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    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent: Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood
    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent: Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood
    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent: Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood
    Ebook454 pages5 hours

    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent: Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood

    By Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen and Amy Newmark

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent includes the best selections on parenting from Chicken Soup for the Soul’s rich history, with 101 stories carefully selected to appeal to both mothers and fathers.

    Parenting is the hardest and most rewarding job in the world. Filled with stories on the humor, hard work, and joy of being a parent, this is a great book for couples to share, whether they are embarking on a new adventure as parents or reflecting on their lifetime experience.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherChicken Soup for the Soul
    Release dateApr 26, 2011
    ISBN9781611591781
    Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Being a Parent: Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood
    Author

    Jack Canfield

    Jack Canfield, America’s #1 Success Coach, is the cocreator of the Chicken Soup for the Soul® series, which includes forty New York Times bestsellers, and coauthor with Gay Hendricks of You’ve GOT to Read This Book! An internationally renowned corporate trainer, Jack has trained and certified over 4,100 people to teach the Success Principles in 115 countries. He is also a podcast host, keynote speaker, and popular radio and TV talk show guest. He lives in Santa Barbara, California.

    Read more from Jack Canfield

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      Book preview

      Chicken Soup for the Soul - Jack Canfield

      Chicken Soup for the Soul® Our 101 Best Stories:

      On Being a Parent; Inspirational, Humorous, and Heartwarming Stories about Parenthood

      by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen & Amy Newmark

      Published by Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC www.chickensoup.com

      www.SimonandSchuster.com

      Copyright © 2009 by Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

      CSS, Chicken Soup for the Soul, and its Logo and Marks are trademarks of Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing LLC.

      The publisher gratefully acknowledges the many publishers and individuals who granted Chicken Soup for the Soul permission to reprint the cited material.

      Front cover photo courtesy of Getty Images, ©Mike Kemp/Rubberball. Back cover photo courtesy of Jupiter Images/Photos.com. Interior illustration courtesy of iStockPhoto.com/Tomacco. Smiley-faces courtesty of Jedediah Owen Taylor.

      Cover and Interior Design & Layout by Pneuma Books, LLC

      For more info on Pneuma Books, visit www.pneumabooks.com

      Distributed to the booktrade by Simon & Schuster. SAN: 200-2442

      Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data

       (Prepared by The Donohue Group)

      Chicken soup for the soul. Selections.

      Chicken soup for the soul : on being a parent : inspirational, humorous, and heartwarming stories about parenthood / [compiled by] Jack Canfield [and] Mark Victor Hansen ; [edited by] Amy Newmark.

      p. ; cm. -- (Our 101 best stories)

      ISBN-13: 978-1-935096-20-7

      ISBN-10: 1-935096-20-6

      eISBN-13: 978-1-6115-9178-1

      1. Parenthood--Literary collections. 2. Parenthood--Anecdotes. 3. Parents--Literary collections. 4. Parents--Anecdotes. I. Canfield, Jack, 1944- II. Hansen, Mark Victor. III. Newmark, Amy. IV. Title. V. Title: On being a parent

