Our Carrier is Pregnant- 8 Weeks/2 Months

February 4, 2013- up to 694

February 8, 2013- up to 3153

February 12, 2013- up to 9428, followed by our first pregnancy scare. Jessica texted me early this Tuesday morning to let me know that she had some spotting. I know some bleeding in early pregnancy is fine, but it made me  super nervous. Our first u/s wasn't supposed to be until the 14th, but had one that day to see what was going on. Apparently it is a subchorionic hemorrhage. I was told not to worry and that this is quite common, but how could you not with a name like that, and this is me we're talking about. We weren't quite 6 weeks at the time of this u/s, but surprinsgly they were already able to see the flickering little heartbeat. That made for one happy, reassured for the moment, momma.

February 21, 2013- Jessica had her ob dr. do a quick u/s just to make sure their was still a heartbeat. It is great having a carrier who is both a nurse and works for her Ob dr. Still a heartbeat, whew! I hate waiting and we still aren't far enough long for her to use my doppler, which I just mailed to her yesterday. I can't wait until she can start using it, but that won't be until the end of the first trimester.

February 27, 2013- Today we are 8 weeks or 2 months pregnant. I am nervous to say the least. I live in fear everyday of getting that text or call from Jessica that we lost the baby. It has only been about a month since we've been back home and getting back into our normal routine of things. Although I wouldn't say anything about being back home has been normal. To get through the days lately I have dived into all things pinterest and getting back into shape. I may already be doing some premature nesting as well, which I suppose is a good, positive thing. I am pretty sure Dereck is sick of hearing about pinterest. I have been making a bunch of the recipes, no that he complains about the cooking. I love all of the ideas Pinterest has given me for our house. We may just have a completely remodeled house by the time the baby comes. I would even go as far as to say the reason I haven't been on my blog much has more to do with me being so preoccupied with projects than anything else, but it keeps my mind busy, which is what I need.

I have been stressing about money a lot lately as well. These pinterest projects are great, especially all the ideas on remodeling my house, but sadly they all cost money. I hate to complain about money, but I sure do hate that having a baby has costed us so much, and it seems like the bills are never ending. The money that was raised in the fundraiser is long gone. I am glad we had it though because it really helped us get through the last couple months. I have added up the totals we have spent so far and have now spent over $27,000 on this process, and it isn't over yet. If this all works out I don't care how much money we spent and how broke we will be for the next how many years, but what worries me is what we would do if this baby doesn't make it. Could we even afford to do this again, especially since we didn't get lucky enough to have extra embryos in the freezer. I hate thinking about this, but it's hard not to when so many make it look so easy to have a baby- no IVF, easy pregnancy, no c-section or other fancy surgery, no funerals, no worries.

But Jessica is still great. I couldn't have asked for a better person/friend to do this for us.

Now to just get through the next, oh what do we have, 32 weeks until the due date. 

BLM Visits

Since we were actually home for reasons other than a funeral or burial, we felt a little bit more up to wanting to visit with people. We visited family of course, we visited with a bunch of friends that we haven't seen in a couple of years, but we also were able to meet up with a couple of fellow blm friends that have stood by my side these past couple years.

First, we visited Kristin and her rainbow, Brooklyn, who was born about a month after Evelynn.

Then, on our flight home we took a 6 hour layover in Seattle and met up with Keleen and her rainbow Mason. Evelynn and Mason share the same birthday. I was a little hesitant in meeting him knowing my little girl should be here and be the exact same age as him. It went really well though and I am glad we were able to meet up. 

 

It is amazing how you can build such a wonderful friendship with someone you had never met. It's even better when you finally get to meet them in real life! I am grateful to have met these two ladies, even if only the reason we met was through the club that nobody wants to join. I would love to meet so many more of you, but hopefully next time I will have my rainbow with me as well.

The 2WW

Over a week down, just a few more days to go until the beta.

Surprisingly I haven't been too stressed about it. I probably would be more, but have been busy with lots of other things.

