The Real Importance of an Anatomy Scan

Most people look forward to their 20 week ultrasound because they are excited to find out the gender of their baby.  Most people don't consider the real importance of the 20 week ultrasound, or what is also called the Anatomy Scan.  Unless you've lost a baby during pregnancy or have had a baby with congenital birth defects, you are blinded to the fact that things can start to go horribly wrong at the anatomy scan.  As a parent who has lost a baby during pregnancy or who has given birth to a baby with birth defects, they know that during the anatomy scan it is far more important to look at all of the baby's organs, the placenta, and the umbilical cord than it is to look at the baby's genitalia. It is important to know if the brain is developing normally, if there are 4 chambers to the heart, if the kidneys are normal size, if the bladder if full, if the placenta has good blood flow and is in the correct location, and if the umbilical cord has all the arteries it needs and if it is located in the correct spot. 

So with that said-today we have reached 20 weeks with Baby M and today we had our anatomy scan.  We did not find out the gender of our baby today.  It was not important to us to know that today.  We know Baby M is either a boy or a girl! And we know we already love our baby boy or girl, whichever it is:)

Here is the scoop with Baby M:

• Measuring 20 weeks exactly
• Weighing 11 ounces
• Heart rate of 148 bpm
• Heart has 4 chambers!
• Brain has 2 hemispheres and is developing normally
• Kidneys looked normal
• Bladder was full like they want to see
• Placenta is still blocking most of my cervix and is "low lying"
• Umbilical cord has an insertion-it is not attached to the middle of the placenta like it should be

And Here is a picture of our little gymnist practicing yoga in the womb:

And Here is a profile picture of Baby M:

All in all, we got a pretty good report from the anatomy scan.  Baby M is growing strong and healthy.  The concerns at this point have to do with the placenta and the umbilical cord.  Due to the placenta blocking my cervix, there is a chance I may end up having a c-section.  But we also have plenty of time, hopefully, to see if the placenta moves out of the way.  It has moved just slightly since our last ultrasound 4 weeks ago.  The umbilical cord insertion is more of a concern.  The doctor informed me that when the umbilical cord does not attach in the middle of the placenta (cord insertion) it can lead to Interuterine Growth Restriction (IUGR) in the baby.  Right now Baby M is just slightly ahead of schedule with his or her size so that is a relief for the time being.  Due to our first daughter having IUGR and being stillborn between 23-24 weeks with the cord wrapped around her neck and with the cord being thinned where it was attached to the placenta, and then learning about the cord insertion today with this pregnancy, the doctor would like to do ultrasounds every 3 weeks instead of every 4 as we had originally planned. We just need to keep a close eye on Baby M's growth and the location of that dang placenta. 

If anyone has had experienced with umbilical cord insertions, I would love to hear your stories and encouragement.  This is obviously a very scary time for us as we approach the next big milestone in this pregnancy (making it to 24 weeks).  It is just scary to know that everything appeared fine with Riley at our 20 week ultrasound, or if it wasn't fine we were never told of any issues, and then 3-4 weeks later she stopped growing and was delivered as an angel baby instead of a living baby.  The fear of losing this baby is just as strong now as it was during the first trimester while I was having bleeding issues. 

Our next ultrasound will be on Thursday, April 16th.  We could certainly use your prayers during this time as we continue to learn to trust God and his promises to us.

Better to be Safe than Sorry

We've done a lot of things differently this pregnancy.  It's cost us a Sh*t ton of money to have done things the way we have this time around. But so far....the money has been well spent.  This is the second time in FIVE pregnancies that I have been in the second trimester.  Over the course of the past three years we have learned so much about my genetic make-up and body that it has allowed us to try to piece together what MAY have been causing our recurrent losses.  There really isn't any one thing that we can sit back and say "AH HA....that's it" so we were not comfortable only treating one issue this time like we had tried with past pregnancies and past procedures.  This time, we decided that if there was even a remote possibility that something the doctors found through blood work or testing could be a factor in our previous losses and could cause an additional miscarriage or stillbirth-we were going to treat it. 

That led us to our decision to use donor eggs, free of chromosome issues.  It also led us to an autoimmune treatment protocol involving Intralipid Infusions, Prednisone, Lovenox injections, and Metformin with repeated blood work every 4 weeks throughout the first trimester.  I stopped the Intralipid Infusions at 13 weeks and stopped Prednisone at 14 weeks but will continue the Lovenox and Metformin throughout my pregnancy because I have multiple genetic factors that can cause blood clots.  I thought I was finished with the blood draws when I had my last one done 5 weeks ago.  However, Dr. Braverman, our Reproductive Immunologist from New York, emailed me yesterday stating he has seen some "upward trends" that he wants to "keep an eye on" and would like me to repeat his panel of blood tests at least once more, if not every 4 weeks the remainder of this pregnancy. He also said that my treatment has been effective and everything is fine right now.

