Time for a second?

When I found out that I  was finally pregnant, I found myself hoping that I was carrying twins.  My high beta’s fed my hope of a twin pregnancy.  I have always wanted three children and the fact that it had proven harder than I ever imagined to get pregnant, I really wanted (like most IVF patients) to have twins.  That way I would have my family in one shot and wouldn’t ever have to consider doing IVF again.

Then I experienced hectic bleeding.  I was terrified I was losing the only viable pregnancy I had ever had.  When we had our first scan at 7 weeks I was a little disappointed to find out that I was carrying a singleton.  But I was just so happy to know that I was carrying a live baby.  I had more hectic bleeding right up until 16 weeks into my pregnancy and then all of a sudden the bleeding stopped and I had a perfect pregnancy from there on out.

In 9 days time my son will be turning one.  I cannot believe that time has gone so quickly.  It feels like I was pregnant both yesterday and a lifetime ago.   As Kade draws closer to his first birthday I find myself wondering if it’s time to consider trying for a second baby.

I miss having a baby to snuggle.  I miss the littleness.  Don’t get me wrong I absolutely LOVE who Kade is becoming as he grows but I yearn for the small days.  The baby powder smelling tiny days.

I had secretly hoped that I would end up being one of those PCOS girls for whom pregnancy was the cure.  It would seem that I am not to be that lucky.  I have had exactly two cycles since I stopped breastfeeding Kade at 6 months.  My current cycle is sitting at 140 days and counting so I think it’s safe to say that pregnancy did not cure my PCOS.

That being the case, if I want a second baby (and I do, I really, really do) that will most likely mean getting my feet wet in IVF waters again.    To be honest, I’m not really sure how that makes me feel.  I know I can physically face doing another IVF, I mean after six of them, what is one more?  I think I could handle another IVF failure emotionally.  I definitely know that the sense of desperation that I felt doing fertility treatments won’t be the same because I do have Kade in my life now.

What makes me unsure is this.  I’m in a good place mentally.  I don’t want to get sucked back into the whole ttc frame of mind.  I worry that I won’t be able to stop trying for a second baby if after one or two IVF’s we havent yet succeeded.  I really don’t want to get back to being that obsessive person that I was before we hit the jackpot with IVF number 6.

I guess I will bide my time and see how things pan out.  Cliff and I have discussed the “timeline” for heading into IVF waters again.  If I am not by some miracle (and it will be a miracle) pregnant naturally by next year, we’ll contact our FS and start looking at heading into our next IVF.

I can only hope and pray that I either manage to conceive by some miracle before then, or that if we do head into IVF again that it takes first time round now that I have already had a pregnancy and live birth.

Time will tell.  As it always does.

Jelly Belly

After Kade was born, the thing I battled most with in the first few days was not the lack of sleep.  It was the freaky feeling of my jelly belly.  I was rather large in the end of my pregnancy but loved the feeling of that rock hard tummy that housed my son.  After he came out that wonderful hard ball became this floppy, empty, soft, squishy, hot mess.

I couldn’t handle the way it looked and felt.  Much like the feeling of my flat belly button on my pregnant tummy skeeved me out, my jelly belly gave me that same feeling.  Thankfully I was lucky enough to have a child who literally sucked me back to reasonable shape in a short period of time.  Nine months later I find that I still have that last bit of stubborn flab on my tum.

37 weeks 5 days pregnant and HUGE!

 

12 days post partum and looking pretty darn good =)

I was chatting to a friend of mine the other day about this very thing.  Her baby is 7 weeks old and she said she was battling with the changes in her tummy since her baby came along.  That it’s not the same as it used to be.  I could relate to those feelings mostly cos I had those same icky feelings about my own tummy after Kade came.

Thing is I figured pretty early on (at about 2 weeks after he came) that I needed to change the way I was thinking about my jelly belly.  For too long I allowed my relationship with my body to suffer and be in a very dark place.  My pregnancy helped heal a lot of the damage I did to my body image.  I wanted to hold onto that.  So I decided to look at my jelly belly as something rather special.

Because the cause of that jelly belly was the priviledge of my pregnancy.  That little bit of flab that I still have is an honor to wear.  Because my tummy will most likely never be the same again – and that’s a good thing.  That permanent change means that I have my child in my life.  For me, a little bit of flab is a small price to pay for the amazing prize I hold in my arms every day.

