Headache for Brynn and myself

Thanks for all of the suggestions to help bulk up over summer, you made me laugh!


While the sudden flurry of doctors appointments have given me a headache worth of things to ponder, poor Brynn has had a headache for another reason. While at the park the other day a couple of young boys asked if they could borrow Brynn's soccer ball. Since she wasn't using it my husband said sure, and started video taping her new obsession of going up and down the big blue slide at our favorite park. Suddenly Brynn noticed the boys playing with her ball and walked over to take a closer look. You can see what happened next! Funny that we don't do many videos but my husband happened to catch Brynn getting up close and personal with the ball. Poor thing didn't even cry! I think she was stunned and then happy to get the ball back.



The nurse in me was pondering taking her to get the old noggin checked out that night, but since she didn't even seemed phased I opted to check on her a few times while she slept to make sure she was okay. Luckily Brynn was just ticked off that I woke her out of a slumber three times that night...but she was fine. Maybe she'll be great at doing headers in the toddler soccer league in a year and a half?

On the weekend we had some friends over Saturday night and then on Sunday went to celebrate my nephew's birthday at my sister's place. It was a packed weekend, but a ton of fun. I decided to practice making my 90 year old grandmother's lemon pie recipe today with some homemade whip cream. Delicious! And I'm supposed to be adding some extra calories, right? Well, I think my doc meant some more protein and healthy weight - but I'm sure a little lemon pie would be what the doctor ordered :-)

I'm only joking about this since in all actuality I'm still just a little in shock that we've decided to go down this road. I have an appointment with my peri on July 14th and with the gastroenterologist for later that week as well. I ran into my peri while I was at work on Friday during lunch. One of the things that he is very persistent about is me getting in as good of shape physically as I can before we get pregnant. He said to look at this like we were training for a marathon since this pregnancy might be a very long road. My peri wants me to eat a lot of lean protein and build up some muscle mass through activity. One of the main problems when we were pregnant with Brynn was me spilling ketones from all the muscle wasting that I encountered from not being able to eat. He said we would discuss the option of a PICC line earlier on in the pregnancy if need be for me to get nutrition by IV if need be so I could hopefully spend more time at home and less in the hospital than I did with Brynn. Hopefully we won't encounter the nausea and vomiting issue like last pregnancy to the same extent, but it's nice to have a plan. I REALLY don't want a PICC line, but if we got to that point - I know that there are way worse things. Plus if it would allow me to spend more time and home and less in the hospital, I would be a very happy camper. I know we have to go into this cycle with a positive attitude or not to bother so that's where I'm trying to get my head at the moment.

My peri also mentioned that we have to discuss what type of cerclage that he or my OB would place. I am somewhat familiar with the different types of cerclages but am a bit confused as to why we might do a different one than last time. I'm trying to write down all of my questions before my July 14th appointment so I won't forget anything.

Well, I'm off to gobble up some protein while it's feeding time at the zoo...I mean dinner time at my house...and then am going to attempt a jog while pushing Brynn in the running stroller. I'm just glad she's not a big 19 month old :-) Hope everyone has a great night!

Appointment with my OB " take one"

Earlier in the summer I tried buying some new flower combos to use in my pots this year. I really like the varieties of the polka dot plants they had out this year. Although I bought them as seedlings they've really grown well with a few impatients. I love pink combos and blue pots so I tried them out in a pot I got at English Gardens nearby.


Yesterday afternoon I trekked down to my OB's office (always say down since most of my doctors are south of the city and we live on the north side) for my preconceptual planning appointment. While in the waiting room I ran into the ultrasound tech from their office whom I've grown to love over the years. I hadn't seen her since our recent miscarriage and she gave me a hug. It was sweet of her and I felt my eyes well up a bit- but I quickly stopped them. I didn't want to lose it in a waiting room full of pregnant bellies. Not there, not like that. Besides, the ultrasound tech (a former infertility gal herself) began telling me about their current plans of adopting from Korea. So that was a well welcomed distraction.

Shortly after I walked into an exam room for my appointment. I discussed with my OB the idea of us doing a frozen embryo transfer in a few months. He's hopeful that my uterus has stretched a bit from our pregnancy with Brynn. That still doesn't solve the issue of my nutritional problems during last pregnancy but hopefully will help with the preterm labor we had. My unicornuate uterus was about 1/3rd normal size before we had Brynn but hopefully it is a bit larger now. My OB pulled out my chart from the office and started reviewing our course during the last pregnancy. He laughed when just as he opened it up, the file ripped at the seam! It was a pretty thick chart and we both said it was time for a new one. Hopefully this new chart will be the start to a new beginning.


