A Milestone.... and a message

What milestone you may ask? Well one that I never thought I would be so happy about ...EVER..... but my surrogate finally got her cycle yesterday!!! This means we can finally get the calender on how they are going to line us up on our cycle dates and get this show on the road!!!

I will let you guys know when the nurse calls back and we finally have some dates.

In other news, yesterday morning I woke up and rolled over and grabbed my phone (which I do every morning). And I was looking at the emails that came in from overnight. Well to my surprise there was an email from someone named QBrezzy at aol. Now I do not know this person, but man she has a lot of nerve. she proceeded to tell me she thinks it despicable that I am "begging everyone for money" when I am not even willing to work myself. WHAT???? Excuse me??? Did you just send this to ME???

I was so angry, and then hurt and then like who is this? So I wrote her back, but just in case she reads here again. I wanted to just say this.....

You don't know me, and I don't know you. But if you did know me you would KNOW that I work a full time job tirelessly everyday of my life and always have. I also am actively looking for a part-time job and spend my weekends filling out applications for them to try to make this surrogate situation easier on us financially. You have no right, and it is none of your business to even question what I do or whether I have a job or not. And secondly I have NEVER asked a single person for money.... EVER. Some of my friends suggested I put the PayPal button on my blog, and some have even donated to help us- we have spent over $100,000 trying to have a child and that kind of money certainly does not come about with me sitting at home all day eating ice cream.

Please don't ever come back to my blog- this is a place for me and my husband to chronicle our journey to parenthood and for the people who love us to keep up with us.

Thank you to all of you who do love us, support us and p[ray for us. We feel the Lord working in all ways to bring a beautiful outcome out of this pain!

Love you all.....

My surrogate....

Sorry there has been a lull in me posting this post. Several of you have reminded me from my last post that I promised to post on my surrogate and some things that have been happening. So here it goes.

Let me begin by saying I so appreciate all of you who I had texted last week asking for prayer as we had to make some huge decisions on what to do. And by that I mean, our financial situation has become so stretched that I was seriously questioning if it was even reasonable to go forward. When I signed the surrogate agreement, we were going to use the donated embryos with her. But because of many factors (the KELL situation being just one) that I wont get into here, it has evolved into me going through another IVF cycle costing thousands that I really had not planned on. Not to mention the surrogate must get what is due her for her incredible kindness.

So for several days I had been in knots trying to decided what to do, what to say to her and all of that. The night before I spoke to her, I literally did not sleep a a wink!

Sooooo Sweetness and I prayed alot about it and I called her and we talked honestly about all the finances and some other things we were both hoping for out of this whole situation. I can not tell you how wonderful my surrogate is. I mean I told her if I had to handpick someone- I really could not have picked anyone better than her. She is a wonderful Christian, I feel as if our babies will be very safe with her. She is very sweet and very honest. She has 2 wonderful little girls, and a very nice supportive husband. She is young and healthy and has very healthy pregnancies and has been a surrogate before and knows what to expect! All of that together- she is just a perfect match for us.

So I spoke to her about these unforeseen financial pulls on us (the air conditioner at the house, my husband's car breaking down etc.) which has depleted the surrogacy fund dramatically. She was so kind and we came to a new more workable agreement that I feel like we can really do, and she still get everything that is due her. I wish I could pay her twice what we are. I truly feel like she deserves it, I actually told her I so wish I had met her at the beginning of this hard journey and we would have so much more money to give to her- but alas we cannot turn back the hands of time.

I really believe the Lord has orchestrated our meeting and this time in our lives. She is so happy to be able to give/ or try to give another family the gift of life and how can you ever repay that???

So then Saturday, I invited her and her girls out to lunch and then we went and got a pedicure together. Everyone kept asking us if we were sisters. It was funny because we both dressed in a black shirt and white Capri's!!! Totally not planned but fun nevertheless. It was nice to spend time with her outside of the clinic, and I hope to maintain our friendship even after the birth of our children.

So all of that to say, thank you for the faithful friends who prayed for us, and for continuing to stand in the gap for us as we still have so far to go. The Lord really did work it all out, and my stress level is much more manageable now.

Tonight is my monthly infertility group meeting. I really miss these ladies when we are not together, and I love getting together and sharing our stories.

Also Sweetness' birthday is Thursday!!! I cant wait to celebrate the most wonderful man I know, who is truly the biggest blessing I have ever received. I will post some pictures of his little party soon.....

And one last note about the cycle. I finished the pack of BCPs and of course never had a cycle. So tonight I start the next pack, and hopefully my surrogate will have her cycle next week and then I begin stimming. It is actually going to happen, slowly but surely. Love you guys...... Until next time.

A summer evening at Virginia Beach

Tonight we went to the beach and rode our beach cruisers on the boardwalk. With it being tourist season I was very reluctant to go down there and fight all the people, but it is something Sweetness has been wanting to do for a looking time- so we went.

When we got there we discovered there was a sidewalk chalk drawing contest. I took a few shots of some cute ones that you can see above.

