What to Expect When You're Not Expecting (part 2)

What to Expect When You're Not Expecting (part 2):

An Open Letter to the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology

Waiting Rooms with Pregnant Women. It sucks as big as it sounds.

Pity Party, Table of One

 Infertile Myrtles are Still Normal People Too

This week has been rough. I haven't felt like blogging because nothing has really happened with our adoption for a few months. When we go through these lulls, a lot of feelings and emotions rise to the surface that you forget about when you're too busy to care.

Christmas was quiet. I reluctantly decorated & we watched a few holiday movies. To be honest I didn't feel like celebrating. We bought a present for Baby Masch, though, & enjoyed quiet times with the K-Bears. Our inward hopes were that this would be our last Christmas as a family of 2, but I think we were too afraid to voice that sentiment out loud.

Two years. I've successfully avoided my gynecological health for two years. I figured the 1/2 year I spent being poked, prodded & looked at inside & out during 2012 would give me a pass from Well Woman exams for a while. Well, late last year I chided myself for neglecting my personal health & thought of all the various forms of cancers I may have obtained since my last exam. I immediately sought a new GYN (because I didn't want to go back to my midwife...) & they scheduled me for my annual exam this week.

Blessedly, I forgot all about this appointment until last week. The reaction I had the day of my it came surprised me in a lot of ways & I realized the pain of infertility never goes away, even if I feel fine. I felt anxious, sad, depressed, uncomfortable & like I was going to puke all day. I prayed that I could get in & out as quickly as possible but as luck would have it that ended up not happening.

My doctor had to leave to deliver a baby so I ended up in the waiting room surrounded by excited couples & big bellies. It's really hard accepting your plot in life when what you want is completely surrounding you. I just wanted to go to each woman, each husband, & tell them to cherish what they have. To not take it for granted & be HAPPY. I realized my eyes were stinging so I pulled out my paperback & blocked out the chatter, the pregnancy magazines & the TV playing a loop of baby advice. When the nurse called me back I all but ran into their back office & avoided as much eye contact as possible.

So here I sat. Staring at this table & reading my paperback, again, to distract myself from the woman in the next room complaining to her doctor about back pain, when her baby would get here, etc.

The nurse came back to enter information into their system & take my blood pressure. (Which was high at this point.) With her back to me, she went through the list of routine questions about my cycle, last exam, & how mild-to-severe my cramps usually are. Eventually, she came to the question I dreaded:

"Are you currently on any form of birth control?"

I responded with a simple "no" & without skipping a beat she followed up with, "Do you use any other forms of contraception?", in which I responded again, "no."

Her next question, "Would you like to speak with the doctor about prescribing birth control?", was answered with another "no" by me so she followed that up with, "Should you become pregnant do you have a plan in place or would you care to discuss options with the doctor?" (Or something like that...my eyes were stinging again & my thoughts were screaming in my head.)

When I responded negatively this time she finally turned in her seat & asked if I cared to elaborate. (Again, my focus was on keeping my cool & not crying in front of this woman so I don't exactly remember her precise wording.)

To those who know me well enough, or have gotten to know me through this blog, you know I have a unique way with words (I'm trying to be nice about myself here) but I tend to lean on the edge of being too blunt on most occasions.

As calmly as I could, I replied: "I was diagnosed infertile two years ago. Needless to say, if I get pregnant I think I'd be OK with it."

The nurse paused, realizing her error, & turned back to her computer without pressing the subject. After an uncomfortable moment of silence she said (still not looking at me) "Miracles happen every day..." I explained to her that I was adopting & her response was "Then you're going to be blessed either way."

I wanted to write all of this to simply explain that Infertile Myrtles have to go to the Gyno, too. We aren't all pregnant or waiting to be pregnant, we're normal people who shouldn't feel ostracized because you're basically a baby factory all day, every day. Just because we can't procreate doesn't mean our uteruses & cervixes don't need attention. Furthermore, read all the freaking questionnaires & forms I had to fill in stating (in detail) my infertility diagnosis & declining birth control consult.

I think the word I'm looking for here is: Sensitivity.

It sucks being angry & feeling like damaged goods...or feeling like you don't belong. The worst is being pitied.

...especially when you pity yourself. Which is what I've been doing this whole time. 

So I'm going to quit that for now. 

I'm grateful for friends who encourage me to blog & share my story. Since we started this blog I have heard so many stories of other couples suffering through infertility & child-loss. It's been therapeutic to know so many of you have found hope & strength in numbers. It's goes a long way when we realize we aren't walking alone. 

