Caroline- 4 Months old
Nathan- Preschool
Brayden- First GradeSaturday, February 26, 2011
Our Family
Todd and I met in October of 1994. We were seniors in high school! We graduated in 1995 and both went on to the same colleges. We worked hard through college, waiting to get married after Todd had completed his degree and I was one semester away from doing so. On May 19th, 2001 I married my best friend! We honeymooned in Jamaica and came home to start our life together!
Right away I wanted kids, but Todd wanted to wait til we were both comfortable in a stable career. He began working for Paychex just before we got married. I finished up my teaching degree in December 2001. Jobs were hard to come by so we moved to Greensboro, NC where I taught 4th grade. Towards the end of the school year, I found out I was pregnant! We were ecstatic! The only thing missing, our family was all still back home in Rochester and that wasn't how we envisioned our children growing up. So back to Rochester we moved!
Brayden William was born on January 24th, 2004. He was our pride and joy! We didn't think we could ever be happier! October of 2004 we bought a house with my mom. Life was perfect! It was an ideal house, large enough for us to have more kids even! A huge yard! A place that felt like home! When Brayden turned 2, we started discussing the possibility of having a second! Todd finally was on board and Nathaniel Thomas arrived January 9, 2007.
Life with two boys...AMAZING! We envisioned them playing trains together. Kicking a soccer ball around in the yard. Playing on the swingset. Riding their bikes! It felt like all of our dreams were shattered when in May of 2007 Brayden was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Our world...as perfect as it seemed...was turned upside down. How could our beautiful, perfect little boy have this AWFUL disease! What did it mean for our future? How were we going to get through this? Was Nathan affected as well? So many questions went through our minds.
We could have let our grief and fear take over. Well, we actually did for a little bit, but that is perfectly normal. We decided that the best thing to do was to stand up and fight this. Fight this awful disease for Brayden. We do what we can to educate others so that funds can be raised to help find the cure. We pray every day that it will be found soon, so that our wonderful boy can take advantage of it and live the life he deserves! Until then, we are taking life one day at a time. We have our ups and downs, but we are a strong family and we get each other through it.
The past couple of years have been spent with Brayden acting as the Goodwill Ambassador for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. We have gone out to various places and told our story. Educated others, given a face to the disease so that people can see this is real and it IS heartbreaking. Brayden has touched so many lives!
Last year, we decided to take our chance and expand our family with one more child. We were blessed with a beautiful baby girl. Caroline Lucille was born on October 4th, 2010. She was early, born just 2 days after we walked in the MDA walk. She is a beautiful, happy baby that lights up the room! She reminds me a lot of Brayden at this age...always smiling!
We decided to start a blog...well restart a blog to keep everyone updated on our family, our fight! I will try to update as often as I can! Thanks for reading our journey...Braythanine- Part BRAYden, part naTHAN, and part carolINE!
Right away I wanted kids, but Todd wanted to wait til we were both comfortable in a stable career. He began working for Paychex just before we got married. I finished up my teaching degree in December 2001. Jobs were hard to come by so we moved to Greensboro, NC where I taught 4th grade. Towards the end of the school year, I found out I was pregnant! We were ecstatic! The only thing missing, our family was all still back home in Rochester and that wasn't how we envisioned our children growing up. So back to Rochester we moved!
Brayden William was born on January 24th, 2004. He was our pride and joy! We didn't think we could ever be happier! October of 2004 we bought a house with my mom. Life was perfect! It was an ideal house, large enough for us to have more kids even! A huge yard! A place that felt like home! When Brayden turned 2, we started discussing the possibility of having a second! Todd finally was on board and Nathaniel Thomas arrived January 9, 2007.
Life with two boys...AMAZING! We envisioned them playing trains together. Kicking a soccer ball around in the yard. Playing on the swingset. Riding their bikes! It felt like all of our dreams were shattered when in May of 2007 Brayden was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Our world...as perfect as it seemed...was turned upside down. How could our beautiful, perfect little boy have this AWFUL disease! What did it mean for our future? How were we going to get through this? Was Nathan affected as well? So many questions went through our minds.
We could have let our grief and fear take over. Well, we actually did for a little bit, but that is perfectly normal. We decided that the best thing to do was to stand up and fight this. Fight this awful disease for Brayden. We do what we can to educate others so that funds can be raised to help find the cure. We pray every day that it will be found soon, so that our wonderful boy can take advantage of it and live the life he deserves! Until then, we are taking life one day at a time. We have our ups and downs, but we are a strong family and we get each other through it.
The past couple of years have been spent with Brayden acting as the Goodwill Ambassador for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. We have gone out to various places and told our story. Educated others, given a face to the disease so that people can see this is real and it IS heartbreaking. Brayden has touched so many lives!
Last year, we decided to take our chance and expand our family with one more child. We were blessed with a beautiful baby girl. Caroline Lucille was born on October 4th, 2010. She was early, born just 2 days after we walked in the MDA walk. She is a beautiful, happy baby that lights up the room! She reminds me a lot of Brayden at this age...always smiling!
We decided to start a blog...well restart a blog to keep everyone updated on our family, our fight! I will try to update as often as I can! Thanks for reading our journey...Braythanine- Part BRAYden, part naTHAN, and part carolINE!
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