with Iann. He has told me not to push Iann to be where the rest of the group is, on the Monday class, but to allow him to get used to other kids being there and to wait for him to join us ... which he usually does.

And there you have an overview of Iann's week. And my week with him! We are happy that Iann has two men working with him, since these guys truly get into the rough and tumble with him, in the same way that Jon does.

Life in a small town

We love living in a small town. Jon and I met in this area, and always knew we wanted to raise our kids here. After living here for 6 1/2 years, it is a rare experience to go anywhere without running into someone you know - either a good friend, or an acquaintance. I have also noticed that if I vary where I buy my groceries, or where we eat out, I run into a different crowd of people. So, sometimes I shop in a different store just to catch up with different people!

I love our small town Children's Museum. In recent years I have visited Children's Museum's in Phoenix and Palm Springs. Certainly, these other places are much bigger and have more sophisticated exhibits. One boasts a huge indoor climbing sturcture around a tree and a room with swimming noodles hanging from the ceiling, both very fun things. The other has a VW Bug that kids can paint, a dedicated store area with an attached pizza parlor, where kids make pizza's out of cardboard and felt. Brynn spent a long time being the checkout boy in the store, enjoying be able to control the younger kids! Oh, and the old police motorcycle was a big hit with Brynn too.

For all their cool exhibits, however, there was one important thing missing: somewhere for the mum's to sit and catch up. I guess since our Children's Museum is so small you can basically see the kids wherever they go, so we can sit and chat. I have a few good friend with whom I have spent many hours with in the Children's Musem, disucssing topics ranging from tax returns to potty training to our loving husbands to budget ideas. I value these many hours with my friends. Up until recently Iann wasn't very happy at the museum so I hadn't been for a long time. We tried again last week and he is now happy to be there, and is able to amuse himself very well, as well as interact with the other kiddos there. Yay for forward movement!


Of course, small town living does have drawbacks. For example, we only have one hospital and so one ER, and that is where Alex died. In the year after that horrrible day I think Jon, Brynn and I had to visit the ER more times than ever before combined. It was still hard to walk past the room where my baby passed away, but I have no other choice.

Another drawback to small town living is the lack of any pediactic specialists. The boys have a great Dr., who has expereince with, and a heart for, kids with developmental delays and SN's, like Iann, and he does a great job claming Iann down when he has to go see him. However, the neurologist and FX/autism Dr's are all up in Denver. Since we only have to see them once or twice a year at this point that's not too bad, but it's still a 5 hr drive to get up there.


Certain therapists are hard to find in our area also. We are very lucky to have found a team of wonderful therapists to work with Iann, however I know that a bigger city would offer even more options.


Will we ever move? Maybe. If we ever feel like Iann needs the services offered in a big city we'll move. But at this point, we are hanging in with what this area has to offer. Since leaving Hong Kong, at the age of 17, our six years here are the longest that I have lived in one place. The idea of leaving my good friends here, and of packing up our house, makes me sad. And so we are staying. For now, and maybe for always.

Family Dinner Night

Ever since we got the FX diagnosis, I have read everything I can get my hands on about the syndrome. Overall, it seems that most of these kids get easily overwhelmed in new situations, and busy places. Restaurants can be a prime place for a meltdown. Thankfully, sweet Iann rarely gets overwhelmed like this. His desire to get down from the table is quite typical for a two year old.

Every Sunday night Jon, Brynn, Iann and I eat dinner with my parents. For many months we have eaten at a Mexican restaurant called Amelia's. They have a big outside porch that we always have the corner table of during the summer, and once the boys are done eating we let them down to explore. In the winter they give us a similar type of table - in the corner - and they know us well enough that we don't worry too much if Iann has to get down to move around. Unfortunately, Amelia's has decided to close on Sunday's until the weather warms up again, I guess our business wasn't enough!

