Archive of ‘Mommy Life’ category

With death comes life…

It’s a couple of days after the tragic death of Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gigi. I’m a basketball fan, but not a die hard fan- and definitely not a Lakers fan. But I am a HUGE fan of people who live to be great and learning of the grit, work and mindset it takes to be the superhuman that Kobe was. And that’s why this story of his untimely death has struck me in a way that I don’t think it has with any other celebrity. From what I’ve learned of him in TV/Media, it was clear he wanted to be great at everything he was a part of. Living in the Philadelphia area and being a part of the Lower Merion community, people are sharing their stories and tributes of Kobe the human being- not the celebrity or basketball player. And it makes this loss even more sad- because at the end of the day, he was just living to be the best example he could be for his kids- so that they in turn could be their best and be great and whatever they do.

When he finally retired, he focused his efforts to provide stories/content for kids to see and realize their full potential. You can’t help but admire someone who really gave to the world as much as he did- and through that all, strived to be present for his kids/family! When I think of someone successful- a few things come to mind- their time freedom, their material success, their ability to give to others, their faith and happiness. I think, how can it be possible for someone to be great at all of these things? Something has to give! It’s too much for 1 person to be great at all those things. But it isn’t. God wants us to be great, and it’s on us to make the choices to be great- and BELIEVE we are capable. Kobe wasn’t superhuman. He just lived and breathed what he was called to be and kept in his mind that he was destined for greatness in every area of his life. I’m not saying that you aren’t successful if you don’t reach Kobe’s level of success. What I’m saying is, it’s in our power to decide what we want and in the choices we make, to create our story of how we are great. That was his story- but what is mine? “Mamba Mentality” is something I never lived by, but totally see and want for myself. It means working towards a life that allows me to choose to be giving of my time- and spend it with who I want, how I want and when I want by removing dumb/time sucking shit/people and focusing on the things that I am great at. The bottom line is that the story of how we define our greatness is different for everyone and we can decide by every choice we make whether we want to be great or not!

When the stories started coming out about the daughter being on that flight, and her name being Gigi- it hit me hard! And then in coming across photos of his daughter, and seeing that Gigi was dressed up like the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz- I just lost it.

I think about the pain and fear he experienced in those last moments- knowing he couldn’t protect a life he helped to create. Knowing what lied ahead for the future of his surviving children and wife. And his wife- I feel for his wife! I pray that she can be carried through this unimaginable loss. Without even putting basketball/fame/etc. into the equation- anybody that has to deal with the loss of a husband is unbearable- but the loss of your husband AND child- the child that most exemplified your husband? Not saying that losing any child would be OK because it’s just awful no matter what- but it makes that pain just more heavy- because at least if Gigi had lived- seeing that child continue her career in basketball would possibly soften the blow, because she would have been able to see her husband live through her daughter. I can’t even imagine. Everything about the story is heartbreaking. But at the same time, it uplifts me- as I’m sure it has many others- to choose to live life in the middle… and rest at the end.

I’m a part of the InvestHER community- and in one of our mastermind sessions with group leaders throughout the country- we went around to share what our theme for this year would be. For me, it’s FEARLESS. Fearless in my sharing, making and SHARING mistakes, taking risks and growing – because although I have the choice to take action on the plans I make for myself- I also need to surrender and understand that it’s HIS plan that I’m living through and am grateful to be living in. So whatever happens as a result of choices I’ve made, or my circumstances or what someone else has done- is part of HIS plan for me- and I am learning how much peace that gives me. I believe my faith has grown so deeply that I don’t care about being judged by being vulnerable and experiencing/sharing mistakes and how I try to grow in area of my life- because in the end- we’re all not perfect- and there are too many people that are in our immediate circle- that need to feel connected, loved, helped, guided- that are living a life full of fear. And if something I do or say by living the way God had planned for me- can impact the trajectory of someone’s life, then I have no other choice than to be FEARLESS!

