Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Oops...forgot a "minor" detail
I alluded to it, but I didn't exactly state a key piece of info in that last post. I decided to cancel the diagnostic laparoscopy for next Monday. I want to see how things go with these new supplements. And even though I didn't say it in my post on Saturday night, a big part of why I wanted to have the surgery was that I was actually hoping that it would be bad. That the results would be that things looked horrible and my odds of getting pregnant based on what they saw would be slim to none. I wanted to be done with this. And now with the renewal of my hope...I would rather not know if it looks bad. Because even if it does, I believe that God is working and that one day I will be pregnant.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
HOPE! (of the ultimate variety)
Amazing...I went to bed last night after posting here, feeling anything but hope. And now just a little over 12 hours later, it's bubbled up again...and it feels good!
Last night I emailed Sarah (a nutritionist I met with two years ago when I was having such horrible digestion issues) with a few food related questions. I didn't even mention to her about the endometriosis and upcoming procedure (although she is aware of my history with endo), but in her response she "just happened" to mention two supplements that she thought would be good for me to take: DIM and calcium-d-glucarate. In doing some research, I found that these supplements are very beneficial for women with estrogen dominance.
Estrogen dominance...wow. The symptoms of this fit me to a "t." What's strange is that I vaguely recall mention of me having this issue...whether it was my chiropractor that mentioned it, Sarah back when I went to her, or if just came up in my research when I was first diagnosed with endometriosis. Either way, I am slightly regretful that I didn't realize it sooner and do something about it. But not that regretful because I truly believe that this whole journey to have a baby is just as much (if not more) spiritual than it is physical. So I believe the fact that I'm figuring it out now is exactly in God's timing. Speaking of which...God's timing is amazing! Let me explain...
It may seem like the hope I'm so excited about is the renewed hope I have of getting pregnant using these supplements to get the estrogen dominance under control. And while that's part of it, the bigger part is my hope that I'm about to take an even more important and life changing journey than this whole baby making thing. I realized this morning that what I've been feeling for a while now is absolutely 100% the truth...it is time for me to become more than a Christian in name only. I've been aware for a while now that my relationship with Christ is pretty shallow, that my understanding of God's love for me is seriously lacking, that my imprint on this world as a Christ follower is nearly nonexistent, and... that I should actually do something about it.
I won't lie...I've had this "someday" feeling about it. And I think the someday I've been waiting for is when we have kids. Like all of a sudden when we have kids, then it will be time to get my priorities straight and actually put my relationship with Christ at the top. It sounds so strange (and quite embarrassing) now that I put it in writing, but it's what I've actually been waiting for.
So here's where the timing gets pretty cool in this whole story. So this morning I'm doing some research on the supplements Sarah told me about. When I did a search for "DIM and infertility," I came across this article, which a lady posted on her blog that's all about her struggle with getting pregnant. I started reading through what she went through, and it was pretty amazing how similar her attitude and take on the whole experience was to mine. She's a Christian, and it was super cool to get her perspective on it. I thought it was a pretty cool find, so I bookmarked it wanting to read more later.
An hour or so later, I gave Mackenzie a call. I had just emailed her the night before to tell her about the laparoscopy I was planning to have, and figured it would be easier to explain the decision not to have it verbally rather than typing it out. Besides, I was so excited, I wanted to share it with someone. We talked for over an hour about many different things, one of which was me telling her about the quote that I shared in an earlier post about waiting being the answer. I told her that I'm not convinced that part of God's answer of "wait" to my pleas to have a baby isn't Him waiting for me to get to know Him better first; that He knows I've been delaying my pursuit of Him because this silly notion of "I'll get around to that later when I have kids" (as if I'll have more time then...ha ha). So we chatted a little about that, moved on to other topics, wrapped it up, and I thought that was the end of that subject for the day. Well, blessedly I was wrong...
I returned to the computer to do more research on the supplements and estrogen dominance, but what I got instead was much, MUCH better. I got a heart-to-heart message from God. You see...that blog I bookmarked earlier was still up, and since I really liked her perspective I decided to keep reading. One of her tags at the side was Hope, and since I was feeling that for the first time in quite a while, I decided to see what she had to say about such things. I scrolled down a ways, and that's when I found this poem she posted:
Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried:
Quietly, patiently, lovingly God replied.