So, we are trying to find another favorite place to go. Last week we tried a different Mexican restaurant, but it just wasn't the same. Tonight we decided to go to Garlic Mike's. I really like their mushroom soup, and mum said no to Pahgre's. Jon and I arrived about 5 mins before my parents, and in that short amount of time, Iann had pulled the paper covering off the table cloth, thrown a knife on the floor and knocked over a glass of water. Amazingly, Brynn was super well behaved all evening. By the time my parents arrived, Jon was ready to pack it in and go home.

I guess I hadn't thought about the other restaurant patrons. All middle-aged couples out for a nice evening meal - not another kid in sight. Opps! Thankfully, Iann is fascinated with my dad these days, and as soon as they arrived he started pointing at dad and babbling. And laughing. And squealing. And babbling more, and more, and more. He was babbling consonants that I haven't heard for months.

His new speech therapist told me the other day that our goal is to get my almost silent boy babbling so much that I wish he would be quiet.We were nearly there this evening. If was so very wonderful to hear, however there was a part of me that wishes he had chosen a more kid-friendly venue in which to be so loud and vocal!

Alex's first few days

Alex was breathing fine right after he was born and he was put onto my chest. However, within 3 min's my OB said something like "You better fix that breathing little one." My heart sunk. This little one was struggling to breathe as well? (Nice picture of me right? I am not one of those women who look perfect right after giving birth!)

In the same way that they did with Brynn, nurses whisked Alex away from me to the baby warmer in my room. In a God thing, the baby nurse was a lady who also worked at my OB's office. She had walked the whole journey of bed rest and worry with me. She listened to his heart and almost right away knew that Alex had a diaphragmatic hernia. She had never looked after a baby with this condition before, but she knew what she heard. To the best of my memory, she described it as follows "His heart was on the wrong side. I knew that he was fine on all your ultrasounds, so I thought through what could have caused it. A diaphragmatic hernia, where his intestines had pushed up through a hole in his diaphragm, just made sense to me."

She was right. Alex was taken away, and again, as with Brynn, Jon followed. However my mum didn't make it to the hospital in time to witness Brynn's birth so when he was taken away I was left alone. This time, mum and Alia were with me. True to form, Alia immediately got on the phone and started calling people to pray for us. And working her family's contacts to provide whatever we might need.

At first I really did think Alex was experiencing the same struggle's as Brynn, and I remember thinking. "Well, we've survived this once, and it wasn't such a big deal really. I can do this. I can meet this challenge." And then Jon came back into the room and told me that Alex would be sent to St. Mary's Hospital, in Grand Junction, to have surgery. X-ray's showed that his large and small intestine had indeed gone through his diaphragm, moving his heart to the side and crushing his left lung. GJ is a little over an hr away by car, so this seemed doable.

Brynn was at our house with Rosa, my parent's housekeeper from Hong Kong, who had come out to help us make it through the summer. Rosa is a wonderful lady from the Philippines who pretty much catered to Brynn's every whim for the next two weeks. Thankfully, she was able to drive Jon's car and drove him to Alia's house to swim everyday, where he was again the center of attention. Another God thing. I really never worried about Brynn the whole time I was gone.

Remember the wonderful epidural I'd had? Well, the greatness of it wore off quickly when I realized that I couldn't get out of bed to go see my baby. He was already hooked up to an IV, and on oxygen in the baby nursery. The one that was now mostly empty and able to handle a child with the intense needs that Alex had. I laid in bed, praying that God would spare me this child. Jon, Mum and Alia all came in to give me reports and show me pictures of my sweet baby Alex.

A short while later, my OB came in and told me that the St. Mary's Pediatric Surgeon was on vacation, and so Alex was going to be flown to Denver Children's Hospital. DENVER??? That's about a 5 hr drive, not so easy to cope with. At this point they brought in a wheelchair and pretty much picked me up and put me in it. I was wheeled into the nursery, where I saw my little boy with tubes coming out of his little body at all angles.

Alex was born just after 1pm, but it wasn't until closer to 5pm that the plane arrived in our local airport, and the EMT's brought them to the hospital in their ambulance.

