Show and Tell - Where it All Began

Our first house. It was 1998, we were newlyweds and we lived in Atlanta. We used to scan the For Sale ads in the paper, scour neighborhoods for Open Houses on the weekends and dream of being able to buy a cute little house in a half-way decent area. We’d always go back to our apartment that was far from the cool part of town and be depressed thinking we could never afford any of the ones that we liked.

But, one fateful Sunday, we happened upon a darling, little bungalow. It was love at first sight. We didn’t even have a realtor, but through some number crunching figured out that we could just squeeze the mortgage payment for it.

Although it was only 950 square feet, it was our dream house. We loved it, adored it. It was the perfect place for us to start the next chapter of our lives together.

I love this photo because in the 11 years that I lived in Atlanta it only snowed three or four times – and the house looks magical to me.

Even after we moved away from Atlanta (some seven years ago), any time we’d go back, we’d stop by our house just to reminisce a little bit. However, I was back there last September and was shocked to see that our precious little bungalow had been leveled - and a McMansion was in its place.

But, I still think about that darling house where it all began.

For more Show and Tell, visit Mel.

The Early Bird Gets the Worm

Throughout our quest to bring a baby into our lives, very, very rarely have things happened on schedule and not once has something actually happened early (except for my period’s cursed arrival). However, the Nest reported some news this afternoon that was a little surprising.

It seems that instead of it being another four weeks until her transfer; it could actually happen two weeks from today! Father’s Day -- so appropriate! That’s got to count for something.

Originally, we thought we’d have to wait an extra two weeks for the transfer because the lab where the frozen embryos live shuts down for two weeks right before July 4 for some kind of extra special cleaning or something, but according to our fertility nurse who’s monitoring the Nest’s progress, it seems likely that the Nest will be ready before the lab shuts down.

I think I’m still trying to process it; you wouldn’t think two weeks would make that big of a difference, but it has been more than 18 months since our final IVF attempt.

And up until we met with the Nest six months ago, we had all but shut down the thought that we’d actually have a real, live prospect of having a bio baby. So, to think that this could happen – and sooner than we thought – is a little overwhelming.

We are guardedly excited about our chances this time, but have complete resolve that we’re doing the right thing. And no matter what happens, we will have solace in the fact that we did everything we could.

Sending fertile waves to the Nest…

Our non-bio baby - a world away

On a more serious note, I wanted to expand upon one of our efforts to bring a baby into our lives that I haven’t mentioned yet.

, We tried to get pregnant for several months “naturally,” then moved on to ovulation induction -- a fertility treatment where you’re pumped full of follicle-stimulating injections, your hormone levels are closely monitored, you have ultrasounds every few days to see how your follicles are growing. Once the follicles are large enough, you take a “trigger” shot to get them to drop and then ever-so-romantically your fertility doc tells you exactly when to have sex (also called “timed intercourse”).

When the OIs didn’t work, our next step was IVF, which we were kind of expecting, but we started wondering if we should “double down” our efforts and look into adoption, too.

After careful consideration, we decided to adopt a baby from Vietnam.

A side bar here before I get judgmental thoughts from those who think we should have tried to adopt domestically (and yes, I am hypersensitive to this because so many people ask me about this and offer not-asked-for commentary on the subject). Every couple makes their own personal decisions based on how their family gets made and it should be based on what they are most comfortable with and it’s no one’s business except your own. OK, I’ll step back off my soapbox.

So, while going through our IVF cycles, we were also filling out paperwork, getting physicals, having our backgrounds checked, unveiling our financial portfolio, having friends write recommendation letters and dreaming of having IVF twins AND a sweet bundle of joy from Vietnam.

In the meantime, none of my IVFs worked, and we waited and waited for the call that we had been placed with a baby in Vietnam. And, waited…what was supposed to be a 9-12 month wait turned into two years.

Finally, last July we got the phone call. A baby boy! We were ecstatic, and for the second time in our lives, we experienced love at first sight. Our agency sent us photos and we couldn’t take our eyes off of the sweet little boy with full cheeks and a black shock of hair sticking straight up off his head.

