2/27/2017 0 Comments Tender MerciesGathering the pieces up after learning we were not pregnant has been difficult. Through it all, I have noticed some tender mercies that have helped us through this.
Work has been busy & stressful for both of us, which could be seen as a bad thing but really I think it has helped to keep my mind off of the sadness. We were able to go to San Diego the day of finding out & were able to spend a lot of time together which was really nice. It was also just nice to be in a different environment & also to go to the beach, which always calms & refreshes me! One thing that was really difficult though was that we had a family dinner Sunday night & N's cousin & his wife came & announced to everyone that they were pregnant. That was really hard because we had been wishing so bad that it was us announcing we were pregnant. In moments like that I feel so sad & just wonder if we will ever be announcing that we are pregnant but I have faith & hope & Heavenly Father is always there to help me & hold me up. I am so thankful for N's strength through this all. He has been with me & there for me through everything & I know it is such an amazing blessing having him for my husband. We have definitely grown closer together through this. I feel like we were close before but since going through this trial/experience, we have gained a closeness that is very special. Working out has become my new thing to focus on. During the IUI's I was wanting to train for a half marathon & get in really good shape, but I was told to not work out other than yoga or walking every 2 weeks after each IUI. That was totally fine, I wanted to do everything I could to ensure that the procedure(s) would work but now I just really need something to focus my energy on & my goal is to start running again, train for a half marathon, & get in really good shape working out at the gym. I'm also going to continue to do yoga 1-2 times a week because I love the stretching & relaxation it brings! Family- I am so thankful for my family. They are so sweet & always praying for us & rooting us on. We have family dinner every Sunday night & it is always the best & so fun to be able to visit with everyone & also have the best meal of the week! The Gospel- I am so thankful for church & for my Heavenly Father & Jesus Christ. I know that I can always pray & that I am never truly alone. I am so thankful for the comfort this brings to me.
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2/21/2017 0 Comments One day I will be a motherOne day, I will be a mother. Right now I don't know when that day will be. The pregnancy test I took on Friday at 4am came back negative/ not pregnant. I am still too sad & raw from the experience. I have moments of complete sorrow & despair but I also have moments of hope & love. I feel like I have been on a roller coaster the past few days. I have felt moments of feeling like I am completely alone but I have also felt my Heavenly Father's love for me. I know that I am never truly alone & that I will be able to get through this day, this week, this month, and however long until this trial is taken from me. I also know that trials make us stronger & that once we have children, we will have different trials that stretch us & make us grow stronger. I feel discouraged that we don't have IUI as an option anymore & I am terrified of the thought of IVF & the many more shots, test, & stress it will bring. But I also have faith & trust that if it is right for us, we will know & will be able to get through it. After finding out that our test was negative, I had a very long hard day of work. Then N & I drove up to San Diego. The drive was nice to be able to be together, have uninterrupted time to talk, & for me to cry & be comforted by N. I had felt so completely alone & such utter sadness as I was driving home from work, crying uncontrollably, like I only have a few times in my life. I said a prayer in my head that I would feel loved & I felt my answer to that prayer as N made me feel so loved on our long drive. I will write more later, but the weekend was good for us but also hard in some ways. It was so good to be busy, go on a date Saturday, go to the beach & Con Pane, go to church, & spend lots of time with family. It was hard having family dinner & having N's cousin announce they were having a baby. I was happy for them but wished so much that we had been announcing that we were having a baby instead of trying to push away tears. Through it all, I still have faith & hope & always will.
2/15/2017 0 Comments A busy day about loveThis week has gone by so slowly so far. On Monday, N came home & surprised me with some beautiful red tulips & my favorite chocolates. I had a really busy day at work that day, we tested 19 kids & were running back & forth & it was just stressful & busy. When I got home, N was there & surprised me by having my favorite chocolate mousse from a little nearby french restaurant. He was so excited to surprise me with it & to be home to see me, it was so sweet. I'm so thankful to have a husband who does such thoughtful things for me. Then he headed back to work & I drove to church to set up for a big cubscout dinner we were having (on Valentine's day of all days)!! It was really busy setting up for the event, having the event, & then cleaning up & by the time I got home, I was so exhausted. We watched Twilight, the only chick flick movie we could find, & finished the chocolate mousse. Overall it was a very busy & pretty stressful day but I'm so thankful for my sweet husband & family & all of the love I feel from them! N was so sweet in thinking of me & the things I really love & he is also planning a surprise date for us when we are in San Diego this weekend! I am so excited, I love surprises! Both of my sisters that live nearby came by & dropped off treats & sweet cards for me & the cutest Valentine's mix cd. I am so thankful for a holiday to celebrate love. We have spread our Valentine's celebrations out with me making N a fancy dinner last Saturday, & him planning our date for this Saturday. It makes it fun to celebrate on more than just one day, especially since that day was so crazy busy!