I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate,
And the Master so gently said, “Child, you must wait”.
“Wait? You say, wait! ” my indignant reply.
“Lord, I need answers, I need to know why!
Is your hand shortened? Or have you not heard?
By faith, I have asked, and am claiming your Word.
My future and all to which I can relate
Hangs in the balance, and You tell me to WAIT?
I’m needing a ‘yes’, a go-ahead sign,
Or even a ‘no’ to which I can resign.
And Lord, You promised that if we believe
We need but to ask, and we shall receive.
And Lord, I’ve been asking, and this is my cry:
I’m weary of asking! I need a reply!
Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate
As my Master replied once again, “You must wait.”
So, I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut
And grumbled to God, “So, I’m waiting…. for what?”
He seemed, then, to kneel, and His eyes wept with mine,
And he tenderly said, “I could give you a sign.
I could shake the heavens, and darken the sun.
I could raise the dead, and cause mountains to run.
All you seek, I could give, and pleased you would be.
You would have what you want - But you wouldn’t know Me.
You’d not know the depth of My love for each saint;
You’d not know the power that I give to the faint;
You’d not learn to see through the clouds of despair;
You’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m there;
You’d not know the joy of resting in Me
When darkness and silence were all you could see.
You’d never experience that fullness of love
As the peace of My Spirit descends like a dove;
You’d know that I give and I save…. (for a start),
But you’d not know the depth of the beat of My heart.
The glow of My comfort late into the night,
The faith that I give when you walk without sight,
The depth that’s beyond getting just what you asked
Of an infinite God, who makes what you have LAST.
You’d never know, should your pain quickly flee,
What it means that “My grace is sufficient for Thee.”
Yes, your dreams for your loved one overnight would come true,
But, Oh, the loss! If I lost what I’m doing in you!
So, be silent, My child, and in time you will see
That the greatest of gifts is to get to know Me.
And though oft’ may My answers seem terribly late,
My most precious answer of all is still, “WAIT.”
(by Russell Kelfer)
Needless to say, I cried quite a bit...especially when He "knelt" and "wept" with me. I felt like God was talking directly to me, and for the first time in a long while, I felt like He truly cared. And not just the kind where He cared about what I'm going through...but that He cared about me and His relationship with me. It was that amazing feeling of being pursued...sought out...desired.
I hope I always remember that the hope I have in Christ and my relationship with Him and God my father is the ultimate hope. Yes, I have renewed hope in the possibility of becoming pregnant, but it is technically possible that it may never come to pass. If God were to have granted my request for a child sooner and not given me this time to "wait," I fear I would have missed out on this "greatest of gifts" He's presenting me with now.
Oh that I will be a good steward of this gift He's found me worthy of!
Last night I emailed Sarah (a nutritionist I met with two years ago when I was having such horrible digestion issues) with a few food related questions. I didn't even mention to her about the endometriosis and upcoming procedure (although she is aware of my history with endo), but in her response she "just happened" to mention two supplements that she thought would be good for me to take: DIM and calcium-d-glucarate. In doing some research, I found that these supplements are very beneficial for women with estrogen dominance.
Estrogen dominance...wow. The symptoms of this fit me to a "t." What's strange is that I vaguely recall mention of me having this issue...whether it was my chiropractor that mentioned it, Sarah back when I went to her, or if just came up in my research when I was first diagnosed with endometriosis. Either way, I am slightly regretful that I didn't realize it sooner and do something about it. But not that regretful because I truly believe that this whole journey to have a baby is just as much (if not more) spiritual than it is physical. So I believe the fact that I'm figuring it out now is exactly in God's timing. Speaking of which...God's timing is amazing! Let me explain...
It may seem like the hope I'm so excited about is the renewed hope I have of getting pregnant using these supplements to get the estrogen dominance under control. And while that's part of it, the bigger part is my hope that I'm about to take an even more important and life changing journey than this whole baby making thing. I realized this morning that what I've been feeling for a while now is absolutely 100% the truth...it is time for me to become more than a Christian in name only. I've been aware for a while now that my relationship with Christ is pretty shallow, that my understanding of God's love for me is seriously lacking, that my imprint on this world as a Christ follower is nearly nonexistent, and... that I should actually do something about it.