What are your thoughts on your jelly belly?

The Unexpected Dilemma

When we started our IVF that resulted in Kade, we decided that we would (dependant on the number of eggs retrieved) be fertilizing two eggs with donor sperm as a diagnostic tool. 

Because we were already on our 6th IVF with no real reason as to why it wasn’t working for us, we figured that this way we could compare embryo’s fertilised with Cliff’s sperm vs embryo’s fertilised with a donor and rule out any sperm issues through looking at the embryology as opposed to the normal semen analysis.  

When we went in for our transfer talk, we were pleased to see that whilst our fertilization rate vs donor fertilization rate was lower (for various reasons, my eggs did not like being ICSI’d) our embryo’s were looking just as good, if not better than the donor ones.

We transferred our 3 remaining embryo’s and decided to freeze the donor embryo’s – just in case.

Thankfully we never had to worry about the “just in case” because we were blessed with a BFP at long last.  At the time, with all the bleeding I was experiencing we decided to not make any decisions relating to the donor embies as we were not sure if the pregnancy was going to progress.  Thank God, our son was a survivor and our pregnancy continued healthily.  As we got caught up with the pregnancy, any thought of the frozen donor embies was stored in our memory banks, much like the embies themselves were stored in a freezer at our clinic. 

We got a bill for their storage a little while ago and we were unexpectedly thrown into a bit of a dilemma. 

It’s important to state that we never intended on using the donor embies in the first place.  BUT.  When the bill arrived we were FORCED to now make a concrete decision about them.  And I found myself wondering if we shouldn’t keep them - just in case.

Just.In.Case… Three innocuous little words but words that hold so much impact when put into practical use in one’s life.

Cliff and I chatted and discussed what we should do with these little embryo’s.  They are a part of me after all.  There was so much more that we needed to consider in light of all that has transpired since we froze them.  We needed to factor in that we now know that we *can* achieve a pregnancy out of embryo’s from our own genetics.   We needed to consider that we’re both not getting any younger and needed to seriously consider when (if at all) we would like to try for a second baby.  We needed to explore our hearts and find out if we could ever really use those embryo’s knowing that they were created using half of me and half of another man. 

I am not happy to discard the embryo’s.  

I have always said that I wanted to be an egg donor – but only once I had managed to have a child of my own.  It seems like the best and most practical solution is to put these embryo’s up for adoption.  That way they have the chance at giving someone else the gift of life and parenthood.  And in doing this, I am in a very round about way, fulfilling my dream of being a donor.

I never thought that it would be a decision that I would grapple with the way I did.  I know how much hope these two embryo’s hold and I know that they could potentially change someone’s life in the most amazing and profound way.  But I do feel somewhat sad that we’re letting them go. 

When I look at my son and feel the many ways he has healed me through his very presence I know that we have made the right decision.

I will never forget the darkness that infertility brings.  The sense of hopelessness when faced with a diagnosis you have no idea how to conquer.

So it is with love that we have put our donor embryo’s up for adoption through our awesome clinic. 

I hope that they heal another couple’s hearts and that they are able to bring back the hope and joy that has probably been stolen from the couple that will end up using them. 

Thank you donor embies, for giving us the sense of hope we needed at a time when hope was low.

Meeting Kade Ethan…

I’m slowly catching up on blogland, and I know I’ve missed so much whilst I’ve been consumed with love for Kade. 

I’m sorry that I’ve not been there for some of you who faced dark times and I’m sorry that I’ve not been around to share the joy that some of you have gloried in… I’m hopefully in a better rythym now and hope to be caught up very soon!

How is it possible that it’s been 11 weeks since my life changed?  How is it possible that it’s been a full 37 weeks 5 days of pregnancy and 11 weeks of having my little boy here with me?  Time.  It flies.

Many of you have emailed and asked how we are doing and for an update and I guess I should start at the beginning.  With my gorgeous boy’s birth story.  Its gonna be a long one so get some tea and settle in…

On Monday the 30th May I had my 37 week appointment with my Obgyn.  Our little boy was measuring at 4.3kg’s already and knowing that this could vary at birth by as much as a kilo we decided to book a c-section for Wednesday the 08th June as he was gearing up to be a big baby.  We decided that should I go into labour on my own before that date I would labour and try my hand at a natural delivery but to be honest nobody really expected our boy to come before the 08th.  He was nice and snug in my belly.