Here goes nothing…

So this post has been sitting in my Google Drive since June. I wanted to document my experience during a really hard time for my family. I went back and forth about sharing this, because it’s really personal. At the same time, a friend recently posted about a similar experience, which prompted me to revisit whether or not I should share mine. In the end, I decided that although this experience is deeply personal, it is also really normal and needs to be talked about more, so that us women who are going through this receive the support we need.

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This past month (May/June) has been one of the hardest in my life, during a time that’s usually the most joyful time of year for my family.

Back in April, I felt like I was on a high after coming back from Paris. I remember feeling like doing that together as a family was an experience I’ll never forget that we shared together. The girls were amazing with all the walking we did, we didn’t carry diapers or a stroller- we had great dinners together, etc. And I joked that I was probably pregnant because of how much we enjoyed our time together. Like God was playing a funny joke with me, “enjoy this now, because it ain’t gonna happen for a long time!”

Well on April 3rd, I took a pregnancy test and it was positive. Cisco and I were overjoyed. At the same time I felt like already overwhelmed and now we have another baby on the way. I honestly didn’t pay much attention to being pregnant because I wasn’t due for an appointment until a couple of weeks later on 4/17. We wanted to have an appointment so that we could share the news with our family on Easter which was on 4/21. But when we went for our appointment and went for an ultrasound- we were told I was only 6 weeks pregnant- but we saw our baby’s heartbeat. I read that the chances of a pregnancy going full term are pretty high once you hear the heartbeat, so although we didn’t share it on Easter, we shared it before we saw my brother for his re-enlistment ceremony on 5/10.

We ran the Broad Street run on 5/5 and shared it with the girls on 5/9. We re-enacted an Easter Egg hunt and the joy in their faces and voices is something I will never forget. We were so excited as a family to welcome a new baby in November. Adelina was finally going to be an older sister and we were going to be a family of 5. Here is video of when we shared the news with them: Surprise!

I remember feeling like I always envisioned having 3 kids, but when I thought the timing was right to have 3 kids, I don’t think my marriage could have handled it. But these days I really felt like our relationship was better. Never perfect. But much better.

And literally the following weekend- after we celebrated Mother’s Day, my birthday and Giselle’s birthday and shared the news with close family in friends- after all the joy and excitement we shared with our loved ones- we experienced the tragedy of loss.

On the evening after we came back from G’s birthday celebration at Treetop Adventure and Benihanna on 5/18, I came home and had some spotting. I was supposed to go to NY with G the following day, but wanted to stay home so that I could go to the Birth Center in case I needed to. So Cisco took her and I stayed home to pack on that Sunday.

Then on Sunday, I felt some very light cramping, minimal to no bleeding- but then I had some light bleeding in the evening. I talked to someone at the Birth Center who said “I’m sorry to say it sounds like it’s going in the wrong direction.” My heart sank. Why would she say that if the chances of me losing this baby weren’t definitive?

So that Monday I went for an ultrasound and it was official- the baby hadn’t grown past 7 weeks. There was no heartbeat. Cisco and I felt broken. I never thought that it was a possibility for me. I took for granted the fact that I was pregnant because I had 2 “easy” pregnancies with Giselle and Adelina- that losing this baby wasn’t even a possibility. We JUST told our family and close friends. I already had gotten maternity clothes because even though this baby had not grown much, my belly was getting round- or that could have just been weight I put on from Paris. But I had a vision of what my summer with the kids would be like. I remember thinking that I wanted to cherish my time with them- with just the 2 of them- before I became a Mommy of 3. Cisco and I decided that it would be worth trying the Cyber Charter school for Giselle because I would be home with our little one. All these thoughts and emotions happened in the span of 6 weeks- from the time we found out we were pregnant to the time that we found out we lost our baby. And when we found out that we lost our baby, we were already set to move out of our house. But our new house wasn’t even ready.

When we left the ultrasound, we went to the Birth Center because I already had scheduled an appointment just in case. It was confirmed that there was no heartbeat and so they gave me my options which were to a) let the baby pass naturally, b) take misoprostol to induce the miscarriage or c) have it surgically removed. When it was explained to me, I decided that taking the medicine would be the option for me because we were scheduled to move. I didn’t want to wait for the miscarriage to happen.

