Starting Up Again

/ Hilary / Leave a comment

Here we go again! After months of trying to become pregnant without any fertility intervention, we have come to the decision to walk through the IVF process once more.

In some way, I feel my body has let me down. How many times did I hear from people, “once you have a baby you will be able to get pregnant without intervention” or “I know of someone who did IVF for their first baby and was able to get pregnant without help for their next”.

Well, that isn’t our story and I am hopeful as I wanted to be with that possibility of my body ‘healing’ itself through a pregnancy, it didn’t.

Something in my body just doesn’t work to make a baby. Science can’t explain it to me. At this point I have had a medicated cycle for the better part of a year and no luck. Unfortunately, we did learn that my left fallopian tube is now blocked and after a rather expensive outpatient procedure, the doctor was not able to unblock it. With this, we are left with smaller chances of a natural/unassisted pregnancy.

We look to the rather large (yet small in the long run) investment of a second IVF cycle. I know what it’s like and I’m prepared for the upcoming round of shots and hormones my body is about to endure.

I stand hopeful that we will be able to have a second healthy, successful pregnancy and birth and yet still fear that my body is too old and the egg quality has diminished. We ended up with one viable blastocyst (what an embryo is called before implantation) and that is now our growing, healthy baby girl who I refer to as Little Princess in my writing.

I write for me. It’s a way of getting my emotions out. I also write for you. For those who are going through a bumpy, rocky, frustrating fertility journey that doesn’t make sense. It’s nice to know what we are not alone in this journey. We desire to become pregnant, to be able to procreate and do the one thing that our bodies are created to do… make tiny humans. So, what is wrong? Why can’t we just have another baby?

We are stuck with questions that won’t have answers.

This time around, I feel a little more self-conscious about spending the money for IVF. Wondering if people are thinking, why are you doing this again? You already have one, why can’t you just be satisfied and grateful that you have her? 

I choose not to entertain those thoughts and questions very long. I have sat with this decision long enough to know that I want to try and put forth the effort and if we end up with a second baby, praise God! If not, then we will see what the next step is from there.

Our journey continues... back at it.

Isn’t this what life is anyway- a series of steps in a direction that we feel we are to take. So here we go… taking our first step to our second baby.

Why I Quit Blogging (and Why I'm Starting Up Again) | Life Update – Angie Americana

Vitamin F

/ Hilary / Leave a comment

I read this the other day and just had to share it.

Vitamin F (Friends)

Why do I have a variety of friends who are all so different in character? How can I get along with them all? I think that each one helps to bring out a “different” part of me.

With one of them, I am polite. With another, I joke. I sit down and talk about serious matters with one. With another, I laugh a lot. Listen to one friend’s problems. Then I listen to another one’s advice for me. My friends are like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. When completed, they form a treasure box. A treasure of friends. They are my friends who understand me better than I understand myself. They’re friends who support me through good days and bad. We all pray together and for each other.

Real age doctors tell us that friends are good for our health. Dr. Oz calls them Vitamin F (for friends) and counts the benefits of friends as essential to our wellbeing. I’m so happy that I have a stock of Vitamin F.

Thank you for being my Vitamins.

Pumping for a Year of Breastmilk

/ Hilary / Leave a comment

I have scoured the internet to find a breakdown of how much breastmilk is needed for the first year of a baby’s life.

Nothing.

So I thought I would do some calculations and post for others who are on the search. I do not know the accuracy of this chart as it’s my best summation after the research I’ve done.

From what I understand, babies 0-6 months of age will consume an average of 24 ounces a day. Babies 7-9 months of age will consume an average of 32 ounces a day and babies 9-12 months will consume at most around 30 ounces a day. This all depends on when solid foods are introduced and how much a baby eats of the solids each day.

One can target to give a baby around 10,600 ounces of milk in the first year.

This chart is a sample of the average consumption of milk throughout the first year.

Although this doesn’t total the 10,600 mentioned above, it’s a good guide to work from when you’re wanting to pump/store milk for the future.

Happy expressing all!

