TTC Round One

This will be brief but I don't want to leave my bloggies hanging. This is not my month! AF hasn't reared her ugly head yet but I am stuck in PMS land gripping several negative pregnancy tests in each hand. Can't say I'm not disappointed but I am "ok" with it this month. I suppose it was only the first round of TTC. I just can't stand wondering if it will happen again. Since it took me 3 years to get pregnant with Nathan I get a little worried-- I don't have three years! I'm no spring chicken anymore!!!

Getting close!

I am officially 10 dpo (days past ovulation for my readers that don't suck themselves into enough online blogs to know the lingo lol). This means that if a little Herman baby hasn't buried into my uterus by now then I am out of the running for the month.

I am trying not to symptom spot, and I was doing really well until I realized I have been pretty queasy that past few days. Last night I almost lost my dinner. I am going to hope that's a good sign and not just a result of geocaching behind the sewage treatment plant!!! Today my mouth has been watering at a disgusting rate. Hate to admit it but I am getting REALLY hopeful. I think I am going to test this Saturday. It's still pretty early, but I am impatient and maybe, just maybe, I will get a faint positive. I really hate keeping this a secret from the rest of the world, and my family. But I really don't want to hear everybody's opinions on why I shouldn't be doing this again. I just want a houseful of babies!

Only one more day to make it through before I hopefully have a joyful answer. I am on pins and needles. I do wonder if the bundle of nerves I have become isn't to blame for my queasy stomach though. I HATE this!!!

Time ticks on

I realized that if this is "the month" and all of my baby making efforts were not in vain, I would have conceived on Memorial Day (fitting in name) and will be able to find out just before Father's Day. What a gift that would be! How I would just LOVE to wrap up a positive EPT and give it to David. However, the likelihood of that happening feels so far off that I am not even going to let myself get excited. I have decided that, at least for now, I am not going to allow myself to get consumed by this. If it does not happen this cycle then I will just focus on losing some much needed weight.

David and I have picked a girl's name. One that he actually liked too! I didn't think it was possible to suggest a name that he actually agreed was nice. We're going to keep it a secret- but I promise it is so fitting! The only hint that I will give you is that like Nathan and Noah, it also starts with an N.

I am waaaaayyyyy too anxious for the next ten days to go by. I already have 3 EPTs just screaming my name. I even splurged on the ones that let you test 6 days early. Waiting until a missed period is for chumps! Now, I just have to survive until then. I am already symptom spotting. So far all I've had was a few spells of nausea... but that could just be from lack of sleep and nerves combined.

Let the countdown begin

Well, I officially may be past the point of no return.... I (think) I am officially in the two week window of anxious waiting. I forgot how much I hate this. However, I have zero confidence that this will be the month considering that it took me three years to get pregnant with Nathan, so my hopes are not up. Plus, we are going on vacation next month which means that if I am not pregnant this cycle than I can still drink on vacation. Always a silver lining, right?? 

My Android fertility/period tracker app says that I have three more days until my most fertile day- however since it can take the little swimmers (which I have recently learned actually crawl, not swim- gross!!!!) 72 hours to squirm their way up there and they can hang around for up to 6 days. I think I am covered....

So, my plan is to BD a few more times just to make sure that I am good and covered and then test no sooner than 6/14.

So, in the mashed words of Effie Trinket for all you Hunger Games addicts out there (you know who you are!!):

"May the odds be ever in my favor!"

Big brother

I have spent the night looking up baby names. Lame, right? For someone who doesn't want to go down this road again, I sure am anxious for the day that I might hold another child in my arms. My baby is nowhere near the infant I brought home. Although watching Nathan grow up brings with it its own kind of joy and wonderment, I absolutely long for the familiarity of sleepless nights and leaky boobs. I am discouraged by where this road may take us but encouraged with the knowledge that we are just part of a plan and what is supposed to happen WILL happen. 

We were all in the car the other day when Nathan announced that his baby sister was on her way soon. Up until that moment he was all about baby brothers, so I don't know if this was just wishful thinking on his part or if he was simply a messenger of encouragement. 

A few days later, on our way to Minnesota, he was playing away in his car seat when suddenly he stopped and told me that he really misses his baby brother and was so sad. Then, in an unprecedented manner, he began crying. That just shattered my heart.

I don't know what all goes on in his little(ish) head, but obviously he thinks about babies too. I just hate that he got cheated out of big brotherhood, because he would be great at it and I want it so badly for him.

Opening the book back up...

My blog has fallen somewhat off the radar these past few months because I have been totally consumed by homework, but it's summer vacation and I now have something to blog about again.

