The Struggle and then Reward

I am pregnant with baby #2!!! When we got pregnant with Jocelyn, we may have felt that it was so hard but this time, we really did have one hard road to go down in order to become pregnant. Here is our story on how we struggled and struggled, but in the end we finally reached the greatest reward.

So back when Jocelyn was 15 months old (november 2014) we decided that we wanted to start trying to have another child. If we got pregnant soon, we would be fulfilling our plans of having a child every 2 years. I had gotten my birth control removed a few months earlier knowing that we were going to start trying soon and I wanted to be sure all the hormones were out of me before we started trying. We were ready to go and thought for sure a few months of trying we would be pregnant just like what happened with Jocelyn. Boy were we wrong. 

Month, after month passed by and I kept getting mother natures lovely monthly present and every month that this happened, my heart became more and more heavy. I felt complete guilt that I could not get pregnant and make Jocelyn a sister. I hated that the longer time goes on the father apart in age Jocelyn and her sibling would be and it made me hurt inside. I have always been super super close to my older sister so it made me feel so sad that Jocelyn would not have a sibling close in age to be this close to as she grew up. The part that made it hardest was watching Jocelyn go up to other babies around us and want to give them sweet little kisses on the forehead, and pats on the head and talk to them in the sweetest little voice. She was so ready to become a sister, and she would be a great sister but I could not give her that gift despite how hard I was trying.

 After 9 months of trying to get pregnant I was told I had an abnormal pap smear and had to go through a minor surgery to get this corrected. The worst news about this was that I was told I would probably have to stop trying to conceive for 9-12 months! My heart broke into a million pieces sitting there on the doctors table when they told me that news. I never cry in front of people but that news was so shattering that I just broke down crying in front of the doctor. I was embarrassed but there was no stopping the tears. The doctor was understanding and explained how the surgery would work and the baffling part to me is that this problem I had to get surgically fixed was NOT the reason I couldn't become pregnant. I thought we had come to the answer of why becoming pregnant was not happening but the doctors reassured me over and over that this was not the answer. 

Once finding out this was not the answer of why we couldn't get pregnant, I had a very hard time coping with anything. I had to get this surgery done, I couldn't try and get pregnant for 9-12 months after the surgery AND after we could finally start trying we were not guaranteed to get pregnant quickly because this was not the answer on why we were not getting pregnant. It was all too much. But I went forward with the surgery.

 (about this time I was given the news that my dad had cancer, so life was just throwing me every curve ball it could)

A few weeks after the surgery at my follow up doctors appointment, my doctor came in and told me some great news. The first great news I have heard in a while between my dads cancer and my infertility problems. She said that the surgery was so successful and that I would only need to wait on trying to conceive for 3 months rather than the 9-12 months they originally told me. I was so excited about that news! I then asked her since I have been trying to have a baby for so long if they could do some tests on me to determine what exactly is preventing that from happening. She told me that she wanted me to keep trying for a bit longer without testing. Her exact words was that they don't do testing until someone has been trying for 2 YEARS!!!! And here again I was feeling frustrated. All I want is to get pregnant!!! Why wont the doctors do testing on me. I am requesting it so why wont they do it. Why do I have to keep trying longer. 2 years is an awful long time to be trying when you just have a gut feeling that something isn't right!!!

Jon and I decided that we were done going to that OB/GYN and started to look for a new doctor. We waited our 3 months of not trying and got the clear to start trying again from the old OB, but as soon as we were cleared, we went searching for a new one. The problem is that there are not very many options where we live and the options we did have, we did not hear very many good reviews about those doctors. So we felt stuck again. We were faced with the decision of: do we just go to a mediocre doctor and hope they do something for us or do we keep searching for a doctor that everyone loves. We finally made the decision to go see a mediocre doctor because at this point we were done waiting. But as soon as I made that appointment, I was talking to a friend on the phone one night and she recommended her doctor who has helped many of her other friends overcome their fertility problems. This was like an answer to our prayers. I quickly called this doctor and made myself an appointment and cancelled my other appointment at the mediocre doctors office. 

Jon and I went into the appointment not very hopeful of the doctor listening to us and thought he would just turn us away like our other doctor saying you are young, and healthy, you don't need any help.  That was the exact opposite of what actually happened though! The Doctor ( Dr. Huish) came in, sat down, listened to our concerns, and after that he told us that he wanted to help us. He could tell we have gone through a lot, and he believed he could help us out. After coming up with a plan, they drew some blood to run some hormone tests, and I was scheduled for an ultrasound to check on how everything looked inside me. We left feeling a huge weight lifted off our shoulders because we finally found someone to listen to us and do something for us!

The blood tests came back normal, which was a downer, but we still had an ultrasound to do so we kept our hopes up for the news of that test. The day came for the ultrasound and after the ultrasound I was seen immediately by Dr. Huish and he said he had bad news but he also had good news. He started with the bad news that I have what is called Poly-cystic ovarian symptom. (PCOS) This means that I have lots and lots of cysts on my ovaries preventing my ovaries from releasing an egg. This is the reason I was not getting pregnant because I was never ovulating! Hearing this news was like having a big bright light that turned on in my heart, I HAD AN ANSWER! I was not crazy thinking something was wrong with me. I know it was bad news but at that moment I felt like it was the best news ever because I was finally given a reason. Dr. Huish then told me that there was a way to fix this and get me ovulating and eventually become pregnant and that answer was a pill called clomid. 

I went and filled the perscription started taking it like he had told me to, and month one came and went. I did not get pregnant, Month 2 came and went I did not get pregnant. I told myself not to loose hope though because this medicine doesn't work right away. So month 3 came and I was late!!!

I told myself not to get excited yet because there were cycles that I would be 2 days late and then start my period. So I made myself not believe I was pregnant. But I did order some pregnancy tests so that I could test in a few days. After 2 days late I started to get excited that this might just be the month I finally got pregnant, but I couldn't bear telling Jon in case it was a fluke. Then 3 days came and I did not start, then 4, then 5, then on day 6 I finally got my pregnancy tests in the mail. I was almost certain i was pregnant at this point but since I never get any pregnancy symptoms, I was not 100% convinced. So I whipped out that test, dipped it in urine and waited 5 long, grueling, tedious minutes and when the timer went off I could not bring myself to look! haha. I was so nervous. I was either about to cry tears of joy or tears of sadness and I just could not look. I eventually did though and to my utter surprise....MY TEST WAS POSITIVE!!!!!!!!! I WAS PREGNANT. THOSE PILLS WORKED!!!

I wanted so bad to wait and tell Jon in a fun cute way that I was pregnant but at this point he has waited 1.5 years to hear that I was pregnant and I was too full of emotion to hide it from him that I just ran out of the bathroom test in hand and showed him. I practically threw the test in front of his face and blurted out I AM PREGNANT!! Then I started sobbing. He was sitting next to Jocelyn on the couch watching cartoons with her and he jumped up from the couch grabbed me hugged me, cried with me, kept looking at the test in disbelief, and we just cried together for a few minutes. We looked over at Jocelyn who was staring at us and she then asked "Mom, Dad are you ok?" We then picked her up and told her we were just really really happy and that nothing was wrong. 

I took 2 more tests the next 2 days to confirm that I really was pregnant, and every one of them came up positive. Our long long wait to become pregnant finally came to an end. We were pregnant, we were happy, and we finally get to give Jocelyn what she wants the most. To become a big sister!