Yesterday, I turned 30 years old. Earlier on in my twenties, I remember wondering why women would get so weird about their 30th birthdays, often claiming they were perpetually 29 instead of ever legitimately entering their thirties. "What's the big deal?" I'd think, baffled. "It's only another birthday. And 30 isn't old."

 I had no idea how much my perception of age (and of life) would evolve as I worked my way through my twenties...

I was 26 years old when Drew and I started trying to have a baby. I still felt pretty young then--it seemed like a great age to have a baby, in my mid-to-late twenties--and I was definitely ready to be a Mommy. That first year of trying to conceive came and went while I struggled with my "signature" irregular cycles after coming off birth control, which meant few opportunities to "try" for a baby. Around the nine month mark, I went to my OB/GYN to explain my frustrating situation, then walked out of the office with a devastating diagnosis of PCOS, a disorder that I learned, upon further research, made it difficult for women to 1) not only conceive a child, but 2) carry a child to term. A couple of months later, I also officially entered the "infertile" category, which is defined as a couple trying for a year to conceive without success. As you can imagine, I was devastated.

By this time, I was now 27 and feeling pretty bad about myself. My diagnosis and the disorder's effects on my body did little to help my self-esteem. I felt fat, ugly, and (worst of all) worthless and broken. The thing I wanted most in life--to be a Mommy--seemed so far out of reach. I had trouble reconciling with myself that this was indeed the "hand" I was dealt. And, oh yes, I asked the question, "Why me?" again and again. I'm not proud of the way I reacted to my situation at first. I wallowed. I cried. I felt extremely sorry for myself as I continued to see friends and family all around me get pregnant and have babies. I sunk deeper and deeper into my own self-deprecation. "Why do you suck so much, Ember?" I'd think, berating myself. I started thinking about romantic relationships I'd had prior to finding Drew, my soulmate, and I'd think, "Boy are they lucky they didn't end up with ME. Infertile, broken me. Did they ever dodge a bullet!" I uttered the same words to Drew and told him I understood if he wanted to leave me for someone who could give him the children he so desperately wanted. He was angered any time this sort of talk escaped my lips, of course. I did it, anyway. (I was a peach to be around, believe me).

During this time, we were referred to another OB/GYN who specialized in infertility. She ordered a full infertility work-up, including the infamous blood panels that earned me a reputation in the hospital laboratory for second highest amount of vials of blood ever taken at once. I was a rock-star, but never in the way I'd hoped I'd be. We imagine our lives so many different ways...we even seek to plan them (however rude it might be, I literally laugh now when people tell me their very specific plans for their lives...when they'll do this and that...because I know life has a way of showing us who's in charge, and it's certainly not us), but we never include the bad things in our plans and reveries about the future, do we? I soon became known as the infertile girl around my OB\GYN's office, and the nurses recognized and felt sorry for me...not really the kind of attention you want, nor the thing for which you want to be recognized.

Then, while we were in the midst of finding out more about my infertility through all of that testing, we got pregnant with our precious LJ. All of the feeling sorry for myself and attention related to being "the freak" at the doctor's office halted right there in its tracks. We rejoiced. The nurses and doctors there rejoiced with us. I was happy, truly happy, until I was nearly 12 weeks into my pregnancy. And that's when it all came crashing down. When I "came to" into the reality of the situation, to the fact that my baby was dead, I was in a worse place, mentally and emotionally, than I was before I got pregnant. I was sadder than I've ever been. I hated myself even more. And, I missed my baby so much, it hurt to breathe. At the risk of sounding over-dramatic, I wanted to die.

I turned 28 years old a couple of months after my miscarriage, and, for the first time, I truly started to understand the panic and despair some women feel about approaching 30. I felt the big three-oh looming there in front of me--a reminder of the years and heartbreak we'd already spent on our quest to expand our family as well as a loud ticking biological clock, quickening my pulse and making me worry about how long we'd be fighting this battle for a child of our own. I began hearing those stories from friends of friends who knew someone who tried for 10 years to have a baby before giving up. And I'd start to see myself there, as one of those random couples...the ones that nobody never quite knew why they didn't end up having kids. I was scared of becoming those people. We'd wanted a baby for so long, and then, once we finally became pregnant, it was all ripped away from us in the blink of an eye. I started seeing how possible it could be that we'd try for and lose a baby (continuing this horrific cycle) again and again, while months and years of our lives passed us by.