Work has been busy but has gone by slowly this week & I think it's mostly because I know that I can take a pregnancy test on Friday. I am so nervous because if it's good news I will be sooo happy & can hopefully be able to get an appointment to get my blood taken to see if everything is good! If it is sad news, it will just be so heartbreaking & it will be such a hard day at work. I let the girls I work with know & they are all going to be there to help me on Friday, but I just know I will be crying a lot if the news is sad. No matter what though, I will continue to have hope & faith & trust in my Heavenly Father's plan for N & I. I have faith in Him & know that He knows best. 2/13/2017 0 Comments Just relax.... hahahahahaha!!!Well, I am nearing the end of the 2 week wait. Friday morning I can take a pregnancy test I am such a mix of nervous & excited! After taking the test, I will have a very busy day of work & then N & I will be heading to San Diego after work until either Sunday or Monday. I am so nervous because if we get a positive test, I will be soooo happy & excited & we can surprise everyone & tell them we are pregnant. If the test is negative, then it will be such a hard day & so hard to get things done at work. It will also be hard to not really have any personal space over the weekend to be sad, but I am hoping the news will be happy!!! It is really hard to imagine what it would feel like to even see a positive test!
I keep having people at work tell me I just need to relax & maybe I haven't gotten pregnant because I am thinking about it to much & it just makes me want to scream. I feel like with infertility you have to at least try to do everything you can & then the rest is in God's hands. I don't feel like you can just sit & do nothing. But then, once you have done everything that you can & that feels right, it is in God's hands. But really, I don't know why people keep telling me to RELAX!!!!! 2/9/2017 0 Comments comparison is the theif of joySometimes I catch myself comparing my life to the life of others. I like to look at Instagram & lifestyle blogs but then at times I realize it isn't really making me happy to look at them. They are so fake & the pictures are so edited & posed & I think, who was taking all of these pictures & why couldn't you just enjoy time with your kids or husband without taking a million perfectly posed, pretending like you don't know someone is there with a camera or fake laughing, pictures & then I feel grateful for my life. I have a sweet husband & wonderful family & I like taking pictures sometimes to remind myself of memories, but I don't have to take pictures of everything & have every picture posed perfectly for more likes, & have to always look like I am having so much fun.
Then there are days like today when I would like nothing more that to be in Hawaii, laying on the sandy beach, surfing & playing in the salty water, eating thai food & waialua bakery cookies & mochi & watching the gorgeous sunset. The past years have been so incredibly stressful, heart wrenching, & I just feel so sad & wornout some days. Not every day, some days I feel happy & hopeful. I think I am just feeling especially stressed out right now with this being our last chance at IUI & having so much going on with work & other activities. I just wish so badly that N & I could go on a Hawaii vacation & be able to relax on the beach & have nothing to do other than beach time, surfing, & eating. If this IUI is successful, we have decided we will go on a trip to Hawaii with some of the money we have been saving up for IVF. If it is not successful, we will need to save the money & continue to save up everything for IVF. I hope our IUI is successful so much so that we can have a sweet little baby (or babies!!) & also thinking of being able to be in Hawaii would bring me to tears (of happiness) because I have been missing that place so badly lately. Right now one of my best friends, my aunt, uncle, & cousin are all there & were all posting pictures & it was just making me so sad. I think I just need to take a social media break for a while. I know that I have so much to be grateful for & that I have a wonderful life. I am so thankful for my sweet husband that takes such good care of me. He has started cooking me dinner every Wednesday & it is my favorite. On Wednesdays, I go grocery shopping right after work & am usually exhausted. It is sooo nice to sit on the couch & relax while I watch him cook a delicious meal! Yesterday he grilled steak & sauteed red potatoes, onions, & carrots & roasted asparagus. It was sooo good!! I am also so thankful to live close by family. I love being able to see my mom & sisters so often, they are so fun to be around & so sweet! Tonight my mom is planning a Paris themed dinner for church so I'm going to go with her. It makes me so happy to be able to spend so much time with family. I'm thankful for prayer & for church. I'm thankful for a flexible job & a boss that is ok with me missing work/leaving early for so many doctor's appointments. I'm thankful we have been blessed financially to be able to pay for treatments. I'm thankful that I have a healthy body & that I can move around, run, & exercise. I'm thankful for beautiful sunrises & sunsets that I get to see daily. When I start thinking of the things I have instead of comparing myself to fake photos on social media, I am so much happier! Well, today we went in for IUI number 3. We are really hoping that we will have a miracle & be able to get pregnant. This IUI was different from the other 2. With the other 2, I had 4 FSH shots before doing the trigger shot & then had the IUI on day 16. Because of this, I was planning on having my IUI on Tuesday or Monday at the earliest. When I had scheduled my ultrasound to see how everything was looking, how many follicles I had, & when we would do the trigger shot, the nurse wanted me to schedule the ultrasound for Thursday, the 2nd. I asked if it would be ok to do the ultrasound on Friday, the 3rd, instead since it would be easier to get work off. The nurse said that should be fine since I usually had my IUI on day 16. After a day, I was feeling worried about trying to do things on my schedule & rescheduled the ultrasound for the 2nd instead. Around this same time, my sister had a baby!! I was glad I had switched my ultrasound & made plans to drive up with my dad to see my sisters baby from Friday to Sunday. I though this would be perfect since I wouldn't be having my IUI until Monday or Tuesday.
