The beginning of the end, Winter 2004

Jenny got a job with her sister, Missy, doing janitorial work. She absolutely loved her job. Her boss was unbelievable! Sherri was so understanding and sweet, but still firm and dominant. Jenny got pretty good pay and was able to adjust her work schedule to work around Zachary's doctor schedule. She asked her boss to consider hiring her husband, Mark, and he got the job. Mark only worked there for about a month before he was shown on camera skimping on his work duties. When confronted, Mark blew up. He stormed into the office screaming at Sherri, but left before the cops arrived. Jenny wasn't scheduled for work at all after that. Several months later, Jenny got a job witnessing a local burger joint. She was nervous; anxiety isn't a good thing to have when you're going to be around people every minute of the day. Once again, she suggested to her boss to give her husband a chance, but after his very first day, he was fired. The boss said that he was too cocky. He made comments about being able to run the whole restaurant by himself.

Jenny was terrified her precious little boy would get sick if she took him out into the weather too often, so she didn't take him out very often until it started warming up. She got her first glimpse into the deep dark side of the human heart. At the mall one day a little girl walked by Jenny and Zachary. She looked at the special little boy and in disgust remarked, "Ewww, Mommy look at that!" Jenny was devastated. How could she subject her child to hearing such cruel things just by going shopping? Later that day in the food court, a woman stared at her son again. The woman knew the difference between right and wrong, unlike the little girl. The woman stared at Zachary as she passed and without even thinking about the fact that his mother stood right there, she gasped and walked away faster. How could people be so cold hearted?

On June 4th the phone rang again. Another death in Jenny's family. Her cousin, Johnny and his fiancé, Suprene were expecting a baby boy, but he was stillborn at 7 months. Jenny believed that this baby was going to bring the family back together since Aunt Sandy was gone, but now there wasn't a chance for that. Once again, the family got in the car and went to Rose Hill Cemetery to put another family member in the ground. Jenny and Mark barely knew each other at this point. He was gone all night every night getting high with his friends as Jenny sat at home with the baby. She began to resent him for it, for everything. Eventually, Jenny sat down with her husband for a talk. She explained to him that when the day came that they got a divorce she wanted things to end smoothly. Mark agreed and together they made decisions on how to handle a divorce. Now that they had a plan for the worst, Jenny wanted to make a plan for the better. She talked with Mark as often as she could about anything at all. She didn't complain about him being out with his friends and she even tried to learn how to play his x-box.

Zachary's first cleft surgery was in May. Mark held their son as they walked 2 blocks from the Ronald McDonald House to Cardinal Glennon. Little Zach looked up at the huge hospital as if he knew what was going to happen. Mark took their things to the hospital room as Jenny took Zach to be checked in. The nurse weighed and measured him. As she started to take his blood pressure, she stopped and asked to do it on his other arm. As she reached for Zach's right arm, Jenny said "He doesn't have one" in a chuckle. The nurse was obviously embarrassed, but Jenny assured her it was okay and she even thought it was funny. Jenny was terrified and her only thought was that they were going to take away her baby's beautiful special smile. She loved his smile and wasn't ready for such a big change, but knew that they had to do it. As she put his favorite heartbeat bear in his hospital crib she began to tear up, but held it in. "There's no reason to cry. It has to be done. Be strong." She repeated to herself.

The waiting game began.
Mark, Jenny, and Mark's parents sat in the Same Day Surgery Waiting Room with the other parents for hours. Constantly looking at the clock, trying to get a nap, or running down to the gift shop to buy him toys for when he would feel better. Jenny sat staring at the clock for the first couple hours and then laid her head on the table and just begged God to let the surgery go smoothly.

The pager went off alerting them to meet the surgeon at the operating room doors for an update. Jenny ran as fast as she could down the halls. The doctor told them that the surgery went wonderfully and their baby would be out of the recovery room and into their arms within an hour. They all breathed a sigh of relief they had been holding in for hours. As they wheeled Zachary out of the operating room. Jenny held in the tears. She saw her child lying in the crib with blood dripping out of his swollen and bruised mouth. He looked up at her in confusion. Jenny didn't cry until they got to the hospital room and she picked up her son. He let out a cry of pain as she moved him and as soon as she heard it, she let out her cries as well. She sat in a rocking chair with her son and bawled like a baby.

Zachary was turning one year old August 24th and Jenny couldn't wait! She began making plans for his party months in advance and invited every single family member from both sides of their family. She wanted every thing to be perfect. Just a month before his birthday, she got a letter from the hospital. Zachary's second cleft surgery was scheduled just one week before his first birthday. Jenny was upset, but she knew she could adapt to the situation and move on. So, Jenny moved his party up 2 weeks so that her son could enjoy his birthday cake at his party like he should. She had been getting more and more irritated with Mark's mom, Sheila, every day by then. One day at the cleft clinic at the hospital, a commercial came on the TV advertising action toys that fought and shot guns. "Our baby isn't going to play with those kinds of toys." Sheila said casually. Jenny was irritated at the fact that Sheila seemed to think that she had given birth instead of Jenny. Later on that day, a cartoon came on that had monsters and a grim reaper on it. "Zachary isn't allowed to watch this show; it's not good for him." Sheila mentioned firmly. "He happens to like this show and he watches it at home." Jenny retorted. "Well, not at my house he won't." Zachary's 1st birthday party went well for the most part, until Sheila stepped in and gave him his birthday cake without telling Jenny.