First off, my Doxycycline that I was given to prevent infection from the egg retrieval gave me a huge unneeded distraction. The bottle says to make sure that you take it with a full glass of water and not to lay down for awhile after taking it. Well Saturday morning, the day after the transfer, I had to take my last morning pill. I was super tired from staying out late the night before, so I woke up, took the pill with only a small sip of water, and then fell back asleep. I don't know if what happened to me has happened to any of you, but it was horrible. After I woke up I started getting really bad heartburn. The heartburn got so bad I felt like I was having mini heart attacks. Nothing seemed to help it. About two days later I started having severe chest pains that was making it difficult to breathe. I also could barely eat anything, and drinking was even worse. We were in North Dakota visiting Dereck's family so feeling like crap and going to the doctor was not how I planned to spend our time. I had done my research and learned that it was most likely esophagitis, which is apparently quite common with Doxycycline use. Anyways, to make a long story short, I was told to go to the ER because the clinic there didn't know what to do with me. The ER did a esophogastroduodoscopy (EGD). I was right about the esophagitis and had a huge esophageal ulcer as well. I got some medicine to try to help the heartburn, but it did nothing, Just yesterday, more than a week later, I can finally drink water pretty well again and can eat most nonacidic and non-spicy things. Not mt idea of a fun distraction. Worst drug ever!

My 32nd birthday was on the 25th. We went to a hockey game but that was about it. It was hard to enjoy it when
I felt like crap and couldn't even have a delicious birthday dinner, but it is what it is. Derecks grandma did however get me a massage and facial before we left town that was amazing and much needed. 

So being up in North Dakota we visited Derecks family and Liam and Evelynn's graves. I wish we could have stayed longer at their graves, but the weather made it hard. Visiting family was good though. At least this visit wasn't because of a funeral or burial like the last three times we were home.

Everyone is so excited about the egg retrieval and transfer and eager to hear the results. I know people want it to work out this time, I do too, but when people bring it up I get frustrated. I wrote a post a few months back about how people were already saying to me that they "just feel it" about the next pregnancy working out. I get that people want to be positive. Plus, the chances of things going bad a third time are slim, but what happened to Liam and Evelynn were rare incidences, and they happened, and no one knows for sure it won't happen for a third time. I also get worried about the fact that nothing that we are doing is a secret. Everyone knows whats going on with us. Everyone knows that we did the transfer two Fridays ago and that the beta will be this Friday. There will be no keeping this pregnancy a secret until we are past the first trimester, not even to the heartbeat. Everyone is waiting for the news on friday. My blog is public so its not liking what we are doing is a huge secret. I just get worried that as soon as we tell everyone, both friends and family, that Jessica is pregnant they are all going to get so excited and assume everything will be fine and even more comments about how they new it would work will come. Outside of the baby loss blog world most everyone I know has never dealt with baby loss before, let alone two significant losses. For most of them a positive pregnancy test means there will be a healthy, living, take home baby 9 months later. None of which has been my reality.

I hate to even bring up religion or beliefs, but even comments relating to that are driving me crazy. I am tired of hearing people tell me that they are praying this is going to work. Please no one hate me for saying this, but I have just lost so much faith in anything these past two years. Sometimes I just want to freak out on people when they say that because God doesn't grant miracles. I mentioned that I read "Bad Things Happen to Good People" this past summer, and if I believe anything at all it is that it doesn't work that way Anyway, sorry for the rant. I just wish people would realize that I love the support, but I only want the support that comes from just being there for me and helping me get through the hard days, not from comments relating to things that aren't guaranteed.

I ended up having a huge talk with Dereck about my feelings towards this. He is so wise and always knows the right thing to say. He reminds that people don't know what to say, just as they didn't know what to say after we first lost Liam and Evelynn. That people want good things for us. They hope for the best and so they say that they feel it will work this time because its what they hope for so badly. He also shared with me a nice little analogy about how if say a child hurts themselves you tend to tell them everything is going to be okay because hearing more bad news will cause them not only more distress but will most likely cause you to be more stressed, and so on. Anyway enough of that.

We have a few days left in Minnesota and then will be heading home. Jessica has her beta on Friday so hopefully we will have good news for the plane ride home.