      PN6071.P28 C48 2008

      810.8/5/02/03525                 2008934916

      PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

      on acid∞free paper

      16 15 14 13 12 11 10                          04 05 06 07 08

      Contents

      A Special Foreword by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

      Preface: The Smiley-Faces, Brian Taylor

      ~The Joys of Parenting~

      1. The Day It All Came Together, Ilsa J. Bick

      2. Change of Heart, Jane Milburn

      3. Snow at Twilight, Maggie Wolff Peterson

      4. Pictures, Phyllis Nutkis

      5. Perfect Vision, Karen Driscoll

      6. A Mother’s Mid-Summer Prayer, Debbie Farmer

      7. Just Another Day, Charlotte Charlie Volnek

      ~Funny Times~

      8. Hamster on the Lam, Amy and Jim Grove

      9. Chickenpox Diary, Janet Konttinen

      10. Sibling Rivalry, Deeptee and Vikrum Seth

      11. A Forkful of Humor, Kimberly A. Ripley

      12. The Family Ski Trip, Ernie Witham

      13. Where Do Babies Come From? Elaine Stallman

      14. A Child’s Blessing, Richard Lederer

      15. Breakdown of Family Traced to Psych. 1 Student, Beth Mullally

      16. The Concession Stand, Ernie Witham

      ~Moms Really Do Know Best~

      17. The Nicest Thing My Mother Ever Said to Me, Marilyn Pribus

      18. Homecoming, Arthur Wiknik, Jr.

      19. Potato Salad and Picnics, Nancy B. Gibbs

      20. Wishing Away, Lana Brookman

      21. Ruby’s Roses, Donna Gundle-Krieg

      22. Getting My Priorities Straight, Sybella V. Ferguson Patten

      23. Apron Time, Donna Partow

      24. In the Sack, Carol McAdoo Rehme

      ~Wise Dads~

      25. Ballerina Dog, Jackie Tortoriello

      26. Once the Son, Now the Father, W. W. Meade

      27. A Veteran’s Garden, James P. Glaser

      28. The Halfway Point, Dennis J. Alexander

      29. Baseball Game Plan, Larry Bodin

      30. Papa’s Best Lesson, Olga Valle-Herr

      31. A Moment Can Last Forever, Graham Porter

      32. A Letter to Santa, David V. Chartrand

      ~They Grow Too Fast~

      33. Lost and Found, Alice Steinbach

      34. When Did She Really Grow Up? Beverly Beckham

      35. Sending Kids Off to School, Susan Union

      36. Here and Now, Barbara Schiller

      37. Who Called the Sheriff?, Nancy B. Gibbs

      38. The Bus Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore, Denise Syman

      39. I Am My Mother and Proud of It, Teresa Tyma Helie

      ~Loss and Lessons~

      40. An Even Greater Lesson, Barbara Russell Chesser

      41. Blessed, Tammy Laws Lawson

      42. Cassie, Blaine Bonnar

      43. Ryan’s Hope, Nancy Lee Doige

      44. One So Young, Diane C. Nicholson

      45. On Top of the World, Diane Graff Cooney

      ~Parents by Choice~

      46. The Question, Mary Chavoustie

      47. Fostering Memories, Janet Nicholson

      48. Behind Blue Eyes, Jenny Graham

      49. George and Gracie’s Babies, George Burns

      50. Son for a Season, Jo Ann C. Nahirny

      51. Hanging On to Hope, Martha Bolton

      52. After the Tears, Cynthia Coe

      53. The Day I Became a Mother, Dorothy Hill

      54. A Gift for Robby, Toni Fulco

      55. My Birthday, Her Party, Gerilynn Smith

      56. A Change in Plans, Kerrie Flanagan

      57. Love by Choice, Shirley Pease

      ~Parenting Wisdom~

      58. Teaching Them to See, Janet Eckles

      59. Dear Daddy..., Linda Saslow

      60. Why Monks Sit in the Snow, Joan Ryan

      61. It’s Only Stuff, Mary Treacy O’Keefe

      62. A Misfortune — Not a Tragedy, James A. Nelson

      63. Money!, Christine M. Smith

      64. Anniversary Celebration, Renee Mayhew

      65. I’m Gonna Write It on the Agenda! James McGinnis, Ph.D.

      66. Bonding with Notebooks, Katie Benson

      67. A Reason to Celebrate, Janet Lynn Mitchell

      68. The Wonder Years, Mayo Mathers

      ~Learning from the Kids~

      69. Is It Fun Being a Mommy? DeAnna Sanders

      70. Learning to Listen, Marion Bond West

      71. Happy Birthday, Jane!, Jane Robertson

      72. Making Room for Shooting Stars, Mark Crawford

      73. Let’s Go Bug Hunting More Often, Barbara Chesser

      74. Choosing Life, William Wagner

      75. A True Champion, Carole Yamaguchi as told to Anita Gogno

      76. Maple Leaf Wars, Nathalie K. Taghaboni

      ~Thank You~

      77. Spelling L-O-V-E, Bonnie Compton Hanson

      78. Reconnecting, Virginia Fortner

      79. One Wish, Rhea Liezl C. Florendo

      80. A Mother’s Love, Mary K. Schram

      81. Donuts, Gail Eynon

      82. Island Girl, Kelly Preston

      83. Somebody Else’s Children, Trudy Bowler

      84. Voicing My Wish, Theresa Goggin-Roberts

      85. The Things You Never Did, Lisa Inquagiato Benwitz