Overall it was a very nice evening and a beautiful day out with Sweetness. Earlier today I went to lunch with my surrogate and I will be doing a completely separate post about that later tonight. I have lots to say bout that and our situation, so I will give it its own post :)

Enjoy this beautiful summer evening...... we did.

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Getting closer.....

So yesterday after yet another phone call with the clinic, we have a more definitive timeline as we approach the actual stimulation to get my eggs. I just finished my pack of BCPs, and will start another pack next Tuesday. Meanwhile, my surrogate is 1 and 1/2 weeks into her pack of pills, so in another week and half she will have her cycle, and then start another pack as well. When that happens I will begin stimming. So we are looking at starting stimulation in me about mid-June or so. That puts the egg retrieval about the beginning of July or so. So we are moving closer and closer, I feel like I have been treading water for so long now, its ridiculous.

So I was reading in the news today, that "Octomom" Nadia Sule.man's doctor will be stripped of his license. Not only for gross negligence in her case but also in 2 other cases of his patients that contracted ovarian cancer from fertility treatments. This got me thinking about something I have already thought about, but now rankly am worried about.

I have known these injections can not be good for you ovaries, and especially since I have done it now 3 times and am fixing to begin it for the fourth time!!! I remember asking my doctor about the risk and he said that doing fertility treatments may increase your risk from 1% to 2 or 3% chance of getting it with NO family history, which I do not have.

So this really will be the last time I ever do this- no matter the outcome- I can not put my body through this anymore.

This has been a great week actually at work. The students are still the same- but my boss has actually paid me a few compliments which I NEVER hear and it has made me at least feel acknowledged.

And today we are having our new King mattresses delivered!!!! I am so excited to sleep on them tonight! We even got a killer Memorial Day deal on new sheets at Macy's this weekend! Yoooo hooooo!!!!!

Thanks for the prayers and for hanging in with us in this long journey!

Happy Friday!!!

I can not tell you how happy I am to see this friday of this very long week!! I hope you all enjoy it and have a really wonderful Memorial Day holiday this weekend.

So why was this week so hard, it wasn't really hard per say but I did experience some weird emotions.

Last Friday evening at 530pm my grandfather from my father's side passed away kind of unexpectedly. My parents divorced when I was like 5 but my father left when I was a mere 9 months old. So to say this side of my family and I were close that's not really true, however I have made many efforts in my life to do what these adults should have done all along. But to no avail, it was always strained and very controlling side of the family.

So when I got the word from my father (of which I also am not extremely close) it brought an onslaught of unexpected emotions. Mainly I think because of all the could-have-beens and wishes from a child's view that maybe have never really fully been healed.

Today is the burial in Quantico, VA and I will not be attending that part, but I do hope there is peace in the family after his death and that my grandmother lives many more years of happiness..... One day I also hope the little girl in me longing to be accepted by my dad's family
will be completely healed.....

Rest in peace Grandad.....
and Happy Memorial Day weekend everyone!!!!

Not much news right now

As my title says there is not much going on right now. My surrogate and I are both on birth control pills. But we will be on them longer than I had hoped or envisioned because of several reasons. The main one is because my surrogate was on a birth control patch trial at our medical school, and she basically had break through bleeding much of the month on that patch. So when she finally was able to with drawl off the trial, my doc did and US and said her lining was too thin to just jump in. So he wants her on a full pack of BCPs and then have a cycle, and then we will get going.

I am just feeling so badly on these BCPs and if I ask for them to be changed then it would only further prolong this whole thing. So I suffer through and lay down most evenings, and Sweetness is exactly that Sweet. He loves me and boy do I love the way he loves me. He takes such wonderful care of me and I am so grateful I get to walk through this life and this adventure with him.

I will post later this week about a few events of the last week, that really have nothing to do with IVF or babies exactly, but important nonetheless.

Blessings to you this week, and my thoughts and prayers are with those of you in Joplin, MO and others devastated by these horrible tornadoes this week. Lord be merciful to them please.

Love you guys!!!!

moving along....

So I am teaching my class this morning and I let them out on a break, and I see I have a missed call from my clinic. Shoot! Of course I miss THAT call! Well after I listened to the message I was even more panicked. Dr. O left the message himself, and he asked me to call him back right away. Can't. Be. Good.

So I called him back right away, and to my great surprise, he did not have bad news!!!! Yeah for small miracles. He even said himself that he is happy to be calling me for once with good news..... that's when you know you have been doing infertility treatments too long..... lol

So anyway, he told me the surrogate's testing came back fine and we are ready to roll!!! So the coordinator will call me today and give me the calender for myself and my surrogate, and she will start the pills today. I have already been on them for a week.

I am very happy to say the least!! So we will be getting our meds filled and be on our way. By the way, they did find Lupron in the country for us to have to regulate our cycles. Awesome!!!

So that is our update- all systems go and I could not be more thrilled! Thank you Lord for lining all this up for us!

Until next time.....