Posted on 12/07/2007 7:52:26 PM PST by yorkie
During this holiday season, a Tucson father has three reasons to celebrate. Andrue Smith's wife recently gave birth to triplet boys.
But tragically, his wife died after the babies were born.
Andrue is now struggling to cope with the loss of his wife and raising the babies on his own.
They're daddy's little boys. Legend, Tristian and Jaisyn were born six weeks premature, a week ago today.
"All I wanted was a son," he told us.
You can see the love in Andrue's eyes. Love, and sorrow, because his wife Debbie will never see her babies.
Andrue says, out of the blue, his wife got deathly ill. Doctors saved the boys, but couldn't save her.
"My wife's heart had stopped beating. Her body suffered and her brain suffered... It's not the kind of thing people will recover from."
So Andrue made the difficult decision to discontinue life support.
"It's going to be hard, very hard. I can't imagine a life without her."
Numb, this 28 year old single father of three is trying.
"My wife, I know she'd expect me to be strong and she'd want me to take care of those kids."
Andrew has a full-time construction job, but questions whether he earns enough to afford childcare. And if he quits his job, how will he pay his mortgage?
"Absolutely anything anybody can help out with or contribute, I'd be very happy to accept anything. I've got my babies, my three boys to worry about, and that's what's keeping me strong."
Andrew calls them daddy's little army.
If you'd like to help the Smith Family......
(Excerpt) Read more at kvoa.com ...
If the extended family (grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles) cannot pitch in to help raise those babies, the father may have to put them up for adoption.
There are triplets in my family. The church pitched in and every day, a lady from the church came over to their house and cooked dinner, and watched the babies so the mother could shower and get a little nap. They couldn’t have done it without the church.
I wish him well, but it always rubs me the wrong way when people say they wanted a “son.” As if a daughter would be not quite as good.
Boys are easier to raise. Plus the name continues. Those are just a few of many reasons...I have heard many woman say the same thing. My wife and I have three boys. Of course I want a girl, but my wife would take three more boys before a daughter. I guess she knows what it takes to raise a daughter more than I. lol.
I can not imagine the pain this father is feeling. I hope & pray he will not have to put his sons up for adoption. What a heartbreaking story. Prayers he gets the help he needs asap.
How sad, but it is also a time for great happiness. It all seems so overwhelming to Mr. Smith right now. I can’t even imagine how he feels.
Prayers for all!
Every man needs a daughter. And every woman needs a son.
Conversely, every man needs a son and every woman needs a daughter.
However, it all works out just fine when we don’t make the choices and we enjoy what we get.
BTW, daughters are not harder to raise than sons. Whoever said that? Daughters are treasures. So are sons. We have 4 daughters and 2 sons and there was no difference in raising them. They all got colic, teethed, became teenagers and then became adults with kids of their own.
And they were/are all great.
Wasn’t Tarzan’s “ward” in the 1960’s t.v. series starring Ron Ely named “Jai,” and played by Manuel Padilla Jr.?
I wish the reporter had asked, like, what the mother died of. Talked to a doctor, maybe? Was it hemorrhaging? Heart failure? Usually such things are a part of stories about someone dying.
Prayers for the family. Will be sending a check.
Is it Andrew or Andrue?
Changing the spelling of common names may look cute on paper but the kid is stuck with saying, “No it’s spelled ___” the rest of his life.
Just a lifelong annoyance.
I just feel sorry for this guy & who are we to judge what he names his children? I've seen worse & I just don't understand what the big deal is in what a person names their children. Didn't George Foreman name all his children George? To me thats really odd.
Yes. I forget the name of it, but someone wrote a whole book on the literary tradition of what Wagner, who did the opera version of the story, calls “Liebestod,” or love-death. A strange fascination in western literature for illicit, romantic love leading to death and transfiguration.
A curious business.
>>Didn’t George Foreman name all his children George? To me that’s really odd.<<
Not to mention loony. Though Kemal Attaturk DID have an entire menagerie named Abdul.
Going to be hard to raise money after naming your kids with Hippie names. I personally have a problem giving money to stupidity. Naming kids like that tells me a lot about the parents.
I’m pretty much speechless here...
Let me explain something, OK? A few years ago, a Freeper posted a story about a micro-preemie baby. Through a series of events, his parents found out about FR and have become posters due to the PRAYERS AND KIND WORDS said on that thread.
Had they been subjected to the ridicule that you people have posted here regarding NAMES!!!!!!!!!!........I can’t even begin to imagine the pain they’d feel.
For Pete’s sake, be kind...have your posts removed by the mods, and take it up in FRmail. Yuk it up all you want behind the scenes, OK?
This man lost his WIFE, the mother of his CHILDREN! Who cares what those babies are named???!!!
You are absolutely correct.
Somehow the thread got sidetracked to trivia instead of the real picture.
Sorry for my involvement in it.
Raising triplets as a single father is going to be more than difficult.
Prayers to the family.
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