20 weeks

The Christmas lights and frozen nights
have given way to spring's blooms and sunny days
I still sit on the porch and cry for you
One foot on the road to the future
one foot stuck always back in December
I watch the stars and wonder
when I'll ever stop thinking
"maybe tonight he'll come home"
Always memories replaying
of when life was life-
Perfect- and we didn't even know it
20 weeks and I'm still crying.
20 weeks and you're still dying every day
over and over again in my mind
20 weeks and it's still just the beginning
of our forever down here
without you.

Love wins.

3-16-10 ( 11.5 months into a 12.5month deployment in Afghanistan)
Babe,

I love you. You're the one I want most when shit hits the fan, when I've had a bad day, when I just need SOMEONE to understand me and love me. I still feel so lucky that I have you. I can't wait for you to get home, to watch you walk that ridiculously long walk up Green Ramp... catch your eye, smile and know that's the last damn time you'll be doing that. I can't wait to have our kids bombard you and then I get my turn. I can't wait to bring you home, hold your hand in the car, have you set your stuff down and know you won't be picking it back up and leaving again after 2 weeks. I can't wait to love you and love you and love you.

I miss you and I am now so freakin' excited that you will be here soon. I can't believe it's almost over.
Love you, so so much.
Krys


I was reading through our old emails from deployments and this one struck me especially hard. It sums up how deep the loss of him is. We're not all so lucky to have someone you can ALWAYS count on for emotional support. But I was. No matter what was going on, how bad things were, how stressed out I was... he could make it better. Just a few words of encouragement from him could calm me through hard times. He built me up, never tore me down. He made me feel beautiful and desired even when 4 pregnancies,3 births and breastfeeding 3 babies had done it's job on my body. He made me feel funny and fun to be around by always wanting to spend his time with me. I knew that I was the person he preferred to be with if he had his chance to spend time with anyone. He held my hand. He sat me up on the kitchen counter and made out with me.( that very morning even.) He told me jokes. He made his weird faces at me. He always grabbed my butt. He always tried to get me to lighten up, stop worrying so much and just ENJOY. He encouraged and supported my passions, he amazed me with his generosity and hospitality, he was loving and fun with our children. He was the friend you could count on for just about anything, anytime.When I had a bad day with the kids and was questioning my abilities as a mother, he always reassured me and told me I was doing a good job.
I've really struggled this last week with coming to terms with the vastness of him not being here anymore. There are so many things I want to tell him and ask him about. There have been so many moments when all I want is to be wrapped into arms and my face in his chest and just feel safe. He was my safety. He was my refuge. For 15 years he was my best friend and when it came down to it, the ONLY person I wanted. 15 years and I still liked to watch him sleep, loved listening to him breathe, was IN LOVE with him.
I know I was blessed. I know some people go their whole lives never having THAT kind of love.
And his love was the kind that mattered. It filled me up and left me full.He left me without regrets. We loved each other and loved and enjoyed each other well. I only wish we would have had more time. His love left me secure,confident and strong. Strong enough to lose him. Strong enough to carry on without him.


But good God, I miss him. And wow, the hole that is just here. The ever hanging emptiness. The silence when I need reassurance. The comfort when I'm scared. The laughter when I needed to get over myself. It's just not there. At the end of the day, I'm left with nothing but the memories how it felt to be his. But I'm not his anymore. I don't even feel like life before Dec 12 was ever even mine. I look at pictures and struggle with believing that was ever really my life. Time is warped since Dec 12. It feels like yesterday and a million years ago all at once. Time doesn't move the same either. It's been 3 months and 5 days but feels like 5 years. Time has slowed down to a drip. My heart feels like it beats slower and out of rhythm. But stronger.
Every bit of my life is completely different without him. Every minute is touched by his absence. Every road I walk on is now different from the way it should have been. I'm meeting people I never would have, doing things I wouldn't have had time ,the reason or the drive to do. Making decisions alone. Parenting alone. And struggling with it terribly. Mourning my past, present and future. Pictures from the months leading up to Dec 12 are hard to look at. It's like knowing a movie will end really badly and it makes you anxious knowing the tragedy is coming. The future feels like that sometimes too. Like every bit of it is marred by this. Sure, we may smile, laugh and carry on, but we're wounded. Never going to be the same. Never going to trust happiness again. It's too fragile, too fleeting. But on the other hand I feel like someday I could love someone and love them well and appreciate love and marriage even more because of losing Frank.I was a good wife. I loved being married and was really good at it. I can't believe that at 32 it's over for me. It's all I wanted to be in my life... his wife and their mother. Now I can't be his wife and I am royally screwing up being their mother. God is going to fix this and use it for His glory though, right? I know the end of this story. God wins. Love wins.I wish I could remember that all the time.