Jack Bauer got excited about giving him a faux hawk. We picked out his name. I went crazy buying him outfits, getting decorations for the nursery, and looking at the calendar for dates for baby showers (it was FINALLY my turn for one, darn it!).

Our adoption agency’s guess was that we could pick him up in January 09. There were still a few hurdles to get over, but they didn’t seem overly concerned.

Then the rug got pulled out from under us. In September we learned that there were some major issues with getting final approvals from Vietnam (Unfortunately, it wasn’t just us, it was also 22 other families adopting from the same orphanage). No kids were coming home any time soon and our agency wasn’t sure how to resolve the issues.

So, when the Nest offered her uterus as a temporary home for our last two embryos, once again, we had visions of a family with both bio baby(ies) and our non-bio boy.

Flash-forward to now and we still don’t have our darling boy and at this point, it is very likely that we won’t get him because of yet more issues and problems at the U.S. and Vietnam levels.

We’re OK, though, especially with the hope that our Nest can hatch those embryos into a baby or two.

Embracing my inability...I mean infertility

I completely accept the fact that people have strengths and can’t do everything well. For example, I can play a mean game of volleyball, can sing like a rock star on Rock Band, and I have Magellan-like directional sense, but I can’t cook, ice skate, sew or bowl well at all.

I can write a public relations strategy like nobody’s business, but can’t do graphic design to save my life. So, I have experts take care of it for me.

And, it just so happens that another one of the things that I can’t do is get pregnant.

So, I’m working with someone who can. The Nest has had three children, so I know she’s got some strong experience in the area.

I’ll just stick with things where I can excel.

It doesn’t take a village to raise a child; it takes a village to create a child

For most couples, it’s just that – it takes a couple, two people, to conceive a child.

Not in our case, or in the case of other couples in our position. It can take many, many people to conceive a child.

Let’s see…

Obviously, there’s the fertility doctor, who performs the tests, procedures and other baby-making magic.

There’s the fertility nurse, who does the daily ultrasounds to check how my uterine lining looked, how my ovaries were growing, etc.

The phlebotomist, who drew my blood on a daily basis to check hormone levels, which determine the best time to do an IUI, IVF, TI, etc. In our situation, our phlebotomist doubles as the person who took the super sperm sample once Jack Bauer produced it.

The lab technicians – I don’t even know how many people have touched my eggs, JB’s sperm, the embryos, blood, etc. Let’s just guess and say “10.”

The pharmacist who filled my hundreds of dollars worth of prescriptions.

The acupuncturist who placed several needles all over my body to prepare it for the IVF transfer of embryos.

There is also a myriad of other medical people, including anesthesiologists, schedulers, ultrasound technicians, more nurses, etc. who aid my fertility doctor by helping him with some of the fertility procedures. Let’s say there are another “7” of these healthcare professionals.

That’s a total of 22 – and doesn’t include other key people like the massage therapist, who helps to relax my worried body, the teenager at Steak N Shake who makes those killer milkshakes that ease the stress, the spin class instructor who helps me get rid of the weight I gained from the fertility drugs.

And now that we’ve enlisted the assistance of our Nest, there are even more people that are helping to bring a blessed child into our lives.

My family – from my amazing sister who offered to be a gestational carrier years ago before she had to have a hysterectomy and before we knew that we would have so much trouble conceiving, to my dad who drove the Nest 100 miles to our required counseling session (sure, require it for us, but any ol’ teenager can get knocked up without having to tell someone why they want a baby), to my mom who brokered the whole hook up with the Nest, buys the Nest pre-natal vitamins, and delivered the Nest to the first appointment with our fertility doctor.

Nurse mom who helped the Nest with her fertility drug injections.

And, last but not least, the most important person to date, our wonderful Nest and her supportive and amazing family.

And, we’re not even finished yet. So, so far, we’re up to more than 33 people and counting, stretching across two different families and three generations of people…

So I guess it doesn’t just take a village for our baby; it's taking an army.