I finished work on the 31st and was excited to have some me time before our son arrived.  Time to get his nursery complete.  Time to swop some duplicate gifts we had received and some time to sleep.  

On Thursday the 2nd June, I was pretty uncomfortable all day and night.  Baby boy was lying VERY low and when he moved my cervix got pretty sore.  But I was not worried.  Just uncomfortable and as anyone who has been pregnant can attest those last few weeks are pretty uncomfy all round.

On Friday 03rd June I woke up and started getting ready to meet my friend who had just found out recently that she was finally pregnant for a day of shopping.  She needed maternity pants and I needed to sort out all the gifts etc.  I went to the loo and when I wiped I had blood on the tissue paper. I was like “what?” and could not quite believe what I was seeing.  My first thought was panic.  Blood for me has traditionally not been a good sign, but I told myself it was my bloody show, I called my midwife and we had a chat.  My obgyn was going away that weekend and she told me that I could come in right away for a c-section before he left for the weekend or I could see how I went considering I was not leaking amniotic fluid and was feeling pretty good overall. 

I chose the latter option – I had shopping to do!  AND I hadn’t yet packed a bag and everyone knows that it can take AGES before the baby comes after a bloody show.  Right? 

I then took the last photo of myself pregnant with my BlackBerry.

I had an awesome day shopping with Tam.  Well when I wasn’t complaining to her about how sore my back was getting and when I wasn’t complaining about the darn Braxton Hicks contractions that were getting pretty darn consistent and slightly painful.  Yes, I was in serious denial.

 Eventually after lunch and hearing Tam tell me for the 50th time that she was sure I was in labour we went home.  I called Cliff and told him “I might be in labour” and that we needed to go to the hospital just in case, and that I was packing a bag and there was no need to rush.  In the car we called family and told them that it was probably a false alarm but that we were headed to the hospital.

We got to the hospital and walked to the labour ward.  We told them I might be in labour and they told me it was not a great time as they were out of beds.  I was like “um, well if I am in labour this baby needs somewhere to be born” and they stuck us in the little side room to put me on the monitors to check if I was indeed in labour.  At this point I was still thinking I would be going home for the weekend and that we would meet our son on the 08th.

The nurse explained to us that anything above 20 on the monitor was a contraction and that they would keep me on the monitor for 30 minutes or so to ensure that I was in labour if I was having contractions.  Well.  My readings were reaching between 75 to 85 and were coming at 3 minute intervals.  Sure labour.  I was excited and pretty scared – I wasn’t ready – he was only supposed to come on the 08th – we hadn’t even finished his room properly!

At this point the nurse started asking me about my contractions – were they not sore?  I said yes they’re pretty uncomfortable and sore and then she said your blood pressure is not good.  My heart dipped.  I asked about labouring and going onto have a natural delivery.  She called the matron who took one look at my BP and told Cliff to get me admitted immediately and for him to change into scrubs cos our baby would be born immediately via emergency c-section.  My BP was dangerously high.  200/116!

Within 20 minutes I was being wheeled into theatre and the on call doctor, midwife, anethetist, paed etc were all getting me ready to meet my son.  Cliff came in (he looked HOT in his scrubs by the way) and we were in a daze.  Before we knew it we would be meeting our SON! 

Waiting for my spinal whilst having a contraction

The spinal was the worst part of it all.  It hurt like a bitch for 5 seconds.  Give me contractions anyday!

Cliff held my hand and took some photo’s. 

Then they started cutting me. 

I have a highly developed sense of smell and I remember telling the anethetist that the smell of them suturing whilst cutting was getting to me.  I remember watching Cliff watch them cut me open all the while praying that our son would be born healthy.  I remember thanking God for this experience, for our boy that would soon be born.  I remember telling them over and over that I wanted skin on skin should baby be healthy enough to do it.  I remember thinking over and over to myself  “this is it Samantha, your life is about to start”, I remember the midwife telling me it was nearly time. 

And then she told me that our son was coming out of my womb.

I remember the anthetitist telling me that I didn’t want to miss this and that he lifted my head and shoulders so I could see my son being born.  What happened next is the most defining moment of my life.  They took my son’s head out of my body and as they started lifting him out, he opened his eyes for a second and our eyes met.  I just felt the tears slide down my face at that point.  He looked at me.  My boy – our miracle looked at me.