During the wait, Jon and I had to decide how to handle the next part of the day. Only one of us could go on the plane with Alex, and mainly due to the lingering effects of my epidural, we decided that Jon would fly on the Flight for Life place with Alex; Mum and I would find another way to get there. Enter Alia and her contacts. Soon after we found out the severity of Alex's condition one of Mum's best friends, Phyllis, Alia's mum, came to the hospital to support her. Between Alia and Phyllis they reached Mark Palm, a pilot with a local relief agency, Samaritan's Aviation. Mark agreed to meet us at the airport and fly us to Denver, behind the Flight for Life plane.

One bright spot of the day was when my good friend Kristen stopped by to see me. She knew just what I was feeling, and therefore what to say to me. She had traveled the same road with her son, who spent weeks in the NICU after his birth. Kristen was a source of support and strength at that time, and continues being such for me today.

God showed up once again when the EMT's walked into the nursery. I knew one of them, and he enveloped me in a bear hug. Mum later told me she wondered who on earth was hugging me so tightly, while Jon stood by, smiling! He promised to transport my baby safely to the airport, and get him on the plane ASAP. Thanks for keeping your word buddy.

Jon went in the ambulance with the EMT's and the absolutely wonderful nurses. Their job is tough and emotionally draining, but they were both professional and caring. Mum and I followed the ambulance in Phyllis car, and saw the decent sized plane Jon and Alex would be flying on ...

and then the tiny 4-seater plane that would carry mum and me up over the Rocky Mountains. Gulp.


Have I mentioned the weather yet? In typical mid-summer mountain weather, a nasty thunder storm was rolling in. Pilot Mark was obviously worried about flying in such weather, but as the father to 3 kids he could only imagine my emotions. We took off as the thunder clouds rolled in, mum in the back and me sitting next to Mark. Planes take off horizontal to the runway, most of the time. But not this time. We took off correctly, but were soon buffeted into an almost vertical position. Mark has since told me that it was one of his 'hairiest' takeoff's ever. Double gulp. I sat and prayed through every thunder-head, the whole way to Denver.

Jon and Alex were met by an ambulance; mum and I were met by some family friends. When we got to the hospital, Jon was sitting in the NICU waiting room while the staff were admitting Alex. At that point it was about 8pm on Sunday night.

Jon mum's, Marilyn, flew in from AZ, arriving at around midnight. I think I maybe slept for a few hours, but it very hard being away from my baby. Denver Children's Hospital was in the process of building a new facility where parents can sleep in their baby's NICU room, however at this old place we couldn't. Jon and I were given a small meeting room, with 2 pull-out couches and were trying to sleep when she arrived. Jon's sleeping pill worked, mine didn't. I awoke when Marylin came in to sleep on the other couch and I took her into the NICU to meet her grandson.

She and Jon snoozed on their couches while I kept vigil at Alex's side. I truly didn't begrudge Jon his sleep. He was working the graveyard shift that month, and had arrived home that morning, eaten breakfsat and gone to sleep ... only to be woken by me in labor 2 hrs later. He was running on 30 hrs without sleep.

The following day, Monday the 30th, was one of relative calm while we waited to see if Alex would stabilize enough for surgery the next day. Time and again we were told that he had a great chance of full recovery: he had flown the whole way over the mountains without needed oxygen! It is believed that his diaphragm herniated as he was being born since the Dr's could tell from x-ray's that his left lung was fully developed, and so when the intestines were returned to their correct position, it was the hope that his lung would expand fully and he'd be breathing on his own within days.

We waited and prayed for the surgery to be successful, holding our son and cherishing the time with him.

Pregnancy My Way

Spoiler alert: This post may be too much information for any male readers out there ...

I always believed that pregnancy was easy for women. God created us to carry babies and it never crossed my mind that some of us may not be good at it! Admittedly, before I was pregnant with Brynn I had never been around many pregnant women, and women in the movies breeze through their 9 months.