Well, when we left the Birth Center, Cisco shared with me a story of a good friend who had the same thing happen to them. But they didn’t take the pill. They decided to wait out the miscarriage and by the grace of God, the pregnancy went full term and their baby was born. I was shocked and remember hearing the story from him when he heard it, but I didn’t put it together. When he told me, we gave our friend a call and confirmed that in fact their miscarriage was misdiagnosed. That they could have decided to take the pill and be done with the pregnancy. And if they did, they would not have their daughter. So Cisco and I decided that I would not take the pill and that I would let the miscarriage pass naturally. At the same time, I prayed that if it was God’s will, that we would still have a baby. It was a crazy thought, but I couldn’t risk ending a pregnancy that still had a chance.

I Googled “misdiagnosed miscarriage” and found articles of women who shared their experience of having a misdiagnosed miscarriage. Like- WHO EVEN THOUGHT THIS WAS A THING???!! I had NO idea- and was so angry and upset that women are being given the option to terminate their pregnancy when in fact there was no reason to terminate it- and the emotional roller coaster that women are being put through. Google it. It’s a thing. Misdiagnosed Miscarriage

But my miscarriage wasn’t misdiagnosed. On 5/22 after I dropped off the kids at school and picked up some moving boxes at Trader Joe’s, I experienced the heavy bleeding that was being referenced in everything I read. Cisco was at work and I called him to tell him it was happening- but to be on guard because I was told that if I experienced heavy bleeding that I had to go to the ER.

I experienced heavy bleeding with Giselle and Adelina. So I think when my body goes through a pregnancy, heavy bleeding is my norm. Because I had some really heavy bleeding with my miscarriage. Soaking through 2 pads in 2 hours is considered heavy. In the span of 20 minutes I soaked through 2, so Cisco rushed home and we went to the ER. He asked me to walk to the corner of where we lived because that would avoid him from going around the entire block since it was a one way street. But when I walked to the corner, I had blood pouring down my legs. The midwife said that it should not be pouring and in the span of 90 minutes I soaked through 4 pads and a towel. By the time I got to the hospital, I was feeling lightheaded. I was scared. The day before (which was the day after we told the kids that we lost the baby) Giselle had a field trip at a hospital. She told me that she saw a statue of a woman who died during childbirth. And she was scared that I would die if I had a baby. I thought of her when I was in the waiting room at the ER. I feared dying and that I wasn’t ready. My life literally flashed before my eyes.

Part of me sharing this is because I want to emphasize how normal miscarriages are. Cisco and I literally came home from the hospital and as we’re still mourning the loss, comments like, “maybe it’s because you’re working too hard” or “it’s from running” or “you have too much going on.” Totally putting the blame on me, which infuriated me! There was no intention to hurt me or make me wrong, but ignorance has a way of being factual for some people who think they are doing you a favor by sharing their “knowledge.” However, many people don’t realize how normal miscarriages are (especially when you’re pushing 40!!) Even though there is no intention to place the blame on a mom that lost their child and had no control of what happened, it is still damaging if said to the wrong person. Thankfully, I didn’t internalize the blame and knew deep down that this was God’s plan for us all along.

The hardest part of this experience is feeling like I traumatized the kids. Cisco was hesitant to share the news with them. But I wanted to share it with them because I knew we were going to see our families soon- for my brother’s reenlistment ceremony and for Mother’s Day. Sharing the news as early as we did may have been premature- but I am ok with that. We felt so much joy that it was hard to contain. If we experienced this loss and didn’t tell our kids or our friends/loved ones- we would have been alone in our feelings of loss. But we feel supported and loved. And I’m ok with telling the kids. Because in the little time that this baby was with our family, we experienced so much joy and love and excitement that we are really grateful for. I’m so sad that our family won’t welcome a new baby in the fall- but I believe that God has a great plan for me and my family. And whether that means another baby in our future or not- I am blessed with 2 amazing girls and a husband that was there for me during my darkest times. I would love to have another baby, but am also grateful for the family that I have.