I had 15 years with a man who was brilliant, funny,dedicated,good and he loved me. He chose me everyday,even when I didn't deserve it. Those 15 years made me who I am. HE made me who I am, both his amazing life and devastating death.

Love wins.








When it's all said and done no one will remember how far we've run the only thing that matters is how we did love.....
("Blink" by Revive)

Feb 12

I wrote this on Feb 12, just never posted it, like I've said... it's exhausting to sit and type all this out sometimes....


There have been so many things I've wanted to say the last 2 months,so many emotions to convey, the depth of the pain,sorrow and anger but sometimes words just wouldn't come. Prayers wouldn't come. I can "write" posts in my head all day but when it comes to the end of evening and it's just me and the quiet.... just can't usually bring myself to tap it out. Grief is exhausting.

It's been two months today. I wanted to not even be aware of the date but it snuck in on me today. Usually on Mondays I might look at the clock at 11:30am ( last time I saw or talked to him) and again at 8pm( time of the accident) and I've even been woke up for various reasons around 2:40am on a Tuesday morning ( the time I woke up and realized something was wrong). Anxiety engulfs me at those times. When I go to bed at night, I hate it because I get very anxious. Coming downstairs to make a bottle or turn the heat up, or because I forget something and going back by that glass front door in the dark makes my blood run cold every single time. My heart beats faster and I feel lightheaded. The thought of those men on my doorstep induces panic. And it's not like anyone is ever going to be coming to that door to ruin my world again. And sometimes it's not the lack of his presence but the presence of his absence that lingers the most. That makes no sense, maybe it does if you know what this feels like. The thought of going to be one more time without him every night makes me stay up until 2 or 3 am sometimes.
We've begun healing though. By week 6 I had hit the absolute bottom of the pit, we had already been snowed in for a week up here, everyone passed the stomach virus around. I had one whole day when I was so sick I stayed in bed all day. Worst day so far. I cried all day. I can't just sit still, I can't let myself lay around and grieve like that ever again. I had weeks there at the beginning when I was on the brink of losing my faith, giving in to complete anger and hopelessness.... I would pray that either God would turn back time or just let a carbon monoxide leak take us all in our sleep. I wanted Heaven. I wanted out of this madness, the disbelief, the knowledge my children were fatherless, the knowledge that my Frank was never coming home. I wanted to die, I 'm sorry for admitting it, but it's true. I couldn't see a reason for any of us being here without him. One evening at dusk the sky looked really weird and Zoe said " It's the end of the world!" jokingly and I jumped up and yelled "WOOHOO,FINALLY!" And I wasn't joking. Hopelessness is a bad bad thing. I didn't realize you could feel such gut wrenching pain and still live. But apparently you can. I feel like the walking wounded. I feel like people can take one look at me and know " Something really horrible has happened to her." Pain that deep should leave a physical mark, right? It doesn't though.
But after week 6 I started getting little pieces of hope and I started clawing my way out of the deepest part of that pit. I came across an email he had sent me in Nov 2010, when he was away for 14 weeks for a school in Alabama and it's changed my life.....

11/15/10
Hey sweetie, Heard this song this morning. The lyrics really spoke to me about us.

