Belly Pic, Registry, and New Dr

I wanted to post my most recent belly pic.  This one was at 24 weeks.  Sorry it is a little dark.  This was the morning before we went and started our registry.  It was so overwhelming, but mostly just so exciting.  There were so many years where these stores were just another source of pain.  I thought that day would never come for me.  This time my husband and I were laughing and picturing our little one in all the cute stuff.  The only tears shed were happy tears. 

We also started the nursery recently!  I LOVE it!  Though right now there is just paint and a crib, it looks absolutely amazing to me!  In passing, I often have to just stop in and smile.  I promise to post some nursery pics very soon. 

Last Friday we met the other doctor that may deliver our little one.  The first one, we will call Dr Mu is awesome.  He has been doing it for many many years and actually has delivered over 7000 babies.  The other doctor, we will call her Dr. Me, I had heard from J is younger and new to the practice.  However, a lot of patients really like her.  Like...is an understatement!  We LOVED her!  I knew that she had a baby about 6 months ago and had often seen her throughout the office with her little boy.  I found out much more about her during our appt.  She too dealt with infertility.  She did IVF with the same dr I did.  She too hyperstimmed after her first retrieval.  She got pregnant after her frozen transfer.  We talked about how easy it is for other women, baby showers, and other infertility issues.  She said that she saw women get married, have their first child, have their second child...all the while she had been trying herself.  God love her to be able to work in that field while dealing personally with infertility!!  She related to me just like all of you do.  What is amazing is this woman may also get to deliver our baby.  Did I say I love her...?  :O)

It's Been Awhile

I am still here! The baby and I are just fine. I have 500 excuses why I have been gone, but they are just that...excuses. I am trying to catch up on all of your blogs.  Please do not think I have forgotten about any of you.  There is not one day that I do not continue to pray for each and every one of you.  I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas!


I still cannot believe that I am passed the "halfway" mark. The baby is kicking up a storm and it is fantastic! I love the little reminders that the baby is doing just fine. Here are some recent pics of the baby. Stubborn would definitely be a word that I would describe our child already. Our ultrasound took forever...not that I minded. I could look at those images all day. The baby had their legs all the way up at their head. They do not get this acrobatic technique from their momma!

I am going to promise to catch up on all your blogs now.  So sorry for being gone so long!!!

Baby Skeletor

Does it make me a bad Mom that I totally thought our latest baby pics were SUPER creepy!? Seriously, it was a couple days before Halloween (15 weeks) and I thought my babies costume was Skeletor! Now, I think the baby is still absolutely gorgeous and I will happily love my skeletor baby...but seriously it is undeniably creepy. I will let you be the judge....

What do you think?  Creepy...or just plain bad mother? :O)  J insited that this was all normal and all babies look like this right now and with shots straight on the face (not profile).  The other pics are of the babies hands and feet.  The baby was waving at one point.  I can just picture the baby waving and saying something like "Do you like my costume Mom and Dad!?  I worked really hard!  Sorry, I daydream a lot these days.
 
At one point during this visit the ultrasound technician (UT) turned the screen away from us.  My heart sank and my first thought was that something was wrong.  The UT and J were staring for what felt like forever, but was probably 10 seconds.  I anxiously asked if something was wrong.  The UT turned to J and asked if she was looking.  J said yes with a smile.  I said WHAT WHAT?!  Then J turned to us with a smile and said nothing, we were just finding out the gender.  WAIT, what!?  You just did what?!  OMG, someone out there knows the gender of our child!  No we have not changed our mind.  We still want to be surprised, but now know that someone out there knows...makes it sooo hard!  I instantly thought that it was a boy for them to know already they must have seen something.  J said, oh no we are pretty good and we can tell either way already.  She did say something later about the 20 week visit confirming so then I thought well maybe girl then.  Looks like we are continuing to get a surprise!  LOVE it!  Now let's hope J can keep her mouth shut :O)

Boy or Girl?

Long before IF was an issue I had always envisioned having a baby. Would it be a boy or girl? Who would they look like?  How would the labor be? Would I have a C-section? Will the baby be healthy? You know, all the questions we have all thought about. The one thing I knew, was I wanted to wait until we had the baby to find out if it was a boy or girl. This is a personal preference and I do not think there is anything wrong with finding out. I just feel that there are not enough good surprises in this life! I love the idea of everyone guessing. I love the idea of Jerry and I going back and forth with names up until the very end until we just see our baby and know. I love the idea of Jerry going out into the waiting room to tell our families It's a Boy! Or It's a Girl! Over the last few years this magical moment looked like something I would just dream about...that this would never happen.

That being said, I want to fill you all in on something that happened back at the time of our retrieval. As most of you know we had PGD done on our embryos. After 5 miscarriages our doctor felt there very well could be an embryo issue. It turns out he was right. Out of 22 embryos only 2 came back good PGD embryos. Because of OHSS, we had to postpone our transfer. In the meantime, I was emailed my PGD results. It lists out each embryo with an id # and then all of the chromosome abnormalities. It was quite alarming how many abnormalities there were. However, there was something else in the results that I was not prepared for either. Any of you out there that have had PGD testing or have researched probably know what I am about to say. Next to the embryo id....I could not believe it....there was the gender. I knew that PGD was also used for gender selection, but that was not why we chose it. I did not know that it was going to be in our results. Whether you find out in an ultrasound or wait until the birth of your child it is a pretty magical moment. Mine...was on an email while I was at work. One more special moment that IF took away from me.