This was not the case for me. Everything was fine with the majority of my pregnancy with Brynn until I reached 36 wks. I woke up for a few days running with mild menstrual-like cramps, so finally called my OB, who told me to come in right away. She sent me over to the hospital, and it turns out I was have contractions every 5 mins. Who knew??? I didn't feel a thing. I was put on strict bed rest, only allowed up from a horizontal position to eat, go to weekly appointments to have an ultrasound, and with my OB, and to swim. Oh, and did I mention the medicine I had to take? It made me me shake, and feel icky, but stopped the contractions.

Statistically, once you stop taking the medicine at 36 wks, labor doesn't start for at least 2-3 weeks. Not with me. I went into labor 34 hours after I stopped taking the medicine. After getting up to use the restroom at about 4am, my waters broke as I got back into bed. Brynn was born 1 hr and 15 mins later - we barely made it to the hospital in time! Brynn wasn't breathing when he was born, since he came out so fast, but was off the oxygen with in 24 hrs, and released with me right on time.

Oh, how quickly we forget the pain and horror of it all!

A year and a half later I was pregnant with Alex. After about 5 weeks into that pregnancy I started some light bleeding. This continued on and off until I was 24 wks, with me being on bed rest that whole time. Jon didn't leave for work until 2:15pm, so he looked after Brynn in the mornings and my parents helped out by paying one of my friends to take Brynn from 2:30 until 6:30, feeding him dinner.

That was really hard on me - a stay-at-home mum who couldn't look after her son properly! But he was a very active 2 yr old, and so very social that he most likely had a better time with his buddies anyway!

At around 24 wks I stopped bleeding, but started have contractions, so the bed rest continued. At 32 wks they put me on the same med's I took with Brynn, and then Alex was born at 36 wks also.

I was in the hospital a total of five times with that pregnancy! Once while we were in Phoenix for Mary Rose's wedding, and four other times at home.

I only had to stay overnight one time, because it was pretty late by the time they were able to stop the contractions. I was exactly 36 wks that day and my OB was thinking about encouraging the contractions. However the nurse in charge of the baby nursery asked her not to, because they had 2 sets of twins and another baby with some medical issues, and they didn't want to possibility of another sick baby, not that anyone actually expected Alex to need anything. So the contractions were stopped and I was sent home the next day.

My parents and other families in our area who used to live in Hong Kong were hosting a huge reunion that weekend, with loads of old friends coming, so I went straight from the hospital that morning to one of the reunion events. I did stayed seated for most of it!

On my fifth visit to our Family Center at the hospital, the nurse didn't even let me get into the bed until she knew for sure I was having the baby this time! She said she didn't want to change the sheets if I just got sent home!!!!

That was 10:30am. I called my friend Alia, who was visiting her family home from NY, and she came over to be with us. I had an epidural at 1pm and Alex was born at 1:20pm. I went from a 5 to having a baby in 20 mins! At least I had an epidural this time. There was no time for anything except oxygen with Brynn.

I will forever be grateful to the nurse who encouraged my OB to send me home 3 days earlier. By the time Alex was born, the baby nursery was almost empty. I was the only lady on the ward in active labor, and so Alex had the attention of all the nurses and Dr's he needed. They looked after him for 5 hrs, until the Flight For Life nurses arrived from Denver Children's Hospital.

But that is a whole separate story ...

Jon told me that he never wanted to watch me give birth again, since he didn't know if he could handle the stress of another sick baby. So three months after Alex was born we made a permanent decision for me not to get pregnant again. They day Jon went to see the 'man' Dr I was struggling with the idea that I might want more kids one day.

"Honey," Jon said, "If we want more kids, we'll adopt." Little did we know how soon that would come to be.

Family Trip to Palm Springs, CA

Jon and I try to get out of Montrose every year for the week surrounding Alex's death. Montrose is such a small town that it is sometimes difficult to avoid driving past our one hospital, and I just don't need that this week.