Fast forward to Thursday. I was nervous going into my ultrasound as always. We have just heard bad news so many times, that now I feel like I am always so nervous for any appointment. The ultrasound went well & I had 3 follicles on the left side that were a great size, 1 on the right that might be large enough, 2 that were too small, & great uterine lining. The lady doing my ultrasound said, "I hope you don't have any plans for this weekend!" I nervously laughed & said that I had planned to visit my sister to see her week old baby but of course this was the most important things. She said that because of the size of the follicles, Saturday would be the day (Day 13 in my cycle). I am so glad that everything looked good at the ultrasound & am hoping that things being different this IUI is a good thing since the other 2 were not successful! The nurse told me that I didn't need to take any more FSH shots (I had only done 3 so far this round) & to take my trigger shot that night at 10:15 & then to come in for the sperm drop off at 8:30 & IUI at 10:15am on Saturday. Part of me was a little sad though, cancelling plans to visit my sister. Of course if we get pregnant, we will be so incredibly thankful but it is so hard getting negative pregnancy tests each month & thinking of the things I missed because of shots & appointments. I missed my sweet aunt's funeral because it was during a day when I needed to be home during a month of clomid. I have missed many other things & it makes me sad, but I know that Nate & I need to continue to have faith & we know that our efforts are seen by our Heavenly Father. Thursday night, N gave me the trigger shot & then we booked a hotel near the fertility center for Friday night. Friday I got off work early since I had been planning on leaving early to go visit my sister. I came home & N & I packed & then headed downtown. My little sister had told me about a restaurant she loved called Culinary Dropout so we decided to try it out! It was decorated really cool & rustic & connected to 3 other restaurants that all had a great atmosphere too. We kept saying we felt like we were in Portland, haha! We got there during happy hour so we decided to just share some appetizers. Thinking they would be small, we ordered soft pretzels with cheese fondue, an antipasti platter, chips & dip, & pork belly nachos. The appetizers ended up being huge & we could have gotten by with only 2 but we were happy to have lots of leftovers! Everything was sooo good! Our favorites were the pretzels with fondue (reminded us a little of Urban Fondue, a special date night place for us in Portland) & the antipasti platter. The platter had cured meats, the best cheese, bread with balsamic, sweet peppers, golden raisins, & persimmons on it, sooo good!! We saved most of the nachos & chips for lunch & Super Bowl treats! It was so nice to have a fun, relaxing date night & to be able to try somewhere so new & different. We have missed all of the cute/quirky places that we used to eat in Portland so it was just a perfect place for that night so that we could relax, have a good time, & not stress. After dinner, we headed to the hotel to check in. They gave us each bags of cookies at checkin, so already it was a perfect place to stay! Then we got up to our room ate our cookies & watched My Best Friends Wedding & Blended & it was so nice & relaxing. Saturday morning came & we ate the typical continental breakfast & then it was time to get the sperm sample. We opt to get the sample at a hotel near the treatment center & then bring it to the office because of both religious & personal reasons. I had been so stressed about this because last month when we needed the sample for the IUI, it was so incredibly stressful. N & I were both so stressed out & it was such an emotionally taxing day. There is nothing less romantic & more stressful than knowing you need to have intercourse at an exact time & then rush to a doctors office by a certain time & that if things don't work out, you have wasted $1,000, that month when you only have a few months chance, shots, & medication. Anyways, that was one of the most stressful days ever, & so I had been praying since then that everything would work out for this IUI #3 & that the day would be stress free. My many prayers were answered & the day went so much better than the day of IUI #2. We were able to get to the doctors office with 10 minutes to spare, then head back to the hotel to shower & get packed up, relax & watch Fixer Upper, & then get back to the office 15 minutes early. The IUI procedure went well though it did feel more painful getting the catheter this time. I stayed laying down for 10 minutes after & have been taking it easy the rest of the day. I am so thankful that everything went well & that today was so much less stressful. I know that this was an answer to many prayers. I know that N & I have done everything that we can & the rest is in God's hands. I know that He has a plan for us & that we will be parents one day. I'm not sure if this IUI will be successful, but no matter what the results, we will continue to have faith in our Heavenly Father & will trust in Him. |
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August 2017
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