Last year I began to document my daily thoughts as Matt and I strapped into the emotional roller coaster for a crazy ride of infertility treatments.
I soon found it too hard to press the publish button at the bottom each time I wrote and have kept it all to myself until now.
I decided to save this first draft I had started because it summed up a lot of my feelings all in one without being too negative.
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Over a year ago, we found out that Matt is unable to have children naturally. Immediately we fasted, prayed and scheduled a surgery in hopes to correct this problem. Unfortunately the surgery did not work, we were out a heap of money, and we were brought back to square one.
We followed up with his doctor month after month, put Matt on copious amounts of medicine, and yet there is still no hope.
This unsuccessful result is the hardest on me because it rests the decision of when and how to have children solely on me.
We were given only a few options of how to obtain a family and sadly, none bring the type of joy that everyone else in the world gets to experience when they first find out they are pregnant and starting a family.
I will never pee on a stick and then stand around with my husband in the bathroom to see the result.
I will never surprise Matt about a pregnancy by making him a meal of foods that all have the word "baby" in their title like Aunt Becky on Full House.
I will never have a fond memory to look back on how and where my child was conceived.
After months upon months of crying myself to sleep, crying on the drive to work, crying on the drive home from work, staying awake for days at a time, sobbing and wanting to throw the computer across the room every time someone on facebook posts a picture of their baby or a status update of how happy they are, feeling like I'd been punched in the stomach every time someone walked into church with their 3 kids and giant pregnant belly and after reading blogs, news articles, studies, and reports about every negative option of conception, I finally came to a decision of how we would attempt starting our family.
If you know me, you know that I am very opposed to modern medicine. As a teenager I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and it took months of going to the hospital, losing the ability to walk, and becoming a guinea pig for the doctors to figure out what it was and never in the meantime did they care for a second to try and dull my pain. After switching to taking only herbs I regained my ability to walk, use my hands, write, and sleep through the night.
If you know me, you'll also know that I survive on a vegan diet and drink an insane amount of water each day to keep myself flushed out and as healthy as possible. My weight has not fluctuated in years, my complexion is clear, and I truly believe it is due to how strict I am with myself.
With having lived this way for so long and intentionally creating a perfect, pure, and fertile baby factory, it was the hardest decision of my life to decide to take the route of IVF + ICSI. After all, I am a Fertile Myrtle! I can get pregnant perfectly normal, why should I be pumped full of drugs? But of all the other options, this really did seem the least risky when the outcomes were weighed.
The fact that day after day I will be injecting myself in the stomach with needles and chemicals that are completely foreign to me and only have a 75% chance of even working is beyond frightening.
The fact that any of these medicines could trigger an allergic reaction, like so many other medicines have in my body, is terrifying.
And the fact that most of these very costly medicines will without a doubt jerk my arthritis out of remission and result in the possibility that I will not even be able to use my hands to hold my baby the day it is born is one of the saddest things that will ever happen to me.
These 3 fears are so overwhelming that the fact that we are also using all of our saving that we have saved for a house, going into debt yet again, and having to move back in with my parents to recoup from these costs is the farthest thing from my mind. Not to mention the extended drive to work from my parents will cause us to have to go into debt further by forcing us to get a new vehicle. Thank you very much fancy Oil & Gas company in which I work! Your wonderful benefits that will pay for tummy tucks and lap bands, but couldn't even pick up a single bill for infertility costs has forced us into a life of well... hell.
But here we are. The decision has been made and the process will be beginning in a matter of weeks.
Although the shots are a huge mountain to climb, the biggest mountain will be to stay positive and not stress my body out with thoughts of, "Am I changing destiny? Am I playing God? What if there was a reason this wasn't supposed to happen? and What if it comes out really mean and angry because it wasn't meant to be?"
Buckle up, this will be a really bumpy ride.
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It is now over 105 shots, 12 blood tests, and 2 VERY sore butt cheeks later, but I'm happy to announce that it all paid off.
Meet embryo Desmond and Amélie our little twince and twincess.
Just a few tests to see if it worked before our first post surgery sonogram...
Des and Amélie at 6 weeks. 
Des and Amélie at their 12 week sonogram.
We have been truly blessed to have such luck on the first round of IVF and hope our luck continues throughout the entire pregnancy. We will need lots of prayers and advice from everyone since we're a little late getting into the parenting game. We know everyone else will have plenty of great tips for us from all of their experiences so far.
Our due date is set for sometime in mid July.
