It's 6 O'Clock in the morning, do you know where your roosters are?

Ours are in the front yard.  I do believe this is the first time I've been showered, dressed, and somewhat ready for the world by 6am.  My clock actually says 5:57am.  And I know you're all thinking, WHAT?  You're on vacation, why aren't you sleeping!  Well, at 4am in Haiti, in this neighborhood anyway, church starts.  And if you don't believe, you're gonna wonder why you don't.  Church is no joke here - I knew that on Sunday when I woke up thinking there was a riot going on outside and was literally fearful for everyone in the house.  I had slept in that morning and by the time I came downstairs and saw everyone acting normally, they laughed at my worried face (ah, the irony.)  So turns out it's not just a Sunday event, it's every damn day, ya'll!  Word on the street is that the guy who leads these early morning revivals has even been arrested before for turning his speakers up so high you can probably hear them in the U.S.  But, he came back.

Anyway, there are also roosters in the front yard that like to worship at 4am, apparently.  They walk around the front yard and just hang out with us like they're part of the family, and they kind of are!  Right now Marc's mother is cleaning the gate and the iron bars that surround every opening.  At night we lock them all on every entrance to the house and sleep.  There are Christmas lights strung up on the top row of the iron bars, and the Christmas tree is already up in her house.  Marc has always loved Christmas.  He's loved the music and the energy and the joy in the season.  He's actually made me love it more.

Zaiya just woke up and he's letting me know that there's a chicken right beside me and he wants to know what all this yelling is about.  "That's a rooster, Zaiya."  Zaiya responds by saying, "Well, why does he have to yell like that?"  He's now telling me to try and pick up the chicken and take a picture with it!  Even my 3 year old knows I'd want to take a picture with it.

And, the power just went out again.  We had power throughout the night which made the fans work, and I do believe that is the only way I slept so well.  And I think we were in bed by 10.  I have no idea what time it is unless I'm on the computer - IT IS GREAT!  There are many wonderful things about being here.  I've been in photographer mode the entire time - snapping the neighborhood and people and kids who stop me and ask me to take their picture. I am itching to edit my photos - but who knows when that will happen.  Honestly, some of them don't even need editing.  It is just beautiful here.  As a matter of fact, I'm going to share a few jewels here.

Marc's mother's friend who spends a lot of time here helping her cook and clean.  She asked for me to take her photo.

Marc would probably kill me if he knew I was putting this on here, but this is what he's looked like almost every day.  It. Is. HOT.  No joke, folks.  And honestly, I love the smile on his face because he is so relaxed and so happy to be here - it's just wonderful to see him in his element.

There are bulls, goats, baby goats, dogs, pigs, and all kinds of other animals here as you walk the streets.  They literally walk right up to you as if they are saying hi... this one literally did walk towards us until we moved.  It was kind of funny.... kinda' scary.  Zaiya loves the baby goats.  He was trying to touch one yesterday on our walk and he said, "Come here, Rudolf!!!"  HILARIOUS moment.

People come out of their houses to talk to us and mostly stare, which is strange but to be expected I suppose.  Marc said there are people here in this area that literally have never seen a white person.  They are all so sweet.  These two little girls followed us on our walk and helped us to not get lost in the maze that is the neighborhood!  They kept telling us how much they liked us.  I took so many pics of them and they made me delete most of them.  

Then, I finally got to get one of one of them who wants to be a model - it was so adorable.  She set herself on this rock and got posed for me, and then explained that she was going to be a model.  I think she just needs to be discovered... I mean look at that face!

The flowers here are so beautiful - in contrast with the way the streets look and the trash that is everywhere, it is amazing to me how comforting the beauty of a flower is.  In all the sadness that surrounds the circumstances here, there are these beautiful, bright flowers lining the broken concrete walls along the street.

This is literally one of the streets off the neighborhood in Marc's parents' neck of the woods.  It is gorgeous.  Hopefully we'll get to visit those mountains soon.

I couldn't resist asking this beautiful girl if she minded if I took her picture.  She was just watching us walk and I'm sure she was entertained by the fact that we kept losing our way and having to ask how to get back to our house :).  I showed her the picture and told her she was beautiful - and she smiled and said "Thank you."  This might be one of my very favorite pictures from the trip so far.

