moving

I need so badly to write about our move up to Minnesota before too much life comes and it gets lost along the way.

We have lived here in Minnesota for a little over a year now. Let me tell you what it was like getting to where we are now.

TW-In this post there is mention of miscarriage just wanted to give a heads up .

Skip down the ************** part to get past that part.

I am going to start this back in November of 2022 when we found out we were pregnant with baby number 2. We were so excited. But with that excitement came anxiety. Having miscarried before it was always a thought in the back of my mind. One i tried to not ruminate on but it was a constant cloud that i had to be mindful of.

I want to give some context of kindof what was going on at the time.

My parents had gotten divorced A year or so prior and their split was messy and I found myself very much involuntarily involved with the drama.

The last in person interaction I had with my stepdad was one where we scream at each other for 2 hours while my sister had my then 1 year old in the back room.

That conversation was the most honest and vulnerable conversations ive had with my stepdad in my whole life.

It was the first time where he got loud and I matched his energy- like "I don't think so this is MY house".

There were a few thing he had said that hurt to hear but I am glad to have heard them because it showed how little he really knew me at all. How little he knew of my journey and how hard it was to get to where I am now in life and in healing.

He was supposed to go out to lunch with my sister and I the next day but ended up leaving town without any notice.

I didn't really hear from him for awhile after that conversation-there was the sporatic text if he remembered my birthday-or if it was mothers day maybe. But he didn't really make any effort before to reach out to me since my mother and him were no longer together.

But that conversation helped me start the grieving process of the life and relationship i thought I would have with the person who "raised me as their own" for 26 years and who is now just nonexistant.

I later found out he was intentionally not talking to me (for i think it was 6-9 months) because he was waiting for me to apologize for "the way I spoke to him the last time we saw each other".

But knowing that he was intentionally creating space in our relationship instead of communicating his issues directly to me, it started to make me question if I even wanted this person to be part of my life-as hard as that was to wrestle with.

Also I joked that i would go no contact with him but its hard to go no contact with someone when they pretty much go no contact with you first.

Alright alright Back to Nov 2022.

We found out we were pregnant with baby number 2 pretty early on after conception.

I remember being so stressed out about planning Christmas for "my side of the family". We went from not getting together for the holidays to starting to more and more. But for some reason that year it was a whole mess with my moms side of the family and I was like problem solved we will just have Christmas at our house (even though we've never hosted Christmas)

And then that wasn't problem solved, and I said I don't care if there are two christmases I am hosting one here.

It was the first time spending Christmas with my bioligical dad and his wife. After many years of teen angst and bitterness, and anger, and forgiveness, I let him in my life a little more. I wanted my kids to know who they came from and there was this whole family I never got the chance to really know. So i felt it was important to start getting to know them. They also wanted to participate in our lives and are actually very nice people.

It was/is a weird experience to go from never really have a relationship with my bioligical dad to now planning get togethers.

And while simoultaniously going from having a relationship with my stepdad who raised me for 26 years to no longer having any real relationship with him at all.

It felt like one part of my heart is healing and at the same time it felt like it was shattering.

Then the week before we were getting together for Christmas my stepdad sends Shelby's present to my moms house. It was a play kitchen. I go and get it and the box is huge so its already so akward for me to carry but I managed to get it in my car and then over to my apartment and then up the stairs.

I can still remember the Friday before we got together for Christmas trying to put that play kitchen together while Austin was at work. I remember it being so f*cking hard to put together and cursing my stepdads name in the fact that it should be him putting this together not me. How he should be here participating but wasn't.

The cries I let out were primal. The sounds of a daughter who was so angry another dad had gotten out of what he signed up to do-at the expense of my broken heart.

I got that play kitchen put together- may have used my own screws for a few places but it was done, it was together.

I woke up the next morning and there was blood when I wiped.

I immediately told Austin I needed to go to the hospital. I was scared. It was a saturday so I went to maternirty Triage (the same place I had gone a few years back when i had my ectopic and when I had shelby).

