Kicks of Confidence

I know, I know…I JUST posted a few days ago. But, I had such an overwhelming response from my last blog that I felt the need to update. By the way, thank you all to your kind words and prayers. They mean the world to Mike and I….and I think they worked (keep reading!).

So, I tend to overdo things….little things, big things. “Overdo” is basically my M.O. I overdo Harper’s small family birthday parties, I overdo holidays, I overdo just about everything. I can’t help it. Yesterday, I overdid in a big way for a woman 17 weeks pregnant with her fifth child.

I have been in a redecorating mood lately, ever since we decided to put our house on the market and start looking for a bigger one. Part of that “mood” has been the need to repaint my kitchen. Painting is not really the issue, however. I have been given the green light to paint as long as I make sure the area is well ventilated and I take frequent breaks. The problem lies in the fact that it’s a kitchen. There’s a lot of up, down, and all around in a kitchen. Up above my cabinets, down by the baseboard, around the trim and appliances. Getting my picture?

I spent the better part of yesterday doing my up, down, all around dance with a paintbrush in hand. I accomplished everything that I could without Mike’s help. That is, until he got home. I needed him to move the refrigerator (I had already pulled out the stove, and heard about that ALL night!!) and take down a few cabinets so that I could finish the last 1/3 of our kitchen. He obliged and I was able to get rolling again. I rolled (no pun intended) until after 10:00 last night.

When I finally cleaned up my mess and sat down (well after 11:00), I felt like I had been running a marathon I was nowhere near prepared for. The reality is, I had, and I wasn’t. I forgot how exhausting being pregnant  could be. Not only that, I forgot how much your weight becomes less evenly distributed and more a pain in the back, literally. I was spent. My knees were killing me from all of the climbing, my legs were tremendously sore from all of the up and down, and my back, well my back was punishing me for not taking as many breaks as needed and lifting objects above my specified limits.

If that’s not enough, baby was MAD at me! We aren’t talking, “Hey mom, I’m glad you finally sat down!” We are talking, “Ummm…excuse me?! Remember me? The person you are growing! Yeah, you exhausted me today and now you are going to pay for it!” Up until this point, I had felt mostly flutters from baby’s tiny movements and an occasional jab or left hook. Last night, I was getting kicked….hard. In retrospect, I probably deserve it.

I have a point….and I promise, I’m getting to it. The wonderfulness of this was twofold. The baby was finally moving so frequently and with such vigor that not only could we watch my stomach move, but Mike could feel the movements. Tiny and slight at first, but the more I rested, the harder and stronger baby began to move, giving Mike a chance to really connect with baby (one of his favorite parts of my pregnancies). These sudden, rapid movements also gave me time to reflect.

Remember how anxious I was just a few days ago? Remember how I asked for prayers? Prayers for calming thoughts and peace of mind? Well, they worked. You delivered. He delivered. When I needed them most, my support group came through with one of the greatest gifts given to me: the gift of prayer. God was listening, and he eased my fears with kicks of confidence! How I needed those tiny little uppercuts and kick boxing moves….

Until next time (baby gender time!!!)….Thank you for all of your prayers and support, and also for reading!

Waiting for the other shoe….

It’s been quite a while since my last post and for good reason. There is really nothing to update you on, at this point. My last post came after my final weekly visit with my OB and I have not seen her in almost a month. So, needless to say, there isn’t much news as far as baby is concerned.

However, I am playing an endless waiting game. For those of you that don’t know me well, I.HATE.WAITING. To say that is my least favorite thing to do would be an understatement. I don’t have the patience for waiting….for anything: my order at the drive thru window, a friend to arrive for a shopping trip, and certainly not for my next OB appointment.

I have not seen my doctor since right after Memorial Day, where I was issued a clean bill of health and sent on my wait to await my next appointment: June 25, 2012. That may seem like a very short amount of time to most, but to a woman who has experienced multiple losses, and who is in the midst of a high risk pregnancy, that month is an eternity. Not only that, we are due to find out the gender of our precious baby during that appointment (making the waiting even more excruciating!).

I was certain that the day I had to visit my doctor for my last weekly appointment would leave me feeling at ease and comfortable with the fact that I had overcome the first hurdle associated with this pregnancy, but in fact, I am left feeling just the opposite. Because I had been given reassurance weekly that baby was okay and growing properly, I now find myself increasingly anxious as to how baby is doing in the home I have prepared and nurtured for 17 weeks.

I have felt the first few “flutters” of baby’s movements and even a good jab or kick when baby gets mad at me for one reason or another. You would think that these tiny movements inside of me would be all of the reassurance I would need. They, in fact, are not. I need to see my baby and hear its tiny heartbeat. I have been through too much in the last year and a half to be anything less than anxious to see that baby is healthy and developing on schedule.