      ~It Takes a Village to Raise a Child~

      86. Swans Mate for Life, Hal Torrance

      87. Love at First Sight, Laura Lawson

      88. Alone Together: A Grandmother’s Tale, Sally Friedman

      89. Same Agenda, Patricia Pinney

      90. Of Needs and Wants, Bob Welch

      91. Grandmother’s Language of Love, Trudy Reeder

      92. The Family in My Heart, Michelle Lawson

      93. Three Times the Lover, Sherry Huxtable

      ~No Place I’d Rather Be~

      94. Alaska Time, Nancy Blakey

      95. Ricochet, Linda Watskin

      96. Falling in Love with Molly, Liz Mayer

      97. Sonar, Linda Mihatov

      98. Sugarplums, Ken Swarner

      99. A Mother’s Day Review, Paula (Bachleda) Koskey

      100. Goose Island, Tom Lusk

      101. My Children, Donna J. Calabro

      MORE CHICKEN SOUP

      WHO IS JACK CANFIELD?

      WHO IS MARK VICTOR HANSEN?

      WHO IS AMY NEWMARK?

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      A Special Foreword

      by Jack and Mark

      For us, 101 has always been a magical number. It was the number of stories in the first Chicken Soup for the Soul book, and it is the number of stories and poems we have always aimed for in our books. We love the number 101 because it signifies a beginning, not an end. After 100, we start anew with 101.

      We hope that when you finish reading one of our books, it is only a beginning for you too — a new outlook on life, a renewed sense of purpose, a strengthened resolve to deal with an issue that has been bothering you. Perhaps you will pick up the phone and share one of the stories with a friend or a loved one. Perhaps you will turn to your keyboard and express yourself by writing a Chicken Soup story of your own, to share with other readers who are just like you.

      This volume contains our 101 best stories and poems about parenting. We share this with you at a very special time for us, the fifteenth anniversary of our Chicken Soup for the Soul series. When we published our first book in 1993, we never dreamed that we had started what became a publishing phenomenon, one of the bestselling series of books in history.

      We did not set out to sell more than one hundred million books, or to publish more than 150 titles. We set out to touch the heart of one person at a time, hoping that person would in turn touch another person, and so on down the line. Fifteen years later, we know that it has worked. Your letters and stories have poured in by the hundreds of thousands, affirming our life’s work, and inspiring us to continue to make a difference in your lives.

      On our fifteenth anniversary, we have new energy, new resolve, and new dreams. We have recommitted to our goal of 101 stories or poems per book, we have refreshed our cover designs and our interior layout, and we have grown the Chicken Soup for the Soul team, with new friends and partners across the country in New England.

      In this new volume, we have selected our 101 best stories and poems about parenting from our rich fifteen year history. The stories that we have chosen were written by parents about their children and by children about their parents. There is a common thread of caring, humor, hard work, and joy of shaping young lives. New parents should enjoy these stories as they embark on their great adventure, and older parents will laugh, cry, and nod their heads as they recognize common experiences.

      We hope that you will enjoy reading these stories as much as we enjoyed selecting them for you, and that you will share them with your families and friends. We have identified the 40 Chicken Soup for the Soul books in which the stories originally appeared, in case you would like to continue reading about parenting and families among our other titles. We hope you will also enjoy the additional books about families, children, pets, and life in Our 101 Best Stories series.

      With our love, our thanks, and our respect,

      ~Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

      Preface

      The Smiley-Faces

      We moved into our dream house, the one with the gigantic sycamore tree in the backyard and plenty of room for our three boys to run around. We had wanted an older home for a long time and ours came with classic doorknobs, big, heavy window frames, thick walls and thick paint.

      We settled in and it became our home. Our home provided a studio office for my wife, Nina, and myself, a welcome change from commuting. I settled into my new studio and got down to work. We couldn’t have been happier.

      Jed is the youngest of my three boys and, at seven years old, moving into a new house was a grand adventure. I call him a hunter and gatherer. Hundred-year-old houses have many secrets to reveal.