This is a special month. A long awaited, much anticipated (and even sometimes dreaded) month. I have finally been cleared by my doctor to try for baby number 3. This should be great news, which it is. But it comes with its own slew of terrifying emotions. Mainly because after being tested for everything under the sun, the doctors were never able to give me any reasons for what happened with Noah. So, I could be a ticking time bomb, just waiting to abrupt again. Or, I could sail through a pregnancy with no problems. I guess there is no way to know other than to take that leap of faith. 

So, my blogger friends, you are in for an exclusive treat. You get to follow me on this (somewhat) secret journey. I don't plan on publicizing that fact that I will be trying again (other than putting it on the Internet for the world to see lol...but it turns out few of my "real-life" friends follow me so I think it's safe). So, for the few of you who actually know me in real life.... mum's the word! I don't care to have everybody's opinion on why I shouldn't be trying again, I just want to trust that God knows what he's doing and let him take care of it. These decisions are far too great for me.

I ask for hopes, prayers and well wishes in this new chapter of my life. I am sure it will come with fears and tears and God only knows what other emotions. But, I think I am excited....

How Noah changed my life

This is a copy of a speech I gave for my communication class. They asked us to 'tell a story' about an event that was life changing, and explain how it affected our life.

We all know Murphy’s Law “If something can go wrong it will”.  

Tongue-in-cheek I lived by this rule.  I tended to live life “glass half empty” and kind of felt like the world was out to get me most days. People would joke that if it wasn’t for bad luck, I would have no luck at all. Who would have guessed it would take the worst tragedy of my life to change my perspective.

 As a child I always dreamed of growing up to be a mother. I am the oldest of 8 kids, so having a big family seemed the normal course of events for me. Of course, given my luck, it took me three years, and several failed fertility treatments to get pregnant with my firstborn, Nathan.  You can imagine my surprise when a month after my husband returned from a 14 month tour to Iraq, I found out I was pregnant with my second child.                                                                      

Everything was going almost perfectly until 20 weeks gestation when my water broke while I was asleep. This began a chain reaction of horrible, worst-case scenarios. Everything that could go wrong was- quite literally- going wrong. No doctors could tell me why; they speculated but came to the conclusion that it was a fluke and a “medical anomaly”. The only definite answer they could give me was that I had a stage 4 abrupting placenta previa.

This meant that my placenta, which feeds and provides oxygen to the unborn baby, was not only located in the wrong spot and blocking my cervix, but had begun to separate from the wall of my uterus. So my son was slowly being cut off of his life support, and I was losing significant amounts of blood each day and was running a high risk of infection. Most hospitals will not allow you to stay pregnant for more than 24 hours after your water breaks, yet I was facing the prospect of several more months in this condition.

Additionally, because amniotic fluid, or your “water”, is necessary to lung development, and my water broke 4 weeks before viability, I was told it was highly unlikely that his lungs would ever develop. I was put on bedrest; specialists suggested I terminate my pregnancy and informed me of the great risks to my own life if the pregnancy continued. Espousing the ideal that ‘where there is life there is hope’; I remained pregnant for another month. On August 6^th while my husband was 4 hours north at a drill weekend, I went into labor in my bathroom and began hemorrhaging. My 17 year old sister rushed me to the hospital and within the hour I was in surgery, having an emergency C-section to save my life, and my son’s. Noah Ethan was born at 11:37 pm where he was met by a neonatal team who had taken a medical chopper from Marshfield. They worked desperately on him but sadly, Noah was born with hypoplastic lungs and only lived for a few hours.

Over the next several months I blogged about my son. My blog originally was a source of information for family who wanted daily updates on how my pregnancy was going; but after Noah’s death became an outlet for my grief. I found it to be very cathartic and before long I was getting several hundred hits a day to the new blogs I was posting. There were strangers from all over the world logging on to read my every post. I developed a true passion for writing. It helped me to work through my feelings and eventually changed my entire perspective on the circumstance.

I stumbled across the quote “Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react”. It sounds almost too cliché to say, but his brief existence has really helped me appreciate life. He has made me a more patient mother and has helped me to realize what is important and not get upset about seemingly insignificant things. I take everything in stride, and all things considered believe I am truly blessed.

It amazes me how a little boy who only lived for just over 2 hours could have such a profound effect on my attitude.

 Oscar Wilde said “The optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist sees the hole.” I decided that instead of focusing on the metaphorical hole in my life, I would instead “see the doughnut”; never focusing on the bad things, but only on my enormous outpouring of blessings. I have my health, a husband who loves me and an amazing son. What more could I ask for?