At first I was a little upset, because this panel of blood tests cost $500 out of pocket every time we have it done.  And I thought, well if my labs have shown that the immune treatment I had been on was being effective, why do we have to keep doing this and spending all this money.  But then again, I thought to myself....I stopped the main two medications for this treatment protocol 4-5 weeks ago and we truly honestly don't have a clear answer as to why Riley was stillborn 7 years ago and it very well may have been due to untreated autoimmune issues.  I started to think about how I would feel if we didn't continue to monitor my autoimmune levels and this baby ended up being stillborn too.  Once I started to think "it's better to be safe than sorry," the price tag of the blood work really didn't matter.  I remember how a couple weeks ago I was really anxious about stopping half of the autoimmune treatment and no longer monitoring my blood work with Dr. Braverman because of having a second trimester loss in the past.  So I think it's wise to see where all my autoimmune levels are standing now that I am taking minimal medication compared to what I took throughout the first trimester. 

When you've experienced as much loss as we have, it makes you cautious and determined to do everything you need to do to have a living baby and prevent another baby from dying in you.  Sometimes the doctors around here may think we have gone overboard with how cautious we are being this time around, but I have also found some really good doctors who just get it.  They know that, if anything, it gives us the peace of mind in being able to say "We did everything we could."  I'd rather be safe than sorry any day.  I could not live with myself if I didn't listen to my gut feelings one more time and had to experience one more loss because of it. 

Next week I will get the blood work done that Dr. Braverman is ordering again.  And the following week we have our anatomy scan for Baby M.  So far everything has been progressing normally the past couple of weeks.  Baby M's heart beat is easy to detect on the home doppler now and sounds like absolute music to my ears every time I hear it.  We have made it to 18 weeks and some days Baby M is really active while others Baby M seems pretty lazy and chilled out. My belly has continued to grow and I find maternity pants to be so much better than trying to squeeze into my regular pants!

 

I hope everyone has a great weekend! We get to celebrate one little niece turning 4 and one little nephew turning 3! I'm excited to spend time with my husbands family this weekend and see his mom and sister who I don't think I've seen since Christmas! A lot sure has changed since then:)

Don't Forget to Live

A couple months before Alex and I got married we went to Vegas.  While we were there, we were suckered into buying a Time Share (after they dropped the price by over $16,000 because we kept saying no).  Our thought process at that time was that we wanted to be able to take our children on at least one vacation every year.  Between the points we earn and the bonus vacation weeks we get every year...we really could go on three! Unfortunately, we didn't anticipate we were going to have thousands upon thousands in medical expenses between failed natural pregnancies and fertility treatments.  Who anticipates that when they get married?! Most people assume they are going to get pregnant on their honeymoon unless they are still on birth control.  I remember thinking that....in fact, I remember peacing out at the end of our reception by telling our friends we were going to go make a baby.  Well-that didn't happen.  And 7 months later the baby we thought was going to be blessing us with a one year anniversary gift ended up being miscarried.  And 9 months after that we had another miscarriage.  And 5 months after that we had a failed IVF cycle.  And then finally 9 months later we were blessed with our successful egg donor IVF cycle.  $50,000 and 2.5 years later of trying to conceive our rainbow baby....we FINALLY think our rainbow baby is on its way.  

Along the journey of trying to start a family, it is easy to forget to live life.  It's easy to say "we don't have the money," "what if I'm pregnant by then," "we can't plan too far ahead because we don't know when we will get to have our baby."  It's easy to place the priority on trying to make a baby...and it's easy to get sucked into living in misery while you watch the months and years pass by as your dream of becoming parents seems to get further and further away.  Learning to still enjoy life is hard when creating a family and fulfilling your dream of being a mother and father to a precious little baby doesn't come easy.  

Sometimes I like to think someone up there in the great big sky knew our journey wasn't going to be easy.  And that person knew if we didn't buy our Time Share before we got married we would have never been able to go on vacations.  We wouldn't be able to get away from our stressful life to enjoy each other.  We wouldn't have been able to squeeze out the extra money it takes to afford a 5-7 day vacation.  