Be strong in the Lord and, Never give up hope, You're going to do great things, I already know, God's got His hand on you so, Don't live life in fear, Forgive and forget, But don't forget why you're here, Take your time and pray, These are the words I would say, Last time we spoke, You said you were hurting, And I felt your pain in my heart, I want to tell you, That I keep on praying, Love will find you where you are, I know cause I've already been there, So please hear these simple truths,

I hope that you have a nice day! I love and miss you and really am praying that we are finished with the course this week and can start being a whole family again.

Frank himself gave me back hope. And I've been climbing out of that pit ever since. I started thinking about what he would say about all this, how I was handling things, what I should be doing with the kids, my future, etc. And it's helped. I still cry a lot some days. Some days I don't cry at all. Some days I still might be so angry that I want to scream, but they are fewer and farther between. I think the reality has sunk in as much as it can and acceptance is possibly starting to happen. I still don't believe it if I look at a picture of him for more than about 3 seconds. When I think about the details of the crash, I can't believe it. When I think about how in 30 years we're still going to be missing him and hating that he's gone.... it's hard to believe. But life is going on. The kids are dealing better than I expected. We still have some big issues. Behavior has been a challenge. Liam is the most heartbreaking thing around here right now. He's 3 and just doesn't get it. He cries and cries for his Daddy. " I need him! He needs me! He never comes back! I want my Daddy! My Daddy loves me, he needs to come back!" It's enough to make grown men cry and believe me, it has. He walks up to strangers and says things like "My dad died" or "My daddy is in heaven." The poor baby just doesn't understand. I pray someday soon he just forgets. His cries are more than I can bear. I hate this for me, but I hate it more for my poor kids. They didn't deserve this. If I could change this for anyone it would be for them.
So the big question everyone has for me is always "How ARE you guys?"
We're here. We're breathing. We get up every morning, we do what we're suppose to, we laugh, we cry, we yell, we don't understand, we hurt deeply. But we're okay. God has not left our sides. He has not burdened us and then left us all alone.
We're okay.

More hurt.

Just when you think you've felt all layers of hurt, another one peels back and reveals another raw,traumatic layer.


Eight weeks ago tonight Frank gave Hunter the last bedtime bottle he'd ever give him and tonight I did the same thing. I sat and held him, tears slipping down my face onto his little blue jammies and kept whispering "I'm sorry, I'm sorry." He was with his new mom most the day today and it was a hard adjustment for me. For 6 months and 5 days he's been my constant responsibility and all day I kept panicking " Where's Hunter?!!" or "Someone check on Hunter" only to realize, " Oh yeah, he's not here." I was packing all his things into his suitcase, kept thinking about how empty this place will seem when he's gone. Buoniconti:Party of 6 will be down to Buoniconti:Not-so-party of 4. God, please let this be the last of our losses, we can't bear anymore.
I know deep down this is what is best for all of us and that he is going to an amazing family. Honestly he's going to be far better off than these 3 left here with me. He'll be in thick of 8 other siblings, a mommy AND a daddy, lots of laughter and joy. He's the lucky one. Here at our house we're just stumbling through the days, some better than others. Healing has been happening though, I can say that.
I still struggle horribly with feeling guilt and shame. I beat myself up for not being THAT mom, who can homeschool, be amazing all the time for her children, have almost a dozen children and be the one purposely picking the severe special needs child.... if I could just be more like that, than I could handle all this. If I could just handle all his needs, present and future and still help my other children heal and thrive..... if if if.
I can't though. And it sucks admitting you can't do something when for years you've said 'Yes, I CAN."
I know that Hunter is going to be fine. My other kids will get past his leaving. I'll somehow get use to the lack of baby bottles, musical toys, all the extra diaper changes,the double stroller, the sounds of his silly giggles, even making up his meds. So much of my day is centered around caring for Hunter. He's the one I hold and hug the most. There is going to be an emptiness here that just fits into the emptiness Frank left.

We'll keep marching on along this road we never saw coming,some days with weeping and some days with hopefulness.


My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. 2 Cor 9

Remind Me.