Baby Via Gestational Carrier Journey Update 9

January 16, 2013 We got to the clinic at 9am on Wednesday morning. At about 9:20am we were brought back to a room where I got a couple valium to help relax me and also had to put a gown and robe on. I had my vitals taken and then got an IV placed. Our RE then came in just before 10:30am and explained what was going to happen during the retrieval. Dereck had to stay in the room we were in and I got brought down to the procedure room. I was able to watch the whole process on monitors next to me and so did Dereck in the room he was in. The procedure was over within minutes and then I got wheeled back in by Dereck. The retrieval ended up going way better than expected. The other day we had only 3 mature follicles, but another must have grew enough thay we ended up getting 4 eggs. It is still less than what we hoped, but 4 is better than 3. After the retrieval we were told that ICSI will most likely be done to help with fertilizing the eggs. Fertilization isn't necessarily an issue with for us but our RE wanted to be on the safe side since we only had the 4. We were then told that if 4 embryos are created and look good we may try for a 5 day transfer, but if they aren't doing well the transfer may be on day 2 instead. Another nerve racking day of waiting until we hear how the embryos look. Jessica started her progesterone injections today also. Need to make sure her lining is good and she is ready for the transfer. January 17, 2013 At about noon we received a call from the clinic. The nurse said she couldn't tell us anything about our embryos other than fertilization took place. She then said that our RE thinks it is important that we do a 2 day transfer versus a 5 day. He feels that our embryos would be better off in their natural environment verus being in their incubators. I hate that the nurse couldn't tell us at least how many embryos we have. Did all 4 make it then? She then told us the time we needed to be back at the clinic the next day. We will first be speaking with the embryologist and then the transfer will take place right after. The clinic then called Jessica to inform her that she needed to be at the clinic tomorrow as well.
I can't believe we are doing the transfer already tomorrow. We weren't even planning on doing the egg retrieval until this weekend. I see another night of little sleep as I am so incredibly anxious. January 18, 2013 Dereck and I and Jessica and her husband arrived at the clinic at 9:45am today. Jessica got brought back to the transfer room right away to get ready. Dereck and I then got brought back to a separate room where the embryologist came in and spoke to us. We got our report card and she explained it to us. We started out with 4 eggs on Wednesday. Only 2 of those were mature so they did ICSI on both of those. For anyone who doesn't know what ICSI is, it is where they take one sperm and they put it into the egg to help with fertilization. Normally a bunch of sperm would just get thrown in the dish with an egg and let fertilization happen naturally.

ICSI

So ICSI was done on 2 of our eggs, but only one fertilized. My jaw dropped and I almost started crying. How is it that we do IVF, when we have gotten pregnant without it twice, but yet we do it and only end up with one. I guess I thought for sure that we would have a lot of eggs and then a lot of embryos. I am overjoyed that we do have one though. One is better than none. At least 2 would've been nice so then we could transfer 2, and not just so we could have a better chance at twins, but also to up our chances of having at least one of them stick. We also do not have any embryos for the freezer so if this one doesn't take we have to start the IVF process over in a few months. Let's just hope this works the first time. Anyway back to our one embryo. The embryologist said that even though we only have the one embryo we have about as perfect of a 2 day embryo as you can get. It got graded at 4A-, which apparently is really good. The embryologist asked if we had anymore questions and then brought us into the transfer room with Jessica and her husband.
Inside the transfer Dereck and sat in a couple of chairs to the side of the transfer table along with Jessica's husband. Our RE then came in and had Jessica lay on the table. He explained to her and the rest of us exactly what he was going to be doing. First he did an u/s to check her uterus and make sure there weren't any chances since the last one she had. Then he did a mock transfer just to make sure that the embryo would make it in okay. That went well so now it was time for the actual transfer. It was kind of weird but the nurse in the room actually turned the lights down low and turned on some quiet music. Almost like they were setting the mood. Like this whole process wasn't awkward enough.

A perfect 2 day embryo

After the embryo was placed the doctor shook all of our hands, said he was glad that he good be a part of our journey, and also said what a wonderful person Jessica is to do this for us. We were in that room awhile longer since Jessica was told she needed to lay for about 5-10 minutes before they would let her leave.
After Jessica was released we all went for lunch. I ended up buying a book for Jessica, that I had learned of through another intended parent called the Kangaroo Pouch, and gave it to her at the restaurant. It is a book about surrogacy so that she could help to explain to her kids what was going on. Jessica will have her Beta in 2 weeks. She was told that maybe the earliest we could do a pregnancy test wold be in about a week and a half. We decided that since we will be up in the area where she lives visiting Dereck's family that maybe we could swing by there place for dinner and then do a home pregnancy test then. After lunch we said our goodbyes for now.

I can't believe our journey of trying to bring home a rainbow baby has started once again. I so hope everything works out for us this time. For now I am optimistic. Now how to get through the next week and half and then hopefully the next 9 months?

Our Carrier is Pregnant- 1 Month

We had dinner with Jessica, her husband, and her boys at their house last weekend. Jessica took a pregnancy test on the 25th, 26th, and 27th. It had only been a week since the transfer, but all three were positive! She surprised us with this test the morning of the 26th letting us know that our dinner would be a celebratory one.

Today Jessica had her beta and it was 186. Woot woot!

1 month down.