IUI #3

 Today was the big day! 

What is done is done. The only thing left for me to do is pray constantly and make sure I take wonderful care of myself over the next 3 weeks. Yes. I said 3 weeks. I do not get the luxury of the typical 2 week wait. I get an extra week due to the last hCg injection I have to give myself. With previous cycles, good 'ol AF (Aunt Flo) showed up 2 weeks after my IUI, so I'm just hoping, praying, and believing that will not be the case this time. AF needs to stay away for the next 9 months! 

As usual, the procedure went well. There isn't really a whole lot of excitement that goes into a nurse practitioner injecting your husband's washed sperm into your uterus. Considering this was our 3rd IUI, we knew what to expect and how it would all unfold. I just laid there and let her do her job. Trey read a magazine on the other side of the room. How romantic, right? When she was finished, she gave us our instructions for the next few weeks, elevated my bottom on the exam table, and set the timer for 15 minutes. Trey and I said yet another prayer as we waited for my 15 minutes to be up. 

I feel more confident with this cycle. I'm not necessarily confident it will work, but I'm confident no matter the outcome of this cycle, I know I did everything in my power to give my husband a child of his own. If this fails, we will be sad. We have poured so much time, prayer, energy, and nearly ALL of our savings into these medications, treatments, and doctor visits. Unfortunately Tennessee does not have a mandate for ART (assisted reproductive technology) coverage so we have poured thousands of dollars into getting pregnant with Baby Bell. It's just money though. We will make more. Baby Bell is completely worth every penny we have spent on him/her. It is hard to put a price tag on having a child.  It isn't about the money though. It is about the dream we have had since before we said "I Do". It is about Trey telling me in pre-marital counseling that he wants to be a daddy and have children with me. It is about our baby having his dark, curly hair, my ears, and our blue eyes. It is about the dream we have in our hearts for our extra bedroom to be a nursery instead of a room full of random stuff. I long for the day when I wake up and get to spend the entire day being a Mommy to our little miracles. I feel like I have to add we do know God is working on our perfect miracle and we shouldn't be selfish and so on. We know that. We really really do. We know it is in HIS time and not ours, but at the same time we are allowed to be hopeful and dream of how we will glorify God with our story and how we raise our miracle babies. 

I want to make it to the other side of this battle so I can point and say, "I never gave up! Even when people and doctors tried to discourage me, I kept fighting!" I want to prove that God is bigger than medicine and just because a doctor told me 7 years ago that I would never carry another child doesn't mean I won't. I will carry a child. I will carry our miracle babies because my God is SO much bigger than what that doctor said to me. God is bigger than the people who have said hurtful, harmful things to me the past 2 years. God and MY FAITH are going to get me through this. God has given me an overwhelming strength to keep pushing forward no matter what bumps I meet in the road to our babies. I am STRONG. I am DETERMINED. I am pregnant with hope for our babies. I hope with every ounce of me being that one day I will have a huge, pregnant belly. I hope my husband gets to feel our miracle s wiggle and kick in my stomach. I hope I have morning sickness, back aches, and a puffy face. I hope someone reads our story and is encouraged to keep fighting for their own miracle. I hope God uses us and our story to give other couples hope. I hope nobody else I know has to suffer through this. 

In the next 3 weeks, I plan to take this blog in the direction of helping others instead of focusing on my own journey. This week is National Infertility Awareness week, so I plan to bring awareness to this disease. I will go from dealing with it on your own to helping someone else cope and whatever else my little heart feels needs to be said. If you know of someone who is on their own infertility journey, please share my blog with them! Give them my email address. Give them my phone number! Please. I want to help. They are not alone! 

*excuse any typos. I composed this on my iPhone as I rode home from Nashville.*