The adoption process is hard. I don't think we were completely prepared for this emotional roller coaster but I hope we're doing an OK job at it. We don't know how much longer we have to wait, but we've made it 10 months & wait 10 more if necessary. 

Lots of Love,

B

 

Nine Months & Counting

Today marks 9 months we have been on the waiting list for our adoption.

There are definitely opportunities for bitterness to seep into my heart when we think about what 9 months means...

...if I were pregnant I would have a baby by now

When in reality, if I were to get pregnant I would have a 4 year old by now.

I can see a difference in my attitude towards infertility when I stop negative thoughts and redirect my thinking to the positive. I'm not saying I'm always successful in redirecting my thoughts. I have my fair share of pity parties, but one, two, three years ago the difference is that I would stay in my pity parties & struggled to cope through the pain & unfairness of infertility.

Kevin & I regularly discuss the idea of having a kid in our house. What will that look like, sound like, feel like? It's just been the two of us for so long, we can't imagine having someone else to talk to or play with. I won't even go into conversations like...what will he or she look like???

We still get depressed. We still H-A-T-E waiting. We still grieve. We still hope...& that's the difference. We haven't given up & know there is an end to this period of our lives.

Realizing that nine months has passed has brought excitement to our lives in some ways. I actually want to finish our nursery, even if that means staring at an empty crib for months. We've starting to buy cutesy things like these:

 

This might not seem like a big deal to any of you, but it's monumental to us. We've spent years avoiding children's aisles, the baby department in Target, but now we feel ok to buy stuff like this.

 

The Wait is a roller coaster & a test of endurance. People ask us every day how we deal with it, what we do. Well, we stay busy. We work on projects around the house. We go to concerts, go hiking, watch movies, hang out with friends. I read and write every day. Kevin takes amazing photos of the moon and nature. We spoil our puppies rotten. It's these things that keep us going.

 

I'm currently reading a book & it mentioned grief in a brilliant way. In Jonathan Tropper's How to Talk to a Widower, the main character Doug lost his wife unexpectedly the year before & he struggles with life after losing his spouse. (It's actually quite a funny read. Not as depressing as it sounds.) At one point he is speaking to his stepson's guidance counselor & she says this to him:

 

"You didn't invent grief. My shrink once told me that...

The point is, people become possessive of their grief, almost proud of it. They want to believe it's like no one else's. But it is. It's exactly like everyone else's.

Grief is like a shark. It's been around forever, and in that time there's been just about no evolution. You know why?

"...Because it's perfect just the way it is."

 

In any unfortunate situation we have the capacity to let grief consume our lives. We have the right to be angry & feel self-righteous, but at the end of the day it just feels tiresome. All I can do is learn from my grief, rely on others & trust that eventually it'll get better.

 

Hopefully we won't have to keep waiting much longer, but if we do it's all going to be ok.

 

...thanks for letting me vent. :)

 

-B



So many ways to help!

During National Adoption Month there are TONS of ways to get involved with adopting families or support children in need!

I have talked about the sweet folks at Sweet Sleep before & I just love how they help kids in foster care as well as orphans in countries like Haiti & Russia. If you feel like giving financially to them, or donating items they could use to send to kids go here: Sweet Sleep
 In their shop they have tons of handmade goods & apparel that benefit their cause OR you can give a one-time or recurring donation to help them out!

If you want to go good & receive something fashionable in return, you NEED to visit Subsidy Shades.

Selling sunglasses to help fund her adoption, Melissa's fundraising idea took off & now she sells shades to help other families. Seriously, their glasses are so cool! They're affordable & I think your loved ones would love to find some in their stockings this year. Go here to order: Subsidy Shades & follow them on all of your social media accounts including Pinterest!

{{insert shameless plug here}}

You can still order tee's here: Love Found Us Tee's to help us raise fund for our adoption! Every little bit helps. Thanks for supporting #teamBabyMasch!!


Love - Brooke

World Adoption Day!

Today marks the first observance of World Adoption Day!

Like us, there are so many families waiting to adopt & so there are so many kids around the world waiting for a home. 

We would be HONORED if you ordered one of our adoption t-shirts today! Not only would it help us provide the funds needed to bring Baby Masch home, but it is a great conversation starter too! So many people have given us feedback about wearing their tee's out & about & the questions they get as to the meaning of "Love Found Us". Hopefully it gives you an opportunity to talk about adoption & bring awareness to your friends going through the adoption process. (Plus, they are SUPER comfy!)

You can order the t-shirts here: "Love Found Us" Tees!

Keep spreading the word & send us photos if you already have a tee. 