There's been some hard moments in this house the last 24 hours and the heartbreak hasn't stopped or gotten easier or more understandable.
Last night after writing about the Hard Decision I sat outside for a long time pacing and listening to a few songs, just trying to find my way. I am so confused and so sad and so disappointed. I feel all your prayers, I read all your amazing messages but I still don't feel like a strong person or a great mom or any of those things. I just feel lost. Like I've just been dropped in the ocean and told to swim, knowing there's no way I can make it from one end of the it to the other. The feelings are that vast, that deep, that lonely.
I'm so desperate to know what the future looks like because the right now hurts too much. Melody and I were talking about it last night , we just want to see what life looks like 6 months, 8 months, a year from now. Will there be more joy than sorrow? Lord, I hope so. I want to know that I will have a purpose defined for me. Who I am suppose to be now?

And then this song keeps popping in my head, I heard it for the first time the day after the world changed.....

(click the title)

Remind Me Who I Am

Hard Decisions.

I've been trying to write this for days but haven't had the courage. This isn't going to be pretty, some people might be awfully upset with me for this, but I can't help that at this point. My hope is that most of you would understand that I have been in a hard place not just the last 4 weeks but the last 5 months. A place most people can't understand. And that was before I become a 32 year old widow/adoptive mom with 4 small children. Hopefully you'll understand that there's nothing more painful than losing your spouse and having to make decisions you'd otherwise never would have had to make.

At 3am on Dec 13 alot of things ran through my mind when those men informed me that Frank was dead. But before they had even crossed my threshold to come into my house I thought "How am I ever going to keep Hunter NOW?" Because for the month before his death I had been grappling with the new information we had about his medical needs and it was scary. It wasn't very hopeful and it had us reassessing what our future was going to look like because we knew Hunter was never going to be out on his own, he'd probably never talk or potty train or any of that. We grieved. But.... We would do it together. Frank was naively optimistic about Hunter's diagnosis, it sometimes really annoyed me. But that was Frank. He loved Hunter wholeheartedly since the second we saw his picture. He loved him fiercely and fought for him to be in our family. He brought levelheadedness and that pesky optimism to me time and time again when I would freak out about if adopting him was really the right thing to do. I've made no secret about this.....if it weren't for Frank, we would never had adopted him. I never felt completely right about it, but I trusted God and I trusted my husband and I did it for God and my husband. I had been saying for months that I wanted to do hard things for Jesus and boy did I get the experience I was praying for, just not the one I thought I was gonna get. I had asked Frank once WHY, WHY this little boy? And he told me that while he was in Afghanistan he saw some terrible things that had been done to women and children and he couldn't do anything to help them, he wanted to be able to help someone and he felt very sure that adopting Hunter was the right thing to do. I knew some of those terrible things he spoke of, and I knew that adopting Hunter was part of Frank's healing from seeing those horrible things. I loved him so much, I wanted to give him the world. So I said yes even though most of my brain and heart screamed "NO!".
It's also been no secret that attaching to an adopted child can be very hard and I struggled from the very beginning. The severity of his special needs shocked,frightened and overwhelmed me. But I pushed on. I didn't fall in love with him, I didn't love him like I loved my other kids but I felt very protective of him, I loved him in my own way and I took damn good care of him. Hunter needed an advocate mom and ,boy, did he get one. He had a daddy who loved him to pieces and we would spend our evenings snuggling with him, playing with him and talking about what else we could do to help him. We were a team. Hunter needs a team.
All the while I struggled with attaching and I have never prayed for anything more in my whole life. I would fall on my face on the floor crying out to God to help me love him and help me be the mom he deserved.I prayed for my heart to be filled with love for him. I'll tell you right now, my prayers were not answered in time. And now my heart is shattered.
Losing Frank has been the worst thing I can imagine. There just aren't the right words to describe it. But to add to the pain is this realization that 12 days prior to his death we finalized the adoption and Hunter became legally ours. I just can't understand the timing of this tragedy. This fatherless little boy needed a mom and a dad and he gets orphaned right after getting them??? WHAT?! I'm trying to desperately to understand The Plan in all this mess. How does any of our struggle, any of our work, any of our faith makes any sense when we adopted this child and I now have to give him up because there's no way I can care for him now???? God, where are You in this????
So that's it. Frank is dead. My children have no father.I have no way of continuing the extensive care of Hunter while also trying to raise my other 3 kids.It's just not possible. In a year my heart hopefully won't be as broken. But Hunter will still be Hunter and he will only be harder to take care of. SO Hunter will be adopted by a great family who can give him everything he needs and handle those severe special needs. My heart is completely shattered. I feel ashamed, awful and like a complete failure. But I have peace knowing that this is the best thing we can do in our situation. It's best for Hunter and it's best for my other kids and myself. But it's one more devastating blow and I sometimes wonder how much more I can take.
My whole life the last 5 years has been about taking care of my family and trying to adopt and advocate for orphans. In one split second my whole purpose is being redefined. Our life should have been adopting more kids, needing a 10 passenger van later this year and working hard to bring awareness to HIV orphans worldwide. I look at his new family's pictures and it just kills me because that should have been OUR life too.8 kids. Lots of smiles. Something just a little extra-ordinary. Doing hard things but those things being worth it because we had each other and we were living the life we felt called to.

