24dp3dt Preggo...Sharp Edges of Rubble...Valleys of Peace

The last two days have been a whirlwind.  Food, friends, family, thankfulness.  Then yesterday we hit Epcot.  On principle, the mouse is not my thing.  I'm not a fan of any kind of faux fabricated festivities.  Especially when the entry fee for one person would pay for 6 days of my estrogen patches.  Besides, I prefer authentic, 'sneak up on you' beauty found in everyday life.  Regardless of the mouse, there was beauty to be found on the faux streets of the countries we visited.  My sweet niece kept seeking me out, she's a snuggler, and she growing so fast.  We had a big group, which meant a lot of different agendas, tons of waiting around, and wrangling of little people and handling of drunkish people.  My niece would come up beside me when there was distance between us and everyone else and lean in.  I talked with her about "enjoying the process" and how she will see days such as this very differently when she looks back on them from an adult place.  I also told her it's ok to feel her feelings now, whatever they may be. I couldn't dig into that with her, but I so mean to in the future.

We are only two days away from some uncharted territory that could be a sort of graduation day for hubby and I.  This ultrasound could actually be "normal" and could be the key that unlocks the door to many significant benchmarks along this road paved with hope.   

So if I hear the words "normal heartbeat" I think I will really be able to let some light into the place in my heart where I've hidden the hope, behind that giant bolder.  I actually feel fear at the thought of that hope taking over.  If that happens, and I feel my heart flooded with actual possibility, I am terrified that my wall of protection allowing me to take each step forward will come tumbling down, and then I will not be able to navigate around the sharp edges of the rubble, I will stumble over every bit of debris.  I feel like once I fall, once I am wounded again, once I bleed, once I feel the intensity of the pain that can come from losing my self in the hoping and believing, I feel that I will melt into something no one recognizes, something with no sturdiness, something without the strength to stand. I fear I will never be able to continue on this road.

So today, with this reality in my face, and this big moment coming in just a few wake-ups, I have to be brave.  I have to let God into the painful places, let Him heal each wound, and let him guide me through the rubble.  Maybe the light of the hope that I allow myself to feel will help me rise above the rubble, and glide over the sharp edges, and feel the happiness that my baby deserves?

There are many many weeks between Monday and the end of the first trimester.  It will feel like an eternity.  Lot's of time and space in between to feel my feelings...maybe completely freak out...maybe in between freak outs I will find little valleys of peace.  Maybe these valleys will be free of rubble, maybe instead there will be flowers and little white butterflies, or tall grass and sunshine.  

Symptom update: running a low grade fever...99.7.  It is making me miss a very important dinner date, with a very important, very sweet friend.  She insisted I skip it and rest.  I love her.  Fever could be a very normal thing according to the extremely reliable web info I read.  Also, the nausea is not constant, but its there.  Eating a snack that includes some sort of protein is helping.  Today my snack of choice was peanut butter and grahm crackers.  Yesterday it was those little foil wrapped Swiss cheese thingies with cheese its. We shall see what tomorrow brings.

20dp3dt...The Beta Breakdown

Had another blood draw yesterday.  My fabulous nurse agreed to add a beta. Got the results today.  They were really good. Here is the line up for my beta results thus far:

Beta 1: 11/13/13 8dp3dt  HCG....39.1

Beta 2: 11/15/13 10dp3dt HCG...189...doubling time 21.08 hours

Beta 3: 11/18/13 13dp3dt HCG...1046...doubling time 29.17

Beta 4: 11/25/13 20dp3dt HCG...17,000...doubling time 43.5

Yep, I've been to the beta base....I know my levels are high.  I'm preparing my heart for what that might mean.  Actually, who can ever really be prepared for what that could mean!  Even when you are an IVF momma, and every intentional act is documented.  I must also remember the soverign hand of My Jesus.  No matter what human decisions were made, I prayed the will of God over every single aspect of the process.  I believe that whom ever is growing under my heart is there because God is in control.  I also believe in loving them for how ever long I'm given.  Nothing is certain, we have a long way to go.  But that boulder that covers that place in my heart where the hope lives moved quite a bit today, about 17,000 bits to be specific!  

