Sunday, June 30, 2013

A June Lookback

I'm way late I know and the month will expire in a few short hours, but Junes have been the months of endings and startings for so long that I wanted to look back through my last few Junes.  It's been a pretty impressive turn around.

Way back when...when I was 18-23 years old, every June meant the same thing...The Start of Summer Camp!!  I was a camp counselor and director and I loved, loved, loved my time at camp.  It really helped shape the person I am today.

Then, I went to medical school and Junes meant the end of a year of medical school and advancing to the next year from the classroom lectures to the clinical rotations in the hospital.  I never did see a 4th June in medical school since I graduated in May.

On to Internship and Residency and this is where the story gets interesting.

June 2009.  Fresh out of medical school.  Starting residency.  So excited and so nervous and happy.  Living in a new apartment in Virginia, just CJ and me.  That summer we also celebrated our 1st year wedding anniversary.

June 2010.  Finish Intern year.  Great year that flew by.  Have lots of new friends.  Decide to start trying after a ski trip in March.  Not successful our first month.  AF arrives early in June, but it's still so early in the game.  Little did we know that this was the month that we conceived our angel baby.  Still so happy and naive.  Life is good.  It gets even better in July when we find out that we are pregnant.  Then, it gets way, way worse when we have a missed miscarriage and two D&Cs at the end of August/beginning of September.

June 2011.  Still not pregnant, but trying so so hard.  Guess who is pregnant though and already out of the 1st trimester, my sister.  About to move on to a RE for the first time after 3 failed cycles of clomid.  Complete a mindfulness course that starts to help the healing process.  So sad, frustrated, angry, sad, sad, sad.

June 2012.  Pregnant with twins!!  What a difference a year makes.  After our first IVF cycle in January.  We are expecting a boy and a girl in September/October.  We cross the viability threshold this month.  I continue to have frequent contractions at work, but my cervix stays long and closed.  I'm nervous about the babies, but so happy and grateful and loving feeling their kicks and hearing their heartbeats and seeing my ever-expanding belly.  Little did we know what we were in for this fall when we delivered our little eagles at 38 weeks and 1 day by c-section.  Our lives were forever changed that day.  We have been falling in love with them ever since.

June 2013.  I am a few weeks shy of completing my residency and as I type this my babies are sleeping in the nursery next door.  I am so in love with my little eagles and couldn't be happier.  They have helped me to heal and for my heart to expand.  I am a better person for knowing them.  Life is so so so good.  And I am so thankful for my wonderful husband who is nothing short of amazing.

What an amazing journey so far!!

Here's the linkup to PAIL.  Here!! 

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Time Warp Tuesdays

I had some rare extra free time this morning and I thought I would participate in my First Time Warp!!  Here's the link for more info and participants in the Time Warp Tuesdays.   http://bereavedandblessed.com/projects-regular-series/time-warp-tuesdays/ 

This month's topic is Decisions.  This is the post I wrote a year and a half ago about the rather quick decision we made to pursue IVF.  

http://rainbowmaking101.blogspot.com/2011/11/happy-thanksgiving.html

The day after that post, I went in for my CD3 ultrasound and talked to my RE about IVF.  She was wonderful and after a short talk with her, I realized that CJ and I had made the best decision already.  My RE talked about a study in which women were given either clomid for three months or went straight to IVF and the women who went on to IVF first, got pregnant faster and ultimately spent less money.

In the days and weeks following that post, I remained very excited about IVF and hopeful.  The anticipation really did help keep depression at bay for over the holiday season.  I also continued to see my therapist frequently and that provided a whole new layer of support.

Our IVF cycle started in January and by February we found out that we were pregnant with twins who were born on October 3, 2012.

By Thanksgiving of this year, we were celebrating with our new babies and it was a Happy, Happy Thanksgiving indeed!

The decision to do IVF came up all of a sudden.  Throughout the fall, CJ had said that we would do 2 IUI's and then take a break for awhile.  When AF arrived after IUI #2, I was devastated and desperate.  I so, so badly wanted to be pregnant.  I also wanted to be efficient and I knew that I wasn't getting any younger.  Armed with statistics and the financial info, I approached CJ and brought up the topic of IVF.  My argument for was basically go big or go home and our clinic had fantastic numbers for someone my age and we could do the guarantee program which gave us 4 fresh cycles + all of the frozen cycles that we could do and we either had a baby at the end or we got our money back.  I was worried that if we waited until I finished residency and fellowship that I would be 32 and the statistics were not as good.  My other money-saving argument in favor was that if I did get pregnant and we had a baby while I was in residency, then all of my prenatal appointments and hospitalizations with delivery would be 100% covered...and that would save us a ton of money.  I don't really know why CJ gave in so readily, but I am forever thankful that he did.  Maybe I'll even get him to write about how he made this decision some day.  Overall, I think it was one of the most important decisions that we have ever made and I am so thankful.  It brought us our twins, our little eagles!!

Saturday, June 8, 2013

To try again????

So we are home from the beach and I'm scheduled to get my Mirena IUD placed on Wednesday and all I can think about is do I want another baby and should we just not try and not try not to and see what happens.  It's totally crazy that I feel this way.  I really need to work out my feelings on the matter and have a nice long discussion with CJ, but for now I wanted to start the ball rolling on my blog.  Now, it's out there and I have to actually address my feelings rather than pretend they don't exist and just go ahead with the scheduled Mirena.

Not really sure what brought this on or what really lies ahead for us.

I do know that I love the little eagles and CJ and our little family has filled me to the brim.


Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Vacation with twins...sans husband

Greetings from the beach!!  Well last year at this time I was craving the beach and couldn't go and this year I'm here with the little eagles.  Unfortunately since the babies were sick for a week straight last month, CJ used all of his vacation time up except for one day.  He drove up with us and stayed through Monday, but now he is back at work. So, it's me, the little eagles, my parents, my sister and her family.  It is still awesome, but we miss "papa."

Going on vacation with twins is exhausting but totally great.  The babies love the pool and we go every night just before bedtime and its great.  Baby boy really likes the beach.  He loves playing in the waves and eating sand.  Baby girl needs to be held more and doesn't like wearing her hat but I'm hoping she warms up to it.  It has also been great taking lots of long walks with my mom and sister and the kids.  We've been making dinners every night except for going out to pizza on the first night and going out for seafood for our first lunch so it's been nice and relaxed.  I'm still breastfeeding and at any moment you might find me offering my babies some boob juice strait from the source...at the beach, sure why not...on the couch with everyone else running around, definitely...in our bedroom trying to get them back to sleep, only as a last resort ( and don't tell CJ.)

Okay we'll we're off to the beach now.