Fortunately for us we made an investment in taking vacations before we learned what married life was going to have in store for us.  Since owning our Time Share, we have been able to go to Virginia for our 1 year anniversary, on a cruise for my 27th birthday, to New York City for our 2nd anniversary (and to see a fertility specialist), and to Tennessee this past week.  We have a vacation planned in May 2016 to go to the Dominican Republic as well.  I am very thankful we have something that forces us to take time away to simply enjoy life together.  

At the beginning of this year we had more points, bonus weeks, and vacation certificates than we knew what to do with.  We decided we wanted to go on a vacation before Baby M comes in August (or maybe July) but I didn't want to be out of the state after 20 weeks in case something happens to go wrong again. Even though I am pregnant now and all seems to be going well, with my pregnancy history it is still easy to find reasons why we can't go certain places or do certain things and travel a certain ways.  We came up with a simple trip to the Pigeon Forge, TN area...a 6 hour drive and somewhere my husband has always wanted to see.  Our trip was planned March 1-8th because next weekend we have our niece and nephew's birthday parties...and after that I will be 20 weeks.  

March 1st is typically a sad day for me.  It's the day we said hello and good-bye to our first daughter, Riley Grace, 7 years ago.  This year I had moments of flashbacks to that day just like I do every year. And I cried....just like I do every year.  But it was nice to be able to get away during a time that is normally consumed with thoughts of what went wrong and memories of burying our daughter.  It was also nice to be able to spend time with my sister and niece who spent three nights with us to celebrate my niece's big 5th birthday.  I'm glad they came....it was the first time my niece has been on vacation and has been outside of Ohio, and the first time my sister has taken a vacation in probably two years.  They both deserved the time away from work, school, and the cold weather.  I've been preaching to my sister for years that she needs to take her daughter on vacation and needs to use her time off work for an actual vacation instead of going out with her friends here and there.  Making memories with family is the most special gift we can give each other so I am glad we were able to make memories with the two most important people in my life.  

Here's some of the memories we made together: 

March 2, 2015-Raegan's 5th Birthday 

March 3, 2015-Exploring the Smokey Mountains

March 3, 2015- Fun in the Arcade Photobooth

March 4, 2015-Raegan's 1st time on a Go-Cart! 

March 4, 2015-Raegan and Ashley at Dick's Last Resort in Gatlinburg 

March 4, 2015-Raegan at Ripley's Aquarium in Gatlinburg 

While in Tennessee we enjoyed swimming, exploring the mountains, watching the Dixie Stampede, playing in an arcade, riding go-carts (I even took a few laps around the track), walking the streets of Gatlinburg, taste-testing wine (Alex only) and moonshine (Alex and Ashley), viewing the sharks and penguins at the aquarium, shopping, and one day of total relaxation with watching movies.  The weather was beautiful on Tuesday and Wednesday but started to get bad on Thursday.  We checked out and went home on Friday instead of today because it was just as warm if not warmer back in Ohio over the weekend and I was really wanting to go to my friend's baby shower yesterday.  Plus I was ready to get home to my doppler to check for Baby M's heartbeat since I hadn't been feeling much of any movement this week.  Fortunately I found the heart beat right away and it was strong and steady.  Baby M must have thought he or she was on vacation/relaxation mode too! My husband was ready to get home and get back to work on our house projects since the past couple of weekends have been spent getting our other house (rental property) together so we could put it on the market this week.  He's made a lot of progress on the bathroom-walls are painted and everything is finally prepped to begin tiling this week! The five days away were just what we needed to regain motivation to get this house ready for Baby M and to rock the last half of this pregnancy! 

No, This is Not My First

As this belly of mine keeps getting bigger, it is obvious to other employees around the hospital where I work that I am pregnant, not just fat anymore.  Those that have never heard about our story and really don't know me outside of being "the crisis worker" have been asking questions and taking an interest in the baby bump.  As innocent as the question is, and a normal question to be asked at that, these questions make my cringe on the inside.  My least favorite and most frequent question by far has been "Is this your first?"

What do I say to that? How do I explain to these familiar faces but complete strangers that I have other children who I cannot raise?  How do I explain that I have 4 beautiful angels in Heaven that I got to carry inside of me but never got to bring home with us? How do I explain that I held our lifeless daughter in my arms for only 5 hours before we buried her?  How do I explain that this wasn't a spontaneous pregnancy and I don't get to have a normal pregnancy where I complain about every little ache and pain but have the ability to be naive that "everything will be alright" because I haven't had a reason to believe it won't be?  How do I explain this baby wasn't created by me but is being grown by me to become me and my husbands child? 