They said that spotting could be normal and that they would draw my blood and that on Monday I needed to get more blood drawn to look at my Hcg numbers and make sure they were increasing. They sent me back home.

The next day, Sunday, I hosted Christmas at our house with my family while I was actively miscarrying.

The next day I got my labs taken and my Hcg levels had dropped.

I was so worried that it was going to somehow be an ectopic pregnancy and so my bgyns office had me come in for an ultrasound that same week which confirmed I was no longer pregnant.

And then we had Christmas with Austins family.

End of December Austin starts searching for a Head Chef position.

January Shelby turned 2!

Then end of February/March find out we are pregnant again.

Finding out you are pregnant at the same time that your husbad is actively searching for a job that may relocate you and your family is not for the weak.

I did my best to not stress-focused on packing our belongings. Little by little sorting, organizing, donating, packing our lives into boxes. There were a few clubs that Austin was interested in and traveled to interview for.

It wasn't until the first couple weeks of November that the job opening for Southern Minnesota popped up.

My husband literally flew up there the week before my due date for his next round of interviews.

He got back and I was still pregnant-no baby yet.

Week of my due date.

My due date was the 21st of November which was a Thursday.

Tell me why I feel i was sent the test from the universe.

That thursday, my due date, my stepdad texts me out of the blue and says he will be in st. louis in an hour and that hes staying at the hampton inn. and would like to see me if I want to see him.

I immediately wanted to be like "I mean, I guess"and say "yes" to him even though I didn't want him to come by because I was focusing on potentionally going into labor at anytime and truthfully f*ck that.

My immediately wanting to say "yes" to his breadcrumb of an attempt to "make an effort in seeing me" was almost instantly shut down by me knowing I needed to focus on me and my energy and guiding this baby into this world- and he was not worth altering my energy.

But Jessie, he got a hold of you when he was in town, you should let him come by.

It is an 8 hour drive from where he lives to St. Louis. He waited until he was less than an hour out to give any kind of "heads up" that he was going to be in town.

I feel this was intentionally done so if we werent able to accomadate seeing him within an hours notice that that was us not wanting to see him and "well see, I reached out to them but they didn't want to see me".

It was the first time I chose myself over his comfort. It was the first time I really saw the "game" he was trying to play.

I deserve more than breadcrumbs.

I went into labor the next evening and then that Saturday Nov 23rd gave birth to our second rainbow baby (baby born after experiencing miscarriage).

We got to go home Sunday after noon and then on Monday Austin got the job offer to be the Head Chef at a Country Club in Southern Minnesota.

A few days later we celebrated Thanksgiving with our families. So much to be thankful for.

Then December started the gaunlet of winter/Christmas festivities.

Pictures, Lights, Christmas cookies, Christmas with each family. All while packing with a newborn and a toddler. Austin was still working for his previous club up until a little before Christmas. So he was going to work, coming home packing and being a great dad.

Within The last few weeks of packing St. Louis got a huge winter storm that Iced the city. The city did nothing and the streets and sidewalks remained icy for at least a month.

But during this we were having to run stuff we didn't want to the Thrift store that was down the street and Austin did that until they closed because their parking lot was iced over and they were no longer taking donations.

I posted so many things and arranged pick ups with my local "Gifts and wishes" facebook page until I had to put all my focus on packing what was left.

We unfortunelt had to throw away so much. I told my neighbors to make sure and go have a look because there was a lot of good items. My neighbor that lived behind me later sent a picture of a plant she had planted in a pot I had painted- She had saved the pot from the dumpster. I put all the kids toys that werent coming with us down at the dumpster near houses I knew people had kids.

It was dangerous. Everything was ice. The roads the alleys. And I was freshly postpartum trying not to bust my a** and hurt myself. I bruised my tailbone when I was only 1 month post partum with my first born and I did not want to make that mistake again.

But there was so much to do but I was hellbent on getting what needed to get done but not injuring myself.

within the last days of packing up the house a cast iron dish fell on austins big toe and cracked it open.

Luckily my sister was there and was able to keep an eye on the girls while I made sure Austin didn't pass out.

He was a trooper and pushed through and