Now what? Where do I go from here? I feel like my heart's been busted into so many pieces there will be no picking them up again.

This is why I keep saying "Surely this isn't the way the story was suppose to end!" Jesus, please come fix this.

And that's my hard decision. To let Hunter go because it's the best thing for him. I can't be everything he needs anymore. I did what I could for 5 months and he's come so far from where he is. I KNOW he will be well loved and well taken care of with his new family, who will hopefully be his TRUE forever family.

I would appreciate that if you had any negative views about this, that you honestly just keep them to yourself. I can promise you have nothing to say that I haven't already beaten myself up about a million times already and will continue to do. This was not easy and I'm dying inside even more from it. So just hold your tongues. You haven't walked in my shoes.

Full Moon.

At night it gets really quiet here, which is a good and bad thing. Good because those loud,awful children are finally in bed sleeping and I can breathe a sigh of relief. Bad because the quiet lets me think. And it lets me walk around this house aimlessly looking at pictures, or his coffee mugs or his running shoes. I cry. I walk away. I look at a picture, I cry some more. Sometimes I stand there and quietly yell "WHY?!?! HOW?!?!" but mainly "Why?! Oh God, please just tell me WHY?" Then I'll shake my head and move along. I'll look at mundane pointless things on the internet ( cuz I don't watch TV), I'll make a sad attempt at doing some housework. I'll cry some more. Usually by 10pm I know all kids are out cold and I go outside.
And here's what you would you see: Me standing out on the porch bundled in a hoodie sweatshirt,a plastic cup of rum and coke in one hand, a cigarette in the other( and I didn't drink or smoke before this), iphone playing Mumford & Sons "After the Storm" on constant repeat, my silent partner in this grief -Frank's sweet,faithful dog Ella sitting beside me. I fixate on a star that is right above the houses across the street. And it's freezing here but I don't care. Because I think about that night and how cold it was. And I think about those last few minutes and what it might have been like for them. I hope they didn't see it coming. I've been told Frank went instantly. I think about how after the helicopters fell and how maybe there was just silence afterwards. How they were just out there in the cold together, but gone. I feel like I NEED to be cold to the bone. That somehow if I think about these things and get cold enough that the disbelief will go away and I'll begin to really truly believe this. Every night I sit out there for a long time and never make any sense of it at all.
I ask God alot of questions. I don't expect answers. I ask Him to take away some of this pain. I ask Him to shield my kids. I ask Him to turn back time. Because surely this, THIS is not how the story was suppose to end. Surely not for Frank or Annie or Luke or Shan. Surely not,God.

I've been watching the moon slowly turn full the past week. Tonight it finally is. Just one more agonizing reminder of our new reality. The full moon.

