Good news (update on the two mommies with spotting)

They both went to the Dr. today and got ultrasound and their babies are doing GREAT!!! YEAH. Our board really needed some good news. I have worried about these women and their babies so much today. Glad they both got good news. I hope and pray that everything continues to go well for the rest of the April mommies to be. Miscarriage is so incredibly difficult and so many people don't realize what an amazing amount of grief it actually causes.

Crying my eyes out

It has been an incredibly rough week for my Due in April board. In the last 2 days we have had 3 miscarriages and 2 more mommies are spotting. I am just devistated for these women. These aren't even early miscarriages that are so common .. these women are 10 and 11 weeks along and had seen the heartbeat. These are women who had been told that same stupid statistic that used to reassure me "once you have seen the heartbeat there is only 5% chance of miscarriage". God I hate that statistic. If you think about how many babies are born each year and you figure 5% of that rate .. it's a HIGH #. Believe me I know because I got kicked in the teeth last year by that same statistic. Their miscarriages (and D&Cs) remind me so much of my loss last year and it's so heartbreaking. I wish I could hug each one of them and say something that will make it all better. But I know it will never be better. I've learned that even though you go on, you never get over it. I am praying so hard for the 2 mommies that are spotting that they won't recieve the same news as the other 3 women have recieved this week. Not to mention praying for all the other mommies on my board. I know I am now in the 2nd trimester (which is the "safe zone" haha) but I know in my heart I am still not out of the woods yet. If you are the praying type .. please say a prayer for these poor moms and their new angels.

My brother is the victim of Identity Theft :(

His day was going fine until he went to the mail yesterday. First letter he got was a credit rejection letter from some place he had never applied for credit. The next letter he opened was a letter from Gateway saying he had a 1800.00 credit limit with them and 1799.00 had been used of it. He has never done any business with Gateway. He called the local police (he is not an officer in the city he lives in .. but one about 20 minutes away) and they came over and filed a report. He called all the credit agencies and let them know what's going on. They are sending him copies of his credit report (I am scared to hear what all this creep has run up on there). The guy doing this had given them Steve's first and last name and his social security # and address (for the bill) and a different phone # to contact and a different delivery address. Steve called the phone # they had listed and got this man's answering machine but it had no name on the answering machine .. but the ironic thing is the guy ends his message with "Have a blessed Day" . Steve said when he heard that message he wanted to wrap his hands around this person's neck and give it a good squeeze. The cops told Steven it may take YEARS to clear all this up. I feel so bad for him. He is soooo down. He now has to go to his Police Department and tell them about this. Because when you are a police officer they keep a watch on your credit score and such .. they don't want cops up to their neck in debt because they might be more likely to be bribed and such. Also he has been getting ready to apply for a police job in a different city and now when he applies he will have to explain this situation to them too. I could just cry.

Second Trimester!!! (GULP!)

Wow I can't believe I have made it. I have had so many fears and paranoia this pregnancy that making it this far never really crossed my mind. Holy crap. I am so happy. I hope by getting happy I am not gearing up myself for a big dissapointment. Oh for the days of innocence when I believed getting pregnant meant you would have a healthy baby 9 months later. God I wish I could be that person again. But I can't. I can never be that person who has no idea of the real statistics ever again. But for today I am happy that I have made it this far. Only 27 more weeks to go. I am 1/3rd of the way through.

In about 5 more weeks we will have our big ultrasound where they look at the baby (or babies .. I will mention more of this in just a minute) and hopefully will tell us the baby (ies) look great and healthy and hopefully tell us the sex(es).

Notice the plurals I keep using? I didn't mention this to anyone earlier because I thought my DH was joking. But he SWEARS up and down that during our ultrasound that he thought he saw another baby not just the one that I saw. It wasn't a vaginal ultrasound and I was only like 11w1d during the ultrasound and it wasn't very clear but there was obviously one bouncing baby in there. But he swears that he saw another one in there too. The thing is .. twins run on both sides of my family. My great grandfather was a twin on mom's side, and on my dad's side I have twin cousins and my great grandmother was a twin. So wow .. that would be incredibly wild. With my other 2 pregnancies I had vaginal ultrasounds early and there was no doubt there was only one baby in there. This time there is a possibility of there being more .. because the dr. was using an abdominal one and she didn't really pan around much .. basically she just wanted to show me one live baby to calm my fears. I had forgotten to mention the history of twins to her. For some reason it never even occured to me to mention it this time. Where is the other two times I mentioned it right away.

So there is my little news. Charles seems very sure of it. And he was this sure about Chip being a boy too .. so it's got me wondering. 5 more weeks .. to find out the sex and whether there is one or two in there. I want one healthy baby but I sure as heck wouldn't turn down two healthy babies .. but sure hope if we have two that atleast one of them is a girl .. cause other wise I am going to be SEVERELY out numbered.