These questions swirl through my brain every time I hear that question.  Sometimes I don't feel like explaining it. Sometimes I don't want to have to "yes" and then walk away with a God awful feeling in my gut that I'm not only lying to them but I am lying to myself.  It's a dilemma that I am starting to face Every.Single.Day. 

So sometimes I reply "this isn't my first pregnancy."  Sometimes people get it just by keeping my response simple, yet complicated.  Then other times I get asked "how many times have you been pregnant?" and I respond "this is my fifth" to which the response then is "you have that many children?" The only way to respond to the last question is by saying "I have no living children." Thankfully, the continued question and answer session hasn't happened more than once or twice.  And when it did happen, I finally told the nurse "I really hate that question" and she understood completely why. 

The reality is this baby is not my first.  I became a mother in September 2007 when I got pregnant for the first time.  I became a childless mother when Riley was born an angel on March 1, 2008.  And I've remained a childless mother through three additional pregnancies.  I am not a "mommy-to-be" because I am currently pregnant and have no other living children.  I am already a mother.  I just don't get to hear anyone calling me "mommy" yet and needing me to kiss bruises and read them bedtime stories or help with homework.  But my job as the mother that I became on March 1, 2008 is much harder than any of that.  My job is to keep my baby girl's memory alive and spread messages of hope and healing and understanding to other mother's who were placed in this role too. 

I am forever thankful that I have been given another opportunity to be called "mommy."  A better opportunity.  One that wasn't looking likely if we continued to use my own eggs.  There is no doubt in my mind that I already am this baby's mother.  And there is no doubt in my sister's mind that she is the aunt, not the mother, despite the baby having half it's chromosomes from her.  And there is absolutely no doubt in my husbands mind that this baby is ours and no one elses. 

We were blessed today with an ultrasound that showed Baby M is three days ahead of its due date! We were blessed to be able to share that moment with my sister and niece today at the doctors office.  We are blessed that Baby M's heart is still beating strong at 156 beats per minute.  I am blessed that I have started feeling little fluttery movements and sometimes a good kick within the past couple of days.  Today, I count my blessings and cherish the news that me and Baby M are so far "normal."

Our next ultrasound will be February 19th and is a big one.  It's the anatomy scan.  But just as we told the sonographer today, we will not be finding out the gender at that ultrasound either.  For the first time, the gender doesn't seem that important to me.  I just want to know if the brain and the heart and the essential organs all look healthy.  I have no strong desire one way or another for a boy or girl.  I just want a baby.  We will eventually find out the gender towards the end of the second trimester so we can prepare better, but for right now...I am also protecting our wallet and hearts from breaking.  I know once we find out the gender I will be on a mommy shopping spree buying all sorts of cute outfits and I did that once already and had to return everything I had brought when two weeks later our daughter was stillborn.  I won't do that to us again.  So I will wait patiently until we are closer to a "safe zone" (if there really is such thing) where if something goes wrong the chances are higher for being able to save the baby.  Until our next ultrasound, I will enjoy playing with my sister-in-laws at home doppler that she is letting me borrow!

 

Wishing everyone a happy week full of positive news:)

The Circle of Life

I've been debating about writing today's post for the past couple of days.  It doesn't have much to do with me at all, but in a way...it sorta does.  This past weekend one of my family's welcomed a new baby and another one of my family's almost lost one of it's adult members.  With these two events, it got me thinking about the circle of life...or at least how the circle of life is supposed to be.

Birth and Death.  They are two opposite, naturally occurring events.  If you are born, one day you will die.  Birth is a celebration while death is usually a time of sorrow. 

On Friday, February 13th my sister-in-law gave birth to her second child, Isaac Edward.  And on Sunday, February 15th we were told my paternal uncle would most likely not make it through the night.  My sister-in-law and her husband battled infertility issues with both of her children and my uncle has been battling cancer since last summer.  Both battles are difficult ones. With infertility you are fighting to be able to create a life and with cancer you are fighting to stay alive.  With either battle family members and friends don't really know how to support you.  People say stupid things.  They say things they think are helpful but aren't most of the time.  I guess that's part of the reason I struggled with rather or not I should even write about this today....because I haven't been in either of their shoes and they haven't been in mine.  My thoughts are only an outsiders interpretation. 