Our model, Lourdi, agreed to crawl into this spot so I could take her picture.  I thought it was a great spot for a picture - but she is actually standing over a sewer, and she was threatening my life if she lost her balance and fell in.  Of course, she couldn't resist posing when I told her I wanted her beauty to contrast the broken concrete.  "Oh, okay, well if you put it that way..."  And off she climbed.  ;)

This little boy just stood there and posed for me forever.  I have several pictures of him, and I love the way he is standing and the smile on his sweet face.  He is going to get water for his family, most likely, and was very excited to see new people in the neighborhood.  What beautiful children this country creates... it is truly remarkable.

My sweet Shaine walking through the neighborhood.  Something about her dress and the fact that she was walking the same path she walked when she was a little girl made me snap this one.  The house we are staying in is the house that she and Lourdi grew up in, but it was only one floor then.  Soon, we are going to walk all the way to the soccer field where they used to go watch the football matches when they were little.  They both talk a lot about how much things have changed, and I can only imagine what it must be like to see the changes and have the comparison that a child's memory holds set against them.

Zaiya is right at home here.  There are many of these concrete slabs from parts of the street that broke during the earthquake, and in Zaiya's mind they make for perfect performing stages.  He told Marc yesterday, "You need to sit down (on the street) because the show isn't over yet."  What would we do without children?  I have no idea.

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I just love this one as well.  Zaiya walking on daddy's shoulders through the neighborhood.  There aren't many words needed for how magical this one is.

Time for coffee and play time with my little man.  We have gotten to play and bond so much - I love the freedom of not counting the hours and just literally enjoying the simplest of games with my son.  I was wondering if this would be a healing trip for me or if it would only cause me more angst.  I am definitely feeling healed on so many levels - mostly because I am gaining insight that few have.  I was talking to Marc about how much this place feels like home to me and how strange it is that it does.  But, like I said, I've been in "photographer" mode almost the whole time.  I've been documenting.  Finally, I left my camera at the house while we traveled to the actual city of Port-Au-Prince very close to where Marc grew up.  There are no connections for car seats here so Zaiya rides in my lap when we go places, which is insane to me but then again it really does make me believe now that car seats are truly over rated.  There can not be a more dangerous place to drive than this and I just keep him wrapped in my arms tightly.  Looking out the window as we drove yesterday truly gave me pause as I held him, in his brand new outfit and his spider man toy from Kohl's.  About 20 minutes into our 45 minute drive I couldn't stop the tears from streaming down my face.  I had to get control of myself once Zaiya figured out what was happening and decided he needed to cry as well.  I know he didn't know what he was crying for, and I realized in that moment that I could not continue to be overwhelmed by it all.  I need to be strong for Zaiya and I need to not insult the beautiful people who live here and are thankful for every single thing they have every day.  

Marc says I have only seen one side of Haiti so far - on Friday we are going to a place called Jackmel where there are beautiful beaches and Marc says it will look like a different country.  I have decided not to take any more "sad pictures" because I don't want that to be what I come home with.  This is far from a "sad" country.  It is beautiful and magical and there is a spirit of life here that I've never felt anywhere else I've ever been.  I am so thankful that our family is here.  And again, I cannot thank those of you who contributed to our trip enough.  Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for this priceless gift.

Love and gratitude,

The Obas Family

Miscarriage

It's hard to find a circle of friends of which one cannot speak of this event in her life.  I've had two.  The first one was quick and "easy" compared to this most recent one.  The first one made sense to me and happened naturally.  It was explained that if a pregnancy isn't progressing as it should, nature simply takes care of it.  I'm a fairly logical person and so that made sense to me and I was able to accept it and move on fairly quickly.  I knew that this wasn't the case with everyone, mostly because of the amount of supportive cards and calls and messages that I received during that time.  I kind of felt like I was cheating somehow by receiving all that attention, because I didn't feel like I was grieving like I should.  My husband and I were trying then, for our first child.

