Moments

mo·ment: an indefinitely short period of time; instant

Brent and I have been hoping to have kids for a few years now.  It is not a challenge we ever expected we'd have... in fact we always thought we would have trouble with the OPPOSITE challenge (having surprise kids or having children sooner than we expected).  The word "moment" has since become one of my FAVORITE words.  I have been reminded over and over again of the scriptures "thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a SMALL MOMENT" "all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good."  (D&C 121:7, D&C 122:7)  We haven't shared our infertility journey with a lot of people because we were really hoping it would just be a quick moment in our lives... something that would have an ending in one way or another.  We hoped we would find an answer or end to this moment with every new doctor we saw, every new test we took, every new procedure we tried.  Apparently we are a great case of "unexplained infertility".  While some moments have been filled with frustration, fear, heartbreak and even grief... honestly this journey has been MORE filled with moments of happiness, moments of peace, moments of excitement and joy and laughter, and lots and lots of moments of growth.  Even though I don't know where this journey will take us, I am so, so, so grateful for all the growth that it has blessed us with.  Even though I don't have answers and doctors don't have answers... I continue to feel that Heavenly Father DOES have answers and that he has a plan for us. 

I am still learning how to talk about all this infertility stuff... something about Jr. High health class really traumatized me so I still feel so awkward talking about anything reproductive related.  :)  The whole experience is still so unexpected and new to me that I don't really know how to share it with others or how to deal with it... of course some of that awkwardness is probably related to my "accountant" personality (Brent tries to tutor me to help me with social skills... but boy, I think awkwardness just comes so naturally to accountants). 

Anyway... I wanted to share some of the ways I have seen the Lord's hand directly in my life during this experience. 

Doctor's have always made me really nervous... throw a hospital in the picture and I would hyperventilate!  The SCARIEST thing to me about the doctor's office is the sharps containers that ALWAYS seem to be filled!  One of the doctors I was seeing for a while always had a super long wait time... it was seriously TORTURE to sit in the cold office half naked and just stare at the sharps container wondering who the last person to get a shot was and why.  I was still SCREAMING over shots in High School (I remember my mom taking me to get my boosters and giving me a strong lecture on not screaming and scaring the younger kids in the waiting room...I still screamed).  I soon learned who got shots at the OB/GYN office... I eventually got to be lucky enough to have a few of them for different procedures.  One day I was talking with a friend who told me about some medical procedures where she had to give herself shots.  The thought was unbelievable to me!  Give yourself SHOTS??!!  It was actually a blessing I talked to her and started thinking about people who give themselves shots... because within just weeks of this conversation my doctor had me give myself a shot.... eventually we went through IVF where almost all my medications were shots (some days there were 3 shots that I was giving myself).  The first time I gave myself an injection was seriously a moment where I knew the Lord had his hand in my life.  Just months before this experience I would get nauseous and have anxiety attacks THINKING about needles... but slowly the Lord showed me that I could handle a shot and eventually taught me that I could give myself a shot.  I have stopped feeling so anxious in the doctor's office and don't even get as queasy going into hospitals anymore.

Earlier this year we started seeing a specialist (also another miracle in our lives) who challenged us to think about trying IVF (in-vitro).  This was actually a pretty tough choice for us... we didn't know much about IVF and it seemed kind of "sciency"... we had been thinking of adoption and didn't know if we should try IVF or focus more on possibilities of adoption.  We ended up deciding to pursue IVF.  I never felt it would FOR SURE work for us, but I felt that it would be a really good experience for us. 

After a bunch more testing and doctor's appointments were were all set up to give IVF a try.  This FedEx box was delivered to our house at the beginning of our IVF procedure... the thing was filled with medications AND a bazillion needles!  All but one or two medications were taken through an injection.  I filled up my very own sharps container!  :)  

More pictures of meds... I had to line them all up in the order I needed to take them so I could figure out which medications went with which needles, etc.  Some of my injections needed to be given in my back by my bum... my mom and JoyAnne and Brent's sister Jessi were seriously HEROS to help me out with this!  Their willingness and expertise at administering shots was another example of the Lord's hand in this journey.

 While we were going through the IVF procedure I ended up having an over-reaction to the drugs... basically I became hyper stimulated.  It was actually a blessing because it meant that I could stop giving myself some of the shots.  :)  It also meant that I had some pain and had to be on bed rest.. and I had to drink lots and lots of Gatorade and measure my urine out-take.  We got to have a "hat" on our toilet for measuring urine.  How exciting!

I was supposed to lay in a recliner... but since we don't have a recliner we tried to line the bed with pillows so it would be similar to a recliner.  LOVED IT!  I slept with almost every single pillow in the house!!  I felt like I was sleeping on grandma's feather bed 8 feet high and 10 feet wide!  Actually bed rest created some very bad habits that have been hard to break... I found I LOVE eating in bed!!  Seriously, even now, whenever I grab some lunch at home my first reaction is to run into bed to eat it!  It is just so comfy to eat in bed!  I was only on bed rest for a very short time... but during those days I felt so blessed!  Brent's mom and sister came by and brought me lunch and visited with me.  My mom and sister came over and did our dishes and brought me food.  Brent played games with me (that is why the laundry basket it on the bed... it was our game table). 

 This is the million and one bottles of Gatorade I was drinking... I was drinking two of these things a day. 

The procedure was intense and a little hard, but there were so many miracles and mercies along the way that it was a really good experience for us.  It did not solve our infertility problems, but it did help us to grow and really appreciate good health.  It also taught me a lot about serving others.  I had a friend in the ward... a woman that served in YW with me for just a couple months (also another blessing that our paths crossed and we would meet each other)... she gave me lots of encouragement and would frequently call to check in on our procedure.  This woman was always so optimistic for us and would help me know what to expect.  One day while we were talking I asked her about her little one (she was pregnant) and she let me know that she had lost her baby girl just about a week earlier.  She was an amazing example of selflessness that even in the middle of this tragedy in her life she was still thinking of me and my small, petty worries.  My family and Brent's were other super great examples of selfless service... no matter how busy they were or what other stresses they had going on in their lives they still made time to take care of us! 

I do have to say... there was one FUNNY medication I that took (I THINK it was to help my body recover from the over stimulation), the side effect was inability to suppress spontaneous actions including gambling!!  Made me laugh!!