overwhelming gratitude...Jeremiah's 3rd Gotcha Day

Tears... they stream down my face as I try to compose myself enough to write this post.  I have been a bad blogger and keep saying I will get to it. It is our story, my kids story, their testimony to what God has done for them and for us as a family.. Yesterday I was too upset and overwhelmed to write his post.  Yesterday was 3 years since Jeremiah was placed in our arms 3 years ago across the ocean in Taiwan.  I am always forever thankful to the Lord for my children and I am forever thankful that even though Jeremiah was so so sick when he came home that I sit here 3 years later with my little frogie boy!  But this year it is meaning more and more to me.  You see in the past 24 hours I have heard of 2 different families who made their journey around the world to bring home their little ones who waited and were so in need of medical care but their children did not live once home :(  It overwhelms me for them.  I know the fear they felt in PICU rooms, looking into the face of that child you longed for so long as you waited for the formalities to be over so you could bring them home.  I can't even fathom what these families are going through at this point.  I feel a bond, a connection with them and it does remind me of Jeremiah's 'prognosis for survival' but I know that I can not comprehend what they are feeling.  At the time Jeremiah fought for his life in a PICU here there was another family I knew that had a daughter fighting and she lost her fight.  I was devastated!  That is NOT how these stories are supposed to end :(  Yesterday when I was in tears when I realized I forgot that it was the 7th and that had let Jeremiah's Gotcha Day come and had made no plans and no celebration or anything.  That is a huge deal in our home and for me to just not even think about it till it is late in the day the day of it was so upsetting to me.  Then I heard about the first family and their loss of their son the morning after they came home!  It changed from anger at myself for not remembering to massive gratitude yet again that Jeremiah is still here with me! and that despite all the dr's opinions and all the tests opinions he is thriving and growing.  I am so incredibly blessed that I get to be a part of his life.  I remember sitting in PICU and crying out to God when he was dying and they are rushing around fighting for him and said I do not understand God!  Please please please let him live ... at least let him make it home so he can know what family is,, what home is, what love feels like from a family.  and then I would say not my will but YOURS but PLEASE PLEASE let YOUR will be what mine is!  It was a minute by minute battle of tears and prayers.  And I sit her 3 years later totally amazed that not only did Jeremiah make it out of PICU and home to experience even for a short while he is still here.  I do not know why Jeremiah got to live or why I got to be the mama that had the baby that is now famous at our hospital, but may I ALWAYS remember and be thankful for every second I have with my sweet Frogie Boy!  Some days I get emotional because I so want to know what he thinks and feels in words, I so wish he could pick up a toy and play, he could crawl and chase after his brother and friends, I could still feed him by mouth and the list goes on, but then I remember that he has more joy than most people who do all that and more!  He is happy, he coos and lets us know in so many ways that he knows us and he loves us.  He thanks us when we do things for him I can just see it and feel it in him.  I am not sure this post is making much since at all but I could not just come on and make a happy Gotcha Day post with so much going on in my heart and mind and  knowing these families are hurting so badly.  Please keep them in your prayers! Now I will post a few pictures for yall.  I thank each and every one who still reads my blog when I post and everyone who prayed and supported us in our journey to get our boy and through all the hospital times!  Overall Jeremiah is doing above and beyond expectation.  We made it through the winter with NO pneumonia or PICU stays!  He has an ear infection right now but other than that is doing great.  He broked 30 lbs!!  all the way to 31 lbs 10 oz! :)  He is 38 inches long and wearing 3T and 4T clothes.  He is totally on tube feeding now because of silent aspiration witnessed on a swallow study that make it unsafe to feed him by mouth anymore.  His tone seems to be worsening with age but I am prayerful that we can find a way to help that.  We have lost our specialists and so are waiting for appts with a cerebral palsy and spasticity clinic in Houston in August.  As always Jeremiah's favorite person is Noah :)  He continues to recognize our voices and respond and is doing better with tracking red objects at times :)  now on to  some pictures.

In our arms in Taiwan :)  June 7, 2010

Newspaper article in Taiwan paper after the press conference when we picked up Jeremiah!  The orphanage wanted to show the Taiwanese people our "Great Love" that we would travel so far and go through so much to adopt a sweet boy with such severe needs.  Little did they know that we were the ones who were so grateful to them for allowing us to be his family! :)

Some of our time in PICU.  The top left picture is not the worst.  For a long while I would not post pictures of him at his worse even though I was asked many times... now those pictures I took for his testimony are stuck on a broken computer so we do not even have them now.  The next picture is SOME of the tubes that were going to Jermeiah, bottom left is his Big brother and sister holding his hand after one of the really scary times when we had been allowed back in,, and the bottom right is close to day 31 when we are almost ready to go home!

off the vent and back in mama's arms

Family picture.  this was one of those days where nothing went right, noah was scared of the photographer and the photographer had no patience but we have a family picture!

smiley boy

Many faces of Jeremiah

brothers :)

hayride

farm field trip

library song time

Cheering brother on at tball

Gymboree Birthday Party

singin

Collage I made for his birthday :)

more at the farm

library shaking Maracca

turning and grinning because he heard Daddy come in and speak!

Sleeping on mama one day

Ready for Easter Sunday Service

finally resting after a day of screaming episodes :(

This morning all ready for a celebration of 3 years as a Sisemore :)