Mum and Dad took Jon, Brynn and I to Disney World, FL the first year, Jon and I took Brynn up to Grand Junction last year, and we all went to CA this year. My sister Julie's in-laws own a home in Rancho Mirage (right next to Palm Springs) and so Julie and her family flew out from England to stay with her in-laws. Mum and Dad rented a house in the same neighborhood, and we were all together!

I was very worried about how Iann would do being in a new place, surrounded by lots of people all the time. One of the issues with FX is the ability to become overwhelmed really quickly, especially when the child is out of his normal routine. Thankfully, Iann did AWESOME!

He absolutely loves being in water of any type, and once he realized that the big whole in the back yard filled with water was a pool, that was all he wanted to do. I had to buy him water wings since he was totally fearless of jumping off the step and being underwater! Unfortunately my camera wasn't working for much of the trip so I have no pic's of the boys swimming.

Talking of swimming, Brynn was a little fish - sorry, he prefers turtle! He has been taking swim lessons all year and they were so worth it. He swam up and down the pool, went underwater, jumped in from the side and just did great. I think he was in the pool for about 5 hours one day ... Jon was great at sticking it out and being in there with the boys most of the time too. He is an awesome dad!

On the actual day of Alex's death we went to the Palm Springs Zoo. It was a great little place and the kids had fun. Jon indicated his desire to stay home the night before, but I talked him into it (think, "there is no way we aren't being together on this day, and I'm going to the zoo, so ...")

Brynn really liked the model railway, spending a fair amount of time following the train around the track. I could see his mind working, imagining what the people inside the train were doing, etc. Iann spent most of the day lolling in his stroller and I'm not sure if he really saw any of the animals, but he stayed happy :)

One of my favorite parts of the whole trip was the great meals that we ate out in the evenings. Mum, Julie and I went to PF Chang's one evening; Julie and Lawrence took us out to a lovely Italian restaurant one night; and then Julie, Lawrence, Jon and I took Dad to PF Chang's since we loved it that much!

It was a wonderful week and we enjoyed sunny CA, while it was snowing all week in CO!!!!! Maybe Hawaii next year??

Where to start???

I am at a loss with where to start this journey. The story starts in the past, but what is happening right now is so exciting that I want to share that too! So, I am going to give a brief synopsis of the whole story now, then I can write about current things, filling in the past as time allows.

Jon and I met in 1994, when we were 19 and 16, in the area where we currently live. We had a wonderful summer romance, then I went back to Hong Kong, and he returned to AZ. This was before email was widely used and it was hard to stay in contact, so we drifted apart. We saw each other on and off over the next 4-5 years, decided it was time to get serious in the spring of 2001, and were married in June 2002.

Our first son, Brynn, was born on March 3, 2005. I went into labor with him 4 weeks early, and was put on strict bed rest. Brynn was a healthy weight, but was born 4 weeks early, and wasn't breathing. We were told that he might have to be on oxygen for up to a month, but he showed his determined personality early, breathing on his own within 24 hrs. It is hard to believe that this scrawny little peanut will be six in a few weeks!

My second pregnancy started out ok, but went south when I was only 5 weeks pregnant. Since this is the short version of the story, let me just say that I was on and off bed rest from that point, until Alex was born, 4 weeks early just like his big brother. Thankfully, Alex was breathing fine ... for a few short minutes. Alex had surgery when he was 36 hrs old, and ultimately passed away when he was 6 months old, due to complications from that surgery. Here are the first and last pictures of Alexander Lake Miller:









Months of pain, anguish and anger followed, and all those emotions still rear their ugly heads from time to time. However, Jon and I decided right away that we couldn't totally fall apart: Brynn still needed 2 functioning parents.

Six months after Alex passed away we began the process to adopt a baby boy from South Korea. Growing up in Hong Kong inspired me to adopt an Asian child, and I liked having two boys! We sent in our initial paperwork on September 12, 2008, and were told the process would take at least 18 months - I was totally fine with that, thinking that I needed to time to grieve for Alex more. Wasn't to be.