      He dug wherever he could. He had several shovels and a metal detector. The backyard of an old house reveals many small treasures for eager young men. Bumstead’s Worm Syrup: One Bottle has Killed One Hundred Worms. Children Cry for More. Try It. medicine bottles from the 1800s, matchbox cars from the 1960s, bones, army men, and much more began to fill Jed’s many treasure chests.

      Bold and active, Jed is a free spirit. All boy as they say. Always smiling and willing to take a dare. He’ll tear anything apart to see how it is made. He tests everything to the limits and is not satisfied until he has carried out his plans. He’s a skater kid. Unafraid. He likes to get dirty and tell naughty jokes. He’s the first to jump off a roof and was recently busted for drawing his teacher as a Cyclops.

      Since I am a creative director and my wife is a writer, there is plenty of freedom of expression around our home and we encourage lots of creative discovery. So we celebrate Jed in all his glory.

      About nine months after we moved in, I made a creative discovery of my own. Indeed, hundred-year-old houses reveal many things. Each time I walk out of my office, I admire the bathroom door. They don’t make doors like that anymore. Solid wood, cast iron hinges, porcelain knobs... I love this house, I thought, as I usually do. And then I discovered it... two black dots and a curve in the middle of the right panel of my beautiful bathroom door.

      Is it a scratch in the paint? It looks like marker... Is that a smiley face? It’s a smiley face on my beautiful bathroom door! Where the heck did that come from?

      My middle son, Silas, always has a marker in his hand for illustrating epic battle scenes between robots and aliens. He’s not a smiley-face-drawing kind of artist. Jed. It had to be Jed because Noah is too old for that. Besides, Jed has been busted for drawing on the walls before!

      I go out to the family room and as I am sitting in front of our new coffee table stewing over the smiley-face, I notice a smiley-face is staring back at me from the coffee table. No. It can’t be... Yes. It is. Another smiley-face.

      I skirt the room... oh man... one on the side-chest. And one on the entertainment cabinet. Wait... that’s a sad smiley-face. And here’s one that is sort of expressionless. Oh man.

      I went to Nina. We looked at each other in astonishment with gaping mouths. Almost wordless. Our eyes locked and we both said, Jed.

      In the next second, we burst out laughing. We couldn’t contain ourselves. Traveling from one smiley-face to the next, examining the intricacies and character of each, we were crying tears of laughter.

      After Jed got home from school, we gathered in the family room. Jed... I have a question for you... did you draw this on the new coffee table?

      Yes, he said under his breath, bright red and rocking furiously in the rocking chair.

      When did you do this, Jed? I asked.

      I dunno, his face filling up and the chair bucking faster.

      Why did you do it?

      I dunno. I guess I just wanted to draw a smiley-face.

      Did you draw a lot of these?

      Yes. Barely audible, the chair going into hyperspeed.

      How many?

      I dunno. Ten or six, or more, maybe.

      I couldn’t help it. I burst into laughter. All of us were laughing. My heart became so full... Jed and his carefree spirit... I swooped him up in my arms and kissed him, almost crying. I put him to the ground and began to tickle him like I used to do when he was a baby. Squeals of delight filled the room. Images of him as a baby, always smiling, flooded my memory. We got up and went around the room together, laughing at all the smiley-faces.

      I never did punish him. I couldn’t. Those smiley-faces constantly remind me to appreciate the unique blessing each of my sons brings to our family. They were drawn with permanent marker, and what could be more fitting? Permanent marks on my life, expressions of who we are, making our marks along the way, on the world, and on each other’s hearts. Besides, now when Jed does something reckless or foolish, I find it easier to bear in mind his silly and impulsive nature.

      Now, when I walk out of my office and I admire that big, old, heavy bathroom door, I say something different... a smile crosses my face and I just say, Jed.

      ~Brian Taylor,

      Creative Director Chicken Soup for the Soul

      Postscript: When I learned of this title within the Chicken Soup for the Soul line of books, I knew immediately what I wanted to do... As I designed and produced this book, I placed Jed’s actual smiley-faces on random pages, giggling as I did it, so you can also appreciate the silly and impulsive nature of kids everywhere, and celebrate the blessings of parenthood.

      The Joys of Parenting

      You don’t really understand human nature unless you know why a child on a merry-go-round will wave at his parents every time around — and why his parents will always wave back.