Then all hell broke loose – he was NOT happy about being taken out of my tummy, his cries and screams were the most amazing thing I’ve heard.  He has a deep voice.  I was crying.  Cliff was crying.  And our boy made a massive wee all over the place.  Such joy and wonder.

They placed our son on my chest and I could not stop kissing him and loving him.  My heart felt like it was going to explode out of my chest with love for him. 

They took him away and did his apgars, Cliff cut the cord and closed me up. 

My BP at this stage was sketchy but I was high.  High on having met our boy at long last.  After 6 IVF’s and over 7 years of waiting, he was here.  Our miracle boy.

Our gorgeous, wonderful, amazing, perfect miracle boy.

Kade Ethan Young.

Our little Clam.

Finally, we were a family of 3.

3rd Trimester

Holy humping beans!  How on EARTH did we get to the 3rd trimester already?

I know I keep saying this, but I cannot believe how quickly time has flown.  It feels like *forever* ago that we found out that our 6th IVF had worked and as I head towards 28 weeks this Sunday I can hardly believe that technically we’ve only got 12 weeks left of this pregnancy. 

Its such an exciting time, I find myself daydreaming of this little boy and wondering what he’s going to look like, whose characteristics he’s going to have more of and so on and so on. 

One thing is for sure, I’m totally in love with him already. 

For your viewing pleasure – scan pics of our Clam @ 26 weeks 4 days:

The Way It Goes…

Reasons why I am considering trying IVF again sometime:

• Cliff will be an amazing Dad
• To experience pregnancy
• Once pregnant I can’t wait to spend evenings with my husband feeling our child move in my tummy
• My Mom deserves to be a Granny to more than one child
• Cliff’s Mom deserves to be a Granny to HIS child
• Gummy smiles I see from my friends kids absolutely melt my heart
• My niece thinks I’d be a cool Mom and that’s gotta count for something
• To decorate a nursery
• The clothes – have you *seen* how cute they are?
• To hear my child call for me when they are sick and to know that only *I* can make it better
• The laughs and giggles that can’t get any better
• To look into my childs eyes and know that they know they are LOVED, so very, very loved
• To see my current babies (my Saff’s and Jazz) protect and guard my new baby
• To experience Mother’s Day without tears and sadness
• To experience Father’s Day without guilt and torment
• To share my love for reading with someone innocent
• Delight in my children who see the world through such unjaded eyes
• We had a chemical before – that’s got to mean that it might go all the way for us at some point right?

I could go on for ever and ever….

Reasons why I might consider stopping this madness for good:

• This hurts both of us so much in so many ways

How a Chemical messes with your head…

… while you waiting for your results of your next treatment…

During my last 2ww I remember feeling a few “symptoms” that I thought were strange but which ultimately led me to believe with my whole heart that I was pregnant.  I was tired pretty much all the time even though I was getting enough sleep.  My breasts were tender.  I had on/off cramps for mostly the last week of the 2ww.  I had some lower back pain.  And I had a weird temperature thing going down.  My neck and shoulders would get super hot and then the heat would taper off for a while, then super hot, then taper off.  And my tummy area just above my bikini line had the same temperature thing (very clinical description don’t you think?) happening.

All of the above “symptoms” could be attributed to the progesterone I know, but at the time they were not cos of progesterone being shot into my butt daily, they *were* because something had tried to nestle into my endometrium, had started growing and then just stopped.

A lot of people are asking me how I’m feeling during this heck long wait after my GIFT.  And I know they don’t mean emotionally.  They want to know if I’m feeling any of the above symptoms that I felt last time round cos then it would give us a little clue as to whether I am indeed knocked up this time or not…

This is the thing. 

I’m not really feeling too much right now.  I am tired, but not overly so. I have the weird temperature thing happening as well.  And the odd cramp and shooting pain here and there.  That’s about it.

I am hoping that this has worked but in the back of my mind I’m not sure.  Swing, swing, swing.  Back and forth, I might be, I might not be.  I always thought it would be better to know that your body can fall pregnant, and while knowing that something happened in my ute last year does give me a certain measure of hope and comfort, it also messes with your head BIG time.

Because you automatically start looking for the same things, you start second guessing everything you’re feeling and thinking.  I kind of miss being that girl who was so dead sure of a pregnancy last year.  I  miss that I was reveling in the fact that my body was telling me in its own subtle way that I was close to creating a life.  And that this time, I am not sure at all.  This time I am close to driving myself to an insane asylum.

