Zane's favorite game

Zane's favorite game from Rob Crockett on Vimeo.

He loves to show off and hold his head up. He always gets very excited doing it.



Relaxing with mom.

Two Month Check-Up - for Zane and for us...

Zane had his two month check-up on Monday and it went very well. He weighs 10 pounds 3 ounces and is 24 inches long. He is really tall for his age. His is kind of a skinny kid still, but doing just fine. We have been fortifying his feedings with a little bit of formula added to breast milk every other feeding and we have to continue doing that, which means I have to keep pumping, which isn't fun, but oh well. We do what we have to. I can let him sleep for a 6 hour stretch at night now so that is wonderful. I have now had two nights of getting 5 hours of consecutive sleep. Well, kind of. I still wake up automatically every few hours and feel the need to check on Zane. I wonder how long that will last. Zane sleeps the six hours just fine. What a good boy :)

When the doctor came in on Monday, the first question he had was, "So, does Zane move or support his head at all?" Well, wasn't I the proud mother as I laid Zane on his tummy and showed Dr. S what Zane can do! Dr. S was impressed almost beyond words. He just looked at me and said, "This is better than typical kids his age!" Zane held his head up great. When Dr. S was holding him and examining him, Zane looked around and turned his head. He is just the cutest thing! What an amazing boy!

Everything else looks good too. He is a healthy boy (besides the oxygen, which will be there until at least November). There are lots of medical complications that can come with Down syndrome and I have been reading up on them. I had a list of things I wanted to make sure Dr. S was aware of and would keep an eye out for. He knew about all of them and seemed impressed that I had already made myself familiar with a lot of that stuff and said that he was glad I had, it "makes us partners" in taking care of Zane. I liked the wording of that because I want to be involved and aware and educated on everything that goes on with Zane medically to the best of my ability and Dr. S wants that too. He has been a great doctor and I am grateful to have a good doctor that we like.

I went to lunch with my mom and our dear friend Janet yesterday. Janet has a daughter with a chromosomal abnormality, not Downs but something else, who is about 28 years old. It was so good to talk to her. She knows what is ahead for me and Rob and it was good to hear what she had to say. If anything, it helps to know we need to keep our sense of humor about life and let Zane bring us laughter. Janet and her family are wonderful and have lived full, fun, happy lives. It is good to see that example set before us of all the exquisiteness that lies ahead.

But the thing that Janet said that seemed the most important was that Rob and I will never have any pride. In studying the gospel and the life of the Savior, it is so easy to see that pride, that pride of the natural man, has no place in the life of a celestial being. Rob and I both have lived our lives to this point as fairly prideful people. Sure we are good people, but we lacked patience and understanding for others, I always think that I am right, and we pass judgment on others that we shouldn't. All of those things, among others, are elements of pride that we possess. I think that one of the reasons that all of this was so difficult for Rob in the beginning was that he knew, deep down, that this releasing of pride was something that he had to learn, that Zane was going to teach him that, but that it was something he did not want to learn. It is a hard lesson, one we will continue to learn for years to come I am sure. But I can feel it being stripped away from us even now. It started out as a painful process, but as we become more accustomed to it, we can feel that we are being shaped and changed into the people that our Heavenly Father would have us be. He is helping us become worthy of what He longs to give us someday, which is everything He has. It is funny to think we actually thought we could live life as we were, secretly knowing we didn't have many Christlike qualities, not wanting to really learn, love and sacrifice in order to become what this gospel that we so strongly profess to believe in wants us to become. In fact, requires us to become if we want to receive the blessing of celestial glory. Which is what we are all striving for, right?

So we are grateful for Zane beyond measure. He is giving us so much more than we could ever give him.

What I Have Learned About Motherhood. . . So Far

With Zane peacefully sleeping against my chest yesterday afternoon, I realized that that is something I could do all day, sit there with him snuggled up against me, and everything would be alright. I would even be considered a good mother, but only for a little while I guess. Looking at him is enthralling in so many ways and on so many levels. The thoughts that run through my mind can't even be explained. They are so fleeting, but they are a series of complete moments and feelings.

And then life hits. I think the hardest thing for me right now is the oxygen thing. It is so hard to go anywhere. Not only because it is inconvenient to lug around the tank but because I worry about him catching anything that could be in any public place we go to. And with that thought, I wonder if once he is off oxygen, if I will be able to act normal at that point or if I am just always going to be worried about what he could "catch." I never thought that I would be an overprotective mother. But then I had a baby that I couldn't even touch without scrubbing down for the first week of his life. That set the stage I guess. I am doomed to become a worrier, and the mother who tries to protect her child from everything, even though I know that can't be done.