We talked about my OB providing most of my care during our pregnancy as well as me being co-managed by the MFM (maternal fetal medicine) perinatolgy group. He wants the two of us to meet with my peri from my previous pregnancy in the next few weeks. We made a tentative appointment for July 14th. We talked about me taking progesterone for the first trimester. Then around week 13 I would have a cerclage placed by my OB - who placed one when we were pregnant with Brynn. He said that he would possibly place a different type of cerclage than the one we had placed last time and that I would likely have to be admitted and stay overnight this time. I said whatever it would take of course I will have to do if we are going to go down this road. I would then take weekly progesterone shots around week 16 or so to help calm the uterus and prevent preterm labor. Likely I may be on procardia again to prevent and control contractions since they helped greatly last time. He talked about the risk that I may have to be admitted and placed on Mag Sulfate again if things got dicey but that we would try to avoid that at all costs.

From a nutritional standpoint the plan is more vague. Mainly because we don't even know if this will happen again. Hopefully we will dodge this bullet. I am realistic of the risk however. Regardless my OB wanted me to meet with the gastro (GI) doc who followed me last pregnancy to get his imput. My OB joked but somewhat seriously told me to start beefing up now. Meaning if we are fortunate enough to get pregnant from our FET then I should try to gain a decent amount of weight early on in case I run into trouble later on in the second and third trimester.

We ended the appointment on a lighthearted note about discussing my upcoming trip with the hubby we have planned to New York for our anniversary. My OB loves to travel with his wife and daughter and had a bunch of suggestions on places to see and shows to go to. He wanted to see me again in a few weeks after the other two appointments to wrap up the plans for another stab at a pregnancy with my good ole ute.

My feelings at the moment? Well I think this post is already long enough..I'll fill in more tomorrow since people may already be bored by this long post :-) I need to make some dinner and crash a little early tonight since worked paged me that I'm in the open heart room tomorrow. When you're in the heart room the cases start at 6:30 meaning we have to be there by 5:30AM to set up so the alarm goes off kind of early. Thanks for listening and I hope everyone has a great night!

Appointment with RE

Thank you for your kind words on my rambling previous post. This weekend we had a great Father's Day with both families. My husband's mom and dad came up from Ohio on Saturday. We went to mass at church nearby in Royal Oak and then they watched Brynn while the hubby and I had dinner and a movie. We went to a theatre downtown and saw a sneak peak viewing of Kni.ght and Day which was good. It's been months since we had seen a movie not at home so it was a blast to get out. They spent the night and then on Sunday we had my parents and grandparents over for lunch. I made lasagna for everyone and tried out a new peanut butter pie recipe that was delicious! More of a winter time food menu but that was what was requested by all the dads so that was what they got :-) Later after everyone left I spent the afternoon putting stain and a new finish on our lights that go up our driveway. I have a few more to go, but the ones I have done look pretty good. I'm not usually very handy so I'm pretty proud of myself.

This morning I had another planning appointment with my RE. On Friday I got up at 5:30 and made an early morning trip to their office to have some lab work drawn. He had wanted to make sure that my beta had fallen to negative - which it had. (Their office is south of the city and we live north of the city and I wanted to get home before my husband had to leave for work - hence the early morning date with the lab tech.) At today's appointment we discussed the frozen embryo transfer we wanted to do in the next few months. After much talking lately between my husband and I, we discussed the possibility of doing a transfer of our frozen embryos to me. My RE believes that ultimately the decision is up to my OB and peri (high risk OB) and us. If my RE has their approval - then he is excited to be able to help us do a frozen embryo transfer. I have begun discussing this option with my OB in passing (I frequently work in the operating room with my OB at work and and have seen him more frequently lately due to our miscarriage.) But I have a more formal appointment with my OB this Wednesday to discuss planning a possible pregnancy with my uterus since last time didn't go so well. From there I would meet with my peri.

