New needles & New pictures

Delightfully, when Andy went to pick up my Heparin prescription last time, they were out of the needles/syringes that they usually give me. The pharmacist gave Andy "allergy syringes" instead. Oh allergy needles, where have you been all my life?! Not only is the needle about half as long, it's also about a third as thick. I've given myself my last two shots almost entirely pain free!! AND they're 10 cents a piece cheaper than the other needles! What a deal! I seriously don't think I've been this excited since we saw that the pregnancy test was positive. I need to take a belly shot now, because I'm guessing in the next month that all my bruises are going to clear up and my stomach is going to look a TON better! I just hope that it's still administering the medicine correctly. I guess I'm just so used to it hurting that I feel like it's not working if it's not hurting. Here's a visual on the old vs. new needle.

Really, need I say more?!

Also, I feel like it's been forever since I put pictures up, so here are some pics of Mr. Ira:Ira and Grandpa Chris on Grandpa's birthday.

Too funny not to include.
Both grandkids digging into the cake while Grandpa chuckles.
We were saying how funny it will be next year to try to get all the grandkids on Grandpa's lap. There'll be 5 then!

Ira "smiling with his mouth open" for his 41 month picture.

My Dear Hubby

I'd like to dedicate this post to my dear husband. He is the reason why I say "WE are pregnant," not "I am pregnant." You see, I may be the one carrying the baby and dealing with the nausea, but he's the one dealing with just about everything else. This first trimester has been pretty rough and there is absolutely no way I could have survived it without his help.

For instance, most days, Andy gets up at 4:45, makes his own breakfast, lunch, and coffee (something I used to do) and is out the door by 5:15 to head to work. He usually calls at least once during the day to check on how I'm doing and how Ira is. I usually call him at some point asking him to pick (insert random grocery/sundry/medicine etc. here) up on his way home. (Because since we found out we were pregnant, I haven't done a lick of grocery shopping.) When he gets home, he pretty much takes over Ira care for the night. He fixes dinner, gives Ira his bath, puts Ira to bed, then is stuck cleaning up the kitchen (because since we found out we were pregnant, I haven't fixed a meal, and I don't think I've cleaned the kitchen up once - there's some funky perma-smell in the kitchen that makes me sick.)

I feel so blessed to have a husband who is so involved and so patient and so caring. One who has let me focus solely on growing our baby while taking over everything else. One who would drive half an hour to get me a Taco Salad that I was craving, only to bring it home, have me take 5 bites (complaining every bite about how off it tastes) and running to the bathroom to... well you get the idea. One who would drive an hour and a half to make it to our OB appointment. I could go on and on, but I'm guessing you get the idea. So if you ever catch me saying, "We are pregnant," you'll know the "WE" was entirely intentional.

Another new post!

I know, once you recover from the shock that I'm posting twice in two days, I'm sure you'll be disappointed by the lack of (much) information in this post.

Our OB appointment went great yesterday. We got to see baby move twice and heard a good strong heartbeat of 154 bpm. Ira actually loved listening to the heartbeat this time and kept asking Dr. Ferris to "play it again." Dr. Ferris said that I can start slowly tapering off of the Progesterone (which I'm currently doing 4x/day), so that will be nice when I'm finished with it!

After the appointment we went to dinner at HomeTown Buffet, because I thought a lot of food sounded good - which is good, because I've lost about 20 pounds since we got pregnant (it's hard to gain weight when you are eating about a third as much food as you used to due to nausea/vomiting.) Long story short, after finishing a small salad, I wasn't incredibly hungry for anything else. Andy coaxed me into eating some baked chicken and some brisket, but all in all I'd say the "ingesting lots of calories" was a failure.

And today I haven't really felt that great. Ira's been a doll though (which, honestly, he usually is, yesterday was just a bad day for him) and he's currently sleeping. I'm hoping to feel good enough to go to the High School football game tonight - I absolutely LOVE high school football. We'll see how that goes.

G'day for now!

Temper, TEMPER!!

I know, again, it's been awhile, but instead of feeling guilty about it, I'm just going to forge ahead and try to do better in the future (I know, how many times have you heard that before.) But instead of giant, monster posts, I'm going to try to keep them short and sweet (or at least informative.)

On the pregnancy front: we are 12w4d today. I have still been pretty nauseous, but I'm hoping that we're nearing the end of that. We have an appointment today that I am really looking forward to. I hope we get to see baby again! (Our doc has a rolling sono machine that he knows how to use and has each time we've been in there.) I'll let you know how it goes.

