Another milestone

So Elliott passed another milestone today.  Which one?  His first trip to emergency.  What a day.  You'd think I could sleep - I was worn out by 2 this afternoon. 

To start the day off I had a fun little game of "Where the hell did the only key to my car go?!" at our public library.  We went to grab a book I've been wanting to read and after I put a hold on it with the ladies at the front counter I went back to my car.  I searched my pockets, my purse, the ground, under Elliott, under the car seat, under the car seat base, under the seats, I went back into the library and checked in their, as well as the bathroom - including the garbage where I'd disposed of a dirty diaper.  The silly key was nowhere to be found.  I then checked my purse again for the 30th time and found the key in a zippered compartment wrapped in my pair of spare underwear (Yes I had a pair of spare in my purse!).  I was hot and annoyed by this time.

I then headed over to a friends house where I enjoyed the heck out of myself.  We were sitting on the deck, enjoying the beautiful August summery day.  Elliott was laying on a blanket on the patio table in front of us.  He was happy and cooing for the most part and then he started to fuss.  He didn't have any reason to fuss, I thought he was just being a dweeb.  My friend and I visited some more over his whining, then I happened to look down at his right hand.  It was red, swelled, and had a line cutting into it, just above the top knuckle of his pinky finger.  My bud packed up the diaper bag while I strapped Elliott into his car seat and I rushed him to the hospital (with a quick stop at my parents shop which is on the way - I wanted to know if they'd seen anything like it before...they had not).  I got to Emergency and showed the nurse/reception lady his finger.  She asked me to take a seat and told me they would call me when they could.  I made a final plea that it be soon, because his finger was turning an awful shade of red...and it was so shiny it looked waxy. 
Not long later (thank God) they called me into their triage room.  The nurse told me it was quite common, that the line was a hair, and then she attempted to cut it off.  Elliott was quite squirmy and the nurse almost cut his precious little finger.  She decided it would be best to numb the finger first.  She wrapped the finger in gauze covered in numbing stuff and asked that I hold it in place for ten minutes.  While I held it I rocked Elliott and he fell asleep.  Another nurse came in about 5 minutes later and decided to attempt the procedure again.  She pushed the scissors into my poor little mans skin, and was able to snip the pestering hair.  It looked like a chest hair...or a cat or dog hair maybe.  Elliott's little pinky is still red, and you can still see where the hair was.  It hurts my heart, but he doesn't seem to be any worse off. 

I then cancelled my afternoon plans, came home, and spent the afternoon trying to over come the feeling of panic I'd experienced. 

The backstory - Fertility and Me

For some reason fertility is a taboo subject in our culture.  This is weird to me because it is a very common condition in North America.  What should be taboo are the questions: "When are you having kids?" and "Why don't you have kids?"  These questions are debilitating to those who are having issues.  If you are someone that asks people about kids...CUT IT OUT.  It seriously can cut a person up inside...these questions feel like a knife through the heart.  End of rant.

Anyways....this is my story, if you don't feel comfortable with the details, don't read it.

My husband, Cal, and I met at a youth event when I was 15 years old.  We began dating shortly after I turned 16 and after dating for three years he proposed.  We decided to get married in the fall of 2004.  I was 19 at the time, and he was 21.  We enjoyed young married life, but in a few years I began dreaming of children.  Unfortunately for me Cal was not ready for kids yet, so we waited.

I was anxious to start trying to conceive because before I began taking birth control I had an irregular menstrual cycle.  For instance, I would sometimes go four to six months without having a period.  I knew something was wrong, but found that my doctor was not willing to look into this type of issue unless we were actually trying to have kids. After five years Cal finally got on the baby bandwagon.  I was elated; I would finally get to have the beautiful babies I had imagined. 

I stopped taking birth control pills in June of 2009 and we proceeded to try to conceive.  We waited eight months for my body to regulate itself, but I never had a period.  I made an appointment and went to see my family doctor.  After two sets of blood tests he was unable to figure out my issues.  Next he sent me to a fertility specialist.

The fertility specialist asked many questions about my body and my cycle, and then sent me for more blood tests and an ultrasound.  He also gave me prescriptions for two medications.  The first medication, medroxyprogesterone acetate (Brand name: Provera), he prescribed because it forces the body to menstruate by balancing and restoring the natural hormones.  I nicknamed it the evil cleanse of death.  The second medication, clomiphene citrate (Brand name: Clomid), he prescribed to force me to ovulate. 

