In South Jersey, I lived with my mother at her job, but nobody knew. She would wake me up as early as 5.00 a.m. After getting up, I would dress up and go to sit in front of the mall until it opened. I stayed there the entire day until around 5.00 p.m. At that time, the client would be eating and wouldn’t see me enter the apartment. I would lay on the floor to sleep. Wemaintained this routine for almost six months before finally getting our own apartment, which we gradually furnished. It took quite a while, but I finally got my documentation, which enabledme towork.My first jobwas at The School of Vineland, where I worked as a group home counselor for children with special needs. I did this for three years, then in 1999, I moved to work with Arc of Somerset, which was the same line as the School of Vineland. Fromthere, Imoved toCentral Brunswick, then to Bridgewater, and finally to St. Peter’s Hospital. Love at First Sight It was a cousin’s wedding, and I had been assigned to the gift table. Also at the table was this hot guy. My! He was cute! The moment I laid eyes on him, it felt like I had butterflies in my stomach. I was really nervous. I think he must have felt the same about me because he immediately engaged me in conversation, talking the whole time. I was so nervous; I didn’t even know what I was writing down from these people giving the gifts. I was very nervous because I really liked him, right from the get-go, and it looked like he did too. I found out his name was Evan Fosu. After the wedding event, he managed to get my phone number from my cousin, and that was when we really started talking. But most of the time, he came to visit at home, since he had his own car. After we had dated and lived together for a while, we finally decided that it was time to formalize our relationship. The parents decided that it was time to put it on paper and make it official. That was in 1999. So, an engagement ceremony was held in Ghana, in our absence; you know what Ghanaian engagements are like. When it came to the part where they asked me whether they should accept the gifts the groom had brought and whether I liked theman, I was asked on the phone, and of course, I was like, “Yes, go ahead and take the dowry and gifts.” So that’s how we got engaged. However, we never had a white wedding. We just couldn’t afford to have one at the time. Evan is a Jehovah’s Witness, and I’m a Presbyterian by birth. We have made our marriage work very well by just respecting each other’s religious background. THREE BUNDLES OFMIRACLES Audrick I looked into my baby’s shiny eyes, feeling overwhelmed with gratitude. I had suffered a miscarriage during my first pregnancy, so this particular pregnancy had filled me with much trepidation. What if we did not make it to its full term? However, God proved faithful, and it felt fulfilling to be holding my precious bundle of joy in my arms. We named him Audrick Dada Kwame Fosu. At this time, IwasworkingwithWachoviaBank, thatwas before it was renamed Wells Fargo Bank. While at the bank, I got a call frommy previous employers to say that they had opened a brand newGroupHome in Princeton, and it just had one client starting. So I left the bank, and I came to work as a manager for Arc of Somerset. The only snag was that my Audrick had just started school, and even though I devoted myself to just working on the weekends, I still needed to have a babysitter. Somehow all my paycheck went to pay the babysitter, which when my husband analyzed it, made no sense. What was the sense in using all one’s paycheck to pay the babysitter when they could babysit their own kids? This was what caused me to become a stay-at-home mom. At this time, I was also studying for my Associates at Katherine Gibbs School of Graphic Arts. Siegmund While at Katherine Gibbs School, I got pregnant with my second child, a pregnancy that passed smoothly and ended with the birth of our second son, Siegmund YawAsare Bediako Fosu, on 11/28/2002. Heweighed 7 lbs 19 oz, 19 inches at birth. It took another eight years before Kendall-Jeffrey Kwame Baffour Nsenkyire Fosu, who we also call Kendall the D.J., came along, and that was after I had suffered one ectopic pregnancy. Kendall I felt one strong kick inmy abdomen, so I clutchedmy stomach and doubled over. Then several kicks more, and the baby in my womb seemed to be moving. It was as if it was agitated. Reaching out for my MP3, I pressed ‘play,’ and the soothing sound of Enya, the Irish singer filled the room. Immediately, the movement stopped, and the kicking also stopped. My baby was calmer. I was quite surprised. Had the baby calmed down because of the music, or was it something else? Reaching out for the MP3, I switched it off, and then the kicking and restlessness started again. Interesting. It became quite obvious that the baby was responding positively to the music. This was fascinating indeed, so for this third pregnancy, we kept Enya’s music on all the time, and that was how we had a good pregnancy. Fast forward to another ten months, and I noticed that baby Kendall was experiencing some speech problems. Anytime he tried to speak, it sounded scrambled. If he said something and he was sure we did not understand, he would pull us towards what he wanted and point it out. Wait a minute, was my baby experiencing delayed speech or something? I took the time to really monitor the situation. It seemed my son’s vocabulary was too few for his age; for instance, he wasn’t even saying ‘mama’ or ‘dada,’ and if he said something and realized that we had not understood him, he would hold our hand, pull us along, and point out whatever he wanted. At one, he still wasn’t talking; hemumbled stuff, but he wasn’t giving us sentences, so, when he turned two, we realized that we needed to get help. 20 The Birthday Journal
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