Graduation Day #2

Graduation Day #1 was graduating from our fertility specialist back in January, and Graduation #2 was graduating from the high risk doctor today. Yes, that's right, we graduated! We have been with a high risk doctor because of my uterus being T-shaped, which greatly increased my chances for having Little Man too early. Dr. G. said he would monitor me up until I was 24 weeks, and then after that we would be out of the scariest part of the pregnancy, and he would leave me with just my ob. Even though I'm not 24 weeks, I still got to graduate today since my cervix has been so wonderfully cooperative lately. Our biggest scare came at 17 weeks when my cervix only measured 2.7 cm. After that, my measurements began to grow as my uterus grew and stretched upward, thus taking the pressure off my cervix. Today I measured over 4 cm, which is really great! Dr. G. said he didn't want to see us again until we were bringing the baby by to meet everyone at the office. :)

I asked the nurse if we could also look at Little Man since I hadn't felt him kick as much in the past week. I was thinking that he had possibly turned himself upside down and had his feet down now. Little Man is apparently trying to work on his flexibility and has positioned himself quite uniquely within my womb. He is head down and legs down too. Which leaves his little bottom facing upward. We couldn't help but laugh when we saw him because it was such an odd position. However, he seems perfectly content to hang out like that right now and was just sucking and chewing on his thumb. He would suck on his thumb for a little bit, take it out of his mouth, chew on it, and then resume to sucking. It was really cute!

Here is a belly shot from today (23 weeks, 2 days). I look awful, but I knew if I posted today without a picture, I might get in trouble with some people!

Working on Cooper's Room

Although I don't have pictures, we are hard at work on Little Man's room. We bought the bedding very early on, and then I suffered a decorator's block (like a writer's block). I'm not a very good decorator anyway, and I'm even worse at spending money. However, Little Man needs his own room, so after a lot of thought, I finally figured out how I wanted his room to look. I bought curtains and a rug the other day, and today was furniture shopping day. Karl and I got up fairly early for a Saturday, got dressed, went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast, and then to the furniture store. I felt like Goldilocks in there. The first crib we looked at was the one I had picked out online and loved but wasn't so much in love with the price; the second one was the one Karl had picked out in the options I showed him online, but it definitely didn't look as good in person; the third one was perfect. I was a little nervous because it was also the only one that didn't have a price tag on it; however, it turned out it was the cheapest of the three and it was 10% off today! As for the glider, the first one was too hard; the second one was too uncomfortable; but the third one was just right! We had a great time, and it was just so exciting picking out furniture for our baby. It was a day that I have dreamed about for a long time!

p.s. Belly bump pictures coming soon...hopefully tomorrow...prepare to be amazed at the growth!

One more afterthought for anyone who may be interested...The Real Housewives of New Jersey, Season 2 starts Monday. As you may recall from last summer, I LOVE this show! :)

National Infertility Awareness Week

Today is the last day of National Infertility Awareness Week. I know it might seem odd to still blog about infertility, but I know that God brought us to and through that broken path for a reason. I hate to put the feelings and lessons I learned behind me and close that door on a time that had such a huge impact on me. In the first weeks after I found out I was pregnant, I didn't think it was okay for me to still feel the "sting" of infertility or to write about it anymore. However, I keep stumbling across more and more blogs of other girls who went through the fight, are mothers now, and still feel the hurt and pain of that tough time. This blog did start as an infertility blog, and I often pray that someone will stumble upon it and find comfort and hope in our story.

Speaking of stumbling upon things, I stumbled upon this video...

What If: A Portrait of Infertility

There are so many "what ifs" in infertility, and I know everyone who's gone through it has been plagued by the same ones. It is hard to imagine how things can work out in those dark days, but imagine it anyway. Let the last "what if" that goes through your mind be "What if this all turns out better than I ever imagined it could?" And you never know, it just might.