Ira is becoming quite the 3 year old with quite his momma's temper. I will not blame anyone but myself for this one. My hubby is the most even-tempered, level-headed person you could know. In the 8+ years I've known him, I've never seen him lose his temper. I wish he could say the same about me. My temper is much better than it was in High School. But it's still definitely there. And now, I've been noticing that Ira has one too. I've recently discovered that the 3s are nothing compared to the 2s. At three they just have so much more of a sense of individuality and independence. So far, I've been proud of myself and my patience with Ira. We use Love and Logic with him, which is actually why I'm posting right now. Ira is in Chair Time - has been on and off all morning because we're trying to sort through winter clothes and see what still fits him. He's not that into it and starts kicking every time I get close to him, so off we go to chair time... So far I've gotten a load of sheets done, I've been on Facebook about a dozen times, I've gotten all of his pants sorted through, and I've scrubbed the faucet clean. So with nothing better to do and all the time in the world, here's your long-anticipated update!

Good day!

My excuse...

So I know, it's been forever, and I do mean FOREVER, since I last blogged. Some have heckled, but I promise I have a good excuse this time. A better excuse than ever before actually...


Told ya! Yes, that's right, WE'RE PREGNANT! And since we found out on July 6th, I've felt pretty puny. Which is actually wonderful because I never felt sick with any of the babies that we miscarried. So yeah, I've been on the couch most days and I couldn't exactly write about it until we decided to tell everyone. Now you know!

We've had 2 sonograms done - one at 6w4d (the photo above). At that point in the other pregnancies, baby was already measuring really small (like back at 5w3d) and the heartbeat was really slow (in the 80s). With this one though, baby was measuring at exactly 6w4d, and the heartbeat was in the 120s. Talk about music to a mommy's and daddy's ears. (Ira on the other hand, plugged his ears because it was TOO LOUD!) We had another one done last Thursday, and again, baby was measuring exactly right (8w 4d) and the heartbeat was in the 160s-170s! Hooray!!!!

Now, for those who are interested in the medical aspect of this pregnancy, let me give you a rundown of that side of things. Warning: This'll take awhile!

After two miscarriages (Jan '08, March '08), we began going to an incredible doctor, Dr. Ron Ferris. He ran TONS of tests, and several things popped up as unusual. First, my thyroid levels (contributes to controlling hormone levels throughout the body) were all out of whack. Secondly, my Vitamin D levels were WAY low (not necessarily a contributor to the miscarriages, but definitely a general health concern.) And lastly, my progesterone levels (the hormone that peaks after peak day and also helps sustain a pregnancy the first 12 weeks or so) were pretty low. So, I started taking 120 mg Armour Thyroid, 2000 i.u. Vitamin D, and 5 g Flax Oil (helps produce better mucus pre-peak as well as being a heart-healthy Omega-3.) every day along with a prenatal vitamin. I also did 200 mg of Prometrium (a progesterone vaginal suppository) on post peak days 4-17. Dr. Ferris also ran tests to see if my clotting factors were high. Nothing unusual showed up on those tests, but just in case, he had me doing 81 mg baby aspirin post peak 4-17 as well. (It would help thin my blood in case it was too thick when I was pregnant)

However, with those interventions, we still miscarried again in October '08. Sooo... back to the drawing board, because apparently there were still issues in addition to those 3 things. I did about 3 months of Metformin, which is a drug typically used for diabetes, but also had been used successfully to treat Poly-cystic Ovarian Syndrome. We didn't know if we had PCOS, this was essentially a clinical trial - if it helped improve my NFP biomarkers (mucus quality, quantity, peak day, temperatures, etc.) it worked, if not, PCOS wasn't the problem. Well, that didn't work at all. In fact, it caused me to start spotting during my mucus build-up. If anything, it made things worse. So we stopped doing that.

After doing some reading, we talked to Dr. Ferris about the possibility that I had Immature Follicle Syndrome. Which is exactly what it sounds like - the egg/follicle never gets very big, however, it is capable of being fertilized. Problem is - it's not mature enough to develop a baby - resulting in miscarriages 90+% of the time. The remedy for that was Clomid, which is a follicle stimulating hormone. Yes, it can result in multiples if you have a hyper-response to it - however, at that point, we would have welcomed multiples! You take the Clomid (it's just a pill) on days 5-9 of your cycle. There's just one minor problem with Clomid - it REALLY dries up your cervical mucus - which is not very conducive to getting pregnant. So, to make up for the drying effect of Clomid, I took Guafinesin (the stuff in Mucinex) and Vitamin B6 on cycle days 5- Peak day.

Dr. Ferris also had Andy and I both do a course of really strong antibiotics prior to trying to conceive just in case one or the other of us had any infections that we were sharing with each other.

He also gave me a prescription for Heparin (a blood thinner) to start once we found out we were pregnant. His thought was this: no, the clotting factor studies didn't turn up anything unusual, however, they were done when I was not pregnant. When you are pregnant, your clotting factors are 5 times what they normally are. His concern was that with each miscarriage, we had seen the placenta tearing away from my uterine wall and his thoughts were that a clot was passing through the placenta, jarring it away from the uterine wall. So....