My poor husband….he is receiving the brunt of my anxiety. I eat, sleep, and breathe, the “what ifs” of this pregnancy. I’m hoping that puts me somewhere within the norm for a woman who has experienced all that I have. I am a mess most days, because the unknown is too much for me to bear. I have accomplished a lot so that I can simply keep my mind from wandering to the fateful ultrasound and appointment next week. But, it doesn’t make me easy to live with, I’ll tell you that. Through it all, he comforts me, calms my fears, and still manages to be a loving, doting husband and father. I couldn’t do it without him…..

So now, I wait. I wait for the ultrasound and appointment next week. I wait for the day I am finally in my third trimester. I wait to buy baby items (just in case). I wait for baby…Essentially, I am doing so much waiting, that what I’m really waiting for is the other shoe to drop. God willing, that won’t happen. Until I know for sure, please do me a simple favor: pray with me, pray for me, just pray that the other shoe won’t drop and all involved with come out of next week’s appointment unscathed and joyus.

My next post should reveal baby’s gender and be much more uplifting! Until then…thank you again for reading.

It’s a God Thing

So when I last left you, Mike and I were awaiting our respective tests to decide our course of action for future (if possible) children. You are not going to believe what happened next….

Mike had spent a four day weekend in Tennessee with his best friend, enjoying Bristol and everything the race had to offer. Harper and I missed him terribly, however, I had a feeling I couldn’t shake and I just wanted him home. A feeling….I had felt….four other times….I called as he was on his way home so he could pick me up a test I was all too familiar with.

I woke up the morning of March 20, 2012 feeling as normal as I possibly could given everything I had endured the past few months. Mike didn’t even know what I was about to do: I walked downstairs and took my test in secret…it didn’t take long for the results to impact our lives for a FIFTH time! You got it…the test, pregnancy test, was positive. I RAN upstairs and jumped back in bed with Mike. I showed him the test and we both fell into fits of laughter for literally ten minutes.

After all, we were under strict instructions to take the utmost precautions as not to get pregnant again so soon after the loss of Haidyn (this was only two months later). So, to say the least, this was pretty much the most shocking pregnancy of them all.

Mike defined the moment best when he looked up from his tears and hysterics long enough to say, “We have got to be THE most fertile people on the planet!!” He was right….we were starting to give popular television families a run for their money. Camp Aguirre?! We were well on our way to our own reality show, if we kept up this pace….

I knew the drill all too well. Call the doctor, go in for a blood test, await the results, work myself into a worried frenzy, repeat. This time was no different and the worried frenzy lasted about 12 weeks (just to give you a small preview).

I was scheduled to attend a conference out of town with a committee of people and some of my best friends, as well as a boss that I had grown to respect and admire. This made my previous steps a little difficult considering I was going to be in Lansing for two days and not able to repeat my blood work each day to make sure my levels were where they belonged. Alas, my doctor’s office assured me that repeated blood tests could be taken upon my return. I scheduled an appointment to go in that afternoon for a routine blood test and spend the next 24 hours a nervous wreck.

Meanwhile, how do you keep a secret this big from some of your closest friends? The answer….you don’t. Especially when one of those people is your “Coke” friend. As soon as I arrived at work with her daily Diet Coke and lacking my daily Coke, she knew immediately. The beauty of this friendship is that she was first ecstatic for me, and then offered her prayers and support should I need anything. Mike and I had decided to wait until we were out of the first trimester to share our news with most people and the world. However, your friends know you better than you know yourself sometimes, and this friend, she’s pretty intuitive.

I packed and planned for my trip out of town all the while wishing and praying (MIGHT Y HARD, I might add) that this was “our” time. I didn’t know if I could handle the devastation of another missed chance at more children. I spent countless days wishing and praying for another miracle….was this our chance?! Only God knew the answer and He was about to put us through the ringer, so to speak.

Conference day one was a success as was my call to my doctor’s office: as normal, I had detected and tested early so my levels weren’t through the roof, but at normal level for someone who was four weeks pregnant. I was to test again once I returned home. As requested by my doctor, I took all of the necessary precautions to make this a complication free pregnancy: I took my prenatal vitamins and hormone supplements, didn’t lift anything over 20 pounds, and limited my caffeine intake (that was a tough one, but totally worth it given the reason).

I retested again a few days later, as well as a few days after that, and continued the cycle for nearly two weeks. Each time, my hcG levels were increasing appropriately and my progesterone was through the roof (a good sign considering it was usually low). However, I was still apprehensive. I had gone through this once before: excellent levels, great progesterone, only to discover that there was no baby setting up shop in my gestational sac. I wasn’t going to be convinced until I could see a tiny body and hear a strong heartbeat.

