7 months!!!!

Aug 27

3 min read

SEVEN MONTHS. 💙🩵

Seven months with Declan & Colton.

Seven months of loving two little boys more than I ever knew was possible.

And today, they gave us a pretty perfect seven-month day.

Both boys were awake, active, playful and SO much fun. They were smiling, moving, interacting and showing off those little personalities that just keep getting bigger by the day.

And apparently, they decided seven months was also the perfect time to prove that these boys know how to POOP. 💩 We had some serious “Code Browns” today. 🤦🏼‍♀️😂 After everything these boys have put us through over the last seven months, I guess poop explosions are the kind of excitement I’ll happily take.

They were adorable and playful ALL DAY…

Until Mom pulled out the camera for their official seven-month pictures. 📸

Then suddenly both boys were DONE. 😂

Apparently surviving seven months of NICU life? No problem.

Mom wanting a few cute pictures to document it? Absolutely unacceptable. 🤣

And while today marks seven months since they were born, developmentally our boys are really only about four months old. That’s the strange world of prematurity. They came three months early, so while the calendar says seven months, their little bodies and brains are still catching up on those three months they should have had growing safely inside me.

And maybe that’s part of why these monthly milestones always hit me a little harder than I expect.

Because I am so unbelievably proud that we get to celebrate seven months.

But if I’m being completely truthful, there’s also a part of my heart that hurts when I say it.

Seven months.

Seven months of watching my babies grow up inside hospital walls.

Seven months of monitors, ventilators, alarms, procedures, surgeries, medications, rounds and learning a medical language I never wanted to know.

Seven months of walking into a hospital to see my children instead of walking down the hallway of our home.

Seven months of saying goodnight and then leaving them behind.

Seven months of watching the world outside keep moving while it sometimes feels like our lives have been frozen in the same place.

There are moments when I look at them and feel nothing but gratitude because they are here.

After everything they’ve survived, I will never lose sight of what a miracle that is.

But gratitude and heartbreak can exist in the same heart. I can be incredibly thankful for how far we’ve come and still ache for everything we’ve missed. I can celebrate seven months and still wish with every piece of me that these seven months had looked different.

I can laugh until I cry over a diaper explosion and then cry later because all I want is to change that diaper in their nursery at home.

That’s the strange reality of this life.

And someday, I know I’m going to miss pieces of this version of them. The tiny smiles. The cuddles. Their nurses who have become part of our family. The people who have loved our boys alongside us and celebrated every tiny victory like it was their own.

But I will never miss the reason we’re here.

I am ready for the day when our biggest problems really are Code Browns, ruined outfits, terrible seven-month pictures and two little boys keeping Mommy & Daddy up all night.

I am ready for the ordinary.

I am ready for the chaos.

I am ready to bring my babies home.

Until then, we keep doing what we’ve done for seven months.

We show up.

We love them.

We celebrate every inch forward.

We cry when we need to.

We laugh whenever we can.

And we keep believing that one day, this hospital will be somewhere we used to live.

To everyone who sent a “Happy 7 Months,” congratulations, prayers, love or a message reminding us just how far these boys…and their Mommy & Daddy…have come: thank you. ❤️

I saw them. I read them. And I felt every single one of them.

I may not have responded to everyone, but please know how much your words meant to me today. Sometimes a simple message reminds me that even though this road can feel incredibly lonely, we aren’t walking it completely alone.

Seven months has been beautiful, terrifying, exhausting, heartbreaking, hilarious and filled with more love than I ever knew one heart could hold.

And somehow, through it all, these two little boys keep showing us what it means to fight.

Happy 7 months, Declan & Colton. 💙🩵

Keep growing.

Keep playing.

Keep smiling.

Keep pooping out of your diapers. 😂

Keep proving everyone wrong.

And most importantly…

Keep fighting, boys.

Because someday we’re going to walk through our front door together.

And I think that might be the first moment in seven months that I finally feel like I can breathe again.