When Frank left for his 1 year unaccompanied tour in Korea in Sept 2000, I was 20 weeks pregnant with Zoe. And for a year I stood and looked at each full moon, knowing I only had X many more until he was home again. Through year long deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan I counted those full moons. Through 3-4 month training times when he'd be away, I counted those full moons. The full moon made me sad but hopeful. Only 10 more. 7 more. 3 more. 1 more until he's home. Now each moon will take me further away from his last moments with us and it's hard to imagine someday when there will be 3,7,10, 50, 200 moons without him. Just an endless amount of pain and longing.
Tonight I came inside and sat here to write this. Stopped halfway through because Liam, our 3 year old, threw up in his bed. As I was cleaning him off in the bathroom he was crying for his Daddy. "I need him. I need a mommy & a daddy. I need to get a daddy."
God, how is this possible? Why so much pain? Why so much gut wrenching pain? WHY? Surely this is not the story.




The sun,the moon
they have all been blown out
you've left me in the dark
No dawn. No day
I'm always in this twilight
In the shadow of your heart.


Cosmic Love, Florence & the Machine

Damn Pears.

I'm learning that grief touches everything. EVERYTHING. And it can leave you alone for a few minutes and then stab you right in the guy with something very small.

Today was a rough day for me. I didn't get any sleep last night thanks to a certain baby, the big kids went back to school, I had a meeting with our landlord and then needed to go to the bank and the commissary. I knew the commissary was going to be emotionally trying. Frank was a foodie and an excellent cook. He loved coming with me to the commissary.
So after an upsetting phone call in the parking lot of the bank, followed by being even more upset in the bank ( hey, money is not fun if it comes because of something like this, I would burn it all in a pile and live like a pauper if it brought back my husband), drove onpost and held my breath waiting to see Kiowas flying. Today was the first day since the accident that they've been back up, I knew it would be hard.
I get into the commissary and stick my iPod in my ears to block out other people and start in the produce section.
And it hits me.
Don't buy those brussel sprouts. He was the one that could make them decently.
Don't buy the cauliflower, he's the only one that would eat it.

But it's when I got to the pears that I felt the life drain out of me. I stood there holding a freaking danjou pear and just cried.

A few weeks before he died he PERFECTED his pear torte. We bought like 10 lbs of pears from the Olympia Farmer's Market and he kept making these amazing tortes. Each one more awesome than the previous.

I'm wondering how to get on living when everything I see is a reminder that I don't want to be here anymore. I don't want this world without him in it. I know I have these beautiful children but they are a constant agonizing reminder of what we've just lost. Their pain kills me. And my pain envelopes it all. The quiet of this house in the evening is more than I can stand.

And tonight the sound of helicopters all around our little town is taunting me.
He's never coming back. He's never coming back.
And everytime I see a pear, or hear a helicopter or any one of a million tiny things I will remember what I've lost and what life looks like for me now. Lonely. Broken. Desperate for Heaven.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

W.H.Aulden

The Day The World Changed.