We were cleared for trying again a couple of months after I finished miscarrying, only to find, soon after, that I had an enormous, grapefruit-sized cyst on my left fallopian tube (at first they thought it was on my left ovary). My doctor kept an eye on the cyst through ultrasounds, but finally determined that I'd need laparoscopic surgery to have it removed. A couple of months later, I went under the knife. The surgery was a success, and the doctor was able to do several more invasive procedures while I was anesthetized to further investigate my infertility. They found nothing conclusive, and a month or so after I healed from surgery, we were cleared for trying again.

We stuck mostly to a Clomid and HCG trigger shot regimen for months and months without conceiving. During this period of time, I turned 29 years old. I took on the strategy of trying to largely ignore my birthdays at this point in time, as they all seemed to depress me further. "Another year down," I'd think. "And still no baby. Another year of poking and prodding and drugs that made me feel consistently sick and irrational and just...not myself." What a life! A couple of months after my birthday, the doctor wanted to try something different, and so I went back on some of the medication for PCOS I'd been on a couple of years earlier, in addition to the Clomid/shot regimen each month. The month after I went back on those meds, we found out we were pregnant for a second time. And, then, no more than two weeks later, I miscarried. It all went so fast: Thanksgiving = yay, happy, I'm pregnant. Beginning of December = oops, nevermind, I take it back, this will be one HELL of a shitty Christmas for you folks, SORRY! After it happened, it seemed unreal that we had conceived and lost again. "Why does this keep happening to me?" I kept thinking...pleading. "Please, God, tell me what you need me to do/learn to be granted the blessing of a child." I racked my brain, trying to understand what made me such a lesser person than everyone else I knew. That had to be it, right? All of my friends and family members were allowed to have children because they were better people. I didn't deserve children. I must admit, I still struggle with these irrational thoughts from time to time, but, for the most part, I feel good that I've been able to turn much of my fears and rantings over to a God who is patient and understanding...who loves me in spite of my shortcomings.

A couple of months after being cleared to try again after my second miscarriage, my OB/GYN referred us to a reproductive endocrinologist (RE) in Grand Rapids. As I've written here before, we were a bit overwhelmed at our first appointment (okay, more than that, I DID use the description of "Dr. Soup-Nazi"), but after getting back a bunch of test results and meeting with the doctor a second time, we had really begun to like the take-charge, get-things-done style of our RE. We spent a lot of time talking and praying about this next turn in the road to having a baby, and we finally came to a feeling of peace and agreement in following the doctor's orders for us for a couple of cycles (which was about all we could afford). We went on faith and started our first cycle of Follistim and Ovidrel injectables right before we left for vacation at the beginning of July. Then, wonder of all wonders, on July 19, 2009, we learned we were pregnant for the third time!

Unlike our first two pregnancies, we were slow to get overly excited. We were both truly happy and grateful, of course, when we first saw that positive home pregnancy test, but (as cynical as it may sound) our previous losses had so heavily colored our perceptions that we were no longer naive enough to think that things would probably turn out all right for us. Luckily, that first week brought with it awesome news: the initial HCG quant was high, and 48 hours later, it was confirmed that the HCG levels were more than doubling, indicating a strong and healthy pregnancy. After those initial results, the waiting game began in earnest. We were lucky enough to be brought in for an early ultrasound at six weeks, and as nervous as we both were going in that day, we left the office on cloud nine after seeing and hearing that tiny, strong heartbeat. There is no better feeling in this world than seeing, for yourself, that the child you created with the person you love is alive and well and growing inside of you. There are no words to describe the elation we both felt that day.