      ~William D. Tammeus

      The Day It All Came Together

      Life is tough enough without having someone kick you from the inside.

      ~Rita Rudner

      March can be cold in Texas. I hadn’t expected that. A transplanted Yankee, by way of a slight if forgivable detour through Virginia, I viewed Texas with the same avidity I did a pit viper. In my imagination, Texas was a land of endless deserts. Rattlesnakes curled up on the porch, and armadillos wandered the streets. My move to San Antonio, courtesy of the Air Force, to which I owed my time if not my soul, might as well have been a one-way shot to the moon.

      It was in that alien landscape of cacti, fire ants, scorpions, armadillos, rattlesnakes, and a purposeful, somewhat lunatic roadrunner that traversed our cul-de-sac every afternoon at three without fail, that I became pregnant with our first child. We hadn’t exactly been trying, but we hadn’t exactly been careful either. We had sidled up to parenthood gradually, practicing first on three cats and a golden retriever. The baby was conceived during a playoff game between the Washington Redskins and the Chicago Bears, somewhere in the third quarter, around the twentieth yard line of the Bears. The Redskins went on to win the Super Bowl that year, a prelude of things to come, and after our initial astonished exchange (Are you sure? Of course, I’m sure. Look, the stick is blue!), we accepted that the pregnancy just was, like morning coffee or taxes.

      But I was not excited. I was a professional. I had a career. Ergo, pregnancy was a temporary way station on the road to something called motherhood, a hazy concept blurred at the margins by images of June and Ward, and Archie and Edith. After a wretched first trimester, when one sympathetic obstetrician observed that if men had to endure the raging hormonal imbalances pregnant women did, they would end up gasping on the floor like beached fish, I had adopted a somewhat detached attitude. There was nothing I could do about the alien invader whose presence reshaped my body before my eyes. She — for I knew it was a she by the sixteenth week — was a nameless entity that squiggled and kicked and rolled and had a knack for getting up when I most wanted to sleep.

      Predictably, my parents were thrilled. My in-laws gushed. I received countless, indulgent smiles as I waddled back and forth, though men stopped whistling. (That was discouraging. Of course, wandering around in an Air Force maternity uniform wasn’t helpful. The uniform was like a light blue parachute: a pull of the ripcord at the start of each month, and a new panel billowed out.) Total strangers approached me in the supermarket and patted my belly, as if I were their private Buddha. Yet despite my pediatrician-husband’s assurances that I would soon glow, I wasn’t in the least bit incandescent. I didn’t place my hands protectively across my abdomen the way women did in the movies. I didn’t coo, and I didn’t knit booties. There was one bad moment, in my fourth month, when I had an almost irresistible urge to buy a sewing machine. I paced the floor in front of a row of Singers and gnawed my nails. I think I finally wandered over to the living room section of the store, found a sleeper sofa on sale, and lay down, waiting for that feeling to go away. It did.

      I remember, too, that my mother assured me that the anonymous lump in my stomach would develop her own little personality. I was not convinced, and to prove who was in charge here, I resisted picking a name.

      One thing I did religiously was exercise. No puffy ankles for me, no hundred-pound weight gain. I swam incessantly. The one thing I did enjoy about Texas, besides breakfast fajitas, was the fact that I could swim outdoors year-round. There was a pool on the training side of the base, and I would swim a mile every day, without fail. As with naming the baby, I refused to buy a maternity suit and give in to what my aunt euphemistically called my condition. My black Speedo stretched very nicely, thanks, and I think after his initial double take, the lifeguard got used to seeing the equivalent of a big, black water beetle.

      Most of all, I wanted to prove that pregnancy was no obstacle. So one cold March afternoon — cold being a relative term in Texas — I pulled up to the pool, lugged my stuff into the locker room, and stuffed myself into my suit.

      There was no one else insane enough to be at the pool except the lifeguard who had trudged out to his seat and huddled, miserable in a gray sweatshirt and beach towel. I wandered up to the edge of the pool and dipped my toe in. The water was like ice. I pulled my toe out. I caught the lifeguard looking hopeful.

      Wrong-o, I thought. Just watch me.

      I crossed to the steps, and gingerly let myself down into the water. The water wasn’t just like ice; it was ice. Any sane person would have leapt from the water, called it a day and had a mug of hot chocolate.

