A Glimpse into Our Future.

Today was a day I would like to label as "A Glimpse into Our Future." We met with our new doctor at the University of Utah for an IVF #2 consultation. He is the head of the reproductive endocrinology department at the University. Just by luck, we were able to get into seeing him, since our other doctor no longer works on fridays at that clinic. I felt more at ease this time. Maybe because I know exactly what we're getting ourselves into this time. We aren't traveling through uncharted territory, so to speak. Been there, done that. Let's do it again, for kicks and giggle's. Literally, "baby kicks" in the belly, and laughter and "giggles" of a child or two. :)

He is recommending trying some new medications, and possibly upping my dose of meds. from our last IVF cycle. Also, he is recommending transferring three embryos this time. Which we totally agree with if we are lucky enough to get three, since my follicle count is low. Even so, with transferring three, the chances of getting pregnant only go up 5% more than if we were to transfer two. And the possibility of actually having triplets or more is still low, so we feel like it's a risk worth to take. So now we look forward to starting our second IVF cycle soon.

Funny thing: when discussing with the doctor, he talked about how recent studies are showing that stress can effect the success rates of IVF. (No duh!!!) As previously thought a year ago that stress had no impact on having a successful outcome with IVF. Looking back a year ago, we were full of stress during our first IVF attempt. Fast forward to present, and I would say we are in a good place, happy, and living without that same stress load. Let's be realistic for a moment, I'm not saying that just because I'm less stressed means that this IVF will work, but it does up our chances. The doctor then proceeded to say that I should do things to help reduce the stress while we go through our second cycle. He said "some people like to meditate (check), yoga (check) , read scriptures more (could work on that one)....you know, like don't go and build a house or anything during your IVF cycle." My husband and I both looked at each other and laughed. Funny, being that we are thinking about building a home. We've already met with an architect. We haven't moved forward with anything yet, but we are still in the dream stage of things. I don't think we will proceed forward with the house, until we know the outcome of our IVF cycle. But it does give me something to look forward to afterwards, and keep my mind off of my infertility/and or pregnancy. Especially if we don't get prego. But the doctor did say that the dream stage is good. We had a good laugh.

So on our way home from our consultation appointment, we accidentally missed our exit off the freeway, as we were goofing off, singing in the car. Marc can really rock a song, by the way. We figured while we were headed that direction anyway, we would stop by and look at this model home we are basing our floor plan design around. We're tweaking a few things with our architect. Anyway, the last time we had looked at the home, it was in the framing stages. Now it is complete. Of course it was beautiful, and just as I had imagined walking through it the first time with the rough framing. I could easily picture us in that home. It does get me excited to move to that new stage in our lives together. Wouldn't it be great if we got pregnant, and built this dream home of ours? Ahhh, dreams and wishes. If only they can come true like they seem to do for other people. All those disney princes stories we were told as a child of happily-ever-after. But it is good to have hope and something to look forward to. I don't expect everything to work out like we wish for. I'm trying to be realistic. But it's nice to live this fantasy world in my head for awhile. To have a glimpse of hope for our future, where hope did not exist before.

50 Months of Trying, Ugh! (I'm tired of dealing with this.)

In yoga today, I was in a deep meditation. I'm seated with my legs crossed (indian style) in front of me with my palms pressed, centered to my chest. We were in a breathing/meditation exercise and were instructed to breath deeply in and out. As we took a breath in, we were guided to bring our arms up and out above our head. And on the exhalation, bring our palms back to heart center. We were to repeat this several times. This is what I was visualizing and meditating upon:

As I breathed in and stretched my arms toward the heavens, I imagined reaching into heaven for my child. My baby. And as I exhaled and brought my arms back in towards my chest, I imagined bringing that baby down to this realm, on earth, to be with me, in my arms. On the next breath in I imagined something completely different. As I reached my arms back up towards the heavens, I imagined my infertility, in the shape of millions of butterflies, escaping my body and sending them out and away from me, and as I exhaled back, with my palms to my heart. I felt peace.