Lots of Love - B&K 

National Adoption Month!



Today marks the beginning of National Adoption Month! 

During the month of November we're hoping you'll join us in celebrating adoption & praying for our future placement.

As we begin our 8th month on the waiting list we are hopeful, prayerful & optimistic that Baby Masch is on his or her way soon!

There are a few things happening this month that we wanted to announce:

First off, due to popular demand & to celebrate National Adoption Month, we have decided to sell more Love Found Us tees to help us raise money for our adoption.

So many of you have sent us photos of you in your Love Found Us tee. It's been awesome to see how excited you are about our adoption!

 

Now through November 15th, we're taking orders on my Etsy store under the adoption fundraiser section. Tee's are going to be printed on a soft, charcoal shirt & cost $25. Sizes available in XS-3X.

We're excited about this new color & hope you guys like it!

Check it out here: www.brookesbeads.etsy.com

Please tell your friends about our t-shirt sale! I can't wait to see more of you lovelies representing Love Found Us!!! 

The other thing we wanted to talk about is WORLD ADOPTION DAY!

November 9th is the first ever World Adoption Day & Brooke is an ambassador! We're raising awareness & celebrating domestic & international adoption. If you want to show YOUR support simply post a photo like this little guy with a smiley drawn on your hand...

Use the hashtag featured above, tag me & Kevin (@itsbrookemasch / @kevinmasch) & let everyone know how COOL adoption is. There is tons of info on their website: www.worldadoptionday.org Check it out & apply to become an ambassador too!

Here's to an excellent month! We're so thankful for YOU!

Lots of Love - Brooke & Kevin 

What To Expect When You're Not Expecting (part 1)

This post goes out to all the Infertile Myrtles out there...

I've been reading a lot of posts about infertility and decided to join in on the movement that's now affectionately known as Fertility Fridays. It can be extremely hard to live with infertility but I don't believe it's anything we should be ashamed of. If you're struggling with it or think you may be infertile I would love for you to connect with me so we can talk about it. The best thing I have found when dealing with infertility is that there's strength in numbers and nothing is too hard to bear when you're holding someone else's hand.

What to Expect When You're Not Expecting

I don't think I'm alone in saying that when you decide to start having kids you go into it thinking that it'll be the easiest thing in the world. People get pregnant every day but as the months go by and you aren't getting pregnant, niggling doubts pop up in your mind and begin to fester. Early on, I really didn't know anyone else who had problems conceiving so there were a lot of times when I felt completely lost. I don't claim to have all the answers when it comes to fertility treatments or testing, but this is my story...

It'll Happen...Right?

My husband and I decided to start trying for kids about 3 years into our marriage. We really didn't worry about it after the first couple of months but once months 6,7, and 8 came along we started to get impatient. I really believe you should talk to a doctor after a year of TTC (trying to conceive). If you have a gynecologist you can trust, they won't immediately force medications on you to help you get pregnant. I found out when we received our final diagnosis that a drug like Clomid would not work for me, so I'm grateful for my doctor's wisdom early on advising against wasting money on pointless treatments. *more on that later

After we tried for a year, we started researching on our own different reasons for infertility, ways to improve your chances of getting pregnant, etc. It's tricky at this stage in the game to NOT become obsessed with your struggle. It can become maddening to try and try and try to make something happen. It consumed me and affected my daily life. I had no reason to doubt my ability to become pregnant so I started buying ovulation kits, I changed my diet, took prenatal vitamins, worked out and read up on every blog or book I could find about methods for conceiving. Despite all my efforts, things weren't happening.

I gave up on my gynecologist and started seeing a Nurse-Midwife who, despite not knowing anything about infertility, worked tirelessly to help find answers for me. She recommended a book called Taking Charge of Your Infertility that was extremely helpful explaining not just conceiving but natural birth control, and understanding the female reproductive system. One of the methods for planning and preventing pregnancy is to chart your temperatures to gauge when you're ovulating. My Midwife suggested I chart my temperature for at least six months so she could get a good idea on what my body was doing. *please take note that I had already peed on hundreds of sticks every morning hoping to learn whether I was ovulating or pregnant. I wasn't looking forward to another six months of testing, but I was willing to try anything. Once I started charting, I kept my thermometer on my bedside table, mapped out my temps and went on with my day. After three or four months I had pages of line graphs mapping my body's temperature and still no clear answers. At my six month check-up she decided that my results were inconclusive but it appeared that I wasn't ovulating normally.