I won't lie...I've had this "someday" feeling about it. And I think the someday I've been waiting for is when we have kids. Like all of a sudden when we have kids, then it will be time to get my priorities straight and actually put my relationship with Christ at the top. It sounds so strange (and quite embarrassing) now that I put it in writing, but it's what I've actually been waiting for.
So here's where the timing gets pretty cool in this whole story. So this morning I'm doing some research on the supplements Sarah told me about. When I did a search for "DIM and infertility," I came across this article, which a lady posted on her blog that's all about her struggle with getting pregnant. I started reading through what she went through, and it was pretty amazing how similar her attitude and take on the whole experience was to mine. She's a Christian, and it was super cool to get her perspective on it. I thought it was a pretty cool find, so I bookmarked it wanting to read more later.
An hour or so later, I gave Mackenzie a call. I had just emailed her the night before to tell her about the laparoscopy I was planning to have, and figured it would be easier to explain the decision not to have it verbally rather than typing it out. Besides, I was so excited, I wanted to share it with someone. We talked for over an hour about many different things, one of which was me telling her about the quote that I shared in an earlier post about waiting being the answer. I told her that I'm not convinced that part of God's answer of "wait" to my pleas to have a baby isn't Him waiting for me to get to know Him better first; that He knows I've been delaying my pursuit of Him because this silly notion of "I'll get around to that later when I have kids" (as if I'll have more time then...ha ha). So we chatted a little about that, moved on to other topics, wrapped it up, and I thought that was the end of that subject for the day. Well, blessedly I was wrong...
I returned to the computer to do more research on the supplements and estrogen dominance, but what I got instead was much, MUCH better. I got a heart-to-heart message from God. You see...that blog I bookmarked earlier was still up, and since I really liked her perspective I decided to keep reading. One of her tags at the side was Hope, and since I was feeling that for the first time in quite a while, I decided to see what she had to say about such things. I scrolled down a ways, and that's when I found this poem she posted:
Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried:
Quietly, patiently, lovingly God replied.
I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate,
And the Master so gently said, “Child, you must wait”.
“Wait? You say, wait! ” my indignant reply.
“Lord, I need answers, I need to know why!
Is your hand shortened? Or have you not heard?
By faith, I have asked, and am claiming your Word.
My future and all to which I can relate
Hangs in the balance, and You tell me to WAIT?
I’m needing a ‘yes’, a go-ahead sign,
Or even a ‘no’ to which I can resign.
And Lord, You promised that if we believe
We need but to ask, and we shall receive.
And Lord, I’ve been asking, and this is my cry:
I’m weary of asking! I need a reply!
Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate
As my Master replied once again, “You must wait.”
So, I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut
And grumbled to God, “So, I’m waiting…. for what?”
He seemed, then, to kneel, and His eyes wept with mine,
And he tenderly said, “I could give you a sign.
I could shake the heavens, and darken the sun.
I could raise the dead, and cause mountains to run.
All you seek, I could give, and pleased you would be.
You would have what you want - But you wouldn’t know Me.
You’d not know the depth of My love for each saint;
You’d not know the power that I give to the faint;
You’d not learn to see through the clouds of despair;
You’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m there;
You’d not know the joy of resting in Me
When darkness and silence were all you could see.
You’d never experience that fullness of love
As the peace of My Spirit descends like a dove;
You’d know that I give and I save…. (for a start),
But you’d not know the depth of the beat of My heart.
The glow of My comfort late into the night,
The faith that I give when you walk without sight,
The depth that’s beyond getting just what you asked
Of an infinite God, who makes what you have LAST.
You’d never know, should your pain quickly flee,
What it means that “My grace is sufficient for Thee.”
Yes, your dreams for your loved one overnight would come true,
But, Oh, the loss! If I lost what I’m doing in you!
So, be silent, My child, and in time you will see
That the greatest of gifts is to get to know Me.
And though oft’ may My answers seem terribly late,
My most precious answer of all is still, “WAIT.”
(by Russell Kelfer)
Needless to say, I cried quite a bit...especially when He "knelt" and "wept" with me. I felt like God was talking directly to me, and for the first time in a long while, I felt like He truly cared. And not just the kind where He cared about what I'm going through...but that He cared about me and His relationship with me. It was that amazing feeling of being pursued...sought out...desired.
