The First Year

The first year was not what I expected. I had random periods from coming off of birth control (which I had only used for a few months).  I took a billion pregnancy tests. I was still really moody from the birth control and extra emotional from trying to get pregnant without seeing it happen.  I was a newly wed, a California girl living in Oklahoma while my husband finished up at ORU, working random part time jobs, with no benefits and not a whole lot of understanding of what was going on. I felt powerless and frustrated, both feelings I would become very intimate with in the future, but I was still very hopeful and optimistic. 

First things first, I started reading books about fertility. My favorite was Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Weschler.  By using the methods in this book I was actually able to pin point the problem I was having....I was not ovulation. After 8 months of trying  we decided to scrape together the funds to go see a doctor. (I didn't know for sure at this point that I was not ovulating). My doctor was very helpful and did the first of many tests that we would go through. These were blood tests and thyroid scans.  Nothing really was figured out before we moved back home to California.  My hubby got a great job, well, he got a job that had great benefits and little else.  

So I started to going to an actually OB-GYN. I figured who better to help me figure out my "girlie" problems than someone who specializes in the area.  For me this was not a great avenue. (I have to interject here, I have a horrible fear of needles; I get light-headed, sweaty, nauseous and usually pass out when I get shots or have blood drawn). The doctor I chose decided that I didn't know what I was saying when I told her that I was not ovulating. So after 3 months of blood tests and Dr. visits, fainting and sickness, my Dr. told me that I was not ovulating....Are you kidding me, didn't I tell her that when I began?!!? It was at that point that I decided to move on to other options in the field of medicine.  

Where It All Began

My name is Sarah. I am 33 years old.  My journey through infertility has been long and tiresome. My husband and I have been ttc (trying to conceive) for 8 years, in October.

I grew up in a Christian home, the youngest of three children. My father was a logger and my mother was a homemaker.  We were happy and I loved my life, I loved my family and I loved the way that I was being raised. Even when I was in my teen years I knew that I didn't want to go to college, I didn't want to spend time traveling or working on my career, I just wanted to be a wife and mother.  My mom had made the job look so amazing and my father honored her and her role so much....why wouldn't that look like the most appealing job ever!?!?!  I wanted to get married young and I wanted to have 5 children all by the time I was 30 years old.

Well, like much of life,  things often don't turn out like we plan. First, God knew things that I didn't know (surprise!! I know).  My husband wasn't quite ready when I was.  So, due completely to my parents wisdom and God's direction, I went to college to become a teacher.  I got my degree and when I was done I moved home. At this time I met my husband who was just getting out of high school.  Yes, crazy I know!!! But I could have search the world over and never been able find a match so perfect,  God, again, knew what I did not.  My husband is the perfect balance to my weaknesses and strengths and I to his. We got to know each other well over the next couple years, in the process becoming best friends and were engaged for 10 months before we got married in 2002.  (He was going to college out of state so we chose to wait to the end of the school year).

Five months after we were married we decided it would be fun to start a family. We thought it would be a fun surprise to get pregnant and then tell everyone. No one that we knew really chose to get pregnant this early in their marriage so we knew it would be a great surprise. I went off birth control and (not knowing much about all this stuff at the time) I expected to get pregnant the first month that we tried (EVERYONE we knew had it happen this way, friends and family, trying or not).  So we were visiting my brother and his wife and their 9 month old little girl for Thanksgiving. We were out shopping at, of course, Babies R Us and I started my period thus crushing my thoughts of being pregnant. This devastated me, I stood in the stall of the bathroom, trying to reign in the sobs that were flooding my throat. I don't like to cry in front of people and I didn't like the idea that others could hear me but there was nothing I could do to hold the sobs in.  I came out of the bathroom finally, barely containing the sadness that threatened to overthrow my control.  My sister in law read the sadness in my eyes and new what was going on.  (It is such a blessing to have siblings and their spouses that love, encourage, understand and even help carry the burden).

Okay, so it sounds like I'm crazy to have been so crushed the first time we didn't get pregnant.  But I am a dreamer. I am a BIG dreamer with BIG expectations. (I believe God is good all the time and does what He promises. God's word says "Delight yourself in the Lord and He shall give you the desires of your heart," Psalm 37:4. I know that God has put it in my heart to be a mom thus He plans on making me one. I have continually submitted this desire to Him, given Him full reign to change or alter it anyway He wants). So by the time I found out I was not pregnant, that first time, I had already "seen" our entire future as parents. I had dreamed about the joy of seeing the positive pregnancy test, about how we would tell our family. I had dreamed about what it would be like to be full term and glowing, about wearing maternity clothes, about feeling the baby kick for the first time, about feeling the baby move. I had dreamed about going into labor, having a home birth and looking at my baby for the first time. I dreamed about who the baby would look like and the names we may like.  These dreams crumbled quickly this first time of not being pregnant.