Aren and Tatiana

When we told Aren he was going to be a big brother the first time, he just kind of stared at us and we got nothing from him. It's kind of what we expected, I mean he was two for crying out loud.

It was about five years later when we told Aren that we were going to have another baby. Again he just kind of stared at us but this time we could guess what he was thinking. His first sister had died just a few years earlier from a medical condition that Aren himself had...a condition that Aren almost died from but was saved because of a bone marrow transplant. Aren's no dummy. He knew that he almost died, and he knew that Lily did die, so putting two and two together, he knew as did Rick and I, that this next baby had the chances of being born with no immune system and having to go through what Aren and Lily had to.

Tatiana was born with a clean bill of health and I wondered how Aren would feel about her. Would he love her as much as Lily? Would he resent her because she was healthy and unless something unexpected happened would never know the painful life that Aren and his other sister had known?

I watch Aren and Tatiana together and immediately know the answers to those questions. Seven and a half years can't separate these two and I love it.