Where We Are Now.

A little recap to where we are now and the journey we are headed on...

The past 365 days have been one of those where the lemons have been plentiful...

Brandon and I started dating a couple of years ago and shortly after I made the move to Austin, Texas from Florida to be with my person.

I knew that cancer and treatments at a young age, having no thyroid and ongoing hormonal issues, would likely affect my ability to have a family, but figured I would cross that bridge when it got here.

We were surprised when it happened naturally and unfortunately, we learned just weeks later that the baby's heart had stopped. I underwent the necessary procedure and then we began the road to emotional and physical recovery. As many of my friends were announcing their pregnancies or births, I felt empty, confused and unsure of what the future would hold.

It had a huge effect on Brandon and I's relationship, we had to conquer through a lot of anger and dark times that nearly broke us, but we got through it and became even stronger in the end. A few months later, in front of my entire family in Pensacola, he asked me to marry him.

And then three days later, boom, it was like Brandon looked at me and I was pregnant again..kidding, kidding. We didn't get too excited, afraid of the loss and pain that we had just experienced. Every appointment was nerve-racking for the first trimester, I had to give my self a daily shot to reduce the chance of a miscarriage, and the morning sickness was getting the best of me.

But it was all worth it when we saw the perfect little heartbeat at the 12-week mark and that everything was progressing normally! We discovered we were having a baby boy at the Gender Reveal party at 13 weeks and right away, without previous discussion, we came up with the perfect name for our boy, our sweet Noah Riley.

It still hadn't hit me that my body, that I had viewed to be so broken, was capable of creating a life. We knew that we were so blessed to be able to experience every milestone, as there was a time we were unsure if it would be possible.

Each week Brandon and I talked about Noah more and more and our excitement grew; we even started buying a few little baby things!

On March 27th, we walked out of our anatomy scan feeling great, we just spent an hour watching our little boy on the sonogram and everything looked normal, to us. The OB was in an emergency C section at the time so he couldn't see us as scheduled so we scheduled our next appointment and walked out feeling positive. When I received a phone call later in the day, I immediately stepped out of my work meeting and had a gut feeling something was wrong. The doctor asked how I was feeling and then went into what he was calling about. "Well I am looking at the ultrasound and there is a heart defect, I will need to send you to a specialist to get a better look"... My stomach turned and all that I could get out was " I knew this would happen, I knew my body couldn't do this". I didn't ask any questions, I was blank, I hung up and went to Brandon to tell him what they discovered.

That night was miserable, I googled every heart defect possible, my mind went crazy. I set an alarm to call the specialist to try to get an appointment immediately when they opened. I couldn't wait for days to get more information, I needed to know now. Luckily they were able to get me into the doctor that morning. The tech did an hour anatomy scan, as Noah gave us a thumbs up, a big yawn and some more cute stuff. The MFM (Maternal Fetal Medicine Doctor) came in, and I don't remember much after that. What he was saying didn't make sense. "Your baby has a very complex heart defect" "it's not compatible with life" "he will need multiple surgeries to survive" "you have 4 more days to terminate in the state of Texas".

At that moment I just cried, I had no words. I was angry, I felt like I had somehow caused this to happen. It was Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, essentially the left side of his heart did not form. Hearing the surgeries that he would have to endure was gut-wrenching. Hearing the statistics of survival... were even harder. How were we to remain full of faith and positive with all of this?

The next few weeks consisted of lots of appointments with terms we had never heard of and deciding where the best facility for Noah to get treatment. We received a second opinion at Texas Children's Hospital {TCH} in Houston, which has been ranked #1 in pediatric cardiology and heart surgery int he nation for the last few years, and after meeting with the team, we walked out feeling that 100 percent is confident that was where Noah had to be. They were requiring us to be fully relocated near TCH at 36 weeks and were required to live there for at LEAST 6 months until he completed his first two surgeries.

As we have walked through this journey for such a short time, in a blink of an eye, our lives and vision of welcoming our new baby, changed completely. Instead of getting a nursery ready in our home, we were packing boxes to move into a temporary place in Houston in just a few short weeks, not knowing when we will return home and what our next few months will look like. Brandon and I have felt all the emotions; sadness, fear, anger, shock but our relationship as a couple has grown closer and closer, and we have had to lean on our faith more than ever. We know that God has chosen us to be Noah's parents for a reason, even though we don't understand exactly why this happening to us right now, we know one day it will make sense.

We began to embark on one of the biggest, most sour lemons that we have tasted thus far, we hope our story can help bring someone hope, faith, and courage as they go through this crazy journey called life.