17-19dp3dt Do Not Be Afraid

This weekend my peace started to feel kind of in the background when compared to my fear.  I was camping with people I love, and don't see often enough.  Each of the ladies that I spent my time with are in different places on their journeys.  Some have walked where I've walked and have since seen the face of a baby to love forever.  Some are still lovingly waiting to see which path their journey will take them on. Others have no idea who I am, who I've been, or what this constant meal of patience pie, cautious cake, and sadness soup tastes like.  Each of them sweetly loved me just as I am this weekend.  I didn't have to work for it, I couldn't perform perfectly to earn it.  I didn't have to explain myself, I was just there, simply Cristy, in their presence, and I was thankful.  That was a gift from God because if I had to be present as celebratory carefree Cristy, I would have fallen flat on my face while attempting to "frolic freely".  The reason... I feel like that war I wrote about during my last post is still raging on.  My peace feels so far away, not gone entirely, but buried deep inside of me where I can barely feel it.  It's like I'm the princess, and I'm on all those mattresses, and the peace is the tiny pea, buried under layers and layers of fear and worry and doubt.  You see, I'm not sick enough, I haven't thrown up enough, my boobs don't hurt enough.  My humanity is grasping at any sliver of proof/data that this one is different than all the ones that came before.  I am fantasizing about asking my IVF nurse to pull another beta just so I can have something to go on until next monday.  That's right, I'm fantasizing/ practicing my speech....what will I say, what will my compelling argument be?  This is not the way I want to be feeling, this is not what I want my baby/babies to feel me feeling.  I want for them what God has for them, His sovereign peace.  I'm praying God will help me start mothering them now, and will settle His peace over my heart, so that it envelops them fully.  

I think I mentioned in an earlier post about the chapel we prayed in the Sunday before the ultrasound during the first cycle.  The chapel was dedicated to "Our Lady of Sorrows" also knows as Our Lady of LaSalette.  I felt drawn to that little chapel during mass tonight, and after communion we went to pray there again.  When I prayed, I asked that for that peace again.  When I looked up from my prayer, my eyes focused on the wall next to the cross where big, beautiful, golden letters read "Do not be afraid". I asked my hubby to remind me of those very words while we wait for next Monday to come.  He may not realize that I need to hear them spoken over me this week.  I invite you all to help me hear them in the deepest parts of my heart, all they way through the mattresses, so that peace envelops all of us in an undeniable way.

14dp3dt and 15dp3dt and 16dp3dt There is a War Going On

I'm sorry you haven't heard from me for a few days.  I've been chewing on something, and I'm going to attempt to capture for you in the meager attempt below. Here's the thing, we've got a really long way to go. I feel like there is no reason why I should have even an inkling of peace about this. But...somewhere in me, from somewhere new and unknown, do I dare say this out loud, I do have this strange soft peace in me about this pregnancy.  That's how I know my Jesus is present all the way through this journey. It's gotta be Him, how else can I explain that I have this peace that surpasses all human understanding.  

My "humanity" can't help but point out to to this sense of peace growing inside me that "my body has never protected a baby past 9 weeks".  It's like until I pass each of the "traumatic benchmarks" I've lived along this journey my humanity can't rest along side this other part of me that feels this foreign peace this time around.  Here are my traumatic benchmarks:

Traumatic Benchmark one: The Pregnancy Test Trauma 

1.  Yay!  We've already passed this one!  Every time I POAS and the line showed up a little piece of me started to heal.  There is still a shrine of pee sticks on our bathroom counter.  All lined up and meticulously labeled.  I owe you a picture of that, maybe if you see it you will understand just how broken I am in this area.  When I saw that faint line at only 7dp3dt, it was like God was launching a campaign to teach me to live a different story this time.