 

Redemption of My Body

/ Hilary / Leave a comment

Over the past several months, I have been walking through a fear of mine that has been running in the back of my head for years. Since I was in middle school, I have dealt with body image issues, lack of confidence, and jealousy of other females and what ‘they had’.

Feeling too fat and not accepting my curves as beautiful, I fought to keep the athletic shape my sporting efforts created. Tirelessly working out well beyond a healthy level, I let fear be my motivation.

Fear of being too fat.Image result for body scale"

Within this struggle was the question as to what my body would look like if I became pregnant and how it would be transformed after I delivered.

One of the reasons I was okay not getting pregnant was because of the way my body would be forced to change, stretch, disfigure.

Fears of the gaining weight and even more so the stretching of the skin and not being in control of how my body would be after I delivered was an ongoing torment in my life.

Through my fertility struggles, one way that I coped with the disappointment after each ‘try’ was saying to myself, “well, at least you have a flat stomach”. My desperate attempt for acceptance.

This pregnancy was a miracle within itself.

I housed this perfect little peanut inside of me and nourished it with good, healthy, nutrient foods to help her grow.

My body grew too.

Grateful to have only gained the appropriate weight for growing a baby, I felt healthy and strong in my skin.

Days leading up to delivery-

“The feet are swollen. The fingers look like mini sausages. The bladder feels constantly full. The weight on the scale is reaching scary numbers*.”

This has been a journey towards redemption for me.

Letting go of what my body needed to do to continue to grow this miracle, trusting that my body was responding the way it was supposed to.

I released my fears and let God control my weight, my aches, my sore muscles, and my mind.

*Scary numbers to me were back to the highest numbers I have ever seen on the scale.

Days after delivery-

“The feet are still swollen. My body hurt, my back aches and it’s hard for me to stand up straight. It hurts to sit and lay on my side feels weird as I still have a weird drooping sensation of my stomach that pulls my skin down to the mattress.”

The days following my delivery, I was amazed at how much weight I had lost in such a short amount of time. My body felt so worn down and used and my limbs flopped like a rag doll. The core center of my body (stomach and back) was depleted of strength from the delivery and I could not imagine doing much more with myself than sitting, sleeping, and minimal walking to the kitchen. My stomach was still round (although it had gone down a lot), and I wondered what my body was going to look like.

Weeks after delivery-

“The feet are no longer swollen. My body isn’t hurting, thank you, God! I still have a pouch in my stomach area, when is this going to go away?”

My midwife confirms that although I do not have diastasis recti above my belly button, I certainly have it below. My stomach muscles are about 2.5 inches apart and when I push down my stomach is all squishy.

She gives the okay to start mild exercises to help bring the muscles back together.

My weight is closer to my normal range, but I still feel ‘blah’.

Two months after delivery-

My body has returned to the weight it was before becoming pregnant. How in the world is this possible? I attribute it to healthy eating and a balanced approach to pregnancy and after delivery.

Nope, no exercise either! What a gift to not be chained to that insanity of trying to make my body respond a certain way. Instead, I have just let my body heal and with it is a healthier lifestyle.

I feel gratitude for the support I receive from people around me who have been through pregnancy in a healthy way.

While there is still a bulge in my midsection, like a little squishy pouch, I am fitting into my regular skinny jeans and will trust that my body will look exactly as it’s supposed to.

It probably won’t look like it had before, but I did carry a human in there for 10 months.

Acceptance around what is, exactly as it is today.

I am healthy. My baby is healthy. My body is meant to bear children. I am perfectly created by God and so is my body.

Redemption of my body… and my mind around my image.

Reality Check: Breastfeeding is Hard!

/ Hilary / 8 Comments

I feel like an ill-equipped mother. I want to breastfeed my sweet little one and it seems like everything is in place to do so- she is latching and I am producing- but we are struggling.

Or maybe it’s just me who is struggling.

She shows signs of hunger, so I feed her.

She falls asleep soon after.

I wake her up. Take off her clothes, make her feel uncomfortable by putting a cool washcloth on her body, tickle her feet, mess with different body parts.