I came home and was upset. Jerry could tell and asked what was wrong. I said, I know the gender of our babies. After being shocked and did not understand how, he immediately asked what they were. I told him that he did not want to know. He, very adamantly said yes he did. I said no you don't. Then explained, the moment I read those results they no longer became embryos. Yes, I believe these are babies at conception....but I was not expecting the feeling I had at that moment. I now saw their little faces. I now started to see different characteristics they would have. I started to see our two little babies everywhere. He agreed at that point he did not want to know. He did not want to get attached like I already had.  Because let's face it, our track record is not that great.

I thought of my dream as I talked about earlier. It did not matter at that point that it would not be a surprise anymore. This was way bigger. I could not imagine our lives without either one and having to wait months to have our transfer just intensified this feeling.

Everything changed once again when we had our ultrasound. There was only one baby. My heart did hurt. For the last several months I felt like I was the mother of these two children and not just embryos in a dish. The pain was replaced with joy to see that baby. Oh and the heartbeat...I still have not come down from that high. After all of these years of heartache I have come to the conclusion. God does have a plan for all of us..at times we may not see it...but I promise it is good!

I am sure that some of you may be saying it is easy for her to say, she is on the other side. However, as crazy as this sounds I am not sure I would take away anything that we have been through. My husband and I are closer than we have ever been. I cherish life. I cherish every moment of it. I appreciate the things that once I just expected out of life. And when our baby is born, when we hold that baby in our arms, because of this journey I will truly know how special that gift is.

The day our baby is born...I will still be getting my magical moment...boy or girl. Since there is only one baby I no longer know the gender. Tell me that God does not have a plan :O)

13 weeks

Here is an ultrasound pic from 13 weeks...

I hontestly do not think I have ever seen an ultrasound pic of the baby facing down like this.  The dr said they baby looked great.  I am actually not going to go back for two weeks this time instead of one week.  My bleeds are completely gone for now, so that is awesome.  It was strange not going to see the baby this past Friday, but I realize I have been very spoiled.  I can go two weeks when I know so many women only get to see their baby a couple of times in an entire pregnancy.  Doesn't make me miss them any less though.

There was a request for a baby bump pic.  This was at 13 weeks.  Not much of a bump.  More like a gut.  I think this week the bump is starting to appear a little more.  I will try to take another bay bump pic soon.  Not sure I will ever give a bare belly pic.  I have quite a few bruises from my Heparin shots.  Maybe down the road I will, just so I can record it and show the baby someday.

I am 14 weeks now..still cannot believe it.  Every day I thank God.  I am still praying everyday for each and every one of you that are still waiting on your miracle.  Love you all....

12 weeks

Once again, I have been slacking.  For some reason I am having all kinds of problems downloading more than one pic to a post.  Anyone else having this problem?  I guess I will have to make a couple different posts to fit the different pics.
Baby at 12 weeks....

Baby was putting on quite a show this day.  The babies legs were crossed and their arms were up by their head.  It made me think of someone just chillin in a hammock with their arms back behind their head.  I choose to believe that the baby was saying I am doing just fine in here Mom and Dad.  You do what you need to get ready for me, but I am doing just fine. 

The Cat is Out of the Bag...or Baby

So now I have really been slacking with the posts.  Sorry!  Where do I even begin?!  First and foremost our baby is still growing healthy and strong.  Thank you God!  Here are pics from our last two ultrasounds. 

This one was at 10 weeks.  The baby started waving and moving their legs.  It looked like baby was putting on quite a show for Mom and Dad!  That was the first time we saw the baby move.  Amazing!

This one is at 11 weeks.  The quality is not as good and the baby actually looks a little smaller, but boy look at that profile.  This was my first external ultrasound.  I have to say not having to drop my pants all the way....awe-some!  Oh and the goo...it is not THAT cold!  :O)

Other big news!!!  The cat is out of the bag!  Our families now all know the good news.  I never thought this day would come.  It is still so surreal!    After every time we announced it, I was first elated, and then ...it would creep in.  That doubt...that anxiety...that thought that now I have jinxed everything.  This is my last week in the first trimester.  You would think I would be able to relax a little bit.  Not a chance.  I still feel like everyday this gift is going to be taken away from us.  I hope that someday soon I will be able to just celebrate this life growing inside me.  However, after everything I am not expecting that to happen until the baby is in my arms.  Then we have a whole different level of worry!!

We made a video ( that for some reason I cannot get on here)that we showed almost everyone.  We said something along the lines of check this video out.  The first slide said INTRODUCING.  The second slide said BABY MILLER.  The third slide was a picture of the baby.  I believe we certainly surprised them all!  There was not a shortage on tears!
On two of the ultrasound pics I asked the ultrasound technician to write Hi Grandma and Grandpa on the screen.  She so kindly obliged.  I found a frame for both set of grandparents.  The quote said...  Just when you thought your heart was full....along comes a grandchild.  We gave our parents them right after we showed them the video.  My Mom said that she says goodnight to the picture each night.  *sigh*
Last week we got another video.  The baby was moving all around!  I think we may have a dancer on our hands!  Lord, let the child have more balance and coordination than their momma!

I promise to write more often than I have.  I am still keeping up on all of your blogs...just slacking on my own!