Dear Future Child

Bear with me while I write this post. It has been a long, raw, emotional week.  While I'm thrilled for family and friends, there was another baby announcement in our inner circle of friends and family and it's a bit difficult to deal with.  If you've been in our shoes, you will understand. If you do not know or have not experienced the agony of infertility, let me educate you.

It is not that we are not happy for others, we're thrilled for you all, but aching and grieving on the inside.  There are good days and bad days.  We need time to sort through our feelings and emotions. It is not that we don't want to be there, it's that sometimes we just can't be there. We have this bleeding gaping wound we're trying to deal with each and every month. We're grieving for something that we hope, wish and pray for each and every month. So please, please just be there for the person you know going through infertility. If affects more people than you even know.

Now onward. I sat down this afternoon and started writing a letter to whatever future child my husband and I may or may not be blessed with. Here it is:

~*~*~*~*~*~

To my dear, sweet miracle,

We have hoped for, prayed for, wished for, and longed for you for years. We have loved you longer than you will know and can even begin to comprehend.  We loved you when you were just a thought, hope, and dream.  We will continue to love you forever.

You, my dear, are everything that we could have ever wished for. I'm writing this now, when you're still a wish, a prayer, and dream. I wonder will you look more like your daddy or me? Will you have his eyes and smile, or my laugh?  Questions that will only be answered when you enter the world and make your grand entrance.

We want you in our arms and love you very much. We are starting the next step in our journey to have you soon. We have waited and hoped for you for a few years now.  The doctor's say it's unexplained why we haven't had any children yet.  I guess that God isn't ready for you to make your appearance yet.  Perhaps you are not ready to join us yet.

We can promise to love you and cherish you.  You can be certain that we will do our very best by you.  My precious little love, we are eagerly waiting for you.  We pray for a happy, healthy, ten fingers, ten toes, perfect, beautiful and wonderful you.

If you're a little boy or girl it will be a thrill for us no matter which you are. We cannot wait to show you the world  and teach you.  We cannot wait to watch you grow, to feel your first kick, and see all of your "first" milestones.  To see you take that first breath, will be a breath-taking experience for us, one that we hope will be soon.

You, little one, are and will be more loved that you know. You've got a few "cousins," second cousins really, already here awaiting your arrival.  I think they would be amazing and fun play-mates. You can have all sorts of fun and get into all kinds of mischief with them.  Oh, just think of the adventures you'll have!

As we begin getting ready for the next round of treatment with the doctors, we hope and pray it will mean that you will be here soon. We can be patient little one, but please hurry for your mommy and daddy love you so.  We cannot wait to meet you.

Hopefully you will be one of the eggs that the doctor takes from mommy next month.  If not we will eagerly and yet patiently wait for you.  Just the thought of you,the hope each month brings, helps us get through the wait for you.  We love you little one.

Love Mommy

                                                     

~*~*~*~*~*~

There it is, the letter that had both my husband and I in tears. It'll go in a journal for our little miracle someday.  I'm trying to prepare myself for what the next 9-10 weeks will mean and bring. There will be pain and discomfort, but the thought that this time, maybe this time could be it, is enough to push through it.

I know realistically there's no guarantee that it will work this time.  However, this time, I've got a glimmer of hope that wasn't there last year. Mentally, emotionally, and physically I'm in a better place. Spiritually I'm in a much better place. It has been through my faith and with the love and support of my family and friends that I have been able to get to where I am today.

If this blog can help just one person feel like they're not alone, then it's worth it. It's been cathartic for me, but I know that by looking at blogs and forums online, I have been able to work through some of what I've been feeling and thinking. I want people to know that you're not alone in this journey.

There are a number of resources available to you.  Resolve is a fantastic website that as support groups and information available to you. BabyCenter also has a number of TTC forums. You can follow register, ask questions, and reach out to other going through the same treatment protocol, diagnosis, etc.  I'd also recommend looking up blogs as well.  Educate yourself as best you can.  Last year I was naïve to think, bam! it would happen. I didn't know about half of what the process entailed.