We started out number 19 on the list of families waiting for a boy referral, and accepted the referral for a little boy named Min Soo Choi only 4 1/2 months later:


Time seemed to slow down at that point, but it was only 5 1/2 months later that Jon and I flew to S. Korea to bring Iann Min Soo Miller home to CO. As you can see, we bonded from the very first moment that we met. Iann didn't cry when we left his foster mum behind, didn't fuss on the flights home, and only showed us any distress on the 5 hour drive home from Denver. He screamed for the whole, entire drive. I was worried that my dad would question what we had done, but he was very accepting of the screaming 10 month old in the back seat!

Again, skipping a large part of the story that I won't go into right now, we started to realize that Iann wasn't developing at a normal rate about 4 months after we brought him home. A year of me fighting to find an answer later, and hours upon hours of therapy, Iann has finally been diagnosed with Fragile X Syndrome and autism. The Fragile X Syndrome is directly inherited from his birth mum, and is the leading cause of intellectual disabilities in boys.

Ok, now that you are all caught up on the broad strokes of the last 4 years, I can start talking about the amazing steps forward Iann is making every day.

Auntie Rose and Uncle Jon

Auntie Mary Rose and Uncle Jon came to stay with us for a few days, and since Mary is an accomplished photographer, she let me download some of her great pics. Here are the highlights of their visit.

Uncle Jon started throwing his 1yr old twins up into the air ... one at a time ... and Auntie Mary took pictures. Those twins flew high! Iann was quite a bit heavier but had just as much fun!

Going to the Coffee Trader has become a tradition when Jon and Mary come to town. Even though it is February, it was warm enough for Brynn to want a mango smoothie. I can't believe my firstborn is almost six! Where does the time go?

Iann and the twins had their first experience of sledding on a small hill behind our house. Here is what Iann thought of the whole thing:

READY:

STEADY:

GO:

CRASH:

I think Iann enjoyed it while he was whizzing down the hill, but would have nothing more to do with it after his hands hit the snow - he won't keep gloves on!

Brynn spent much of his time playing Super Mario Brothers on the Wii with Uncle Jon. Jon was very patient with him - thanks man! When Brynn got home from school on Tuesday he couldn't understand how he'd made it to the next level, until Auntie Rose admitted to playing it on and off all day! Another favorite past-time of Brynn's was learning "jon-jitzu," Uncle Jon's way of doing karate from the couch!

After some fun time playing outside on Monday after dinner, where Iann got to get into one of his favorite things ever, the swing, the three little ones had a bath together. I think this may have been the beginning of the end for Iann. On Tuesday morning Iann decided that he was done. Up until that point he had handled the twins really well: not getting too upset when they took his toys, watching them eat when we were all at the table, and just being another one of the boys. All changed on Tuesday, when the two Jon's decided to go shooting, leaving Mary Rose with the 3 little ones (I was at work).

Mary Rose told me that he got super frustrated because he couldn't communicate with her, and just lost it from there. I forget that I understand his sign language and basically know what he wants most of the time, so he has never had a tantrum with me before. But poor, sweet Mary Rose was unable to understand what he wanted/needed. From that point on Iann whined/cried when he saw the twins so we pretty much kept them separated.

Overall, Iann do SOOO well. Remember, we had just spent a week in CA, in a different house. My sister and her kids were around us from about 10-5 each day, and Iann did great out there. We truly had a wonderful visit with Jon, Mary and the twins, and I hope Iann's behavior at the end won't stop them from coming to visit us again soon.

Initial Post :)

For all of you who have been encouraging me to write about our experiences over the past 4 years, I am ready to start now. Three years ago today Jon and I spread our six-month old's ashes in the canyon behind my parents house. Life seemed to stop the day Alex passes away, and since then we have experiences plenty of pain, tears and sadness. And yet, love allows us to feel loss, which then can turn into life.

Over the next few months I will begin to tell the story of our love, loss and life. Please bear with me as I struggle through this, and search out the segments of time needed to do so!