Our Family

The Beginning
We met in college. Jeremy was a senior majoring in creative writing and Christy was a sophomore majoring in early childhood education. We got married just ten months after first meeting. Jeremy got a job in trucking and Christy finished up her last two years of college. We became pregnant with Olivia the last semester of college. After graduation, Jeremy transferred to North Carolina so that we could live closer to Christy's family.







Our Girl
Our oldest child and only daughter Olivia made a very dramatic entrance into the world. She is a girly girl who loves art, reading, dramatic performance, and piano. Olivia is a huge help to us. She is the only child her age that we know who can change the diapers of all three of her brothers. She has a tender heart. She loves to educate her friends and complete strangers about Autism, and she takes her responsibility of big sister very seriously. We cannot begin to say what a help she is to our family!







Our First Boy
Jack was our first miracle baby. We found out that we were expecting again when Olivia was only three months old. Jack was born ten weeks prematurely, and spent the first six weeks of his life in the NICU. He had to be intubated, he had two collapsed lungs, heart surgery, and a brain bleed, but our gracious Heavenly Father spared his life, and he is now perfectly healthy. Jack enjoys playing soccer and basketball, and he is also taking piano lessons from his Meemaw. Jack is serious about his responsibility to protect his younger brothers. He is very sensitive to how others view his brothers that have Autism and how people treat the special needs community in general.


Our Second Boy
You can read all about Josiah in the “About Josiah” section. :)





Our Baby Now in Heaven
We found out that we were expecting our fourth baby when Jo was still little. At 8-9 weeks of pregnancy, God chose to take Tory Michal to heaven. The loss of our baby caused us to yearn even more for heaven, and we so look forward to the day when we can be reunited with our precious child.







Our Third Boy
Early in our relationship, we talked about adoption, and we discussed how much we wanted to adopt and how great it would be if we could do this while our biological children were young. The loss of Tory made us focus on the frailty of life and how none of us is promised another day on this earth. We felt it was time to consider adoption. Two couples in our church had adopted through a Christian agency called Amazing Grace Adoptions and Orphan Care. We contacted the agency to request some information. God chose to move in a miraculous way, and Jalen joined our family through adoption just four months later. He was just nine days old when we got him, and he appeared to be healthy in every way. Right after his first birthday, we noticed that his development seemed to suddenly be delayed. Our bright and engaged baby became lost in his own little world. We became convinced that Jalen also had Autism, and our fears were confirmed when he was diagnosed at 18 months old. We know that this was God’s perfect plan for our family, and we are so blessed to have him. He loves mud, and loves to get dirty. He is a brilliant little boy. He memorized the alphabet and numbers 1-10 not long after turning two. The amazing thing is that we never taught him this. His doctors believe he has something called Hyperlexia. He loves to draw pictures and to create videos on his computer using Moviemaker. Jalen's favorite place is to be outside, and he also loves swimming. Jalen has Sensory Processing Disorder like Josiah, but his SPD is not as severe. He will benefit greatly from having access to the pool as well.


Our Fourth Boy
Judah was certainly a surprise. His birth was thankfully very easy overall. He was a perfect distraction for us during a time of great difficulty. He kept us just busy enough that we were not able to dwell too much on the challenges of being a family touched by Autism. Judah has never known a time in his life where he hasn’t had siblings that require a tremendous amount of care and attention, but he takes this all in stride. God blessed our boy with a tender heart, and, for the most part, he exudes the old saying “go with the flow” perfectly. Judah’s current interests are creating on the game Minecraft and playing baseball in the Spring. He is a super smart kiddo who works hard at doing well in school.

Our Fifth Boy
Since our fourth boy was such a surprise, you can imagine how completely floored we were to find our that a fifth would be joining the family! We realize that it probably sounds crazy to say, but Jason has been easy. We were going through such a hard time when he was born. We felt covered over with concerns about the present and fears about our unknown future. Jason was a perfect reminder from our Heavenly Father that His plan is best. Having Jason in our family has been like coming up for air. He is such a funny little kid who has such a great disposition. He has a wonderful imagination and a love for his family that brings us all together.








Our Extended Family
This description wouldn’t be complete without mentioning what a blessing it is to live so close to Christy’s side of the family. Papa and Meemaw are such a blessing to all 16 of their grandchildren. They make daily efforts to help encourage and sustain us. And it has been a joy to live so close to the Uncles, Aunts, cousins, and other family members. We miss seeing the rest of our extended family that lives out of state, but we see God’s grace in having us live in NC where we have been able to access excellent specialists and therapists in the field of Autism.


We have added one more granddaughter since this picture was taken. :)




Our Support Staff    



We are thankful to all of the ladies who have helped us care for our boys over the years via our therapy hours. You become part of our family, and your efforts to help us maintain their safety and further their development are a blessing we will forever cherish!