To be continued…

Our first trip without a stroller!

So last July, my good friend tipped me off that flights to Paris were $350 and I had to hop on it. I questioned our judgement after realizing that our kids aren’t city folks and I contemplated not telling them about the trip at all so that I could enjoy a trip with Cisco without any whining or complaining, but we didn’t have the heart- LOL. Literally the day after we purchased the tickets, I ventured into Philly with the girls in the heat and walked from Reading Terminal to Broad and Walnut and it was non-stop whining. We planned on having this trip be their Christmas present, so we didn’t tell them about it for 5 months, which was plenty of time to change our mind and cut our losses!

Well, we told them on Christmas that they’d be joining us and I’m thankful to say that WE SURVIVED! Yes, we are “lucky” they are good travelers, but I’m not gonna discredit our parenting skills either! Before kids, Cisco and I would fill our itinerary. He planned this trip for the most part and when I saw we had 1 thing on the itinerary I almost had a panic attack. There are definitely things I would have done differently, but hey- I didn’t take the time to do it- so I was happy! How did him planning this trip even become a “thing?” The first time we went to Disney, Adelina had just turned 1, Giselle was 3 and I was just exhausted. At that time, Cisco was the one that wanted to go to Disney in the first place (he’s kind of a big fan) A few months before we were scheduled to leave, I had nothing planned (because naturally, I would do it without being told) and told him that if he wanted to do anything on this trip, he’d have to plan it- AND HE DID! And he passed with flying colors! So I handed him over the reigns for the most part- I still gotta make sure his “vision: of our trip is somewhat in line with what I envisioned (replace “vision” with expectations)- LOL! We’re a very good team in that way. He does research based on what’s the best value. I’ll make the decision on what’s worth putting paying a little bit extra for and what’s not.

1 thing I could not stand about Paris was the airport… WTF is up with their departure terminal? I mean, maybe Norwegian has the shittiest gates in the airport? I know it’s a budget airline, but seriously, they had 1 “deli” not even a restaurant- for the area between security and the actual gate (which is Tiny AF). Isn’t security usually before all the restaurants and shops?? Normally I would go through security, get to my gate and any extra time I have I’ll stroll around the airport. Here, you have to leave the area with the gates to access any shops/restaurants- and then go back through security. It was not really well thought out and definitely ranks as one of the worst (if not THE worst) airport experience ever.