We tried. For three months. Which has never happened before. (We'd always conceived as soon as we started trying - once when we weren't even trying at all!) And Clomid had some awful effects on my hormones (probably b/c they were finally where they were supposed to be!) Let's just say I was a MESS (depressed, negative, grumpy, insert every other pessimistic word you can think of here.) Which as you might be able to conclude, was not very helpful when you're trying to conceive!

Finally, we conceived on our 3rd cycle. (Which I know, is not really that long to try - I know lots of people who have had to try MUCH longer!) Here's what that cycle looked like med-wise (I feel like a 90-year old with all my meds!)

Every day:
1 Armour at precisely 6AM (important to do it at the same time every day)
5 Flax Seed Oil
1 Vitamin D
1 baby aspirin
1 prenatal

Pre peak:
1 Clomid days 5-9
3-4 Guafinesin days 5-Peak
1 Vitamin B6 days 5-Peak

Post peak:
1 Progesterone days 4-??

Once we found out we were pregnant (on July 6th):
4 Progesterone - 6 hours apart
2 Heparin shots (.5 ML) -12 hours apart
plus the Flax, Vit. D, baby aspirin, and prenatal.

So seriously, you think I've had time to update my blog?!

Belly shots are going to be funny this pregnancy, as you'll see in the following photo, because I am no nurse, so my ability to administer the heparin shots is far from perfect!


I'll get to taper off the progesterone once we hit the 2nd trimester, but I'll continue the Heparin all the way through the pregnancy. The pregnancy is also considered high-risk, so I'll have a sono at 18 weeks, 26 weeks, and then every week starting at week 28 to make sure that baby is growing well.

So yeah, that's the scoop. I apologize for the lengthiness, but I wanted to document a full explanation. Thanks for staying with me! God bless!!

I can't read

Recently, a friend loaned me the first two books in the "Twilight" series. I have long said that I wouldn't read them, I guess I thought they'd be too sci-fi-ey - which is a genre I do NOT enjoy. Well, I thought I ought to read them since they were loaned with a good recommendation... and I couldn't put them down. At the expense of my house, my cooking, my laundry, and my poor, dear husband, I finished them both in a matter of 3 days. And so, I have decided that until I get a little self-control, I can't read any more.

An Update, Finally...

Sorry to all that it's been SO long since I've written last. As usual, life got in the way of blogging. How durst it?! Soooo, instead of writing a million paragraphs, I decided to just put pics and captions up to update you on what we've been up to lately. Here goes...

Hopefully this blog won't be a snooze....

Andy won tickets on the radio (seriously, why does he have all the luck) to go to 81 Speedway. In going, we found that we need to take our son to Vegas. He picked the winner in probably a half a dozen races while the cars were driving their practice laps. (So apparently I'm the only one without luck here. Apparently the boys in my life snatched it all up)

This is what you get when you try to take a picture of Ira. I thought that look didn't usually come until they were in their teens???
Andy's roommate from college, Brad, got married the beginning of June. It was our Anniversary weekend, so I took a pic of the two of us.
The happy couple.... err... Brad and Andy... college roommates and best buds.

With living closer to Andy's parents, Ira got to help with harvest more this year.
We went swimming at the Clearwater Pool the other day. Ira's favorite thing to do in the water was play "Jump Splash." It's a game whose name is pretty self-explanatory.
For lunch today, I tried my hand at making tapenade. Although it looks disgusting (it's the black stuff on top) it tasted really good. Lunch was assembled as follows: whole wheat cracker spread with hummus, topped with creole tilapia and a dollop of tapenade. Ira's not the biggest fan of the hummus, but he LOVED the tapenade.


And now, outside we move.
We've been spending tons of time outside lately. I love the hot weather and Ira loves playing in his little pool. I thought I'd give you an update on all my plants (because Lord knows they're much more interesting than me!)


This is my hibiscus that Andy gave me for my b-day. This is the second round of blooms so far.
This is one of our 24 (I know, ridiculous) tomato plants. I cannot believe these began as tiny tiny seeds just a few months ago. And I thought Ira grew fast!
The sugar snap peas. We only had 3 seeds come up this year, much to my disappointment. I think we've picked 4 pea pods so far. Woo hoo!!
Two near-ripe cucumbers. Of course, the thing I like the least it what's ready first. Anyone have any good pickle recipes?
We don't have weeds in our garden, we have petunias. Seriously... Here they are next to the corn.
One of the 3 zucchini plants. Does anyone know, I have lots of blooms on my plants, but none of them have zucchinis behind them. At the risk of sounding like an idiot, (hey it wouldn't be the first time and certainly won't be the last) where are the zucchinis?!!
Our watermelon plants. In the background are the cantaloupe plants. I can't WAIT for these babies to start producing!
Lastly, I made a new bread recipe today, Honey Wheat. We'll see if I'll break my streak and actually eat some bread. (Long story short, I haven't eaten much bread since I ate 2 moldy pieces of cinnamon toast about 6 weeks ago.)

Hope you got your fill. As usual, I'll try to be better about updating. God bless and Happy Monday!