But as I have thought about this past week's events and thought about both birth and death, I started to realize how similar both events really are for most people.  My nephew was greeted by his mother and father when he entered the world. And when my uncle dies (because even if it's not this week, next week, next month, or next year....he will eventually die because we all do) he will be greeted by his mother and his Heavenly father when he enters into Heaven.  That is the ultimate dream, isn't it?  To feel your mother's embrace when you are born, and then to feel your mother's embrace again when you pass over into Heaven?  This is how it is supposed to be in the circle of life.  You're parents give you life and show you how to navigate the world around you, and they are supposed to die before you so they can show you life on the other side when you join them.

There are so many people around the world whose circle of life is broken.  They have children they were never able to give birth to because of miscarriage and stillbirth.  They have children who passed before them due to childhood illnesses, suicide, tragic accidents, addictions, and deadly diseases in adulthood. My circle of life was broken 6 years and 353 days ago.  My children had no mother to embrace them into the Heaven, but it will be the first thing that I do when I do make it there. 

Where was I going with all of this?  I guess just that I hope my uncle can find some comfort in knowing that when his time is done here on this Earth, his mother is waiting on the other side to swoop him up into her arms just as she did the day he was born.  He is still hanging on but doesn't look well at all.  And if I know my grandmother at all, she will give him a sign when it's time to let go and join her in his forever home. 

So this week instead of asking for prayers for me and Baby M, I am asking for prayers for my uncle, his wife, his children, and his grandchildren.  I pray that either a miracle would happen and my uncle would be cured from his cancer which is throughout his entire body, or I pray that his pain and suffering would be taken away from him and that his family would have peace in knowing he fought as hard and as long as he could and that he will be healed when he gets to where he is going. 

Helloooo Second Trimester!

Hello Second Trimester! It is so nice to FINALLY meet again.  I can't believe it's been so long.  7 years....did you know it's been 7 years since you and I have been friends?  Can we never, EVER, take that long of a hiatus from each other again?  Do you think since First Trimester has finally stopped keeping us from each other that maybe in about 13 more weeks you could introduce me to your friend Third Trimester?  I would really, REALLY love that! 7 years ago you abruptly ended our friendship three weeks short of letting me meet Third Trimester.  Will you please never, EVER do that to me again?  Can't we all just be friends this time? 

So here we are. 14 weeks pregnant.  Starting the second trimester.  For the second time in my life.  I couldn't be more amazed with this precious baby growing in me.  It's starting to feel like maybe, just maybe, this baby is meant to be born into this world, with me and Alex as its parents.  I'm starting to actually allow myself to complete our baby registry (I know it's still early....but I'm a planner by nature), and get excited about how we could potentially find out the gender of our baby, and imagine a successful birth of our little miracle.  But even though me and Baby M have escaped the "danger zone" of pregnancy....there will always been some anxiety, minor now compared to several weeks ago, that we are going to be told the worst news a parent can be told at some point before we get to the point of bringing our baby home and rocking our baby to sleep.  I can't help it.  The image of giving birth to our stillborn daughter 7 years ago at 24 weeks will forever be ingrained into my brain.  You can't just make that disappear.  It happened. And the unfortunate part is it can happen again.  But, the good and relieving part is that we know so much more about my body now than we did 7 years ago and we are treating and trying to prevent issues that are within our control this time.  And we know genetically Baby M is healthy, with less than 1 in 10,000 chances of having a chromosome abnormality! We never did any genetic testing on Riley because she was born with her cord around her neck, so we can't say for certain that she didn't die because she had Down Syndrome like we know two of her younger siblings died from or Trisomy 13 which we discovered several years later is a possibility with my own eggs.  So with all the information that we have now, and with everything we have done differently this pregnancy compared to my pregnancy with Riley, the chances of this baby coming home with us in less than 26 weeks (HOLY CRAP!!!!) is more of a possibility than ever before! And that is what I will focus on repeating to myself over and over.

Today we had another successful appointment with my OB.  The nurse got to use the doppler on my belly for the first time and Baby M still has a strong beating heart.  Even though it looks like I'm carrying high already, the little nugget is still hanging out down lower on my left side. The OB nurse is still very intrigued about our little donor egg baby and tells me how sweet and awesome my sister is for giving us this opportunity.  I can't wait for our next ultrasound on February 24th when I get to introduce my amazing sister to the staff at my OB's office and share another amazing moment with my sister when she gets to sit in on the ultrasound with her daughter:)

I hope everyone enjoys Valentine's Day with their special someone (a spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, best friend, or kids) this weekend! My husband and I will be spending our day cleaning and fixing up our second home in Columbus so we can put the For Sale sign in the yard and then will be spending our night at a hotel and going to dinner at a Japanese Steak House.  We were supposed to go to Columbus last weekend to get the house done but I was stuck in the bathroom all day Saturday with a stomach bug that was tearing me apart and stuck on the couch all day Sunday because my body was so sore from Saturdays puke fest.  So I'm hoping the bug is gone and stays away so we can celebrate Valentine's Day AND our entrance into the Second Trimester! OHHH....and we are getting our wedding rings redipped and cleaned since we are going to be in the area of our jeweler.  Sounds like a perfect Valentine's Day to me!