Overall, we spent 6 nights in Paris, drove from Paris to Loire Valley and spent 2 nights in Amboise. Some of our trip highlights were:
1) After waiting 1 1/2 hours to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower with our 5:30pm reservation, we made the sunset JUST IN TIME. Like literally, just in time. If we caught the next elevator up, we would have missed it. That alone was pretty amazing and was likely the work of Jesus Himself!
2) Seeing how the girls made the locals smile with their attempts at broken French.
3) It had been pretty cold the first 4 days of our trip, and on our last full day in Paris we got beautiful weather and the perfect spring time Parisian day. We went to Luxemborg Gardens, grabbed some chairs and basked in the sun after we had our picnic lunch. We strolled Ile Saint-Louise,and enjoyed ice cream at the famous Berthillon. We had plans to tour the inside of Notre Dame but skipped them to follow the music playing on the Pont Saint-Louis bridge. The girls screamed “BUBBLES!!!” and there was a man with his large bubble solution and his wand, blowing hundreds of large bubbles in the air. A few feet over was another man playing his guitar- and it is a memory I will always cherish- nixing our plans to see the girls entertain themselves for over an hour chasing bubbles, and seeing the joy in Cisco’s face as he was taking pictures of them with music playing in the background as the sun was just about getting ready to set! After that we headed to the Seine River cruise at sunset and enjoyed our final dinner in Paris in Rue Cler.
4) Disneyland Paris! Did I mention that Cisco is a huge Disney fan? I didn’t want to go, but he insisted. And to earn some pats on the back from the kids, he even told them that I didn’t wanna go to Disney so he could get all the credit- LOL My favorite memory from here was going to “It’s a Small World.” I have memories of my Dad taking me to Disney World and going to “It’s a Small World” there. I had a moment where I was grateful to share a memory with them, that my Dad shared with me- and so I cried! And my girls were filled with empathy when they saw my tears- which made me cry more.
5) My morning runs to explore and take pics of the city and then pick up croissants for the fam back at the hotel. I was usually the first one to wake up so this was my “me” time which I treasured.
6) Dinner at Chez Bruno in Amboise- literally THE BEST dinner I had in my life- and I am so grateful we shared it with the kids. I swear we are in the “golden years” of parenting because they waited in line a lot, walked a TON, and we were able to enjoy some nice dinners together!
7) Our drive to Amboise- driving through the historic towns, yellow fields of rapeseed, and symmetrical tree lined roads.
8) Making friends in Amboise with Mimie from the Amboise market and Philippe who we met at Le Clos d’Amboise- where we had our last dinner in France. Philippe overheard me talking to his neighbor and learned that I was from NY, which inclined him to share that his wine is served at Bouley at Home, in NY. He is a wine connoisseur, and has a vineyard in nearby Cheverny. He offered some of the wine he ordered for himself and his wife- which had floral tones to it- which I never had before. Such a kind gesture to offer wine- and he made sure to give me his card for our future visit!
9) Versailles! What an amazing site as soon as we arrived- I could not have imagined how grand this place is- to get to the front gate is about a quarter mile. Our Uber driver was so much fun- we had a 40 minute drive from Paris so we made quite the effort to talk with each other which we all really enjoyed. We only covered the first level and part of the second level- after a while I was like, “OK I get it, you had a lot of money to spend.” LOL… So we took the shuttle to see other parts of the property since it isn’t possible to do all that walking with the kids- the whole property is about 3 miles. It would have taken us another day or 2 to really explore the entire thing. We rented a boat to enjoy some time on the lake and when we were done, we sat down along the edge of the lake to watch the ducks/fish with the kiddos. An older man sat down beside us, who was with his grandson, and offered us some stale baguette to feed to the fish and ducks.
10) Which reminds me to say- we found the French to be very warm- everyone (except 2 people, that number would be much higher in Philly- lol) we interacted with was friendly, we didn’t find them to be snobby/stuck up at all. I think it helped that we had kids that were saying “bonjour” and “au revoir” and “merci beaucoup” everytime they had the chance. Our Uber driver on the way to Versailles was really happy when we sang the French portion of the song “Take a Break” from Hamilton and the classic “Champs Elysees” (which I never heard of, but apparently Cisco knew it since he took French)

I couldn’t believe how much we enjoyed our time there. As the time to go to Paris was approaching, I was getting a little stressed because I worried that there wasn’t much that the kids would be interested in. But they really enjoyed the sight seeing. I feel like we underestimate how great they are at adjusting because they surprise us everytime at how much they can handle.

And last but not least, today I received 4 texts within a span of 30 minutes about the devastating fires that took place at Notre Dame. When I heard the news and saw the church up in flames on my phone, I took it lightly, thinking it was going to be contained quickly. When I saw the damage unfold, I couldn’t help but cry knowing we were able to marvel at its beauty just a few weeks ago, and its significance to so many people, but especially the French- and happening during Holy Week as well- is heartbreaking.

Here’s a link with some pics from our travels:
Pics of the Van der Buellas

Easter 2016 at the Buella’s!

Our family cleaned up nicely, even though Adelina insisted on rockin’ her snow boots!  This is us in front of our new place. We hosted our first “big” party, Easter lunch. I made dirt pudding cups, raspberry thumbprint cookies, a Filipino dish (Kare Kare) and roasted prime rib. I’ll post pics of the spread! Fun times 🙂

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Dessert!

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