Honestly, I have mixed emotions. Everyone's main concern if we were to be fortunate enough to have this frozen transfer work is mostly twofold. One would be the possibility of a premature delivery and the other is my health - especially towards the end of the pregnancy. The good thing is that my OB and peri were very successful in stopping my premature labor and my shortening cervix. Bad thing is that this time would we be so lucky? Other good thing is that I've regained all the weight I lost in my second and third trimester. Bad thing is that when we delivered Brynn I had lost 20+ pounds of my pre pregnancy weight. So not only had I not gained a single pound while pregnant in the long run - I also dropped another 20+. When I finally got home after delivering Brynn, I weighed somewhere around 110 pounds or so and I am 5'11. I avoided looking at myself in the mirror because I was disgusted by what I saw. I've always loved running and had always had a muscular build - it was shocking to see myself looking so bony I could count every rib.

I want to have another child so badly, but I don't want to put him or her in danger of a premature delivery. Brynn was so fortunate - we dodged so many bullets while pregnant. And I'm ashamed to admit one other fact. I'm afraid of getting sick again. I'm afraid of losing control of being able to do things like drive or take care of Brynn. And I'm afraid of having to rely on other people having to take care of me. It's such a low feeling when you are so weak from being sick you have to have your husband or a nurse give you a bath in bed or wash your hair because your doctors don't feel you're strong enough to have bathroom privileges in the hospital. That sounds so selfish, but I'm afraid of that feeling, and to be to that point again. I'm afraid of being sick.

But I know we can get through almost anything. I know in the end we'll be okay. So that's why I'm going to travel to my OB's office on Wednesday and talk about the possibility of doing something we thought would be crazy. I'll talk to my OB about us trying to get pregnant with the help of my RE and a frozen transfer. Just like old times...here we go again!

(Thanks for letting me ramble, I promise the next post will be back to more upbeat things!)

Closing the door

When we moved into our new house a few months ago - we decided not to paint one of the upstairs bedrooms. We left it the eggshell / white color that the rest of the house initially was. Each of the other rooms we had our painter complete in whatever color inspired me at the moment. When our painter asked why not that room as well - I said we weren't sure what we were going to use it for. We already had one bedroom painted a sky blue for a playroom, and one bedroom as ours, as well as Brynn's painted a sea foam green. But the fourth upstairs bedroom - we left it as a blank canvas. In the back of my mind both my husband and I secretly wished we could say without a hesitation that it would be our second child's bedroom. I threw a few boxes of extra linens and pillows in the closet and shut the door so Brynn wouldn't run in there.

Then we found out we were pregnant last month. One Saturday - I found the door open to the extra bedroom upstairs. I glanced inside and my husband had moved the diaper genie in the one corner. My heart smiled, at least it felt that way if hearts could actually smile. I left the door cracked, it somehow seemed wrong to close it now. Each night when I went into Brynn's bathroom to give her a bath, I would glance at the door to the spare room cracked open a bit. I wondered when we would pick out a paint color - the door would be wide open then. Then came the crushing news that we had lost the twins we were pregnant with.

As the days past, I decided to close the door to that room for now. It hurt too much to look at it cracked open. The crack in the doorway to the room just reminded me that my heart felt cracked in two.

Two days ago we got a letter and a phone call from our fertility office. Due to various reasons they were going to be moving all embryos stored at our hospital to another location that happened to be one state away. Nothing was changing with our office, their practice or the future of the care of patients. Basically no big deal, our embryos would just be taking a road trip, free of charge since the clinic was paying to transport them. We needed to sign a consent form allowing them to transfer the embryos or we could give consent for them to be donated for research - or else discarded. The last option actually made me gasp. There would be NO way under any circumstance I would EVER discard my embryos. I called my clinic and spoke with my favorite nurse. I mentioned to her that we were currently kind of in limbo land due to our recent miscarriage. She was empathetic as ever and said that even though they would be moving all embryos for people who chose to - that the clinic would be holding on to all embryos that were planning to be transfered with FET (frozen embryo transfer) cycles in the next four months. Basically, if you were doing a FET in the next four months at the clinic, there was no point in moving your frozen embryos.

Basically, we had some serious decisions to make. My husband and I have been talking things through and I believe are making some progress. I called the fertility office today and told my favorite nurse that we would like them to hold on to our embryos and not transfer them out of state. That puts us in the group of patients who would like to do a frozen embryo transfer in the next four months or so. How we ended up in that group is still not clear to me. Maybe it's because I want to be able to crack the door to our spare bedroom open again - even if it's just a crack. It's a start. I'm just having trouble allowing my heart to be able to look at a cracked door, knowing it could swing either wide open or slam shut on us again.

The furry sibling and the here and now.

