God's provision

So three days after my mother arrived, Lawson was laid off at FedEx. Upon hearing this news from him on the phone, I momentarily had a breakdown, cried and was slightly hysterical for 20 minutes while my mother held Ruth on her shoulder and repeated over and over; "Oh my gosh!"

Our midwife arrived for our two week appointment as I was envisioning us selling our house and having to move to wherever Lawson got a job. Upon seeing Amy at the front door, I pulled myself together, wiped tears from my face as Amy entered and I filled her in briefly on our changing circumstances. Then we began discussing Ruth's health and my recuperation from the c-section.

Lawson arrived home during Amy's visit and I was amazed at his calmness. At that point I felt that God was going to take care of us and give us peace to get us through this hard time. My husband sat down in "Kit's chair" and started going through paperwork. Amy asked to hold Ruth, told her she was a keeper and claimed she wasn't going to have to weigh our little girl using the "fish scale" since we had her weighed at the doctor's a couple of days prior. The visit was short, Amy told us we had a lot to discuss and she had to move on to another appointment.

Once our midwife left, Lawson filled us in on the details of what transpired at work that morning. He then disappeared into the office where he promptly filled out six job applications and networked on the phone with contacts. Lawson's grandmother informed him that he had a cousin working in Nashville as a headhunter and should be expecting a phone call that day.

My thoughts returned to a song we had both heard on K-Love a couple of months ago. The song tells of a man who has lost his job. He dresses up every morning and "goes to work" too ashamed to tell his wife the truth. I remember Lawson commenting that if he ever lost his job, he would tell his wife and everyone right away. The more people who know, the better chance of networking and finding a new job. Lawson did exactly that. He shared the news on Facebook, emailed contacts and called friends and family. One of the jobs he applied for was at UT Memphis and a FedEx co-worker who had previously worked at UT Memphis "put in a good word" for Lawson and nine business days later, Lawson had a another job.

Crying nights

Wow, it's been a while since I've posted anything. Ruth was 9 weeks yesterday, May 21st. At the end of week two, my mother came to visit us. She was very helpful with taking care of Ruth while I took a shower or napped. At night, she was a life saver! Ruth cried for hours non stop. My mother would come downstairs and we'd take turns holding her in the darkness of the living room. I'd nurse her and then she cry. We'd change her diaper and she would cry. Mom burped Ruth on her shoulder and she would cry. I'd bounce her on the exercise ball and she would cry. Eventually, she'd settle down and be quiet, her eyes would close and I would test if she was asleep. We'd pick up one of her arms a couple of inches and let it fall. If it fell like a rag doll, Ruth was certainly in a deep sleep. If she stirred and the arm was stiff, we knew we had more work to do! When we were sure she was asleep, we'd so carefully tiptoe across the living room to the bedroom and lay her ever so gently in her cradle. Alas, Ruth felt the temperature change from my arms to feeling the coolness of the cradle sheet. The little girl wiggled and grunted and cried softly. My mother quickly rocked the cradle back and forth while Ruth whimpered; sucking on her binky. After 10 minutes of this, we convinced ourselves Ruth was asleep. I retreated to my bed ever so quietly and mom returned to her room upstairs. About 20 minutes later, Ruth commenced crying again. I would take the baby out to the living room and the entire process would occur once more. As I reflect back on this, I have realized that Ruth kept waking up due to flailing her arms, hitting them on the sides of the cradle which caused her to cry and she probably wanted to be swaddled tightly.