And then there are the feelings of utter and complete inadequacy. Does every mother feel that? Or do I have an extra measure of it because my first child happens to be perfect? But I mean really perfect. I think about all of the things that I am going to try to teach Zane, knowing that really there is so much more he could teach me, not only here on this earth as he is, but in the eternities. Rob and I and our other children will probably sit at his feet at times and learn from him. I hope he will teach us then as I hope to teach him now, filled with love and gratitude unspeakable. I hope I can merit that from him. But I am so far from being capable of being a perfect mother to him. And I am so sorry for that. I want to do my best, but don't know if I always will.

I could never even hope to come close to being a great mother if I didn't have Rob. He is my rock and he does so much for me. He is so caring and wants to do everything to help me. He loves Zane so much and it is so fun to see how much Zane totally loves his dad. To be a good mother a woman needs a good father by her side. And I am blessed with that fourfold. Rob, I love you. I don't deserve you and could never thank you enough for who you are.

Life is never the same, in so many ways, just as people tell you all the time when you are pregnant. But now I will never know if all that I am experiencing is the normal thing or how much of it is different because Zane has Downs. The tiredness thing (which comes with any baby, I am sure) is crazy, but I can see now how it kind of just becomes a way of life. I told my mom that I was getting about 5 to 6 hours of sleep a night (not consecutive, mind you) and she said, "Yeah, that is probably what I was getting when you guys were teenagers." I thought, "Oh great." But the funny thing I am noticing now is that I feel less tired the busier I am. Hmmm, maybe that is some messed up form of a blessing.... Because motherhood is tiring and motherhood is busy... Or maybe this is just a phase and I will go back to feeling more tired the busier I am.

Seeing how much other people love my baby does something to my heart and soul that I can't comprehend. I love to see and hear that other people love Zane. It brings a comfort and a pride and a healthiness to me that nothing else does. All of his family, his grandparents, his cousins, his aunts and uncles, our dear friends, our ward members... I love it. It brings me joy. And I am sure that will continue throughout his life.

So for now, since I have to go feed the little boy, that is it, Lessons in Motherhood 101: 1) sometimes you just want to sit and stare at your kid, 2) you will be perpetually tired until who knows when, 3) you need the man of your dreams by your side and 4) you will love other people loving your child. Oh and 5) you will never feel up to the job, like you just aren't good enough, but you will keep going, doing your best, and praying for help from our Father everyday.

Zane tummy time

Zaune tummy time 6 weeks from Rob Crockett on Vimeo.

What can I say?. . .

There have been so many times I have tried to sit down and write about this last month or so of our lives, and every time I do a little someone ends up demanding my attention. Imagine that. He is sleeping right now and instead of trying to sleep too, I am going to attempt to sum up a bit of what we have gone through this month.

Even as I type that I know it is going to be impossible. How do you start to explain a total transformation of self that isn't visible or tangible to anyone else? When the doctor came in and told us that Zane might have Down syndrome, I honestly just sort of said, "Okay" at the time. I won't take the liberty of trying to tell Rob's side of the story, or attempt to explain what his soul has been through. I hope he will do that. Not on this blog necessarily but somewhere, so we can have it to share with our families in the future. That said, our stories overlap and intertwine and some of what I have felt has been part of what Rob has felt. There are kind of three experiences in this: mine, Rob's and then ours together. I know I can't get it all down, but I have to write this. I will never forgive myself if I don't at least try to capture some of what this journey has been for me.

The test to check for Down syndrome takes a week. What kind of torture is that? Zane was still in the hospital recovering from the infection in his lungs (we got to stay there with him, thank goodness) all hooked up to monitors and machines and that suddenly became the least of our worries. Our parents supported us so much. When I called my mom right after the doctor left our room, I could barely tell her what the doctor had said. My parents dropped everything and came up to the hospital immediately, something they continued to do all week for us, and which without, I don't think we could have survived. Rob's parents flew up from California for a day and for that we are so grateful. That love and support was much needed. Basically, there was a 50/50 chance of Zane having Downs and we had to just wait all week not knowing.

I was so hopeful. I know God is Almighty and I knew that He could make this go either way. We prayed SO HARD that he would not have it. Together as a couple and individually we poured our hearts out like I have NEVER done before in my life. The idea of always having a prayer in your heart took on knew meaning for me and I also never have fallen to my knees more in one week, ever. Priesthood blessings were a huge part of that week as well. Rob gave Zane a blessing through which Rob's own personal struggle could be felt. Rob and I received blessings from our fathers. But something happened to me and Rob as a couple that is indescribable, something that only Rob and I will ever truly understand. I can only simply say we were drawn closer together. But it was incredible. We were always in contact with each other, always touching, always sitting close, always looking at each other. I needed him so badly, but what I needed was him and all he was going through. I didn't need him to tell me everything was going to be fine. I needed to know his thoughts and his fears, I needed him to know how I felt. I needed to cry with him and I needed him to hold me as we lay in the hospital bed in the middle of the night. I needed him to come to me, and he did, just as much as I ran to him.