I hope I always remember that the hope I have in Christ and my relationship with Him and God my father is the ultimate hope. Yes, I have renewed hope in the possibility of becoming pregnant, but it is technically possible that it may never come to pass. If God were to have granted my request for a child sooner and not given me this time to "wait," I fear I would have missed out on this "greatest of gifts" He's presenting me with now.
Oh that I will be a good steward of this gift He's found me worthy of!
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Forward Motion
2011 is already a quarter of the way done. In the world of couples trying to conceive (ttc is the official lingo, I guess), the arrival of April means that a baby this year isn't going to happen. Unless of course the baby were to arrive a few weeks early, but I don't even have the hope of that. The reason being, there will be no April pregnancy. Why? Because a week from Monday, I go in for a diagnostic laparscopy to check out my insides to see what endometriosis has been up to the last three and a half years. It's a pretty minor surgery, but I can't imagine I'd recover quickly enough to be up for ttc. :)
I've actually been quite blessed when it comes to the endometriosis. Sure, it lead to the removal of half of my vital baby making parts; but since my initial pain and surgery back in 2007, except an occasional sharp pain on my left side I haven't really had any pain to speak of . That is until last month. The occasional sharp pain turned into a relatively frequent stabbing sensation. The fact that the worst of it coincided with my period is a pretty strong indicator that it's endo.
I was able to get into Dr. Stenzle within a week, and of the options he gave me (one of which was taking some hormone to put myself into a "menopausal state") doing the laparscopy seems like the best plan. I probably wouldn't be in such a hurry to do it, but I'm really curious to see what's going on in there. And as a little added bonus, Dr. S said he'll put some dye in my right fallopian tube and video it so a fertility specialist could check it out. I don't know that we'll ever have a fertility specialist, but I figure if there's anything major, he could probably let us know.
So yeah, that's that. We're also planning to have Ryan's "stuff" tested in the near future. For a long time I didn't think we'd go that far, but now I just want to know. If the results were to indicate that the odds were definitely not in our favor, I think it would help us move closer to adoption.
Speaking of adoption...we joined a small group a few weeks back that was about adoption and orphan care. I was really hopeful that there'd be at least one other couple going through what we are, and that we'd find it to be a step in helping us determine if adoption was where we should start moving. But the only ones in the group were couples that already had kids and were adopting. It felt quite similar to being in a group with a bunch of pregnant woman. So yeah...emotionally I couldn't do it.
We'll see what happens. It's strange...right now I just feel like I'm letting life just slowing push us along in whatever direction it chooses to take us. It at least feels like we're moving forward, so that's a good thing...I think.
I've actually been quite blessed when it comes to the endometriosis. Sure, it lead to the removal of half of my vital baby making parts; but since my initial pain and surgery back in 2007, except an occasional sharp pain on my left side I haven't really had any pain to speak of . That is until last month. The occasional sharp pain turned into a relatively frequent stabbing sensation. The fact that the worst of it coincided with my period is a pretty strong indicator that it's endo.
I was able to get into Dr. Stenzle within a week, and of the options he gave me (one of which was taking some hormone to put myself into a "menopausal state") doing the laparscopy seems like the best plan. I probably wouldn't be in such a hurry to do it, but I'm really curious to see what's going on in there. And as a little added bonus, Dr. S said he'll put some dye in my right fallopian tube and video it so a fertility specialist could check it out. I don't know that we'll ever have a fertility specialist, but I figure if there's anything major, he could probably let us know.
So yeah, that's that. We're also planning to have Ryan's "stuff" tested in the near future. For a long time I didn't think we'd go that far, but now I just want to know. If the results were to indicate that the odds were definitely not in our favor, I think it would help us move closer to adoption.
Speaking of adoption...we joined a small group a few weeks back that was about adoption and orphan care. I was really hopeful that there'd be at least one other couple going through what we are, and that we'd find it to be a step in helping us determine if adoption was where we should start moving. But the only ones in the group were couples that already had kids and were adopting. It felt quite similar to being in a group with a bunch of pregnant woman. So yeah...emotionally I couldn't do it.
We'll see what happens. It's strange...right now I just feel like I'm letting life just slowing push us along in whatever direction it chooses to take us. It at least feels like we're moving forward, so that's a good thing...I think.
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