When you get to this point I believe you have a few options:
1.) Move on and come to terms with the unknown. You might get pregnant one day but you might not. Change your priorities, consider it a closed door and carry on.
2.) Continue testing. Seek a specialist to further test any problems you're having with conceiving.
3.) Talk about alternative ways of becoming parents (IUI, IVF, surrogacy, fostering, adopting).

If You Don't Know What an RE is, Then You're Probably Fertile

We decided to go with option #2 and I can proudly say that I am lucky to have a husband that wasn't embarrassed to get tested. It's a sensitive thing to talk about with men, but you have to remember if you're both wanting to get pregnant YOU ARE A TEAM. There shouldn't be embarrassment to get tested (for men or women).  This type of shame reflects the idea that we live in a society where it's normal to conceive and you're abnormal if you can't. Treat infertility like any other illness or disease. You shouldn't ignore it and you should want to know what's going on in your body.

We sought out a Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE) next and began what would become a 10 month process of diagnosing our fertility. It sounds super scary but here's what you need to keep in mind when you visit an RE:

Their sole job is to help people conceive babies. There are many different methods to make this happen but a good RE will completely diagnose your health before prescribing treatments and alternative methods to pregnancy. Believe me, I asked if I could just take medicine or do an IUI at the very beginning but our doc was patient and said he wanted a clear picture of what was going on before he would make any decisions.

We were given a timeline of tests necessary for me to complete and started right away with blood work and ultrasounds. If there's one thing I can guarantee when it comes to fertility testing it's this: You will give TONS of blood and get poked and prodded in places where the sun don't shine every time you visit.

The Lupron Challenge Test came first, doesn't that sound exciting?! It's really not that fun. The LCT tests hormone levels and egg development/sustainability. You go in two days in a row, on the 1st day of your period (I'm not joking) give tons of blood, get a shot of Lupron (which makes you a crazy hormonal) and an uterine ultrasound (you want to stick what, where?!?!?!) More blood is given the following day and through all of this they can see how healthy your eggs are. *spoiler alert: I failed the Lupron Challenge.

A few weeks later I went into the hospital for a procedure where they took cameras and looked at my fallopian tubes, they sucked out a sample of my uterine wall and took a closer look at my ovaries.

Quick story: I'm in pre-op when Nurse Ratched comes to my bed and goes through my file. She quickly tells me that my doctor is en route so we will get going pretty soon. Before walking away she adds, "oh good news! You're not pregnant. Your pregnancy test came back negative!"

People can be really insensitive.

What Happens Now?

When we received our final diagnosis we were told that we would have less than 1% chance of conceiving naturally and 50% if we went with other alternative options. It was extremely hard to hear initially but I'm glad we have the results because it helped us move on. What did we do after we received the news? We took a trip. We went to visit friends and toured some National Parks and took time away from the world to absorb our diagnosis. I guess you never know how you will handle a situation until you're in it. I can tell you I've never felt grief like I did when we first found out. It really sucks and it doesn't stop sucking.

After a lengthy bit of time we had a talk about kids. Did we still want them? How would we have them? Then we took more time to dwell on alternative means to parenting. Let me just say there is no right or wrong answer here. You have to do what's good for your family and not worry about what the everyone else says. I wanted to still be a mama but realized I don't need to carry a child or even be biologically related to him or her to be one. Throughout our entire journey we agreed that we would make all of our decisions as a team and if 1 of us vetoed an idea then we would drop it and move on to something else.

When we started the adoption conversation we both felt at peace about moving forward. I knew that no matter what we would fulfill our desires to parent by adopting a child who needs a home. We sought advice from friends who adopted and eventually chose an agency that we felt comfortable with. Even though we have chosen to adopt and I CANNOT WAIT TO ADOPT it still hurts to think that I can't have a biological child.

So if you're in the middle of the infertility struggle and don't know what to do next, just take it one day at a time and keep breathing. Talk to someone about it. Talk to ME about it. If I'm useful for anything it's an endless supply of funny YouTube videos and motivational photos on Pinterest. It'll get easier...I promise.

Lots of Love,

Brooke

Perks! Perks! Perks!

Since our Indiegogo campaign ended last month we have been gathering up all the perks to send to our donors. This week we received the t-shirts & we can't wait for you to receive them!

For everyone who donated, keep a look out for a special delivery in your mailboxes!

Keep up with us on how much you like your perks & send us photos in your t-shirts so we can post them on a later blog. If you use social media, tag us or use #lovefoundus #BabyMasch #Adoption

As always, thanks for your continued support. The waiting is getting tough but we feel your love.

Lots of Love,

Kevin & Brooke