      Not me. Gritting my teeth, I persevered, and it was when the water hit the bottom of my belly that the baby reacted. Suddenly, my belly levitated. I was stunned. To be absolutely sure, I backed up the steps. The water receded, and my belly sagged. I counted to ten then got in again up to mid-abdomen. Now my belly didn’t just rise; it lurched, and there was an odd, scrambling movement. It was as if the baby was trying to climb into my throat — anywhere it was warm. Then she kicked me, hard.

      An image flashed in my mind: my baby yanking on her umbilical cord and yelping, What the heck are you doing up there?

      I couldn’t help it. I started to laugh. I’m sure the lifeguard thought I’d lost my mind. But in that instant, the baby went from being an anonymous alien fluttering around in my belly to assuming her own uniqueness, and she wanted to be very sure I understood that she was not amused.

      So I didn’t swim that day, or any other day in March of that year. And that night, my husband held me at arm’s length and studied me with care.

      What? I asked.

      He folded me into his arms. You glow.

      We had chili that night, with lots of jalapeño peppers. Later, as my husband slept, my little daughter made very sure I understood she wasn’t amused by jalapeño peppers, either.

      No matter. As I drifted off to sleep, I thought of a name for her. And when she popped out four months later, she gave me a look that indicated that she wasn’t amused by this little turn of events, either.

      ~Ilsa J. Bick

      Chicken Soup for the Soul Celebrates Mothers

      Change of Heart

      All her friends were going to the baby shower, but my daughter, Kathy, wouldn’t attend because she had a softball practice. Recently, there always seemed to be some reason why Kathy couldn’t attend a baby shower. In my heart, I knew that something must be wrong.

      Then I learned the sad truth. She and her husband, Kevin, desperately wanted to start a family and were having no luck. It was extremely difficult for them to talk about, and her father and I were sworn to secrecy. They had seen many doctors and undergone numerous tests, and still no reason for the problem had been found. With each new procedure, their hopes would build, only to end again in sad disappointment. They were on an emotional roller coaster ride.

      Next, they traveled to a clinic in Vancouver, British Columbia, for in vitro fertilization — an expensive process in which a number of embryos from the couple are grown in a laboratory situation. The doctors then choose the healthiest embryos and implant several in the mother. The hope is that at least one will take, and she will become pregnant. After three failed attempts, Kathy and Kevin became despondent and were ready to give up. And then, out of nowhere, a dim light of hope began to shine.

      Carleen had been Kathy’s closest friend from the time they entered high school. They had shared everything with each other ever since. She and her husband, Ward, had been there for Kathy and Kevin through all their hopes and disappointments. Carleen was the only friend Kathy confided in, so she experienced this roller coaster ride right at her side. When Kathy and Kevin returned from Vancouver, disappointed and heartbroken, she looked at her own good fortune and made a decision. She offered herself as a gestational surrogate mother. Kathy was overwhelmed at this unbelievable gesture made out of pure love from her best friend.

      Could it be possible? After further medical, and some legal consultation, they realized this might be a real option. But when it came right down to it, would Carleen really be prepared to go through with it? She had a husband and two small daughters and knew she could not make this decision on her own. Her husband, Ward, began to struggle with what might happen. He felt for Kathy and Kevin, but he also cared very much for his wife. He had concerns about the drugs she would have to take, even though he was told they were safe. He feared for her health and emotional well-being after the birth. What if there were complications? Kathy made sure Carleen knew she had the option of changing her mind. There would be no questions asked and no hard feelings.

      Still concerned, Ward finally decided to ask his wife to say no. He was on his way to phone her with his decision, when he suddenly stopped dead in his tracks. In that moment, he realized he might be preventing the only chance Kathy and Kevin would ever have of having a baby of their own. Ward then told Carleen, Go ahead. I’ll be with you all the way.

      The planning began. By now, Carleen’s parents knew, and Carleen’s dad had many of the same concerns as Ward. I understood his concerns — as Kathy’s mother, I had my own. I’d never heard of this kind of thing before; it was all new to me. I was worried about the relationships between the four people and how they might be affected in the future. Not wanting to make things any harder for them, I decided to remain silent, and instead, just sent all of them my prayers.

      Leaving their

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