The funny thing is when I was little I wanted a little girl and then twin boys. Well I got my boy first .. so maybe we could have twin girls? Oh and all the twins in both sides of my family have been of the same sex so if we got one of each that would really stick out.

Have I mentioned lately

How much I value and appreciate all my online friends. If not. I am saying now. I love and appreciate each one of you. You all provide special things in my life. I don't know how I would have survived the last year with out you ladies. Some of you I have known even longer and I just want to tell each and everyone of you how much I appreciate your friendship and support. You ladies are the best. Reading your posts from yesterday it just reminded me all over again how blessed I am to have you all in my life. I have always heard when one door closes another one opens. I will always ache for the baby I lost .. but I think all of our angels have guided us together so that we can watch over each other.

Mias2Angels

I saw about Justin on another board today. I don't know your's and Justin's story. But I saw his photo in your blogger account. And I just wanted to tell you how beautiful he was. If you would email me (sweetrobin@mail2mom.com) or post a link to where I can read about his story I would really love to read it. There is nothing harder than losing a child. If it was up to me no mother or father would ever have to go through that. Just wanted you to know that I am praying for you and little Justin. And in your honor I wanted to post a poem that someone sent me when I lost my Stella last year. It made me cry .. but it made me feel better too. I hope and pray that it will help heal your heart the way it has helped heal mine.




What makes a mother?

I thought of you and closed my eyes; and prayed to God today.
I asked what makes a Mother and I know I heard him say.
A Mother has a baby, this we know is true.
But God can you be a Mother, when your baby's not with you?

Yes you can, he replied with confidence in his voice.
I give many women babies, when they leave is not their choice. Some I send for a lifetime; and others for a day And some I send to feel your womb, but there's no need to stay.

I just don't understand this God, I want my baby here!
He took a breath and cleared his throat; and then I saw a tear. I wish I could show you, what your child is doing today.
If you could see your child smile with other kids and say "We go to earth to learn our lessons of Love and Life and Fear, My Mommy Loved me oh so much, I got to come straight here.

I feel so lucky to have a Mom, who had so much love for me, I learned my lesson very quickly, My mommy set me free. I miss my Mommy oh so much but I visit her each day when she goes to sleep, on her pillow's where I lay.

I stroke her hair and kiss her cheek and whisper in her ear "Mommy don't be sad today, I'm your baby and I'm here."

So you see my dear sweet one, your children are okay. Your babies are here in my home, and this is where they'll stay. They'll wait for you with me, until your lesson is through. And on the day that you come home; they'll be at the gates for you.

So, now you see what makes a Mother, it's the feeling in your heart. It's the Love you had so much of; right from the very start.

Reguarding Anonymous Posters with mean things to say.

You know your comments would mean alot more to me if you used your name. I'm sorry if my post offended you .. but it's kind of hard to make ammends to someone who isn't even willing to tell you who they are.

You know you don't have to like me. But this is my blog .. if you don't like it. Don't read it. I'm sorry if my feelings piss you off. I am sure there are plenty of other blogs out there for you to frequent. As for me not being supportive. Well you obviously don't really know me because the people that do know that I am one of the most supportive people around to all my friends, both primary and secondary infertiles .. not to mention any of my friends that don't fall into that category. I actually have spent over the last year on the TTC after loss board and now have moved on to the Pregnancy After Loss board and I have done nothing but support my friends on both those boards. So how dare you acuse me of not being supportive.

But you know what .. if my making a simple post about how my life has changed in the last 3 months has really offended you that bad.. please let me know who you are so that I can make sure I never bother you again incase I frequent your blog or something. Because I really don't want to waste my time posting to or caring about someone who says something so mean and hurtful to me.

You know I have had alot of sadness and alot of pain in my life .. but I have never gone out of my way to try to cause pain to someone the way you 2 anonymous posters did. If I hurt you inadvertantly well then I am very sorry. If your message was in the intent of hurting me. Well I'm sorry but you missed the mark, because I definitely don't want to be friends with someone as bitter and spewing hateful things like that.

You don't have to like what I say .. but my words are my own .. you have no right to tell me what not to say.

Wow has my outlook changed in 3 months.

I just got the urge to go back and read all my posts that I have posted since I first started this blog. I was so sad and so depressed when I started this blog. I had pretty much reached the end of my rope I think with the whole TTC process. The weird thing is I didn't even know that I had conceived (or atleast ovulated where conception ended up occuring) 2 days before I started this board. It's funny. I've discoved if you want to get pregnant and haven't been having much luck pay the 45$ for Fertility Friend VIP membership and then open up a blog talking about how you are battleing secondary infertility. It worked for me.