I will leave you with these pictures of our first trimester (12 weeks) photo shoot! Enjoy:)

Adventures of Alex and Lindsay

Our life is so hectic already! It seems like something is always happening.  Just when we think we are getting ahead, BOOM! Shit hits the fan again!

I will start with baby news first.  We made it to 13 weeks!! Second trimester, I'm coming after you:) In less than one week I can officially celebrate being apart of the second trimester....something I haven't been able to do for 7 years.  It feels pretty surreal right now.  This week I've experienced more nausea than I probably have the entire first trimester.  And I even threw up a bit, twice.  My sniffer has been super sensitive to the slighted smell....and foods, Oh em Gee! I had such a hard time eating this week because anything and everything smelled, looked, and tasted horrible to me. I remember having these issues when I was pregnant with Riley but I don't remember having food aversions until later in the second trimester.  The smell of chicken was horrendous.  We could not have chicken in the apartment.  It's funny how some of your favorite foods become your worst enemies during pregnancy!

In other pregnancy news, we got our professional first trimester pictures done over the weekend and I can't wait to share them with all of you! Hang tight for next weeks post....I will have the CD with the copyrights by then:) 

Now, besides making our way through each week of pregnancy, we've...well, my husband and dad, have been working hard on getting our upstairs renovation completed.  Over the last weekend we got our ceilings sprayed and bought the majority of the tile we need for our bathroom project.  I'm now working on picking out paint colors for the bathroom, master bedroom, and nursery.  We've been working on getting our taxes done and hoping we'd get enough back to be able to buy the furnishings, carpet, doors, and trim to complete these three rooms that we have to get done before the baby comes.  But of course....before we even finish our taxes our furnace decided go out on us, again.  And after some discussion with my husband we decided to bite the bullet and replace our 28 year old furnace with a new energy efficient furnace because this is the third time in two winters that it's gone out on us, plus it doesn't heat our house that well and uses an insane amount of gas every month.  We certainly were thinking about the baby when we made this decision.....we can't have our heat going out for days again when an infant in the home next winter! So before we could even submit our taxes...our entire refund has already been spent. 

Sometimes I get really down about how much debt my husband and I have from all our medical expenses and college tuition and credit card bills.  I get really discouraged when it feels like we are finally coming into some money and before it even lands in our bank account it's already spent.  I bitch and moan about how we are barely surviving and how as soon as we start to get ahead and make good decisions with our finances, something happens and we get set back again.  But a co-worker said something to me this week that made me take a step back and analyze our financial situation differently.  He said "at least you have had the money to spend."  It made me realize that God really is taking care of us.  He is providing for what we need when we need it.  We are getting just enough back from our taxes to cover the majority of the cost of our new furnace.  We had just enough room on our credit cards to pay for our first IVF cycle along with the grant we got from Baby Quest to pay for all the medications.  My husbands new job allowed him to pull out of his retirement early and it was just enough to pay for the remainder of our second IVF cycle along with the money we raised through our golf tournament fundraiser.  We found out three weeks ago that our tenants are moving out of our home in Columbus that they have been renting for the past two years. They bought a house this week and we have to meet them tomorrow to get the keys from them.  I was really upset at first because the thought of paying two mortgages and losing $500 a month in income was scary to say the least.  But my husband got a pretty nice bonus from work today and it's enough to cover the second mortgage and utilities for a few months while we try to sell the house.  So tomorrow we also meet with a realtor and put our Columbus home on the market.  We hope to make a nice profit off the sale since we did a lot of remodeling to the home when we lived in it. Of course it sucks to once again use the bonus money that we had other plans for on something we weren't expecting to have to deal with right now....but in the end we may come out on top if our house sells rather quickly. 

I guess the moral of today's post is that I am grateful that we've never really been in a situation where we couldn't pay for what we needed.  We've questioned our ability at times, and our adventures aren't usually fun ones to sort our way through....but somehow things always fall into place.  God always delivers, and for that I am thankful.