Our next ultrasound wasn't for another two weeks, and it's amazing what can happen to a person's psyche during the seemingly insignificant time of 14 days. The elation of that first ultrasound, though still there inside of me, was pushed aside by those old feelings of doubt and anxiety by the end of that first week. I thought about all that could happen between ultrasounds, and waited anxiously for the eight-week ultrasound to come. I prayed, imploring that the precious little life inside of me would continue to flourish. And I prayed for peace of mind to not let the worry overtake me and cause harm to the pregnancy.

Our second ultrasound was much of the same: the baby was healthy and growing furiously, and the heartbeat was as strong as could be. The RE had no concerns whatsoever, besides keeping me on progesterone and baby aspirin to help sustain the pregnancy. He was ready to "graduate" us back to my OB/GYN at that appointment, but we asked if he'd be willing to schedule us for one more ultrasound at 10 weeks, just to ease our minds in the interim while I contacted my OB/GYN office and scheduled my first appointment. We both knew that the first appointment there wouldn't include an ultrasound, and so having one more ultrasound with the RE would enable us to stay with our "two week check-up" schedule we'd become so used to. He agreed, of course, because of our history of losses, and much to our relief, everything looked wonderful at the 10-week ultrasound as well. In fact, that ultrasound ended up being the most exciting one yet! The baby had grown a ton, looking more and more like an actual baby (rather than bean) each day, and we even got to see its little arms and legs move (the Doctor thinks we woke him/her up when he went in with the "wand" -- remember, it's still a transvaginal ultrasound at this point).

I called to make the appointment with my OB/GYN, and when I told the nurse that we were pregnant, she literally whooped and hollered in excitement for us! On the day we went in for my appointment, a couple of the nurses met us at the door and hugged us and congratulated us. (I guess word had spread that we'd be in that day, and the whole office was excited for us.) I started thinking back to the days I'd walk into the office in the midst of glowing, pregnant women--those days when I was well-known as the "infertile girl"--and, in retrospect, I'm okay with the attention I got from being the "odd one out" in those days...especially if it resulted in so many sharing with us in our joy now!

The appointment went fine for the most part, with the only concern being that my blood pressure reading was a bit high. The doctor is going to be really cautious with me during this pregnancy, so she decided to put me on a low dosage of hypertension meds, and I have to monitor my blood pressure on my own at home a couple of times per day.

Then, last Friday, we had a little bit of a scare. I was having quite a bit of cramping, and even though no spotting accompanied it, I was nervous enough to call my doctor's office to get their opinion. The triage nurse collected a bit of additional information about the pain I was having, then called me back and told me that the doctor on call that day (my usual OB was out of town for the weekend) wanted me to go straight to the hospital for an ultrasound. Immediately, as you can imagine, I became a nervous wreck. I don't even remember driving myself to the hospital. How did I see the road through that torrent of tears? I arrived alone and went to the x-ray department. They got me in very quickly, which I was very grateful for, since it was difficult holding in my emotion there in the waiting room. A few moments after the technician began the ultrasound, a call came over the intercom in the room, and Drew popped his head into the ultrasound room a few seconds later. Turns out he drove (way too fast) all the way from work to be there. Luckily, we were able to see right away that the baby was fine. It was actually moving around quite a lot, trying to squirm away from the probing ultrasound (I can't really blame ya, baby, it was uncomfortable for Mama, too, because of the tenderness from the cramping areas). We were able to laugh and ease some of the tension while the technician took a look at my ovaries and measured blood flow there to determine if that is where the pain was coming from. The technician saw a cyst on my left tube (another damn fallopian tube cyst again!) that my RE noticed several weeks back. When it was first seen, the RE said that they were pretty common during pregnancy and usually go down on their own, but this one hadn't seemed to reduce in size at all. Though there is no immediate concern with the cyst, it is something that they'll have to keep a close eye on. It makes my left side pretty tender, and because of the pressure, it is already difficult to lay on my left side for more than several minutes at a time.

We know all too well that the road ahead of us is still a long one, but we are breathing a sigh of relief at having made it through the most risky first trimester. Please continue to keep us in your prayers...that this pregnancy will continue successfully...that this latest cyst will not cause us complications...and, most important of all, that the baby will be healthy.

So, um, would you like to see pictures?

