Welcome to our blog. [1]

We are creating this place for us to share our story. We want to be able to point family and friends back to this place so we can share our journey with them.  We haven't told anyone up until this point because we (mainly me) wanted to have the big surprise announcement. 

 ***Spoiler Alert*** I'm not pregnant.  

 I was already losing the chance to surprise James. I have dreamed for 12 long years how I would tell James that I was pregnant.  I've made plans multiple times. So I didn't want to lose out on surprising our family and friends too.  But James has finally convinced me to open up about our journey.  If we have disagreed on anything throughout this entire process, it has been whether or not to tell loved ones.  

My not wanting to share this journey prior to now has not been to hurt anyone.  Please forgive me for hurting your feelings for not opening up to you sooner.  It has been very hard for me at times to stay quiet but I kept thinking about the "Big Announcement" and it would help keep my secret a little longer.  

Also, this.  


To my closest family and friends, please know that I love you.  


Here is our journey over the past year...

The Beginning [2]

Twelve years ago when we got back home from our honeymoon, we decided to try for a baby. First of all, what were we thinking? Why didn't we think that we need time to adjust to married life and learning how to live with each other? I'll tell you what we were thinking-- we thought, "We could be pregnant with our best friends! Wouldn't that be so much fun?"  You see, my best friend, Jessi, had called us before we left for the honeymoon with news that she was expecting baby #2. 

It didn't happen in our first year or any other year since. Around year 2, we went to the doctor to try to figure out what was happening. We had some minor tests run and were told that he had a low count and I had the estrogen level of a post menopausal woman. Say what?! I was around 23 and didn't have any symptoms of being post menopausal. The doctor gave me some medicine to take during certain times of the month to see if that would help things out. He also instructed me to take a certain type of cough syrup because of effects on mucus. I won't go into too much detail there because ew. 

Well, the Rx and cough syrup didn't help.  Next, the doctor ordered a dye test (I am not very technical when it comes to medical talk so you are going to have to just love me in spite of it. But I have since learned that is HSG-- there is a longer name for it but I don't think you really care about that, am I right?). 

The doctor would shoot the dye up my Fallopian tubes to see if there were any blockages and if there were, perhaps the dye would help remove them. We got a call the night before the test saying that our insurance company didn't cover infertility testing so we canceled the test. Somewhere in there, we had an ultrasound done and the doctor told us that it appeared that there was a 5 week pregnancy. We were so excited.

I peed on a stick but it was negative. I had a blood test but it was also negative. We were crushed.  


What happened to the 5 week pregnancy?  I asked that very question when I went in for my yearly appointment.  The midwife told me that my body probably recognized it as an unhealthy pregnancy and absorbed it.  

We didn't pursue any more fertility treatments at the time because we felt like we just needed to give it a little more time.

More Time [3]

We gave it more time and a whole lot of prayer (by us and many others) but we still weren't pregnant. We started thinking that maybe we were meant to adopt so we started some research. We were still under the age of 25 and found out that we were too young for any international adoption. Some countries required you to be 25 years or older but most were 30.


We considered private adoption within the U.S. but it was so expensive. Not that international adoption wouldn't have been wicked expensive too.  We didn't make much money and it was so overwhelming to think of coming up with $20,000+. I remember James calling an adoption agency to ask some questions and when they told him the amount it would cost (which would cover legal fees, home studies, etc) he was appalled and said, "So basically what you are telling me is you are selling babies for $20,000." 


Obviously, we realize adoption agencies are not selling babies and that there are fees that need to be covered. But it is a really frustrating place to be in. We felt we had love to share with a child but we couldn't seem to have our own baby naturally and we had to pay thousands of dollars to be able to love on a baby that someone didn't want or didn't feel they could care for. It was maddening! Someone just give us a baby!  


Next, we researched adoption through social services. We realized that most adoptions happen via fostering. So we started filling out paperwork to become foster parents but before we had our paperwork finished, we got a call from our previous pastor saying he heard we were interested in fostering and he had a family that was in need. A family with 3 children needed respite care. It all happened so fast but we brought those 3 kids home a couple days later. We had them for just 3 weeks but it felt like so much longer. It was so hard. Going from no children to 3 children with very, very full schedules was quite an undertaking. It was hard transition for all 5 of us but James & I were so happy we were in a place to care for those 3 kids even for a short time.  After that, we decided to take a break and give it a little more time.


We requested paperwork to become foster parents 2 more times (the most recent being January 2015.) but there always seemed to be some life change that happened that prevented us from turning it in.