Neela and Brynn are never far apart. Whether doing something that they shouldn't be doing like pulling on the vertical blinds or just trying to scale the porch.



On most nice evenings Brynn grabs her Dora ball and strolls along side Neela as we walk.






Thank you so much for your kind words. They have given me some bright spots which has been an otherwise difficult week for us. I don't think I realized at first how excited we were about the thought of being pregnant. We had never really thought about it as an option or as a "next step" for us at this point in adding to our family. So we were blindsided when it happened - but then we were filled with a joy so big, I didn't know how my heart was going to contain it all. I feel so guilty over the moments that I experienced fear and anxiety over how we were going to make a pregnancy in MY uterus work, since we had planned on using someone else's uterus to carry our next child. What a waste of emotion that fear and anxiety was since it was moments I missed out on experiencing the complete and utter joy I was feeling at every other second. If anything I think I'm realizing that fear is utterly useless - it just robs you of time you could be spending and devoting towards enjoying the here and now. The here and now of those few weeks we were pregnant with our twins.

Right now I'm not sure where we're headed. My husband and I have to take a step back and let the dust settle a bit. I did call my fertility office the other day just to let them know what was happening. They sounded as shocked as we were feeling a couple of weeks ago. Somehow we ended up making an appointment for next Monday afternoon to discuss the future and what our options are. We still have our three frozen embryos awaiting our decision. I'm torn on how fast I want to steam roll ahead with adding to our family, but I'm feeling a bit of fire under my bum in wanting to give Brynn a sibling. But for now Brynn will have to enjoy her furry sibling Neela until we make some decisions over the next few weeks. While she enjoys Neela - I'm going to put any fear and worry about whatever decision we decide to go with aside. I'm going to enjoy the here and now - and fear isn't going to be a part of that. Not anymore.


Neela is about as good of a furry sibling as a mom could ask for to hang with Brynn - even if she does get confused sometimes. Oh well...Neela just says "You can't have beauty and brains!"

Moves and a miscarriage

It's been so long since I've updated. I'm not sure if anyone still pops over this way. I still check in on people - I love to see updates and hear how everyone is doing. It's been a strange last few months. An unexpected last few months. In the last weeks we've been trying to get settled into our new home, which is slowly starting to feel more like home.


Amazingly and much to our relief we also sold our old house that we had lived in for almost 9 years. Although it was so sad to leave- it was also sad having two house payments, LOL!

Brynn turned eighteen months and is doing great - she has come so far from where I thought things would be. She loved her little kiddie pool we set out for her this holiday weekend.





She loves pretending to drink out of anything we do like a water bottle, even though I think she prefers to dump it down the front of herself :-)





Brynn loves the parks that surround our new neighborhood as well. I'm loving the fact that the city we've moved to is packed full of great parks and young families. Pretty much every nice evening we pack her up in the stroller and just walk to one of the play areas nearby. Brynn stands at the back door around 6pm and just says repeatedly "Outside!" but it's more like "ou - siiiddee." No "t" sound...she hates those :-)


Most suprisingly of all was the way I had been feeling over the last few weeks. It all seemed vaguely familiar. Then two weeks ago when I was the only person in the operating room at work to smell a gas leak - I knew what was happening. Later that night I stopped at Tar.get. I went to the bathroom and saw something I had waited our whole life to see - a "pregnant" on a home testing kit. (Last time with Brynn we had gotten a phone call from the fertility clinic.) We were shocked, surprised, even terrified since we had been proceeding with a gestational carrier cycle in the months ahead. But most of all we were delighted. Could this really be happening?

I called my OB, started taking some progesterone that he had phoned into my pharmacy (since I'm chronically low in the past) and we held our breath. My HCG levels were drawn and they were rising - could this really be? Later that week we had an ultrasound - it showed a gestational sac - things seemed early so we scheduled another scan for the following week. As time went, I felt like things weren't right - no cramping or spotting - just not right. As we had more scans and more lab work - things I was used to from the past and we got to see something I never dreamed would happen. A few days ago I saw not one but two gestational sacs. Twins. Twins conceived without doctors, without in vitro fertilization, without a third party present. Twins in my uterus. What the heck?

But we found out the thing we would not get to see. And that was two heartbeats. Or one for that matter. I kind of knew that this was all a little too easy. When something like that happens at first - you almost forget that you are infertile. But I think once an infertile, always an infertile. It's part of who you are - and in the end I've come to accept that. We were just blessed to beat the odds once and look at what we got.