This is not a joke

Remember we made the decision to go for IVF on Monday and by Saturday we were back in the doctor’s office for the egg retrieval. Four days later we were back for the implantation. The picture you see on the back of the announcements are our two little babies in embryo stage prior to implantation. We found that so fascinating to be able to see them at that stage.

 

After leaving the implantation we were told to come back in two weeks to see if we were pregnant. “Don’t take a pregnancy test” they said. For those of you who don’t know me all that well, I’m a rule follower to the “T”. So no, I never took a test. I waited, impatiently I might add. Two weeks later on a beautiful Monday, the nurse called to say “You’re pregnant!”

 

Holy cow! I started jumping up and down in Beau’s office. Up and down! Beau, I think sat there in disbelief a bit. He smiled, but did not react as crazily as I did. I couldn’t believe it! It was actually happening for us. Excited was an understatement. We called immediate family right away!

 

It wasn’t until two weeks afterwards that we went in for an ultrasound to find out how many embryos took to the uterus. In the room with us were Dr. Schnorr, a medical resident and one of our favorite nurses, Kristen. The doctor starts the ultrasound and immediately says, “So, you’re having twins” and then went immediately into “blah, blah, blah”. I have no idea what he said after that, I just wanted him to go back and say the first part again. He was so casual with it, I thought he must have been joking or something!

 

But no. Not a joke.

Next Step...

Like I said in the last post, this last IUI round didn’t go as “normal” and no one was really sure why. The doctors continued to up dosage and just wait for things to happen as they should.

 

One Monday afternoon after coming in for bloodwork in the morning, my nurse, Andrea, called to say that instead of having just a few good size eggs ready, I had about 20! That meant that instead of an IUI, I was perfectly set up for IVF.

 

Let me go back a bit. If they had let me continue with an IUI with 20 eggs, there was a possibility I could have been octomom! I did not want to be on television for that! The other option was for them to, for lack of a better word, “pop” the eggs, which they said would be incredibly inhumane for me because it would be so laborious and painful for me. So the best option? IVF or nothing and I would have wasted that month of prep.

 

I had to make the decision that day. Beau was out of town. I made the call. He and I discussed it and we both felt this was God’s doing. It would be too difficult and long of a paragraph for me to explain everything that a woman normally has to go through to prepare for IVF. And I did almost none of that. We truly believe that through the efforts of myself, Beau and the doctors, God blessed those and increased them greatly and had His own plan for that time. We decided to go for it…

 

So here is our ultra sound from week 12. Amazing the difference from the last!

Gamecocks in the Amish Country

So we spent the weekend in Lancaster PA and the surrounding area. It was a rushed but great trip that included dinner with an Amish family, a Broadway like production of Moses, and my favorite, a trip to Gettysburg. We also visiting Kathryn's family including Uncle Jerry and Aunt Joan. On Saturday, Chris and I headed up to a bar to watch the Gamecocks play Vandy. This bar was called The Bullfrog and was in the tiny town of Georgetown PA. It was around 10, which is late in the Amish day, and the bar was pretty empty...maybe because they don't drink. Anyway, I decided it was an opportunity to "buy a shot for the house." So I did and we quickly made friends and the good guys quickly ran up 14 points. I channeled my inner deacon and proclaimed "when you give you receive." I was the entertainment. Anyway, Chris and I had a good time and here are the pictures to prove it. Note the very young looking Amish boys who were part of the action. I will leave off their names but they were Carolina fans that night.

Our little babes

Sent from my iPhoneWe were able to see our two little babes today! And they're healthy and growing well! One of them was super active. So much that the ultrasound tech had trouble getting a consistent heartbeat. That little baby kept doing doing flips. It was so neat. They were both moving so much! It was so exciting to see!!!


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Images from six and a half weeks

The first shows both and Kathryn immediately started crying. It was a big surprise.

Image 2 is the close up that we were expecting.

Image 3 looked like a ginger bread man. Really cool.

The Journey Continues...

Due to a series of different circumstances Beau and I found ourselves at Coast Fertility in Mt Pleasant in early April of this year. We were assigned a nurse and given a very thorough “talking to” of what to expect over the next few weeks/months and reminded that it’s not a matter of “if”, but “when”. We were excited and so hopeful!

 

We immediately went into what they call an IUI cycle. I won’t go into the details of what’s involved. (You can look that up if you’re really interested, but I’m positive some of you out there are hoping and praying you don’t have to read through those details. So I’ll spare you.) Beau and I were certain it was going to work the first time. We were just so sure. But one Friday night we learned that it hadn’t worked and we were right back where we had started. Disappointed is not a strong enough word to describe our feelings at that time. I can’t say for sure, since I’m not in Beau’s head, but I think it took a little longer for me to move past it internally.

 

But, as is typical with me and Beau, we just said, “Ok, here we go, let’s try this again.” So we jumped right into the next IUI round. (Admittedly, I was a little more guarded this time and not as sure it would work. Beau was still trying to be the optimistic and hopeful one of the two of us. He did such a good job!)

 

This round didn’t happen anything like the first one. Things weren’t growing like they were supposed to, they were stalling and we didn’t know why, not even the doctors. But they just kept pressing forward and we continued to go along with it. And so glad we did…

the blog won't accept pdfs... so here is the letter to the editor

Letter to the editor

I got a little fed up when I was in the harbor the other day and saw a City of North Charleston fire boat. We don't have the infrastructure necessitating a fire boat and this thing looked expensive. It made me think back to a report I read about Mt. P getting an armored personnel carrier. What a ridiculous way to spend money.

The Start of Our Journey

Like most other couples, Beau and I wanted children. You know, the ideas and dreams of teaching small people all the neat things about the world. Dreams of these small people taking on your very best characteristics and personality traits and none of your worst. J Dreams of holding little small hands and taking them to school for the first time, watching them run down the stairs on Christmas morning, making pancakes on Saturdays, dressing them up in crazy outfits for family photos, boring them with stories of our own childhood and seeing their beautiful smiles. So like everyone else we just assumed it would happen. But the “just happen” wasn’t our journey.

 

Our journey, although not what we originally planned… it has been our journey and we would like to share it with you.

 

Please keep visiting our blog as we share the story of our journey and the blessings that God has given us in His goodness.

 

scaffolding

Who knew that changing a fan would be such a pain. Here is David up 3 decks of scaffolding changing out our fan. 

General football merryment

So the season started off with utter disappointment but has rebounded with a with against the Georgia Bulldogs. Here are some pictures.

Check out that new snazzy grill.

Caroline and Carl are constants.

Eddie our neighbor sporting his Germany jersey. Colors are close I guess.

Gamecocks!

South Carolina vs East Carolina. Go Cocks! Fun day with the hubster!