Here is the latest picture of our little miracle from our 12-week ultrasound last Friday:



I also just have to share this second image from our 12-week ultrasound. The baby was moving around like crazy, and the ultrasound technician just happened to catch this one of the baby all sprawled out at just the right time. Every time I look at it, I just laugh! (Also, look closely...do you see anything else interesting in this picture?)



My second trimester (13th week) of pregnancy began this week, and our precious little one is due at the end of March. I can't think of a better 30th birthday present! I feel beyond blessed that this milestone birthday brought with it an abundance of joy, rather than more dread and heartache. Turns out, for us, the third time was a charm!

Thank you, all, for coming along with us on this miraculous, nearly four-year long, journey. I know the road was often dark and difficult to traverse, but we appreciate you sticking it out with us, and rooting and praying for us all along.

Cheers!

Em, Drew, and Our Little Lucky Charm

Dear BB,

Tomorrow--August 10, 2009--was your due date. It's amazing how clearly I can remember these important dates for my lost babies--and how hard they seem to hit me when they finally arrive. Like your sister LJ, your Daddy and I will be forever saddened that we were unable to meet you. We regret that we missed seeing you grow inside my belly week by week. We know that you are now safe and happy and whole in heaven, being taken care of by other family members we also love and miss deeply, but...we still miss you, just the same.

I remember those very first feelings of wonder and thankfulness knowing you were there inside me; I remember the dates and events and emotions so clearly from last November. It had been another year and a half since we'd lost LJ, and we were beginning to think another pregnancy was out of reach. When we saw our miraculous positive home pregnancy test, neither your Daddy nor I could hold back the tears of joy.

We were immediately filled with both utter happiness and absolute trepidation, all at once. For us, we realize now, a positive pregnancy test will always be accompanied by a complex set of emotions. For every life we create, we feel hopeful and grateful, but we also fear another loss of life so strongly that that singular joy will always be somewhat muddled. I wish it didn't have to be that way, but our circumstances sort of determine our thoughts and actions in life, don't they?

I remember the pure elation I felt at the confirmation of your existence when the doctor called with your HCG quantatative blood test results, and I remember that fateful, hesitantly worried call several days later when your HCG levels did not continue to rise as they should. We knew right then that we would lose you, and the only thing left to do was wait...and say good-bye. The tears of joy we had cried days before were overtaken then by a torrent of heart-break that flooded our entire consciousness.

Little One, you were a part of our lives for such a short time, but you will always be a huge part of our family...taking up a huge spot in our hearts.

We'll miss you and love you forever,

Mommy and Daddy

It's hard to believe that tomorrow it's been two years since that horrible day: Friday, July 13, 2007. I've never been fond of Fridays that land on the 13th day of the month, but, of course, our first ultrasound for our first baby would fall on that date. I tried not to be superstitious, but that morning I felt scared and subdued as your Daddy touched my belly and talked about seeing you. I wanted so much to share his excitement, but something inside me held back a bit. I can remember that day so clearly--it has played back in my head like a movie more times than I care to recall. In fact, I've tried to push the vivid images out of my mind when they come back to haunt me, perhaps not as often as they once did, popping into my stream of consciousness (usually at inopportune times), or awakening me at night--the worst type of nightmare...one that came true. I remember the silence, the sobs, the screams, the stares. I remember it all as if it were yesterday, and the punch in the gut still takes the breath right out of my lungs.

I don't know that a mother ever gets over the loss of a child. Naturally, the rawness of the emotions have subsided with time, though some days will transport me right back to my personal hell. I am forever changed from having had you for a brief time, LJ, and for having loved you so deeply and purely. And I am forever changed from having lost you, for experiencing that particular kind of unfathomable anguish.