What struck me differently about this meditation is that I've (of course) always meditated about pregnancy and a baby during yoga, but I never before meditated about my infertility. It was like I was saying goodbye to my infertility for a moment and it felt so good. Like I didn't care about it anymore. My infertility wasn't controlling me.

I do have to say that these last couple of months, I have been feeling better. But I think it's the result of a few things. One, obviously, I'm on some "happy pills". But two. I've made the decision to rule out living childfree. Living my life without children just isn't for me. I've got too much "motherly talent" in me that it would be a waste if I didn't have children. In fact, even my name Ra'Chelle stems from the Hebrew name Rachel which literally means "motherly" (if you were to look it up in a baby name book.) I think that decision alone has helped me come to terms with Plan B: Adoption. If I can't have biological children of my own, then of course I would adopt. I'd adopt tomorrow if I could. I think what is holding me back from adoption at this point is that we have unexplained infertility. It would help if the doctors had an answer for us as to why it's difficult to get prego/ and maintain a pregnancy. But since I've been pregers twice, I have reason for hope. Having unexplained infertility is not allowing me to have closure and move on to Plan B. But I think I'm getting so tired of my infertility, that I'm getting closer to moving towards Plan B.

We did meet with an adoption agency last week, just to get information, so obviously I've been thinking about it a lot lately. I can't say that I was inspired to move towards that direction yet, but it did get me thinking....We could always sign up with the adoption agency, and if for some reason, we got called because a birth mother was interested in us as a potential couple to place her child, we could always make the decision to say yes or no. If we weren't ready, we could pass on the opportunity, till it was right for us. But I was a little intimidated by the fact that some couples have been waiting almost up to 4-5 years in some cases. And I don't like how writing up an adoption profile seems like you are having to compete with other couples. It seems to me like these adoption profiles are like "Christmas brag letters." (Look at us! We're a fun couple! Choose our family! Look at all these fun pictures of us!) If it were up to me, I'd have each couple fill out a standard personality questionnaire/ likes and dislikes/ interests... so the birthmother gets an idea of what these people are like, and have pictures to see what they look like. That way it would be less biased. And if I were a birth mother choosing a family, I'd look for a couple that looked most like me and the birth father of the baby or go by a strong feeling that that's couple the baby needs to be with...but that's just what I would do. But whatever...I'm not in those shoes. And I'd rather be in my shoes than hers....That has got to be one of the hardest things to do. But I won't let my mind go there.

Anyway, so Plan A: IVF again! Yes I've made the decision to to it again!!! I did it. I made the appointment for the consultation. July 22nd! It's with a different Doctor this time, so we will see. I guess all I can say is that if if doesn't work, at least I gave it my all, and I will know that I at least tried. It's better to regret something you did do than to regret doing something you didn't do. So I'd rather regret spending the money on this expensive procedure and know that I tried, then not doing it at all. I know it sounds like I don't expect the IVF to work, but it's hard to get my hopes up. Either way, I've come to the conclusion that I will become a mom. Whether it is through IFV biologically, or through adoption.

I've just come to the point, like I've said earlier, that I'm tired of dealing with the infertility. I'm ready to move on. Move to that next phase of my life. Our life together as a family. What's funny is that I've added up in my head how many times we have "tried" unsuccessfully. If you think about it, we've been trying to get pregnant for a little over 4 years now. We started trying in April of 2007...so add that up in your head: 4 years, that's 48 months plus May and June equals 50 months we've been trying to get pregnant! Ah!!! That seems crazy! Theres got to be some point where I'm going to have to realize I may not get an answer why we have difficulty getting pregnant. I may have to accept that "unexplained infertility" is our diagnosis. I might have to accept that we may not get an answer. That scares me. But in order for me to move on to Plan B, I may have to come to terms with that. All I know is that I'm done dealing with infertility. It's escaping me slowly, like a weight is being lifted as these "infertility butterflies" are flying away from my body. (Please Pray for us.)