And life went quickly and almost painlessly on as we felt it simply the way this particular union of egg and sperm had ended.  We'd certainly done enough reading about how easy it is for a pregnancy to fail.  So, it's one failure.  We'd try again in a few months.  We did and now we have our almost 4 year old son who lights our life with more joy than we ever could have imagined.  We can't imagine loving anyone he way we love him - at least, I can't.  My husband has a daughter and I know he feels the same bond with her.  There is just something about your children.  I recently described motherhood to a group of inquiring single friends in this way, "I never knew what unconditional love was until I was a mother.  Especially as my son gets older, he's the one who has taught me about real love; I'd never really experienced it until he was here.  So yes, I am better for it and I am even more driven and determined to accomplish my goals in life because I want to make him proud."

And I do so want to make him proud.  So this past month, when we found out we were expecting another child, we were COMPLETELY FREAKED OUT!  We had so many plans - long term and short term and financially had no wiggle room at all for even the prenatal visits much less the vitamins and the food and how could we be so irresponsible and how could we lose track and omg what the he-he-helllll are we going to do?

We're gonna have a baby, of course.  And not because we are staunchly against making a wise decision for everyone involved. But because we almost instantly embraced it and started imagining Zaiya as an older brother and how much joy the companionship would bring him.  I have siblings and so does Marc and we can't imagine life without them, so it seem as if it is a gift we simply want to pass on to Zaiya.  And even though we did not feel prepared and had not been on our best behavior while not realizing we were pregnant, we threw our hands up to fate - we are half religious (I'm the non-religious half) and so on some level we were trusting our higher beings that we'd get through it, some way and somehow, no matter what.

Then, I started having complications.  Then the first ultrasound showed an empty uterus.  Don't panic, we'll wait a couple days and check again (but if it's tubal it could be a threat to your life).

The ultrasounds and probing and talking and hoping and speculating and growing and stabilizing that happened over the next four weeks was excruciating to say the least.  It ended in the ultrasound room, with my favorite doctor who saved my life literally after the complications I had after giving birth to Zaiya.  I trust her more than most things in life.  Marc was beside me, both of us just stared at the screen.  The week before, my dear friend Sandy had sat with me watching as we observed "definite growth" of the sac and felt a hint of excitement and relief that all would be well.  So, as I sat there with Marc watching the screen and knowing that the growth was far less and there was still an empty black football shaped hole inside of me, I turned to see what my doctor's face was telling me.

"It's still empty.  At this point, I feel confident that it's not going to grow.  I am very sorry.  I wish it could be different, I wish I could change it.  I'm going to let you digest that for a minute, and then I'll see you in my office. "  She hugged me, I got myself as together as I could after having a quiet moment embracing the sink with my tears.

Marc hugged me and said he was sorry, but that just felt empty because how could he understand?  How could he possibly understand?  And what was I so upset about anyway?  We weren't planning for this, so why does it even matter?  He already has a daughter.  He has a daughter and son and his life is complete.  I was irrationally angry and jealous of him in that moment - and ashamed of myself for even thinking of his daughter as not really my own.  It is true I did not watch her grow up and she doesn't call me "mom," but it is also true that with or without Marc in my life, she is now a part of me and when she hurts, I hurt.  So I am extremely blessed to have this relationship - and Zaiya is too.  Zaiya does have a sibling.  Isn't this enough?  Why do I want to be a mother again after I just decided I was fine with just having one?

This is where it gets very difficult.  The visions that go through one's mind when imagining the next steps are just about the most terrifying you can imagine.  We sat in her office listening to the options.  I was 8 weeks pregnant with hcg levels above 40,000 at that point, had already gained almost 20 pounds and was extremely uncomfortable and feeling extremely much more pregnant than I actually was.  And in the middle of listening to my choices, I realized that some women don't even have the option to listen to the choices in the way that I was hearing them.  And it made me angry.  I chose to take the quiet route and handle things myself at home, which if I had to do over again I never would do again.  I had a very violent reaction to the medicine and almost called an ambulance because of the level of pain and discomfort I was in.  Marc held cold washcloths to my neck and forehead and followed my every command (some humor... damn that was really nice actually... ;)) and just held me into the morning as I shook speaking to the doctor on the phone explaining that the pain killers and anti-nausea medicine she provided for were not working at all.  My child would be up in a matter of hours and I needed to be able to care for him.  With Ibuprofen, and breathing, my body finally settled down enough for me to sleep a few hours.  Zaiya woke up and wanted to bounce and play on me and didn't understand why I was so sick.  Mostly, he wanted to know about his baby sister (he had absolutely decided it was going to be a girl).  I told him that I was very sick and he needed to let his daddy take care of him.  I reminded him of when I told him that we may not have a baby if I got sick, and that I was sick now so we were not going to have a baby anymore.  His eyes swelled with tears and he cried in confusion, "But I want a baby sister, I want a baby sister!"  There was nothing I could do.  All I could do was to tell him that I did too, and that he was my miracle baby and I loved him very much, and that maybe one day we could try again to have a baby sister.  He kissed me and said, "Okay, mommy."