Today, LJ, I want to say thank you for the way in which you've changed me. Two years later, and I see some of my changes more clearly. I know that some might argue that the change in me is not all for the better, and that is okay. I don't really expect everyone to understand it, to understand me. It's so hard to put yourself in another's place, isn't it? We're all different, have different experiences, trials, and triumphs, and each minute detail helps shape the people we become. In many ways, I've become more introverted. I have noticed that I am more careful with my heart. Although I like to believe that every time a heart is broken, it grows back stronger, larger, it is never easy to open it back up for the pain associated with heartbreak. I keep to myself a bit more. I'm sure I'm a bit guarded. I do try to be open and honest with what I write here, but I try to be careful, too. I've felt how much the words of another can hurt, and so I find myself sharing less than I once did. It's hard to explain how I've changed. I'm just different. But, in many ways, I feel like I've become more "me" than I have been in many years...that I've reverted back to the essence of who I once was and perhaps strayed from for a time.

I never would've chosen this path for myself--to struggle to conceive a child in the first place, then lose the two precious babies we were blessed with. No one would choose that pain. But again, with time, I am beginning to see what living through such losses has done for me. Perhaps I wasn't as compassionate or empathetic as I needed to be to others. Perhaps someone who reads my blog has learned something from my experiences and will know how to better approach a friend or family member who experiences a similar horror. These thoughts are just a couple of ideas that have stuck with me during my time spent in self-reflection.

You see, although I keep myself pretty busy with work, I have a lot of time on my hands to do just that: think...reflect. Work is surface activity, and it can only take you so far. Even when you're completely caught up with work (which I never seem to be), you don't feel the satisfaction I'd imagine you'd feel by just being surrounded by the presence of your children. The feeling catches up with me easily; I keep myself busy, but behind all the busyness, I still feel empty. I miss my LJ and BB. I think about the 18-month old toddler LJ would now be. I think about how much messier yet full of life our house would be. I think about how frazzled and sleep-deprived I'd be. And I'd trade all of the "peace" and "couple time" and bit of extra spending money in our pockets in a second if I could see LJ now, read her a story at bedtime, play the piano and sing to her, even wipe the sticky strawberry juice from her chubby cheeks and fingers. And BB, who would've been due to join us outside the womb in less than a month, we'd talk to BB in my belly and await with anticipation LJ's brother's or sister's arrival. I'd give anything to be able to have these moments with my babies.

If I had to guess, I would admit that the lesson that I needed to learn most of all was to let go of my "sense" of being in control. Perhaps I merely needed to learn to plan less, to realize that this life is really out of my hands, and that I can only do the best I can with what I'm given. As I've written before, my life leading up to this point did little to help teach me this lesson. I became accustomed to thinking that planning, hard work, and dedication will produce the intended or desired results. I was used to achieving what I set out to do, and I'm sure I probably became a little self-righteous when I got what I wanted "all on my own": the grades, the job, the guy, the house, the cars...all of the things in life that I once imagined proved to the world that I was successful. Little did I know that true success is measured via an entirely different system. And that nothing that I've received in life was achieved "on my own." It is only by grace that I've been given the blessings in my life. And success isn't what you do for a living, or how much money you make, or what house you live in, or what "toys" you have. We've been richly blessed in these particular areas, but I would give any and all of it up in a second for another day with the babies I lost. Success is happiness. Success is family. Success is the simple things in life. Success is sticky fingers making a mess on your newly painted walls...because those little sticky fingers are a miracle.

LJ and BB, I visited your Great-Grandmother Beatrice's grave site while we were in Colorado last week, and as I talked to her through my tears, I thanked her for taking care of you both for me. Give her a big kiss for me, okay?

Oh my beautiful babies, I miss you every day. Thank you for the lessons you have helped teach me and I'm sure will continue to teach me, just by being a part of my life.

Love Always,
Mama

It's been a while since I posted an update on what's going on with us, fertility-wise. Last I mentioned, we were waiting on the final set of results from the tests ordered by our Reproductive Endocrinologist to determine if there is a discernible cause for my recurrent miscarriages.

The chromosomal tests both Drew and I took were the last piece of the puzzle, and after waiting several weeks for the results, those too came back normal. What great news!