Traumatic Benchmark two: The Beta Breakdown

2.  This one is last weeks news...This is the week of the Beta testing... This little number means everything to a hopeless hopeful.  I only had two of these weeks under my belt.  The first one was deceptively comforting.  This second one has been out of this world awesome.  I know better than to let it mean everything.  I also know how to google to find the beta base, and have searched high and low to read what other people scored during the beta breakdown.  All of this information means almost nothing, but that doesn't stop me from devouring it like a family sized bag of sweet/salty chex mix (you know what I'm talking about!)

Traumatic Benchmark three:  Worried about Wandy....The First Ultrasound

3.  This is the next benchmark I am striving for.  12/2 at 3:15.  It feels like a million miles away, but really its right around the corner.  This is where my "human understanding" is currently at complete war with the "peace that transcends understanding".  In ten years, I have never had a normal pregnancy ultrasound.  The first one at 8 weeks, our baby Gabriel Murray Lafferty measured at 5-6 weeks.  The doctor said he saw a heartbeat, I started bleeding the next weekend.  The loss occurred at 9 weeks.  There were a few late periods, faint pregnancy tests, chemical pregnancies with clomid that followed.  We never again saw evidence of a baby in my uterus.   July 15, 2013 was the empty uterus scan from hell.  To be honest, if that is my experience again, I just might have to be done.  This girl just can't have another experience like that.  The fear that I have that history will repeat itself is at total war with the weird unfathomable peace that I am feeling.  I've never had even an inkling of this peace before.  I pray with everything I am that this peace wins this war.

Traumatic Benchmark four: A Dozen Weeks Sounds Like a Dream

4.  Reaching this benchmark will feel like graduation day.  The faith walk to this day is going to be long and arduous.  Between first ultrasound 12/2 and the 12 week mark is a little over 5 weeks.  Its over some rough terrain....terrain like Christmas, and LOTS of family time full of hopefulness and uncontainable excitement.  People may ask things about names and boy girl preferences and who might be the God parents.  Before that 12 week mark, these things feel like daggers.  Maybe that won't be the case this time, maybe that peace I'm feeling will envelope me and let me join them.  I'm going to start praying for that too.  No wonder regular preggo people keep pregnancy a secret until then.  This is another burden of IVF, the knowing right away, the people who are closest knowing too.  It's a thing.

So I'm going to have to think on what a plan to get through the benchmarks 3 and 4 might look like. With everything else in my life, if I can build a framework,  I think maybe I can hang some curtains that remind me to embrace this gift of peace. 

13dp3dt... Beta #3... Whoa!

Well friends, our third beta was awesome.  1046.  The beta didn't just double, its more than five times the 189 we got three days ago.  I'm thankful for the reassurance that provides. I'm trying not to get lost in what that could mean.  I'm trying to take each day and be grateful.  Each day is one more day I get to hold them under my heart.  Our first ultrasound will be 12/2. If today I'm 4 weeks and 2 days preggo...then I will be 6 weeks and 2 days when we take a look with wandy.  That probably isn't quite soon enough to hear the heartbeat...but we will probably see it. If it's there to see...please, please let it be there to see.

I'm feeling a lot of action this time around...Pressure, pain when I laugh/sneeze/cough. Weird smelling pee. Nausea really started today. I'm ditzy...well ditzier(sp) then usual.  I'm exhausted at 3pm and it feels like I'm trudging through mud until bed time.  My boobies hurt, but aren't much bigger.  I am thankful for every ounce of discomfort, every possible reminder that this could be really happening.

Where is my guy in all this? My hubby seems to be all about the science.  He thinks this is really possibly happening because we finally know about, and are treating the Crohn's.  He's saying logical, analytical things about these awesome test results.  But that's not all folks, here's something that really got to me yesterday....  He prayed after communion at mass that he would get to see our baby's face.  Ok, so maybe he's finally living this out of his heart also.  The man's heart is breathtaking to behold, I'm honored anew every single time I get to hear words that came straight from that heart.