I Would Die For That

This video is so touching if you have had any experience with infertility or long for a child at all.

My husband and I often tell people that Olivia is our miracle baby or that she was a long time coming. Often times people do not really understand what we are saying. We started trying to conceive in December 1999, two years later I finally became pregnant. We were twenty at the time we started it was very frustrating to be told to be patient when our Friends were on birth control and getting pregnant. We were so happy to get the news that we were having a baby. Unfortunately at 19 weeks into the pregnancy I went to the bathroom to discover that I had bulging bag of waters. We rushed to the nearest hospital and found out that there was nothing that could be done the pregnancy was over. Our first baby girl Desiray was still-born 15 hours later.

It took 18 months for us to conceive again. In that time there had been no confirmation as to what had caused my first pregnancy to end and I had about seven different doctors in that time frame (you gotta love the military). I was diagnosed with PCOS which is a condition where you do not ovulate on a regular basis. I was just about to start taking Clomid to help me ovulate when we found out I was pregnant for a second time. Since we had no idea what had gone wrong with the first pregnancy we were very scared about this one. I put my self on a modified bed rest and everything was going very well. I was sent to a high risk Dr who stated that losing a pregnancy at 19 wks was a one in a million chance and it would not happen again. That was at 14 wks, according to every Dr I have spoken to since my chances of wining the lottery are better. Seven weeks later at 21 wks I was in the hospital in pre-term labor. When the Dr checked me I was 75% effaced and 3-4 cm dilated. At that point there is still a chance if the Dr does the right stuff....my Dr did not. I was left sitting up in a hospital bed all night, the next morning our second daughter, Madilyn Rose, was born. She was with us for a while, I don't even know how long I just know that I cherish every minute that I held her in my arms. It was at this time that I was diagnosed as having a possible incompetent cervix. My cervix cannot hold the weight of a baby and carry it to term so it opens up early and without medical intervention I cannot carry a baby full term.
Eight weeks after Madilyn was born we moved from England back to the US. When we got settled in we applied to be foster parents because adoption is something that is really on our heart and we felt that going through foster care was the best way to do it. While adoption is still something we feel lead to do we have put it aside for now.
We also started doing fertility treatments. Metformin for treating PCOS and Clomid to help me ovulate. I lost count of how many cycles I did but we were at the end of the rope on that rout and insurance does not pay for any more that that so we had some decisions to makes. We were pretty sure my body just had its own timing for ovulating and I would be pregnant in Dec 05 Jan 06 but then my husband got orders to deploy to leave in Jan 06 and I did not get pregnant in Dec 05 so I was pretty sure I would not see a baby for years to come.
While my husband was deployed it was a healing time for both of us. All of the years of trying to have a baby and losing babies had really put a lot of stress on us and the time apart really did us some good. And DH was in a war zone so it put life into perspective for him as there were a couple of times he was not sure if he was coming home or not. He was suppose to be gone until Aug 06 but got sent home in May instead. When he returned we just enjoyed each other for a few weeks and then I went to the Dr to get a referral to the infertility Dr again so that we could start trying for our baby again. While I was there I asked her if she could do a pregnancy test on the off chance that I could be pregnant because there was no point in me making an appointment if I was just going to have to cancel it. She ran the test and the next morning she called me to tell me it was positive. I couldn't believe it, I wasn't even late yet for that cycle. We were thrilled and understandably very scared at the same time. We put our baby in Gods hands because it was by the grace of God that we were even having one considering that my husband was still suppose to be half way around the world at the time. I had a cerclage placed at 14 wks and had really an ideal pregnancy until about 30 wks when I started having some symptoms of pre-term labor. At that time I started working half days and went on modified bed rest (no house work, no extended shopping trips, no heavy lifting, ect.) and I had very little signs of per-term labor after that. At 38 wks my cerclage was removed and a week later I delivered our third baby girl Olivia Faith (bringer of peace and the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen) a healthy 7 lbs 1 oz and 19 inches long with no complications during the delivery.