On the evening of December 12, 2011, my husband CW3 Frank Buoniconti and 3 other pilots were killed when their Kiowa helicopters collided during a training flight on Fort Lewis WA. December 12, 2011 we got up to get the kids off to school. Frank was flying nights that week so he was home that morning. We got Zoe out to the bus, hung around with the boys , they watched the obnoxious Kia Hamster Party Rock commercial about 5 times, we danced around in the kitchen, laughed... normal "us" stuff. I had errands to run and he came with me so I wouldn't have to drag the toddlers out of the van every time. Came home, put the littles down for their nap and spent some nice time together before he headed out to work at 11:30. He kissed me goodbye, said "I love ya, see ya tonight" and got in his truck and drove off happy. He called me a few minutes later and said "Hey, would you close the garage door? I love you!".I went on with my day, Hunter had a doctor appointment that afternoon... our last one for a month. It was a cold day, but after we got back from the hospital I put the littles in the stroller and we were standing in our driveway when a Kiowa flew over the house low and slow. I knew it was him, I took a video of Liam yelling. We loved seeing Daddy fly over the house. Now that I think about it... that was the last glimpse we got of him. Flying out over Puget Sound... doing what he loved. I got the big kids home from the bus stop and did our normal evening stuff. After the kids went to bed I was cleaning up my office and putzing around on the computer. I was waiting up for him, figured he'd be home around midnight. By 12:30 I decided to go to bed. I heated up the rice bags to warm up his side of the bed ( He came home like a block of ice after flying at night up here), I did that so he wouldn't put his cold feet on ME when he slipped into the bed. He loved that I did that for him. I rolled over and fell asleep and woke up with a start at 2:40 and immediately felt something was wrong. He should have been home by then. I sent a text at 2:43 "Babe,where are you?" Didn't get a response. Got out of bed, looked out the window to check for his truck, paced a few minutes. Got back in bed, trying to shake it off. But I felt seriously off. I texted him "Worried here-are you okay?" I laid down but my head was What If-ing already. A few minutes later the doorbell rang. I know I freaked out but I also thought " Oh crap,he's home and I left the chain on the door!". The dog bolted down the stairs, I started walking down the stairs and got midway down and could see through the glass door. I could see guys in uniforms standing on my doorstep. My knees kind of buckled and I started shaking really bad. I walked slowly the rest of the way at one point thinking " Maybe they're cops, maybe he had a car accident". But I opened the door and two Army uniformed men were there. And I knew, but I didn't knew. I can't remember exactly what they said.They asked if they could come in and I ( must have been in shock) said " If I let two men in this house at 3am Frank's gonna kick my ass." The chaplain shook his head and said ' No, ma'am, he's not." And that's when I realized what they were there for. I asked them " Oh God, who was with him???" They couldn't tell me. I don't remember at what point I found out later that it was 3 others that died as well. I let them in and remember that slow walk to the living room and just shaking so bad and being so cold. I sat on the couch and just kept saying "I don't believe this." The guys were so nice, they were upset too, one of them read the official statement. something to the effect of " I regret to inform you that while flying a training mission last night on Dec 12 your husband CW3 Frank Buonicont ( except he pronounced it like picante) was killed ". Murder my heart. I'm sitting here typing this 19 days later and I still can't believe it. I went into complete shock. They asked if I wanted to call anyone and I had to go upstairs to get my phone. I called our friends Bobby & Melody who live down the street, Bobby is a pilot in Frank's troop too. I called Frank's brother so he could go tell their parents. I called our good friend Lori, who is also a pilot up here. I don't remember much about that morning. Bobby,Melody and Lori got here pretty quickly, we decided to let the kids go to school without telling them. We had to to hold it together. It broke my heart putting Ronin on that school bus knowing that when he got home I was going to tell him the worst news ever. I know I spent the day just in shock. But we laughed, we cried, we laughed some more, we cried some more. I had to call about a million people and deliver the news. Every time I said it I still didn't believe it. About mid afternoon I finally just laid down on the bathroom floor and sobbed until I couldn't anymore. As the hours rolled by and it was time for kids to start getting home I just wanted the world to end. The thought of telling my poor sweet kids that their Daddy wasn't ever coming home again..... I still can't believe I had to do it. But I did. I took Zoe for a short walk as soon as she got off the bus. It was awful. I took Ronin up to his room and told him. It was awful, he's 6 and he's our sensitive one. He just cried and cried so loudly. The other grownups in the house went outside, it was too much to listen to. I just sat and held him and cried too. Later I quietly told Liam that Daddy's helicopter crashed and that he was in Heaven now and wouldn't be coming home. I laid on head on my bed and started crying and he reached his little hand out and said "Don't cry Mommy, Daddy be home tomorrow!". I half wished they were all tiny and wouldn't understand, but on the other hand I know that at 3 years old Liam won't remember much later on. And that breaks my heart. The day ended somehow, I don't remember. People were already flying in, family, friends from back East. Thank God for all of them surrounding us. I put the kids to bed, prayed and cried with them. I am thankful for the weekend we had together as a family before he died. On Sunday we went and chopped down our Christmas tree. Frank made spaghetti and meatballs for us, Lori and Melody & Bobby and their 3 kids. I have no regrets about our time spent, I know he was happy when he left this earth. He died doing what he loved and he died leaving people feeling loved and blessed.