Sometimes, when I think about the kind of child Zaiya is I can't help but to become instantly emotional at how much he reminds me of myself and how much easier it is to love those qualities in him than it is to love them in myself.  Life is funny that way.  He is extremely gentle and sensitive almost to a fault, and he is compassionate and loyal and imaginative and so incredibly smart.  And I made him!  We, made him.  So clearly my body is capable of this process... so why at this point in our lives was this happening, and why did it it happen in a way that forced me to watch, literally, a dying pregnancy for a month and a half on screen.  What kind of torture is that?  It's enough to make me never want to consider trying again.

As I started telling friends and family, I realized how many people I had to surround me and support me and that felt truly amazing.  For the first time in my life, I was seeing the results of what I had worked so hard to achieve, actual, true friends who I was okay approaching for help and comfort - who were willing to give it and whose hearts were connected to mine in a way I had never realized before.  I realized that part of me was ashamed to admit what had happened, and that made me angry.  So I put it on Facebook finally, after several vague posts about how much support I was needing that I didn't think was fair.  "Miscarriage." is all my status said.  A good friend pointed out that it is an echo of my personality to just get to the point, which is why the post made sense to him.  That was a pretty awesome thing to hear. (Thanks, Andy.) And then I just started reading articles and posting paintings and feelings and thoughts and letting go of the fear of what others would think or how uncomfortable they may feel with me being so open about something so hard.  Many women, some friends and some strangers, shared their stories with me and it was comforting to me.  And it helped me feel so much less alone.  So that is why I decided to write this blog.  I don't know why or how but it is so helpful to hear the stories of others and to know that you can and will survive.

I am still having strange symptoms from all of this and am still in physical and mental pain in many ways.  I don't understand why, but the doctors tell me it has a lot to do with hormone levels and the trauma of losing a pregnancy - it is a serious jolt to the body and mind.  So, it is not a decision that any person could or would ever make lightly.  I am still unable to sleep without waking up in a panic - this is the worst insomnia I've ever had in my life.  I am posting and virtually talking about this experience but it is still very difficult to actually speak about it over the phone.  I know there are many friends whose voices I'd love to hear, but I somehow cannot bring myself to verbally tell the story.  A baby shower at work on Friday nearly broke me again - but I think it was mainly fatigue that prompted those tears.  Sleep is far underestimated... especially under these circumstances.


I want to thank all of the friends who have reached out to me and comforted me through texts, posts, calls, meals, visits, company, chats, messages, and encouragement.  I also have one of the most amazing sisters in the world, without whom I am not sure I'd have made it this far.  It's because of her that I do believe I'll try again... not to mention my incredible brother who married a woman who has very quickly become my 2nd favorite sister in life!  What would my life be like without my brother and sister and the brother and sister they've given me?  I don't think I can even handle thinking about that.  Of course it would be different and most likely I'd be fine - only children are some of the most amazingly well adjusted people I know!!!  Hahaha - but there is nothing like a sister or a brother that you grow up with.  There is just nothing like that bond and that connection.  I wish everyone realized how precious siblings are... and I wish for my family and for others out there that have sibling "issues" that time will continue to grow and heal wounds that are asking to be healed if by nothing else but the force of love that moves the world.  If there's one thing I've learned from this experience, it's that love is so very powerful.  All we really have to do is embrace it.

I wish you all love and thank you for the love you continue to show me.  Thank you for listening to my story.