Part Two:

March of 2009 began a year of miracles, blessings and favor in both our lives; in spite of all the medical complications. For me personally I found forgiveness for the mistakes I'd made, the Lord healed my spirit from a very broken relationship, He restored my Faith in Him and He gave me new Hope that the life He had planned for me was a life of abundance. Even though I was still walking the same journey of caring for a daughter with special needs I had a renewed perspective that somehow there was a reason in everything. Noel spent the month of March in the Hospital because her stomach was not working. After a few weeks of no progress in getting her stomach to take food, the decision was made to put her on TPN (I.V. Nutrition), she went into surgery to get central line, it's a catheter that runs through a major artery and goes into the heart. I sat in a waiting room as the minutes turned to hours, knowing that it should have only taken 45 min to put the catheter in, I knew something was wrong. This type of central line is commonly placed through the chest into the subclavian veins; the problem was Noel's subclavian veins weren't in the right place. So in the process the surgeon accidently punctured her lung, they had to place chest tubes immediately to fix the problem. He ended up placing the central line into her leg, which wasn't ideal but it was usable. Noel had to have the chest tubes, which are excruciatingly painful, in for the next two weeks until her lungs healed.

Noel was discharged from the hospital still using the ventilator 24 hours a day and now being hooked to a continuous IV that ran 22 hours a day. We went to our new Home; my parents' house in Black Hawk. This started life as a single mom of an extremely complex medically fragile daughter. Just to get her TPN ready would take 45 min each day; I had to use needles, viles, syringes, I even had to learn how to draw Noel's blood; all things a medical professional with years of training should be doing and not just a regular Mom. My life was consumed with caring for Noel; I had very little time for anything else. Noel was making great progress physically and was even able to take a few steps with her walker. I did somehow find the time to check into the website Christian Café, which is an online dating website for Christian singles. I had first heard of Christian Café from a very dear neighbor in Grand Junction, she found her husband on this site, so I thought I would give it a shot and see what might happen. I knew in my heart what I desired and made my requests known to God; His plan not mine. I looked at two profiles and the second one happened to be an amazing man who had full custody of his two children, he was also a certified EMT. He checked off two major boxes on my list: someone who loves kids and someone who could handle all of Noel's complex medical care. Over the next few months I got to know Dustin Beauvais; he is the man God always intended for me to be with. We wrote messages back and forth and would chat from time to time. It was something for me to look forward to amidst the endless Hospital admissions and constant medical care. It made me so happy just to know that God had a plan for my life one way or another. Noel continued to struggle with her eating difficulties and because she was severely anemic (low iron) she had to have two blood transfusions to try and build up the iron in her blood.
On June 6^th 2009 Dustin and I planned to meet for the first time for a dinner date. We met at a restaurant in down town Denver. I was so nervous and so insecure about how things might go, all that changed when he walked in and saw me for the first time. As we sat down at the table he said, "Wow you're a really gorgeous women." All my insecurities melted right away. We proceeded to have the best first date ever; a walk under the lights in down town allowed us plenty of talking time to really get to know each other. With laughter, lite hearts, and sincere spirits the peace and certainty I felt was from God no doubt. That night we both went home knowing that we had just met "The One;" God's chosen one. I was as honest as I could be with Dustin about Noel and what life involved with her; he wasn't scared a bit. Dustin meet Noel about a week later, we met for lunch. I pulled up, he proceeded to watch me pile on Noel's ventilator, her suction bag, her oxygen bottle, her bag of TPN, her feeding pump and then pick her up to walk 10 feet into the restaurant; I remember I kept apologize for how dramatic it was just to get my little girl out of the car to eat lunch. If I thought anything would scare him off this would be the point. But again Dustin wasn't scared, he told me later the first time he saw Noel that God told him not to worry that He had her in His hands. Noel and I met Lily and Landen, Dustin's kids, the next weekend. It was love at first sight; I knew right away God had given me what it would take to be there Mom too. The rest of the summer was spent hanging out as a new forming family. Noel had a few more Hospital visits and she continued to struggle with eating; Dustin was learning very quickly what life was like with a "special" little girl.
In August of 2009 we went to Resurrection Christian Fellowship for the first time. I told Dustin right away that this church felt like Home. At one point during the service I leaned over to him and said, "I feel like this is the kind of Church that would actually pray for Noel." I had taken her to a few different churches and people would look at her with a sad kind of look but no one ever offered to pray for her. Towards the end of the service I had to take Noel out early so we went and sat in the visitor's center of the church, we were immediately approached by a pastor who asked if she could pray for us! That's when I knew we had found our church Home. A few weeks later I was approached again by a woman in the hall who asked if she could pray for Noel, again I rejoiced in what God was doing. I didn't think too much of the prayer until later that night. Noel was still on TPN 12 hours a day at the time, that night we went home and Noel's central line broke. This wasn't the first time it happened, since the line was in her leg we had to make many emergency room visits to get her line repaired. That night I had had enough I didn't want to drive an hour and a half to sit in the emergency room for another 8 hours to get her line fixed. So instead I called her Doctor. At this point she was taking enough food into her stomach to survive, her stomach wasn't ideal but it was working enough to get by. After talking with the doctor he decided that we could stop Noel's TPN and take the central line out and see how she did. I was rejoicing in the Miracle God had done, I hadn't even prayed for her to be healed of the line and yet God did it. Sometimes in our lives God wants to heal things that we don't even realize can be healed!

In August Dustin proposed to me and Noel, he asked me to be His wife and Noel to be his daughter. We were married on October 18^th 2009. We had such a blessed wedding; better than I could have imagined. Our marriage didn't start out like most, ours started out like we had a daughter with special needs; first thing the next morning we got a call from Noel's nurse that she was in the ambulance and they were about to take her to the Hospital; without me. We drove as fast as we could to get there before they took her, she had never been in an ambulance alone, let alone in the hospital without me and I wasn't ready for this to be the day. She had been at home with her nurse when her trach clogged; which means she couldn't breathe, her nurse did what she could but knew immediately she needed some back up help. I can't even count the number of times Noel has turned blue and I have had to resuscitate her and change out her trach, I can usually get her stabilized myself but there have been a handful of times I've had to call 911 for help. Noel was scared when I got to the ambulance but after changing her trach and having her mommy there she looked better quickly. She was able to come home from the hospital that same day.

We learned early on the only way we could make it thorough was together; with answered prayers Dustin and I became a full fledge team. Through the learning of medical care and the balance of life, Dustin and I became and continue to become closer than I ever knew was possible. Noel now has a family and another daddy that loves her like his own; he treats her like a princess and loves her with all his heart. And I have a family; I am the mother of three wonderfully amazing children. I hope in reading Noel's history and my Testimony that you can see God is a God of second chances, that we are never too far gone for Him to forgive us and change our lives. I also hope you see that no matter how dark the situation, how overwhelming the trial seems; there is a reason. Noel is fearfully and wonderfully made, she has a purpose and God has a plan for her life, she is an amazing blessing and I pray that through this blog you will all get the opportunity to get to know this Special, Special gift and this very Special Girl.