We're baaaaack

After having some privacy/security issues involving our adoption I had to take down our family blog and adoption blog, so this is the NEW blog which will hopefully remain uncompromised so we can continue sharing our family's story. Names will be changed and I may not be reposting old blog posts but if you've been following us for a while you know the story.

We moved from our beautiful desert home to the even more beautiful Pacific Northwest 3 weeks ago and have settled in great. All our kiddos did great on the trip and we have a nice big beautiful home for everyone to run crazy and hopefully grow bigger in. All the kids are adjusting, they are resilient little warriors, we're so proud of them. The best part of the move was that "Hudson" is already has been receiving high level specialty care at the nearby hospital and we are moving very fast getting consults,tests and possible diagnosis, it's been awesome to have him being taken care of by so many great doctors.
Hudson's immune system is doing great, enough so to take him off the strong antibiotic that was helping protect him against HIV related pneumonia that he has suffered a few times in the past. This is GREAT news because it means his body is getting stronger, his viral loads are going down and his CD4 count is consistently getting higher/stabilizing. He has been progressing on a fast track since we brought him home July 31 and just last week he started crawling on all fours. He's into all kinds of things now, is getting bigger and we're happy to see how far he's come in such a short time.
We're just now skimming the surface of his special needs though and it's an emotional time. While we're so happy and excited for him to be getting care and for the "work" to begin in getting him better and on the right track...... the medical facts about his conditions are sometimes scary,depressing and just exhausting. Right now I'm just going to list off his medical needs because lots of people have been asking and we need lots of people praying specifically about them.
* premature birth, born at 4lbs 12 oz
*HIV+, which may have caused HIV encephalitis (which is a whole big thing on it's own)
*severe illnesses requiring multiple hospitalizations in early infancy
*failure to thrive & malnutrition
*microcephaly
*severe global developmental delays
*neglect of unknown proportion in birthhome until 15 months old
*strong possibility of cerebral palsy
*strong possibility of autism spectrum disorder
*prenatal exposure to alcohol,cigarettes and possibly drugs
* and God only knows what else, but hopefully that's IT.

Did you just say "Holy crap!"? ( and I try not to say that but it just kinda slips out when staring at that list).
Yes, it's an enormous,overwhelming amount of WHOA to deal with. Some of it we knew when we picked him up, other things have started coming out of the woodwork since then. We are sad for Hudson, he should have had a different start in life. We believe he is fearfully and wonderfully made, but all those things listed above are because of someone else's bad choices and the consequences of those choices and that's also very hard to process. As his new mom it breaks my heart and makes me angry with a HOLY ANGER that he has been served this injustice. But I also believe even more so in God's faithfulness and healing. Hudson may never be a typically functioning child. I have felt that since the day I met him. But with loving care , professional assistance and the healing that comes only from Heaven..... he'll be alright. Define "alright"? I can't even put words to it right now. We are adjusting to our new normal, there's moments of great grieving, terrible frustration, immense anger, total helplessness ,disbelief and even doubt. There's also moments of great hope,joy and STILLNESS. He's home. He's safe. He's fed and warm. He's loved on, cuddled,kissed,tickled,played with, read to, prayed over,cried over,he smiles, he watches his siblings,he pulls the wipies out of the wipie box, he will lean in for kisses occasionally. He KNOWS he's being taken care of here. It's evident in the change of his demeanor since we came home. He knows we are his family. He's no longer fatherless. He has parents who only want the best for him and who will fight for him and defend him.He's ours.
All those things overshadow his diagnosis. All those things make this hard,hard road worth it. All those things tell us we did the right thing. Our God is Mighty To Save and we are so thankful He delivered Hudson out of his previous life and into our family. We don't feel worthy of the honor to be his parents and be a part of his story in redemption and healing.

Please pray for Hudson, we have a ton of specialty appointments, including a sedated MRI coming up in the next 6 weeks. Pray for the doctors to have wisdom and that they'll find absolute diagnosis so we can know what we're dealing with and get on with it. Most of all pray for divine healing on Hudson, on his brain specifically.

Thank you for all your support over these months of transition, we are so thankful for the friends and family members we have who been an amazing source of encouragement and helpfulness to us.