Look what I found in our garden this morning

Another Post About Pregnancy: The Good Stuff So Far

So I realized my last post was a little woe is me. I guess I was in need of a good place to vent. So maybe I can turn that around a little bit by posting about some of the good stuff that has happened so far.

1) Telling people. It was so exciting for me to tell people that we were pregnant. It seemed like it was a long time coming. Most people I told were excited for us, but seemed to reserved, as I am sure they were worried about getting our hopes up. I did, however, get a couple of good responses.

The best reactions I got were from my Aunt, Uncle and Cousin in Florida. We were at a family Christmas party and I had just told everyone my news. Towards the end of the party, we decided to skype with our FL family members, to let them be a part of the party. After a slight delay from the internet connection all three of them threw their arms into the air and gave the biggest "YEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHH" that I got. It was so sweet.

The other good one was my sister in law in Boston. I was able to keep it secret from them and tell them in person because I had a trip planned to visit them. I arrived on New Years Eve, just after midnight, so she might, just might have had a little champagne by that point. She came to the door when I arrived and offered me a glass. I told her I couldn't. She insisted. I gave her a sly smile and told her, "No, I really can't" After considering this for a second, she also threw both hands in the air then immediately hugged me so hard I thought she was going to try and lift me off the ground, which would be no easy task mind you. She immediately walked me around to all of the friends they had at her party and introduced me then told them my news. She was so excited that she told a whole room full of strangers to me. It was really cute and so flattering.

2) Putting on my first pair of maternity pants. This was something I did not get to experience the first time. I had a good friend give me a whole box full of maternity clothes and a couple of other large baby items before I found out I was pregnant. I put them in our extra room, closed the door, and hoped that this would never become a point of sadness. Well, it never had to. I started wearing the maternity shirts way before I needed to, just because they were long and comfy and new. The pants she gave me weren't going to fit so I bought some last weekend. I still don't need them, all of my other pants fit, I could just tell it was about to be time and I'd wanted to have at least one pair on hand so I didn't get caught without any pants that fit.

After I put them on it was the biggest relief. Even though my other pants still fit, they press against my abdomen and this is uncomfortable. I also came to realize that they push right where the nausea is, and that is not good. Now I wonder why it took me so long to convert. I still wear my old pants, but I am so looking forward to when this isn't an option any more.

3) Finding out, and telling people the sex of our baby. Almost as good as telling people we are pregnant. I have thought our baby was a girl from the time I found out I was pregnant. Most of the time, instead of calling the baby an it I would call her a she. I knew this was going to make for a messed up baby if it was a boy, but that is how convinced I was it was going to be a girl. I would even go so far as telling people, "When I find out this baby is a girl, I am going buy...(insert adorable girly item here."

I think another cool thing about finding out the sex of the baby, is just knowing that I am at this point. I seriously did not think I would make it this far. It is so hard for me to fathom that yes, I am pregnant. I am in fact so truly pregnant that we actually know the sex and any minute now I will be able to feel her inside of me. I am really looking forward to what lies ahead for me and misstc :)

Pregnancy: Part 2, the first 18 weeks

After coming off my high of finding out and being able to tell people that I was pregnant I experienced a whole new feeling. Morning sickness, the biggest misnomer known to man. I was so sick. All day, every day for weeks upon weeks.

Part of my sickness I attributed to the progesterone that I had to take until the end of my trimester, for a total of eight weeks. I was wrong, after the end of my first tri, the end of the medicine, I was still so sick. I couldn't keep anything down before breakfast, and was lucky to keep food down after lunch. I spent every evening and every weekend for three weeks lying on the couch, trying to keep food down. It was miserable. I would never ever wish that upon anyone. It was so bad that even though I had told half of my family and friends that I was pregnant, I stopped telling people. I'm pretty sure that ended up making some people upset but I couldn't tell people I was pregnant any more. When you tell someone this kind of news, especially after waiting for it, they expect that you will be elated, joyous, so happy for the chance to be a mother. The probably was, I wasn't happy. I felt extremely blessed to be pregnant, and I thanked God every day that I got to have another day with my child, but I was so miserable that my response was always something not far from cynical.

While I laid in bed at night, I would pray and ask God to hold me in hand and keep the nausea away long enough for me to fall asleep. I would ask our Blessed Mother to pray for me. She had been here before and knows the woes of pregnancy. I would ask for her to please please put her mantel of protection around me, just so I could rest. At times, I felt like my grandfather who passed away 27 years ago when I was two years old, was standing there beside my bed, holding my hand so that I could be at ease enough to sleep. For this time, I am extremely thankful. At was so sick during the day, but somehow I still managed to sleep well at night, even though it always seemed impossible.

At my six week appointment I asked my doctor for some medicine to help and he told me he would give it to me if I had to have it, but I could tell he would prefer if I didn't take it. After I threw up on myself while driving on the way home from work one day, I immediately called my doctor and asked them to call in the prescription. I got it that same night. After that first pill I titled my medication, Zofran: the miracle drug. The first day I took it I felt like I new person. I had energy, I didn't feel sick at all. I actually ate three meals. The next day, however, the medicine didn't seem to work as well. I didn't throw up but I still felt nauseous, and that has pretty much described the rest of my pregnancy. I have good days here and there and I have really bad days about once a week or so. I would say over all though, I feel so lucky not have other complications that I'll take the nausea. It has become that I am either used to it, or it is manageable now.

I do still have days like yesterday. I had not slept in two days, and I think that sleep deprivation aggravated my sickness. I get so hungry that I am nauseous and so nauseous that I don't feel like I can eat anything. After two days of this I broke down yesterday morning and cried. Cried for 15 minutes because this wasn't fair. Why couldn't I be one of the people who felt so much better after 12, 13, 15, 16 weeks? Why couldn't I have a day off. Of course today, I am back to normal: nauseous but able to eat and manageable. Back to being thankful for the good days.

