Lauren's First Birthday

Lauren is 1 year old! I can't believe she is a year already (well, now 13 months today or almost 9, however you want to look at it.) The day before and her birthday were both hard days for me. Not that her birthday wasn't a WONDERFUL day, just lots of feelings about how my life changed the year before. I had feelings of such happiness & joy on her birthday but to be honest I also had feelings of guilt and sadness. Guilt because it was me who was so sick that they had to take her way too early to make sure that I would live. My liver was on its way to rupturing and neither of us would probably make it if that happened. I try to tell myself there's nothing I could have done, but I still feel guilty. I think that feeling no guilt would be abnormal. Hopefully you guys understand what I mean. I felt sadness because emotions of her first hours came flooding back. It is so hard to see your child literally fight for their life. I remembered how it felt to first see her--so tiny. There was no way I could have ever prepared myself for how small she really was. I remember how sad I was that she had to fight so hard to stay with us, but incredibly happy that she was fighting so hard. It was kind of a catch 22...I remember wanting her to fight so hard to stay with us, but I didn't want her to hurt or if it was too hard for her to fight, it would be okay if she had to leave us. Mommy & daddy would be okay. No one should ever have to say goodbye to their child and we are lucky that Lauren was so strong. She is one amazing little girl. I look at her now with all the admiration in the world for her. She has taught me about a new kind of love, for both her and Adam.

Now for some updates:

Lauren weighs about 20lbs! She has a big girl car seat and is still rear facing until she is 1 year adjusted at the end of August. Mainly keeping her rear facing is because her bone density isn't that of a 1 year old, it's that of a 9 month old.
She's been sick a couple times now. :( Once around Mother's Day and currently she's on the tail end of a cold. She has never had any breathing problems thank god. Hopefully she will be over this one soon. Unfortunately she did manage to get Adam sick this time. She got me sick last time.
She is eating table foods now. What a big girl! She still has no teeth though. The doctor always says "they are so close." She's eating fine without them though. :)
She saw the Developmental/Behavioral doctor at St. V's at the beginning of the month and she said she is doing great. I'm not the biggest fan of the doctor (I don't think she does well with adults, that's why she works with kids) but that's the only one they have up there. The Physical Therapist also isn't too high on my list either. She freaked about Lauren getting on her toes and pulling herself up with her upper body. She ended up talking about how "we will have to put her in braces if she doesn't stop that." Our pediatrician isn't too worried about the tip-toe issue because she can stand flat footed. We do some foot/ankle stretches to make sure her muscles aren't too tight to please the physical therapist. It's really hard when you have different people telling you different things. The doctor also wants to send her to a pediatric dermatologist because of the spot on her left arm that every doctor has told us is a hemangioma. She said "I'm just not convinced that's what it is." Keep in mind this doctor saw the same spot in December and agreed it was a hemangioma like everyone else. I'm not mad at the fact that she's not convinced that's what it is, I'm annoyed at the fact that she tried to deny ever saying she had seen it before. I just want to know what it is. Anyhoo--now for some fun pics because I know that's what you all really want!

The above picture is from Lauren's birthday party. Kathy was saying something very important!
Family picture! She was getting a little tired of the cake I guess.
Yummy frosting!
Lauren checking out the candle. I'm a bad mommy and completely forgot to get a picture of the cake and food. Next year I will do better! It was all really cute though!
Daddy and Lauren before the party.