Lets jump into Charlotte (current post)

I’m sitting at my friend Bernie’s house waiting for my hair dye to kick in while she picks up around the house. She does my hair every six weeks because my hair grows insanely fast, but this time we decided to do highlights for summer and see if it stretches the time between coloring appointments. My gray comes in FAST.

It’s funny — on my TikTok and IG (@durstfamilychaos), someone commented that I’d look ten years younger if I dyed my hair, and another person said I looked like Anthony’s mother. Honestly, both comments made me laugh. I know my hair needs to be done. For a little while I thought about just letting the gray take over naturally… but I still feel too young for that.

Since it’s summer, I told myself I really need to get this book going. I brought one of my old journals with me today — the one where I documented the kids’ history — and started flipping through it.

Last week I posted about Sam’s birth, but today Charlotte stood out to me.

Charlotte is my most peaceful child. She has her quirks — very OCD tendencies. When she was 3 or 4, we went trick-or-treating and she counted every single house we stopped at all the way until we got home. She sets alarms for bedtime and waking up, and the second they go off, she jumps up immediately. No procrastination at all.

She’s the only kid who naturally helps me with laundry, dishes, and picking up around the house. She’s such a giver, and her love language is helping people. We love baby number seven to the moon and back. I cannot believe she’s going into high school already. Where did the time go?

When I got pregnant with Charlotte, I knew almost immediately. I had implantation bleeding and told Anthony right away. Of course, he thought I was crazy. Two weeks later I tested and there was the faintest little line. SUPER faint. But I was so excited. I love my babies so much.

Anthony, on the other hand, was pissed.

I still remember showing him the test in our bedroom when he walked in from work. He looked at the faint line and told me I needed to go to the doctor to confirm it. The disappointment he felt hit me hard. At the time, I was already struggling with depression, and suddenly I felt like this was somehow my fault.

Honestly, he got mad every time I got pregnant… well, except for Zack.

I think the only reason Zack was different was because neither of us were trying to get pregnant. I had just started going back to the gym after having Marissa and had gone from a size 12 to a size 0. I was NOT in the mindset for another baby. I had one period after breastfeeding and them BOOM! Pregnant AGAIN.

Plus, it had taken years to get pregnant with Devun — three years Not doing anything to stop it from happening nothing. Marissa was just as hard. I had a miscarriage right before her. That pregnancy took 6–9 months of trying, and then after the miscarriage it took another four months before I got pregnant again.

When I finally got pregnant with Marissa, Anthony’s response wasn’t “I’m so excited!” It was, “Congratulations, I know you wanted it.”

I’ll save Marissa’s pregnancy story for another post.

Maybe I should have thought about Anthony’s feelings more. But deep down, I always knew these humans were supposed to come into our lives. I knew they needed us.

Anthony wanted all of our babies before we turned 30. I knew I wanted six kids. We were racing some imaginary deadline together.

After we had Sam, about two years later, I started having major issues with my IUD. Infection after infection. My doctor finally recommended removing it. To me, that felt like a sign we were supposed to have another baby.

Even though my doctor warned me after Sam that I shouldn’t have any more children because mentally it would be too much for me… I didn’t listen. I knew there was another baby waiting to come.

So once the IUD was removed, we did absolutely nothing to prevent pregnancy.

I don’t know if Anthony thought it would take longer or maybe thought it would never happen, but whatever he was thinking… he was wrong.

I took a test and saw a positive line.

The next day I tested again with a digital test and it said negative. I was devastated and couldn’t understand how the first test had been positive. I literally ran to the front door while Anthony was leaving for work and stopped him.

“Maybe I was wrong,” I told him.

But right then, this little voice inside my head said, “No. You know your body. There’s a baby in there.”

So I waited another five days and tested again.

Positive.

We had conceived the baby.

I think Anthony was especially upset because we had a Mexico trip planned — our FIRST vacation without kids. He thought if I was pregnant we wouldn’t be able to go. Honestly, emotionally and mentally, we really needed that trip.

I used to tease the kids and tell them only Charlotte got to go on vacation with us.

Anthony’s brother Matt and his wife Ashleigh watched the kids for five days while we were gone, and it was exactly what we needed.

Actually… I think I need to renew my passport. We need another getaway.

I’ve always wanted to do an African safari. Anthony thinks I’m completely insane and refuses to even entertain the idea. But Alaska? I could definitely do Alaska too.

Anyway… back to Charlotte’s story.

I actually documented a lot of Charlotte’s pregnancy and birth because her story was a little different than the others. Luckily, I can just retype my old journal entries.

I’ve noticed that as I’ve gotten older, I really struggle to remember things now.

In some ways that’s good.

In some ways… it’s heartbreaking.