Jenny was furious! "How dare she let him have his cake before I could sing him happy birthday!" Jenny fumed. She went behind a wall and sobbed. This was Zachary's one and only 1st birthday and she felt like it was ruined. Sheila and Jenny were mad at each other through the entire rest of the birthday party and Jenny decided to not talk about the party ever again.

The second cleft surgery went well, with the exception that Zachary was in much more pain than the first time. This surgery the doctor had done work on all of his mouth and nose. Every time little Zach moved his face even the tiniest bit, he screamed in pain. Jenny wished she could take the pain away, but the best she could do was give him Tylenol with codeine. After the scabs began to come off, Mark and Jenny finally got a glimpse of what their little boy was going to look like. Jenny stopped feeling so bad about the changes and decided she should be excited about it. She hung up new pictures of her son right next to the older ones and smiled.

Mark was still selling weed out of their home after Zachary was born and Jenny couldn’t take it anymore so she refused to allow it any longer. Of course, this didn’t stop him and she found bags of it hidden around the house on several occasions. They still fought in a regular basis about his drug use because he claimed that marijuana was not a drug, it was a plant. Jenny still thought that was a cheap excuse to use drugs.

It was October when she lost another family member. Mark woke Jenny up that morning and told her it was important and she needed to get out of bed right then. "Not again. Someone died" she thought. Jenny was right. "Momma Brenda passed away this morning, honey." Mark told his wife. He didn't want to tell her. Even he was starting to lose count of how many people had died in Jenny's life. "What? Momma's gone?" Jenny asked with tears in her eyes. As she looked to Mark her eyes looked like a child's eyes, she was crushed, and Mark couldn't do anything about it. All Jenny could do was think about the past couple of weeks. Jenny had been taking Zachary to see Brenda every day. Momma Brenda loved watching Zach, so Danielle and Jenny found reasons to get out and go somewhere, mainly so they could have fun, but so that Momma could have her alone time with her grandbabies. "You're so strong, and baby girl, I admire you for it." Momma said to Jenny as she held Zachary close to her chest. "I love you sweetie, you're like a daughter to me, and no matter what you need, I'm here, just ask." Momma knew how hard it was to go through countless surgeries and to endure the heartache that you could not take the pain away from your precious baby boy. In the end, she just knew. Momma always knew everything.

Mom Brenda was gone, and Jenny wasn't sure if it was her place to intrude on the family during their grieving process. Jenny made dinner for her dear sister, Deanna, and took it to her. As she walked into the yard, she could see the whole family outside consoling each other. She walked to Derek and just held him as he cried in her arms. She kissed him on his forehead and told him she loved him before she walked over to Danielle. The baby of the family was doing better than Derek was, but she was still hurting very badly. As Jenny hugged and kissed her sisters and Derek, she began the mom duties. She cleaned the house, gave everyone dinner, and changed and fed the baby. Once she got home that night she let it out. She laid on her bed once again and cried herself to sleep.

Jenny periodically cleaned out files on their computer. Clearing out old files, deleting broken links, and cleaning out the favorites list. She stumbled across his chat logs and became furious. As she read the conversations between her husband and several underage girls, she couldn't believe it was the same man. "What happened to the man I married?" she thought. Was she not enough to satisfy him? Why would he go without having sex with her, but look at the smut she found on their computer? Her mind was going in circles trying to understand, but in the end, she just couldn’t understand.

When Jenny brought it up to Mark, she tried to stay very calm and understanding. She talked with him about it and he claimed to be addicted to internet porn, chatting with young girls, and cyber-sex. Jenny tried to convince her husband to see a specialist about it, but he refused and promised to never do it again. Mark kept his word, for a while. The next time she caught him "misbehaving" on the internet, she wasn't as calm as she was before. "If you want them and not me, then go for it, get out and go!" she cried out at her husband. She kept blaming herself. She thought, "I could've lost weight faster." or "I should've played more video games with him.", but deep down she knew she wasn't to blame. She had done her best, but it wasn't working.
She entered into a radio contest. The prize was a $3,500 gift certificate for the local plastic surgeon that could be used for anything. Jenny desperately wanted to feel beautiful again. Her husband hadn't made her feel attractive in so long that she couldn't even recall the last time he told her she looked good. Jenny won the contest, but she still believes it was just because they felt bad for her disabled baby, not because she deserved it. Either way, Jenny was excited. She began getting regular facial treatments for her occasional acne and started down the road to being happy with herself again.