I was set up to see my doctor each week to monitor my pregnancy and growth. This may seem excessive to some, and maybe even a bit inconvenient. However, given the alternative, I was happy to be there every week to make sure.

We had a tiny scare in week seven when I experienced brown discharge. I was told to immediately go to the lab to have my levels tested and then over to the hospital for an ultrasound. I was near vomiting for three VERY long hours that night until I heard the greatest sound on earth: baby’s heartbeat. It was nice and strong at 133 bpm. Whew….we crossed the first ultrasound hurdle, but we still had almost seven more weeks until we were out of the woods. I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to withstand the stress of my everyday life as well as a high risk pregnancy.

Guess what?! I DID IT! We are now just shy of 14 weeks with a clean bill of health for mommy and baby! I could give you all the boring details of doctor’s visits, multiple tests, and various appointments, but all I really care about (as well as my supportive husband) is that WE DID IT! Baby Aguirre (#5) is due November 26, 2012 and I am over the moon! It’s a God thing…when you need Him, He listens. That’s all this was…..a God thing!

An Uncertain Future

It has been quite some time since my last post (almost three months). This is partially due to our ridiculously busy life and partially due to a very uncertain future where our fertility was concerned.

After determining the reason behind the loss of Baby#4, Haidyn, my doctor sent us to a fertility specialist in Flint. I was a little more than apprehensive. I was referred to the specialist the day we found out about Haidyn’s tiny heart no longer beating. It took me over a month to make the phone call for a simple intake appointment. Mike and I had a very simple plan for the conception of our children: Let God do the talking and use absolutely no invasive medical intervention. Was this doctor going to suggest IVF, infertility medications, and the like? I was NOT excited about that one bit, and neither was Mike.

Needless to say, we went to the appointment, anxious to hear what the doctor had to say. It was a cozy little office with a wonderful staff! We were not taken to an exam room but instead were sent to a room set up in a more family room fashion with furniture and shelves and shelves of medical journals. We felt comfortable immediately. A nurse came in and spoke with us about how our history would be handled and the general flow of the appointment. At no time did she mention any of those dirty medical terms that I was terrified of hearing.

The doctor came in and asked about our history. I hope your computer screen is super bright white because that’s about the color of my face when he asked me to relive my year of pure emotional hell. Luckily, Mike started our story so I didn’t have to. When I calmed down, I finally relived each miracle and loss in their chronological order, ending with the most recent, baby Haidyn. The doctor reassured me that since we had experienced two once-in-a-lifetime occurrences (blighted ovum and triploidy), he had absolutely no reason to believe we couldn’t carry a healthy baby to term. Also, given that we had done just that with Harper, and she was perfect, he said that luck (and science) were on our side.

Just to err on the side of caution, however, he wanted to perform some routine tests. I was to undergo a battery of blood tests as well as a saline sonogram. Mike was to have a semen analysis performed to make sure all of his “swimmers” were in perfect condition to undergo anything we were going to throw at them. We left with all of the paperwork needed to complete our individual tests as well as instructions on when/where to complete them. We left feeling hopeful that this would all work out in due time.

After our appointment, Mike and I sat down and did some real soul searching. We had a list of questions we needed to answer together: Was this what we wanted? Did we want to subject my body to more tests after all it had been through in the last year? Did we want to go through with the tests at all or let our original plan for God to give us children when He decided it was time? If given the go ahead, did we want to start planning for more children or wait? Needless to say, we made a lot of life changing decisions during a very intense conversation. Everything came down to this: God would give us more children when He knew it was time. We would stop worrying about it, but plan to give it at least a year before we thought about expanding our family. That last one was Mike’s doing. Given all we (and my body) had been through, he felt it necessary to give me time to heal physically and emotionally. If given the okay, he knew I would want to work on baby making ASAP. I love him even more for thinking of my well-being.

After our bout of soul (and baby) searching, we both came out on the other end basically unscathed. We were incredibly content with our decision to leave it up to God, but wait a year before bringing up “baby talk” again. What a relief. The last year had been so incredibly stressful on both of us that it felt good to give this up to God and let Him guide us through this very uncertain, somewhat rocky journey.

After all of this was said and done, it was almost time for Mike and I to both have our respective tests performed, and we were still a little anxious about the tests themselves and the results that would inevitably decide our course of action for future miracles. We were unable to complete our tests as scheduled due to a little something that got in the way.

Stay tuned for my next post! Trust me, you won’t want to miss it!!