A Monday full of signs

As if coming up on Kenny and Nicks (way too early) birthday and especially Nicks angelversary isn't bad enough, Monday there were reminders...over and over again.

It started with taking Kenny to his therapies (speech and OT) at the hospital. As we were waiting, a nurse walks by. She stopped in front of us, got the biggest smile on her face and said, "Oh my goodness!!! Kenny? Is that you? You are getting so big!" Turns out, shes a nurse on the pediatric floor that Kenny goes to whenever he's hospitalized. It was so nice seeing her again...and even nicer that it wasn't because of an admit of Kenny ;)

The second incident happened not too much after seeing his nurse. A woman with an infant sat down right next to me...very cute baby girl in her carrier. I told her that her baby was just so pretty , made mommy small talk and then mentioned something about how chubby and kissable those little cheeks were. She then tells me that they are completely different from her other baby's cheeks...the baby girls twin brother...yeah, shoot me now please. Did I really have to be having this conversation...now? "OK...not gonna let it get me down...I'm good like that. I'm a tough cookie", I'm telling myself! So I ask the next question..."were they early?" wanna know what the answer was? Here goes...nope! Actually she was 39 and a half weeks when she had them....the topper...the kicker to it all? Her previous set of twins were 36 weeks! Inside I'm face palming and wanting to just cry and walk away, but on the outside, I put on my happy face for her! I congratulated her for having such a strong uterus and that not many mommies carrying twins goes that far into the pregnancy. I really was happy for her. She then asked if I had any other kids. Do I dare go into the full "I have 8 living but one passed away" which then leads into Kenny and nicks story? Nope. I just couldn't. I just told her that I had 8 children...period.

Thank god for therapists being prompt to the appointments!

And finally we get to my last twist of fate. As Kenny and I were waiting for Tony to pick us up, after great speech and OT sessions, these two older women were sitting in the same waiting area that we were. I heard them talking between one another saying how cute that little boy was...how he had such an angelic and kind look to him..talking about Kenny.

The one woman asked me if she could give him (meaning Kenny) a pretzel or a piece of gum. I thanked her but told her that he doesn't really take much of anything by mouth. She asked why was that? I said that he has feeding issues which require a feeding tube. The older of the two ladies made mention that she thought he looked tiny for his age and I said yes, but he is huge compared to what he weighed at birth...and then the conversation really got going! I told them about how he and his twin were born 17 weeks early. They asked tons of questions about what their issues are now...yep, they didn't hear the part that I told them that Kenny's twin passed away.

Ugh... So anyhow, the younger of the two asked me if his twin was bigger than him...as in now a days...not at birth. I looked at her and had to tell her that his twin, my third son, passed away. OK, now telling someone that a child of your died is not what many people ever want to encounter. To some, it is a very hard and awkward topic...so I try to tread this topic lightly in face to face conversations. I do have to admit that they were very compassionate to Kenny and I, It was such a blessing in disguise. The conversation didn't end after that! They just were as sweet as could be, talking to Kenny even though they had no idea what he was saying...which he was trying to tell them that a school bus went by. By the time Tony was there to pick us up, these older women knew all about Kenny (and Nick). I told Kenny to say bye to them...an without even thinking twice, he went over to each one of them and gave them each a huge hug! Cutest.thing.ever!!!! I thought he'd just wave bye-bye to them...but noooo...he really liked these ladies.

As we were walking away, I overheard them talking about knowing that he was a special little angel the minute they saw him.

It made me so proud.

I do believe that Nick was totally giving me signs and nudges!