I guess there is only one way to get through the next 6 days - one little bite of the elephant at a time.

I dream a dream… of you.

It’s a beautiful day.  The sun is shining and I can feel it warming my back and hugging my shoulders.  A bird dips down on its flight and swoops past us on its way to it’s nest.  A bee buzzes and I can hear the hum of the other families that are out enjoying the summer’s day.  Laughter and shrieks of delight.  A dog barks excitedly in the distance.  Our jack russel Jazzy, sprints off to find out what’s going on.  Saffy (our gorgeous labrador) trots next to us as we stroll towards her favourite spot – the dam.

And you move inside my belly.  A slow but determined arc of movement.  I take Daddy’s hand and hold it close to where you’re moving and you kick his hand – hard, annoyed at his intrusion to your game.  We both laugh.  We look into each other’s eyes and Thank God silently for the miracle that is you.  The wonder that is you….

I wake to the scream of an alarm, but the dream of you, it lingers.  It makes me feel warm and happy. 

And I remember that sometimes dreams do come true.

Perceptions

When I was a kid, I used to get so much joy out of seeing pregnant ladies and thinking “hehehe, I know what *you’ve* been doing lately….”  At times it used to skeeve me out to know that this nice looking woman had been bumping uglies with her man and that they had created life together.  At other times it would amaze me completely how SEX could cause this awesome miracle.  But at all times in my life as a young innocent, I knew that I wanted to be that woman one day.

Now that my eyes have been opened by my own journey to a possible conception, I find that my thoughts towards pregnant woman have changed many times.  In the beginning of my journey, I used to look at them and think to myself “not long now and that will be me”.  Soon enough those thoughts turned to ones of extreme jealousy “oh god I wish that was me…” and I would have to turn my head away from the sight of those wonderful bellies cos I just knew that those woman could feel the waves of wanton longing that my eyes were radiating towards them. 

These days when I look at a beautiful belly, I still sometimes can’t hide the wanton longing, but more often than not I wonder what it took for that woman to get that belly.  I wonder if she had to struggle to be blessed.  I wonder if she sat through countless FS appointments discussing options.   I wonder if she had to go through countless IVF’s/miscarriages to have the priveledge to rub that belly.  I wonder how many tears she’s had to shed before reaching the other side.

One things for sure my perception of how beautiful bellies are made has been changed by this journey, and I think my perceptions are better now, more gentle and less (for lack of a better word) smutty.

I don’t think I’ll ever take what it might have taken for that woman to get her belly for granted again.

Bah humbug…

This is exactly how I feel today.  Bah humbug.

And this is why.  I got an email from a friend today.  A friend I used to share a house with and who admittedly I have lost “closeness” with.  Her first child was “one time without condom” oops.  A real miracle child considering that my friend was told she’d never have kids.

Once her daughter was born she never went on birth control and she and her husband have been trying for # 2 since their daughter came along.  She’s unfortunatley had 2 miscarriages in the last 3 years and in her email said they did not want to announce their pregnancy until they were past the 12 week mark in light of their history with m/c.  I totally understand that and I am SUPER happy that she is finally going to get her second child.  I really am.

But.

I spoke to her just shot of a month ago.  She had called me to ask me if I was pregnant cos she said she had a feeling I was.  I assured her I was not and she went on about how she was SO sure that I was.  After chatting a bit I asked her where she and her hubby were in terms of ttc.  She said they were still trying.  But she was already nearly 9 weeks pregnant.  I have to admit that I am a bit upset by this “white lie”.  I understand in my heart of hearts why she never annoucned her pregnancy before passing the 12 week mark, but in light of the nature of our conversatoin and how she went on and on and on about her having a feeling *I* was pregnant and not telling, I’m a bit miff with her.

That being said I guess we’re in much the same boat as she was about not wanting to say anything about the pregnancy.  We have not told many people that we’re busy with IVF.  The only people that do know are the people who read this blog, our direct families and one set of RL friends.  With our last treatments we told a lot of people – many of which did not understand the process and honestly probably did not care overmuch.  At this point I just don’t need the added pressure of “everyone” being in the know so to speak…

So the question is this, am I being hypocritical by feeling hurt that she kept this secret from me?