So I have passed my former loss mark

We found out at 11w4d that we had lost our last baby. I had my D&E at 11w6d. I am officially 12w1d now with this baby .. and on this past Monday we saw our beautiful jumping and flipping baby. It feels surreal to have made it past that humongous milestone. Only 6 more days and I will no longer be in the first trimester. I am already starting to not feel quite as bad. Although I am still tired constantly. The nausea hasn't been quite so bad. And my breasts haven't been quite as sore. I think I am reaching a point where the diminishing symptoms are being contributed to the 2nd trimester approaching rather than jumping to the conclusion that something is wrong with the baby. Now I am not saying that all my worries are gone.. but just that I seem to be relaxing and seeming to be able to accept this pregnancy with out so many reservations.

I am on cloud 9

I had my dr appt. today. They were soooo backed up today. My appt. was scheduled at 10am .. but I didn't get seen until 12 o'clock. The dr. tried to listen to the heartbeat and couldn't hear it .. which I wasn't surprised by being that I am plus sized. With Chip they tried at 12 weeks and couldn't hear it. So they brought in the ultrasound machine (the abdominal one .. apparently something was up with the vaginal one) and started the ultrasound. It took a minute or so (and it was fuzzy) but suddenly we saw this little tiny baby and all of a sudden it jumped!!! The Dr. said "Well I can't really see the heartbeat because of it being fuzzy but that is obviously one alive baby!" and then it did a flip, and then another jump. I have never been so thrilled in my whole life. I feel like a 50lb weight has been removed off me. I think we are going to be okay this time!!! I can't imagine any baby doing flips not being healthy right?

10 Weeks!!!

I can't believe I am 25% of the way through. I am still having bouts of nausea, my breasts are HUGE (they need their own zipcode) and I still have major fatigue. I can't believe only 3 more weeks to go until the second trimester. I so hope I make it this time. If I make it to the second trimester I think I will be able to relax a little bit. My friends online keep selling all these adorable baby cloths .. and I have had to really restrain myself. I am trying my best not to buy anything until we have the big ultrasound where we find out boy or girl. My MIL and my mom are convinced the baby is a girl. But I am trying to think boy. I don't want to get my hopes built up on a girl and then be crushed. So I am thinking boy (boys are wonderful! My son Chip is my life!) until I know differently. I will be thrilled if we have a girl though. I really thought Chip was a girl and was soooo surprised when he turned out to be a boy. This time I think I will be thrilled either way.

I don't have Gestational Diabetes !!! WOO HOO

I have been so tired lately that I hadn't gotten a chance to write about flunking my one hour GD test on Wednesday. I was really stressed about it because Diabetes runs on both sides of my family and I am plus size which sure doesn't help my chances of getting it any. That's the reason they tested me at like 9 weeks where most people get tested much later on in their pregnancy. I had to go and take the 3 hour test yesterday. Good lord it should be illegal to make a pregnant woman with morning sickness go 12 hours without eating or drinking then make her drink Sunkist on crack and then expect her to not vomit for 3 hours. I was sooooo sick. I ended up spending an hour laying down in a dark exam room trying my best not to hurl. If I had hurled I would have had to do it all over again. Well luckily I didn't throw it back up, and all my numbers came back good. So I am in the clear for the moment. I will have to take it again around 28 weeks .. lucky me. I requested that I skip the 1 hour since I always fail it anyways and just skip straight to the 3 hour so I don't have to drink that stuff twice. It's funny I used to love Sunkist .. but after this experience I may never be able to drink an orange soda again.

Oh and my appt is scheduled for 9/13 (one year and one day after my D&E .. fun fun fun). I will be 11w1d ... last year I found out my baby had died at 11w4d .. if you pray .. please pray that the ultrasound finds a healthy baby with a beatiful heartbeat this time.

Watching a Baby Story

And I am thinking of Getupgrrl! Today's show is about a couple who couldn't carry a baby to term on their own so they found a wonderful surrogate .. they ended up also using a donar egg (after two failed attempts with the woman's eggs :( ) and they are getting ready to great their beautiful baby. The couple and the surrogate and her husband and family have become very close. The mother to be is so awesome. She has even go through the process of lactating. She said she couldn't carry the baby in her womb but that she could and would do this for her baby. The Dr. proscribed her some medicine and put her on b/c pills to try to trick her body into thinking she was pregnant and then she started pumping and WALLAH she is now producing milk and just awaiting the arrival of her baby to be. I am soooo excited for this woman. And I am hoping and praying that Getupgrrl will soon be in this woman's shoes and be awaiting the arrival of her healthy baby!!! Sending good luck with her possible surrogate !!! I am pulling for her so hard.