How my Van gives me HOPE!

Almost ten years ago, I gave birth, at the age of 24, to a precious boy named Andrew. I was a first time mom; young, naive, and so excited to be a mommy!

I was a typical first time mom, worried about all the germs and outside things that could harm him.  I was also THAT first time mom that was judgemental as all HECK!  I would say things in my head like, “Why don’t you just mop your floor, it’s a mess.”  OR “My kid would never act like that!”

When Andrew was 18 months old, I started feeling nauseous.  I took a pregnancy test and it was positive! I was so excited, Mark and I always wanted a large family, since we both came from families with four children.

That same day that I found out I was pregnant, it was my first day on the job of working at a steakhouse. I had to go out and get a job because we were in so much debt, and so broke.  When I told my boss that I was pregnant, I could see the look of regret on his face.  It would be against the law to fire me now, and he knew that.  We decided that I would be a hostess, instead of a server, less stress and less carrying heavy trays full of food.

Two weeks later, I woke up and knew something wasn’t right with the baby.  I went to the doctor immediately and they confirmed my worst nightmare.  The baby had no heartbeat and I would go on to miscarry that baby later on that week.  I was devastated!  Crushed!

I had to go back into work and tell everyone that I had lost the baby.  Telling a bunch of male servers at a fine dining steakhouse was not only embarrassing, but also very painful.

I worked at that job for 13 months, 5-6 nights per week until the wee hours of the night.   I forgot what it was like to put my son to bed, I forgot what he ate for dinner, and I missed seeing Mark.  I also had a secret during those 13 months – I could NOT get pregnant again.  Mark and I decided to try for another baby right after our miscarriage, but we just were not getting pregnant.

During this same time, we finally were starting to dig ourselves out of the debt that we were in and were able to purchase a ‘new to us’ van.  We wanted a van because even though we had one child, we liked to travel with friends and have room to fit large items in our vehicle.

I remember driving that van around town, looking at the partially empty seats.  There were four seats, one of them was filled with a car seat, another one should have been holding a baby car seat. God just hadn’t allowed that to happen for some reason.

I quit my job at the restaurant and started to learn how to coupon to supplement some of the money I was making.  I loved being a stay at home mom, but I had just one problem.

Every single person around me was having baby after baby, I think I found out at least once a month that someone I knew was pregnant.

Every single time I found out someone was pregnant, I wanted to scream! I wanted to cry out to God and ask WHY NOT ME? What did I do wrong!?  I went through a year and a half of that battle within myself. I was so angry at God that he was not allowing me to have any more children. It was too painful to bear and I decided that I either needed to reside in the fact that we were only going to have one child, or God was going to have to do something in my heart because I was too heartbroken to continue on trying.

On a whim I asked my doctor to an ultrasound on me, begging him to figure out why I was not getting pregnant.  He found something, and I was able to get surgery to fix it.  Two months after that surgery – I was pregnant!

Nine months later, I gave birth to the most beautiful little girl Hannah.

Twenty months after that, I gave birth to a precious little girl named Kaylee.  We were done having children (or so we thought)! God had other plans and decided to bless us with just 1 more little princess.

Twenty-five months after Kaylee was born, we had our fourth little bundle, Abigail Joy!

I have that same van that I bought back when Andrew was two-years-old. That same van that I sat and cried in because it was too empty. Now it is not, that same van is  filled to the max with screaming little children.  I am overjoyed with love for them!  I dreamt for years that my van would be filled with my children, and here I am with that dream a reality.

Why am I sharing this – after all it doesn’t have anything to do with saving money?  What it does  have to do with is hope – hope for whatever circumstance that you are dealing with.

Don’t give up!  Whatever you are dealing with right now – don’t – give – up!!