This last time, a friend that had work experience in social services, warned us against doing foster care. He said he had seen too many couples in our situation get crushed when a child that had been placed with them for a year was given back to their parents. He was looking out for us and wanted us to avoid that hurt.

So we decided to go back to the doctor.

Back to the doctor. [4]

The doctor that we had seen a decade ago is still in practice but he isn't dealing with infertility anymore. Over the last couple of years, I have connected with a local gal via social media that was also going through infertility. She had been pretty open about a lot of stuff through her blog. I initially reached out to her after she first posted their story to tell her that she wasn't alone on this path and to compare notes with her. She and her husband had not been dealing with it as long as we had but she was further along the path when it came to seeking treatment. Since we live in the same area, I asked her to refer me to whomever she was seeing. She ended up referring us to a doctor up in Richmond about an hour and a half away. He and his nurses have been fabulous. I don't think I could ever say enough good things about them. We love them. We want to do life with them.  The long drive is totally worth it.  

My first appointment with them was one afternoon in February. It was starting to snow before I even left work.  The snowflakes were incredible but I didn't have time to stop and enjoy them because I was so scared of being late since it was such a far drive. I ended up getting pulled over by a state trooper which stressed me out even more about being late. (And it wasn't for speeding but for my window tint being too dark.).  After the appointment, I wound up driving home on icy roads in a huge snowstorm. Well, huge in terms of the Hampton Roads area.

We didn't do much other than talk at the first appointment.  We went over our test results from a decade ago. We made a plan for when I would come back to start tests.  A week or so before my first appointment, my cousin told me that she was pregnant.  I was so excited because I was sure that this was our time.  My cousin, Renee, and I are 5 months apart in age.  For 95% of our lives we have lived several states away from each other but our parents made sure that we grew up together.  I was confident that I would get pregnant and my baby would be able to grow up with a similar relationship with his/her cousin.  

My doctor ran some tests on us and found that I have the correct estrogen levels for my age and my tubes, ovaries, and uterus look great. He told us that James does have a lower count and his motility & morphology are funky. Basically, his little men look and swim funny. The doctor suggested a round of chlomid and an IUI- intrauterine insemination. (Not sure what that is?  Think turkey baster.)  I would take the chlomid and then start taking ovulation predictor kits at home. Once we got a positive ovulation, we would go back up to Richmond for the IUI.

The first IUI [5]

Shopping for Ovulation Predictor Kits is overwhelming.  There are several different varieties. There are digital and non digital.  There are single, double, or triple packs.  There are lines or there are smiling faces.  So many choices!  Which is the best and easiest to use?   Which one is fool proof?  So much pressure! 

We had our first positive ovulation on Memorial Day. The deal was that once you had a positive, you call the doctor and plan to go the office the next day for the IUI. There was a mix up and the on call doctor told us to come that very day. We were excited because we were off work already and didn't have to call in sick. We hadn’t explained anything to our employers at this point and we didn’t want to have to call out randomly.  So off to Richmond we went. Normally they want the guys to arrive to the collection location between 7:15-8:00. It was already in that window when we talked to the on call doctor and she told us to still come. We had an hour and a half drive to get there. We were super excited and hopeful. This was finally happening!

We arrived at the collection clinic close to 10 am and explained our situation. Those poor ladies were getting ready to close up so they could go celebrate the holiday. After talking to our doctor, she told us they would still see us. I cried because I was so upset that I was ruining plans and making people stay late. I was way emotional.

Once the sample was ready, we carried it over to our doctor's office. The entire place was dark and closed up for the holiday so the nurse met us at the door. She was so gracious and kind as I apologized over and over for holding them up. She reassured me that all was well and they were happy to see me. (See? Wouldn't you want to do life with someone like that?) The doctor came in dressed like he was ready for a cookout (in fact, he was hosting a huge neighborhood cookout for the holiday. More apologizing happened after he informed us of that but he was really sweet about it and said no apologies were needed.).

This was the first time that James was meeting the doctor and he was his normal funny self. He had the nurse and doctor cracking up. The doctor was so great-- he even let James push the plunger into the catheter saying that James could honestly say he got me pregnant should it be successful.

They had me lay on my back for about 15 minutes.  James & I were practically giddy with excitement. It was starting to hit us that we were really doing this.  James made some comment about no turning back and I fired back, "Eh, I could always go get a morning after pill."  I think I shocked James speechless. He was not amused.  My humor has always shown up at the most inappropriate times.  

We were sent home and told to test in 2 weeks.