A Personal Share

I do not talk often about the thought of another child or my infertility issues.  It’s not a secret; it is not something to be hushed.  If you were to sit down with me and ask I would share my heart with you.  But the subject is not one that everyone can handle.  People are not sure what to say and often I just feel the subject changes the mood to sadness, who wants that, so it is easier for others if I just keep it inside or keep it with those I feel safe.

Today I am going to share. Today I am going to be open.  Today you will read a few notes that were made over the last year and blog that has been postponed for over 6 months of not being ready to share.

Fall 2014 MOP’s

As I sat at my MOP’s table we talked about how we need to accept our current struggle and pray for it together.  One young mother started crying about her infertility and the process of IVF.  My heart was in my stomach, I had never shared with my table my struggles because it’s always so depressing.  Who wants to walk away so sad but this young woman had been struggling for along time.  She needed another women to come along side her and encourage her.  She talked about how she felt bad because she has one child that they had from IVF and how sometimes she feels bad because she should be grateful.  My mentor mom kept looking at me waiting for me to speak. 

Dear Lord,

My heart is heavy today.  I have been doing a deep spring-cleaning of the house and some how it always means a cleaning of my heart and soul.  I find ovulation test and medicines of my past hopes.  I see them with angry eyes and a sad heart.  The cleaning and getting ride of these items means the end of my last hopes and dreams that I have to let go.  It’s time to move on.  Even though I may move on from the objects of reminders, my heart remembers.  My heart is heavy with sadness.  Some days I go right past that sadness and I don’t feel anything.  My days are too busy to bother to let them in and work through them.  As time goes on I know the visit of the sadness will lessen but for now it comes as the wind and reminds me of things lost.  Of what could have been, what our dreams were, and what our hearts longed for. 

Lord, I know your love for me never changes but my love for myself changes.  I wonder if I have done something wrong, am I being punished, what might you be teaching me?  I am thankful for the people you have put in my life that have loved me and encouraged me.  These ladies have helped to open my heart to feel the immense pain, to open my heart to let them love me, to care for me, and to encourage me.

In life we all fail, we all must pick ourselves up and walk again.  We must face the failure and move on.

We have tried for years to conceive more children but it has not happened.  We have gone to fertility specialist with IUI treatments and even searched the internet for different remedies.  All this has left me tired, stressed, and overwhelmed with sadness that it is time, time to walk away.  One night before the next set of IUI treatments, bloodwork, and ultrasounds I said no more.  I was done and ready to walk away.  I was ready to stop fighting.  I was ready to turn and see the sunlight and not walk back into the dark hole of fighting and pushing I had be in the midst of for 3 years.  I have two beautiful children.  It is not in God's plan...right now adding another child to our family is not in his plan.  Only prayer could help settle my soul, to heal the pain so I can put this part of my life behind me with a healed heard and knowing God knows best.  Knowing this is his plan for me.

There are different levels of mourning, specifically 5 stages, I have been back and forth through all of them and all though I sometimes think about the what if my heart is content and have entered the stage of acceptance, per a counselor;) I am not just making this stuff up here.  I am feeling healed and happy.  It has taken a long time and although the yearning sometimes sparks up in me I am content with knowing where I am, who I am in God.

Meeting Dr N

I recently had a couple of appointments. The first one was to see if my tubes were open. This by far was one of the most embarrassing test that I have ever had. It was uncomfortable but not painful like I have heard some describe. That is done and the results came back perfect. No issue here.

Appointment #2 in the same week.  I got to meet Dr N.  He is a fertility specialist and was very nice.  I know someone who used him in the past and like him so here we go.  He was blunt straight to the point which he apologized for but I love.  Don't beat around the bush just be straight forward with me.  At this point just tell me.  He said honestly you had a problem with the first and now the second he said there is something going and basically you should have been pregnant with in the first 6 months.  There is a problem and secondary infertility happens but can be helped.  Ok...now what do we do?  A couple more test, oh fun.  So we will see how those come out and then for decisions.  This may get interesting.

This is a Hard One

Warning the below info may just be too personal for some people but I felt maybe it would help others.

For you to fully understand what I want to share I must start from the beginning.  I am sure it is no secret from previous blogs, from the very beginning, that getting pregnant has never come easy for me.  For three years I had been off the pill, this time included dealing with a minor surgery of having a cysts drained, medicine to help the size of another cyst go down, and 15 months of trying later we were pregnant with Gracie.  Although the over all pregnancy with Gracie went well there was the minor complication of the surgery at 5 months.  Considering pregnancy issues don’t run in my family, the thought never crossed my mind that I might have a problem.  I thought I would be the girl who got pregnant on her honeymoon night or 3 months after her baby was born.  Nope, not me.

            This summer again after having issues I decided to go to my doctor.  When having to work around football schedules it makes things a little harder and some doctors seem to think you are crazy for caring.  I needed to know if something was wrong before we wasted a year, I want to know what to we could fix.  When I got pregnant the first time I had been on the pill for just the month before because they again thought it would minimize the size of my cyst.  I was told those hormones most likely gave me the levels I needed to get pregnant.  SO, I thought I would go in, see the doctor and just talk, just to make myself feel better.  In September 2010, I found out my thyroid level was fine but that I had Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome(POS)(read this link which explains perfectly).  The extremes of POS vary from each person.  Interesting enough the first time I was introduced to POS was the summer after Gracie was born.  I found out 2 people I knew had it, both there situations similar.  I had read up on POS and thought there was no way I would have it considering I have only 1 of the symptoms listed.  I brushed it a side until September, when I went to the doctor.  My one symptom besides blood work is the number of cyst I get, anyone surprised?  Sadly there is nothing I can to do to prevent them.  Obviously we are months from September.  All the medicine I have taken and all the methods I have followed have not helped in the least.  All of our tests come back perfect, which I think is worse.  I'd rather there be a problem we can try and fix.  When there is not problem, how do they know where to start to fix what is not broken?   I did not even know secondary infertility existed. All of this along with life has just been a lot at times.

Even though there are a lot of other details I could share there is not a need for those but I have been reading a couple blogs regarding women who have had fertility issues much greater then mine.  I know I am lucky I got one and although I am hoping for another it may not come in the form I am hoping.  That being said we are looking and investigating other options.  Praying about what options to take next, what is our next step?  Interesting enough I will most likely share a little bit about this next step of our lives.  Although even doing this now seems odd and strange to share these personal details.  I don’t have a problem talking about them in general but I can’t see your facial expressions and this is a vulnerable step.  I am stepping way out of my comfort zone for this one and this has been sitting in my post for about 2 months to be published. 
There are some friends out there that I love dearly that I have not shared this with mainly because I just have not had the chance so please don't be offended, and I never know how to bring up, it seems to be such a downer on the normal conversation so I tend to leave it out.