Plus 1

I've fallen behind in my blogging (again). This picture tells you why:

There's a BABY in there!!!

We are pregnant and couldn't be happier! I'm 17 weeks along, due early September. We actually found out CHRISTMAS DAY that we were expecting, it was the best Christmas present we could have ever asked for. Our own little Christmas miracle!

I've been pretty sick for the last few months so it's taken me awhile to get this post out. I've been so incredibly grateful for the support I've received from friends here; they've brought food, popsicles when I couldn't keep anything else down, had Emery over for play dates, and just been so understanding while I've fallen short in everything I do the last little while. I'm finally coming out of that dark abyss known as the first trimester and I'm happy to be getting our life back on track...sort of.  

Emery is so excited for this baby. She frequently talks about how our family will soon have 4 people in it. A month or two ago I was watching a little 9 month old girl and she was laying on Emery's lap while we fed her a bottle. Emery got wide eyed, looked up at me and said, "Is this the baby from your belly?!" She was a little disappointed when I told her it wasn't. :) 9 months is a long time to wait when you are 3 years old. 

This next portion might be TMI for those who have never struggled with infertility so feel free to stop reading here. :)

Our journey to get this baby is important to me and I'd like to share it in case it could help someone else. I'll try to keep it brief. We started going to a fertility clinic almost 2 years ago. After a lot of bloodwork, tests, and a few surgeries, they told us we had unexplained secondary infertility (aka you haven't been able to get pregnant again and we don't know why) and that our best chance for pregnancy was IVF. This crushed me. I was a decently healthy not-even-30-year-old woman. I should be able to have a baby without a petri dish--isn't that what my body was MADE TO DO?! So we stopped going to the clinic and decided to keep trying on our own until I either got pregnant or I was ready to try IVF.

Then a friend of mine started seeing a chiropractor/nutritionist/quantum neurologist in our ward and recommended I start seeing him. I told myself I would do whatever he said and follow everything he told me to do for 6 months, and if it didn't work, we would try IVF. And so began a fun journey of a gluten/dairy free diet (so hard for me!), TONS of nutritional/vitamin/mineral supplements (24 pills a day!), and some brain training/nerve stimulating exercises three times a day. I was not excited to jump on the gluten free wagon because of all the ridiculousness surrounding the fad, but I figured I might as well try it. What did we have to lose? After 4 months of seeing Dr. Hayden, BOOM. I was pregnant (I also lost weight...less carbs will do that for ya!). I was so excited and I had never felt healthier and more energetic. Then the pregnancy sickness started and all that healthy energy flushed down the toilet along with everything I ate. So I'm back on a regular diet now because for a few weeks all I could keep down was white bread..and I eat DONUTS again!

I don't know if the things I did would work for anyone else, but Gavin and I were willing to try ANYTHING people told us had worked for them (yes, that statement should make you nervous) so I wanted to share our story. If you have questions feel free to email me.