But as I said, I was hopeful. I understand the gospel well enough to know that just because you have tried to do everything right in your life and then you pray hard for something it doesn't mean it will happen. Faith is one thing, there are all the "Come What May" and "But If Not" conference talks that kept coming to mind. And I understand that and hoped I would be able to fully accept whatever it was that was God's will....But hope is something entirely different than faith and it is a gospel principle as well. One that, while you have faith and understand that what you want might not be what happens, you can and should still have hope. At least that is how I see it. There were times when I could see what the doctors were talking about when I looked at Zane. There were times when it took my breath away to think that he really was Downs. I cried about. I thought about it a lot. But there were also positives to hold onto and I didn't want to let them go. Zane really didn't have many of the markers, and his heart looked great, and he was getting stronger everyday, his muscle tone was good, and he passed his hearing tests, and he was nursing and doing well, and his eyes were amazing and would focus on Rob so well. I refused to sink into some kind of despair before the results were even in. So I kept my hope.

But it must be said that the despair I mention isn't, and never was, anything about Zane. It was personal despair, getting over whatever our expectations were of what Zane's life was going to be like. Which now, as I look at it, is kind of funny. Of course parents have expectations of what their children's lives will be like. We have expectations of what our own lives will be like. But does anybody's life go just as planned? Accidents happen, people make bad choices, people get sick. No one knows what may lie ahead, we just like to think that we do. The simple prospect of Zane having Downs just seemed to change everything all at once, and I think that was what was hard. There was nothing gradual about it. It was all of a sudden and in our face and the shock and adjustment that it took is the "experience" I am trying to articulate here.

That week was crazy. Rob had to start back at work so I spent the days at the hospital, trying to learn with Zane how to breastfeed as he was weaned off the IV and pumping to get my milk supply going. My mother kept me fed. She brought lunches and dinners almost everyday. My brother and his wife came and visited, as well as a few other close friends. The support and love we received in the form of emails and messages and gifts and word-of-mouth was incredible and overwhelming. We can never begin to express our gratitude for all of the amazing people we have around us. Just know that every single out reach, large or small, from someone close or just an aquaintance, was felt and appreciated.

The implications of what it meant to have a Downs baby, and have it be our first, all the unknowns and everything that seemed different, I don't know how we wrapped our heads around it. We went home with Zane still on oxygen and then got the call a couple days later with the results. Our Zane had Down syndrome. Now began a whole new crazy week of actually accepting the news. We had been through a roller coaster, trying to be prepared for anything. And now we knew and it seemed to start all over again. Rob took it really hard, I hope he doesn't mind me saying that, but his disappointment sent me into a downward spiral of wanting to just take Zane and go away so that Rob could have his perfect life that he had always pictured. I didn't want him to have to "deal" with this since it was something that was so unexpected for him. I felt sad that our life together no longer resembled the life he wanted. There were a few really hard days of Rob dealing with the diagnosis and me dealing with Rob dealing with the diagnosis, if that makes sense. Not that I wasn't have a hard time with the diagnosis as well, I was. I didn't know if I could the mother that Zane needed. But it was harder for me to watch Rob struggle.

But we came through it. The thing that healed us is spending time with Zane and being together. Rob reassured me of his love for me and for Zane. When you are with Zane, you know everything is going to be okay. He is so incredible and we can't believe he is ours. When you go through something that is difficult, you end up hearing a lot about other people's difficulties, people are more willing to share. And from that I have learned that everybody has their difficulties and their trials (although I no longer think of Zane as a trial) and many people I know and admire have gone through things that are much more difficult than what we are going through. Everybody has to learn things that they never thought they were going to have to learn. That is a big part of what life is all about. I now know that I am just beginning to be taught the lessons of life. Life is in no way about having things go perfectly. And while I don't know everything that life is about, I now know part of it is about how you deal with things that come your way that you didn't want to have to go through or that you thought you couldn't do. My brother told me when we were in the hospital, and I don't remember where he got this from, but "trials are God's way of making sure we are worthy of exaltation", or something to that affect. There are a lot of things I feel when I hear that quote but one of them is the fact that Zane already has exaltation. We have to work to be there with him. Rob and I were reading in Alma about the resurrection while we were still in the hospital and we both strongly feel and know that that day will be a glorious day for our family. To see Zane in all his glory. I hope we can live worthy of that.

Zane is awesome. He is doing well, gaining weight now and starting to smile. Life has been just like it would be with any newborn, and life will continue to be just as it should. Everyone has their story and this is ours. And we are blessed.

Zane 5 weeks

More Zane pictures

On the way home from the hospital with his O2.



Meeting grandma and his uncles Tadd, Nate, Owen, and Will.


Chillin' in his swing.


Whitney is already skinny again.



What he's really good at right now.