She awakes, recommits to eating.

…Falls asleep.

This happens multiple times in the 30 minutes she remains latched.

When she pushes away and seems to be satisfied.

I burp her.

Waiting for her eyes to open up again and for her to begin rooting, I change sides.

Same issue: different side.

I become frustrated.

What is going on my sweet little one?

Are you tired from all the work of sucking? I know, this is so much harder than the bottle and even harder than the umbilical cord that just put food into you for the last 10 months.

She will go for 10-15 more minutes and then give all the signs that she is done.

Limp arms, open hands, eyes rolled back in her head.

I think she is full and so I change her diaper, re-clothe her and she is out.

For 15-20 minutes.

Then she is fussy, squirmy and putting her hands near her mouth.

Really?

Still hungry?

Ok- so I proceed to feed her more.

10 minutes of feeding and then she is milk drunk.

Is she done?

I hope she is full.

I am tired and wanting to take nap- sleep when she sleeps is what I’ve been told.

I put her down, ready to take my nap- and she stirs.

Still hungry.

I don’t know what to do. How often to keep feeding her these little amounts?

I cave.

1-2ounces of expressed milk delivered via bottle.

The easy way out.

She sleeps for 3-4 hours.

I am so tempted to just stop breastfeeding all together.

The bottle is easier for her, for Hubby, and possibly for me as it would be more time back in my day to take care of me and do other things.

But I don’t want to just be a milk factory- I want to breastfeed.

I am conflicted because I thought this would be easier.

No one told me how hard breastfeeding is.

Why is it so hard to feed my baby?

What am I missing here?

Another scenario:

I take a nap and while I’m asleep, Hubby and I miscommunications and he feeds her a 4oz bottle.

I wake up from my nap an hour later, ready to nurse, and surprised to see her nursery door still closed.

Shouldn’t she be up by now?

I ask and that is when I find out the reality.

I began to cry.

What is wrong with me that I can’t feed my baby enough food to help her sleep?

I am so scared of my milk production going down because I am not feeding her when she is hungry that I immediately hook up to the breast pump.

I am scared that I am doing it wrong.Image result for frustrated mom

Scared that she is going to get used to the bottle and reject me.

Scared that my milk production is going to be so out of whack because sometimes I feed and sometimes I pump, that I won’t be able to continue this beautiful act of producing food for her.

I’ve heard that she is young and still practicing this whole eating thing.

To give her grace as she will get tired from sucking for 30+ minutes.

I just don’t know how to take care of myself and sleep when she is eating little bits every so often.

I think I need a day when I just commit to not giving into the bottle and just feeding her, little as it may be and as often as it may be.

How will I get the sleep I need?

I’m not sure- but others seem to be doing it without the bottle. Maybe I’m just enabling her.

My expectations are off–  I didn’t know it would be like this…

She latches well, I have milk- what’s the issue?

I thought it would be easier, but it’s not.

It’s not just me, it’s the way this whole thing works.

God help me be patient with her… and with me.

A FEW DAYS LATER

We tried getting her on a 3-hour schedule of feeding and she was just so sleepy during the breastfeeding portion that we would attempt for a minute and then go straight to the bottle.

It just wasn’t working.

We are now back to letting her sleep until she naturally wakes up.

Little Princess feeds her from me first (which when she is awake is about 20 minutes)

Tops her off with the bottle (which is typically 1-3oz depending)

Play with her

Put her to sleep for another 4 hours.

I still have the twinge of “I’m not a good enough mother to be able to provide her the full meal”, but then I realize, it’s not me. It’s not my ability to provide.

It’s her stamina.

She’s just a sleepy baby.

I keep telling myself- the most important thing is that she is loved, she is safe, she has a full belly and she has a place to sleep.

It’s my ego, my pride, my fear that is keeping me away from the peace and serenity of this season.

I decide to push away the negativity and instead embrace the hours in between when I get to rest and recover while enjoying the moments I get to hold her close.

I’m not a bad mother. We are all just learning.