Now I'll leave you with some funny images and truths about IVF. Laughter is one of the only ways that you'll get through the process sane. If you can't laugh you'll cry, and I know which I'd prefer.

                               
(Images courtesy of google image search)


Smile and laugh my friends. Simply because you can. Until next time.

Cautiously Hopeful

And we've got a "Green Light" people

After days and weeks of anxiously waiting and wondering, we had our IVF consult with our RE this past Monday. I've lost 70lbs since this spring and in doing so it has apparently caused some positive health changes. Not only am I lighter and over all healthier, my blood work came back with improved numbers.  In comparison to last year's numbers it wasn't a huge change, but there was improvement. 

For those just joining us on this journey, my husband and I have been diagnosed with unexplained infertility. So, thus far all of our test were normal and fine. Three rounds of Clomid, 2 medicated IUI's and still we haven't gotten pregnant. Significant weight loss and healthy lifestyle changes also have not helped us to achieve pregnancy. So it has been decided that we're moving on to IVF. 

It's terrifying and thrilling at the same time. I've read different forums and blogs and "know" what to expect, but in the long run I really have no way of knowing.  Having not experienced it first hand yet, I don't know how true the horror stories I've read online are. The unknown is the scary part. 

But it's the hope that's keeping us going.  That little tingle of thrill down our spine that is helping us to slosh through the packets of information and preparing for what's to come.  The hope that our sweet little miracle will be conceived. 

Goodness I just got chills. 

It has officially been one year since our last IUI and what a world of difference a year makes!  I pulled myself from the deep, dark, lonely void that is the infertility struggle. And if you're someone struggling with it, I recommend that you reach out to the various support groups that there are out there. I am also willing to answer questions and offer advice and what words of comfort I can to anyone that needs it.

In the past year I have gone through a complete transformation.  I'm not that same woman that I was just 12 months ago. I'm healthier physically, mentally, and emotionally. My marriage is in a much better place and we're stronger and closer than ever. 

I have also found that by being more open and honest about our infertility, I'm finding strength and support. In opening up, a number of friends and acquaintances have also shared their own struggles.  We've really helped each other get through.  

We are cautiously hopeful for our next step. I start my protocol once I call day 1 of my next cycle. Then just a short 7 weeks later we will know.  It's terrifying and thrilling to know that perhaps this could be it. Or perhaps that one of the eggs they harvest in November could eventually be our miracle baby. 

I still have my moments where there's that ache and pang. There's a never-ending longing that sometimes swamps me.  But when it gets like that I hop on the treadmill or exercise bike and work for it.  I'll be damned if I haven't done everything that I physically and realistically could to make this work. Either that or I go visit my cousin who just had her sweet miracle baby of her own.  She and her husband have been together for nearly 14 years and didn't think that they could have children. Her little baby girl is their miracle baby and gives me hope that it will happen for us someday. 

So I'll leave you here with that hope. That someday whether biologically or not, it will be our turn. Don't forget to live your life though going through this process.  As difficult as it is, the world must go on. Don't wallow in it, that's a very dangerous and scary place to be, take it from someone who completely shut down. 

I know that no matter what happens we'll be okay. It won't be easy and if it's not meant to be it will be difficult to accept, but God has a plan for all of us.  Who am I to question what that plan really is. I recently got a tattoo on my left inner wrist in white in.  It's really rather simple, but holds so many meanings for me. "Faith, hope, love" written in cursive in an infinity symbol.  Those three words have gotten me through the past 4 years. They are from 1 Corinthians 13: 4-13.  We had this as a reading at our wedding 4 years ago this October, and those words, "faith, hope, love" have gotten us through the ups and downs of life and especially our infertility struggle. 

You aren't alone. As mom says, "chin up, it'll be okay."