We had a follow-up appointment with the doctor last week to discuss the results and whether or not we would like to move forward with any assisted reproductive therapy, and it was a much different experience from the first time around. I wonder if he could sense that we were pretty much ready to throw in the towel on all of the testing, meds, and invasive rigmarole. I wonder if early morning appointments are just bound to be more productive, because everyone is fresh and less frazzled than they are by late afternoon. I wonder if he could see that, with every word I spoke, I tried not to let the tears spill over from exhaustion, frustration, and sadness. Whatever the reason, the doctor was patient with us. He explained that although they couldn't find any particular reason that I continue to miscarry in their testing, his hunch is that my PCOS and the resultant hormonal craziness and erratic cycles makes for eggs that are, in general, of poorer quality. That's not to say that I'm not capable of producing decent eggs. It just sounds like, when the hormones aren't working together in just the right way (it's such a fragile system that if one thing is "off," it affects a whole slew of other things down the line), an egg might not mature quite as much as it could have, and even if the egg becomes fertilized, it has less of a chance of being a viable pregnancy because the conditions weren't quite right. It also leads to the lower progesterone levels both of my doctors have noted, which have also been shown to lead to miscarriages.

With those things in mind, the doctor's recommendation was for us to move forward with the Follistim (FSH) injectables cycle we discussed during our first consultation. I shared my reservations about starting down this path a while back, but I must say that after learning more about this particular practice's philosophies and policies (our doctor himself wrote an article for the clinic's newsletter that addressed the controversy over the "Octo-Mom" situation and explained how and why that situation would never occur there, partly because of his own affiliation with a Christian fertility organization), he really set us at ease.

After hours of discussion and praying for direction, the decision seemed to almost make itself as we sat and spoke with the doctor. After hearing his recommendation, I felt very strongly in my heart (much to my surprise) that moving forward with his suggested regimen was the right thing to do. I was instantly nervous, however, as Drew and I had not gone into the appointment with this potential shift in directions having been discussed ahead of time. But when I looked over at Drew to try to gauge his reaction and thoughts, he was already five steps ahead of me. While he was the one completely overwhelmed during our first appointment with the fertility specialist (formerly known as, and unfairly named "Dr. Soup-Nazi" by me), this time, he was the one barreling forward. He was already discussing dosages of the medication and planning things out in his head.

A smile crept onto my lips. I felt like I could burst with happiness! We were both on the same page, and we both wanted to do everything in our power to give this a shot! It was going to cost us a lot of money, sure, but now was the time. We may only be able to afford a couple cycles, but we had to give this a try...

And, so, here we are. We started the Follistim injections last week, Wednesday. Drew has done a great job giving me a shot in the stomach every night, and I have even gotten used to the shots themselves (if not so much the bloating, headaches, and hot flashes). I had a follow-up ultrasound this morning, and though I don't have any follicles that are yet considered "mature," we increased the injection dosage for the next three days, and I'll go back in for another ultrasound Thursday morning to see if any of the follicles have made progress. Once we have at least one that looks promising, we'll do an Ovidrel (HCG) "trigger" shot to finish the final maturation of the follicle and "encourage" the egg(s) to release.

Please, keep us in your thoughts and prayers over the next few weeks. Despite the intense regimen, we are both feeling hopeful right now. It feels good to truly feel like we're doing all we can to help our chances of conceiving and having it be a successful (viable) pregnancy. At least, if we get to the end of what we can afford and haven't been successful, we won't have to wonder "What if?...."

-Em

Afterwards, I went back to bed…too scared to sit and wait for the result myself. He checked the test for me. Negative, again. He broke the bad news to me gently, held me, said he was sorry. Inside, all I could think was, “No, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’ve failed again at making you a Father. I so wanted to have a special present for you this Father’s Day.”

He responded to my thoughts before I could even utter them aloud.

“As far as I'm concerned, we've got two beautiful children waiting for us in heaven, and in my mind, they are the best kids ever. They may not be with us physically, but I'm still fortunate to have had even the few weeks we did with each of them. So, I am a Daddy and you are a Mommy to our two beautiful kids, and we are good parents because we still love them, always will…”

He had to stop then, as the tears came.

This weekend, I want to wish you a Happy Father’s Day, Drew. Even on this day when it feels impossible to be happy.

Thank you for loving us so deeply,

Mama, LJ, and BB (and Molly and Sammy, too)