My doctor taught me how to chart my temperature daily using a basal body temperature (BBT) thermometer.  He told me that the most accurate way would be to pee into a Styrofoam cup, and then to take the temperature of the urine.  As gross and weird as it was, I was willing to do ANYTHING.  I charted my pee temperature religiously.

Doctors in small towns like the one I live in are notoriously busy.  Because of this I did not want to pester him with a ton of charting questions.  I went back to work and talked to a friend who had similar issues.  She recommended http://www.fertilityfriend.com/ the self proclaimed “Leading Destination for Women Trying To Conceive”. 

This website was a godsend.  The site includes a charting system and answers to tons of questions about fertility.  It also includes ovulation, menstruation and fertile day predictors, as well as community boards where women can talk about their issues.  For the ladies that are lucky enough to conceive the site also has a pregnancy monitoring system.

Fertility Friend was a lifesaver for me, and it taught me a lot.  I learned about the phases of a menstruation cycle, and how to actually determine the fertile days in that cycle.  Predicting ovulation while charting is difficult at first, because it does depend on an individuals past history.  This is especially difficult for people like me who have never had a ‘normal’ cycle. 

My newfound knowledge was helpful, but it still didn't help to regulate my cycle.  A normal chart will show low temperatures prior to ovulation and then the temperature will spike.  This spike indicates the day after ovulation.  My first three months of charting produced wild and crazy temperatures.  The completed charts looked like a child’s connect the dot picture of mountains. 

I returned to my fertility specialist and received the results of my test back.  I was diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).  This condition affects a woman’s (duh) ovaries.  It causes a woman to have anovulatory cycles (meaning no period), as well as can cause acne, increased hair growth on face and body, infertility, and miscarriages. Increased hormones cause most of the issues. Super fun!

    

During the fourth month, and the third prescribed increase to my dose of Clomid, I finally achieved ovulation.  I showed my new, more promising chart to my doctor.  He was so excited he actually did a happy dance.  Unfortunately I did not become pregnant. 

The “trying to conceive” journey is a roller coaster of emotion.  For example, the first month when ovulation occurred but pregnancy did not was a hard one.  During the month I was excited to see, for the first time ever, the shift in temperature that indicated that I had ovulated.  I then proceeded to get my hopes up about possible pregnancy.  I worked myself into believing I was pregnant.  It was emotionally draining when I got a visit from "aunt flo".  I tried to convince myself it was implantation.  (Implantation is when the egg implants in the uterus, this can cause a bit of bleeding.)  I researched far and wide on the Internet looking for any explanation for the increasing flow.  I finally gave in to the gnawing voice in the back of my head that was telling me "you are NOT pregnant dummy". I broke down that night and cried for hours.  Cal didn't understand my devastation...he figured it was a good sign that everything was beginning to work right.  It took me three weeks to pull myself out of the sadness that I was wallowing in.  My husband had to deal with a hormonal mess.  I still feel bad.

The next month was a much different story.  While I tried not to get my hopes up I watched my temperature chart become a textbook-like example of a possible pregnancy.  As soon as enough time passed I took a pregnancy test.  I was sorely disappointed with a negative result.  The next day I tested again (us crazy trying-to-conceivers will do that) and was rewarded with the faintest line imaginable...but a line none the less!  I was through the roof happy.  I waved my wonderful home pee test in front of my husband's face.  He was happy too.  I went in the following day for a blood test to confirm the result.  When the office called me to tell me the results I was stoked.  I followed up by making an appointment with my fertility specialist - I walked through the door with a grin on my face and he said he could tell the result of the test by the look on my face.  From there on I began the pregnancy journey....a much happier journey than the one I'd just completed!

Why.

My son, Elliott, will be three months old tomorrow.  I know it sounds cliché, but it's crazy how fast the time flies.  It feels like just yesterday we brought him home from the hospital - that first night home was one of the scariest nights of my life.  My husband Cal and I were now in charge of this brand new life; what a huge responsibility.  That night Elliott cried non-stop, we tried everything to console him: we fed, changed, jiggled and wiggled, burped and rocked him.  Looking back now I'm sure he was mostly gassy and partly felt our insecurities and fed from them.  Gosh I wish someone had told me about gripe water back then, it sure would have come in handy!  Finally we were able to put him to sleep by standing with him, rocking back and forth to the music we'd listened to most frequently when he was in the womb.  My husband and I both felt sorely lacking on that first night.  Luckily with tons of prayer and lots of advice we realized we could raise this beautiful boy.  There are still frequently times of semi panic, but we're learning as we go.  I decided to write this blog to help catalogue my thoughts, hopes, dreams, and memories so they won't be forgotten or overlooked in the future.  So here is the story of my family as we grow.