Pregnancy: Part 1, finding out

I have been wanting to blog about how I found out that I was pregnant for a long time now. 18 weeks to be exact. When my daughter is pregnant, I want her to be able to know how she came to be, what I went through during pregnancy and birth, and what my experiences were. I ask my mom questions about how hot were the summers really? Were you really sick? And her response is always, "It wasn't that bad." I know this is her answer because she is an angel. The most precious women you will ever meet. Even if she was in the hospital being terrorized by my fetus she would still say, "It wasn't that bad." Although, that could be attributed to what I pray is true, that after you give birth you forget all of the pains of pregnancy and delivery. Oh, how I hope that is true.

The details are already starting to get fuzzy so I figured it is finally time. I'm not sure why I put it off for so long. Even though I don't really believe in the sort of thing, I think all along I have been so afraid that writing about the pregnancy would curse it in some way. I did not have any problem telling people I was pregnant, because I knew this pregnancy was meant to be and anything that happened was also a part of a greater plan. For some reason though, writing it down was different. More permanent maybe?

TC and I tried to get pregnant for a year and a half, with a pregnancy and miscarriage in there. Trying to get pregnant after the miscarriage proved to be harder than I thought. It became especially hard over last summer when the people who got pregnant after I did started having their babies. My estimated due date came and that was very difficult for me. I'm not sure why, but I was an emotional wreck the week leading up to that day. I think it was a lot of, "what should have been" thinking that really got me down. Then, the people who got pregnant around the same time I did who also miscarried had already gotten pregnant again and started having their babies, and I got even more sad. Every month with no positive result was a huge disappointment. It didn't help any that my periods were getting further and further apart, so every month I would get my hopes up. I would think that I had missed my period, I would buy no less than 5 home pregnancy tests, and the results were always the same. Not my time.

In August, I saw my general practitioner who also does my well woman visits and she told me just what I didn't want to hear. We hadn't tried long enough, I was still young, and to give it more time. TC and I had made the decision that if we weren't pregnant by the end of the year we would see the OB to find out if something was wrong, and if we needed to take more drastic measures.

In October, I went on a spiritual retreat that was very moving. I felt like this was a huge refresher that I needed in my life. I was going down a slippery slope of sadness and resentment that I did not want to be a part of my life and this renewal gave me just the reminder that I needed. That there is a plan, and that everything happens for a reason.

In November, we bought our first house. It was a stressful but very exciting time. I had so many people tell me that now I was going to get pregnant, because now I had somewhere for the baby. I heard this so often, in fact, that I considered slapping the next person who said this to me. If the house was all we needed then why didn't I get pregnant when we closed? The month we moved in? I needed people to stop telling me now was my time because it wasn't.

So, come December I made the appointment we said we would make. I did not want to go. I did not want to find out that something was wrong with me. Sure enough, after blood tests and exams I found out that I have Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) that can cause a lot of the symptoms I had been having. The doctor told me I was probably not going to get pregnant on my own.

Ever since my retreat, TC and I had been praying the rosary almost daily and in general praying much more with each other. I was going to mass two or three times a week, and at least once a week would sit in Adoration, a place in the Catholic church you can get some quiet prayer time in front of Christ. I always loved this time, as anyone would love an hour spent by themselves in quiet thought and meditation. Some time during my retreat I learned that one of the witness's mother had asked St Ann for a daughter, and a daughter they got. I learned that St Ann was Mary's mother (I know, it is probably sad that I didn't know that) and was one of the patron saints of conceiving. Every time TC and I would pray together, I would ask St Ann to pray for us. Nothing else. I wasn't asking to be pregnant, I wasn't asking for anything, just, "Please, pray for us."

One day, about a week after the doctor had given me my options for what to do about my infertility, I was sitting in Adoration with TC. Typically when I pray it is prayers of thanksgiving and supplication. This time, for the first time ever I told God, "I'm listening, if there is anything you need to tell me." I heard, as clear as day, "You're pregnant." I know it seems like at that time pregnancy would be on my mind all the time, as it is when you are trying to get pregnant, but I had just had my period so it really wasn't on my mind at all. It wasn't time for it to be on my mind yet. My first thought was, obviously I just made that up in my head. God doesn't say those kinds of things to people. Then I sat there in quiet again, "You're pregnant." Clear as anything that is clear.

I told TC about it when we left, explaining to him that I know how crazy this sounds, and I know it sounds like something I would just make up to hear in my head, but it was not something I was thinking about at all.

It took me about a week to build up the courage to test. I was so afraid that I was crazy and getting negative results would just prove that. The first test I took had a line on it, but it was so faint it was only like you could tell there should be a line there. The second test I took had pretty much the same result, the third was the same but just barely a little darker. The fourth test: two lines, two distinct lines. No doubt, no question, I was pregnant.

Travis and I had already exchanged Christmas presents at this point but I ran into the bedroom, jumped into bed and told him I had another present to give him. He was going to be a daddy. Unlike the first time when I found I was pregnant, when his response was "Oh Crap! What have we done," he got the biggest smile across his face and gave me a huge tackle hug. It had finally happened.

I immediately called the doctor and got blood work taken to confirm and make sure everything was okay. I cancelled my appointment to get my infertility medicine, and scheduled my first prenatal appointment. After doing some checking on the internet, I found out that when I tested I was barely pregnant, only three weeks. That means that when I heard that I was pregnant I was just in the process of having an embryo implanted. Technically, according to my cycle, none of this should have been possible. It was too early in the cycle. But nothing is impossible with God. We have a little miracle baby growing to prove it.