Getting our family here

Talking and learning

2011-06-26T22:35:00.000-07:00

There it was. In August of 2004, we lost baby #2. I was sad. I was disappointed. I had not yet felt like I had gotten over the first loss. But suddenly, now, I could talk about it. Maybe because I had been through it before. Maybe because people knew this time. Whatever the reason, it helped. Suddenly a bunch of people came out of the woodwork who had been through this. Some of my dear friends and even a cousin reached out to me as they had experienced miscarriage. I learned that there was something to having a support system. And now that I could talk about it, I learned from others. I learned that there could be reasons behind these losses. Medical reasons. I learned that there were fertility specialists and medications. There were tests that could determine why pregnancy loss occurs.

I talked to my doctor about it. I was floored to learn that a patient isn't referred for any of this kind of testing until after three miscarriages. Since I could get pregnant, I wasn't considered infertile, so I couldn't just go see a fertility specialist, insurance would never pay for it. Insurance also wouldn't pay for any testing for the miscarriages because I hadn't had three.

To this day I don't understand that. Why would a medical professional wish another miscarriage upon a person in order to do testing? It also makes no sense that insurance companies would want to wait. I looked at the medical bills of a subsequent miscarriage and the hospital bill alone was over $10,000. I paid $100 of that. If the insurance company had paid for testing prior to that and discovered that all I needed was a pill, they would have saved $9,900. But wait, they won't cover the cost of that pill anyway.

To clarify, I didn't only just need a pill, I am stating that hypothetically because in many instances and for many women that is the solution. For me, it wasn't, and I will continue to document my story and details in further posts. But it frustrated me how short sighted the insurance companies were. I was extra ticked off just knowing that I may have to go through another miscarriage just to get some answers. I didn't feel like I could do that.

Two weeks later

2011-06-26T19:58:00.000-07:00

It was a strange two weeks that passed after hearing the news. I had to tell people that I was pregnant, but not really. This was necessary in some instances such as work so that I could explain why I may need to suddenly call in sick for a few days, or in telling my Bishop and counselors so that they would know what to expect.

Then there was that irrational part of me that when each day passed without miscarrying, a part of me still hoped the doctors got it wrong. I was now 10 weeks pregnant with an empty gestational sac that measured only 6 weeks.

Finally my body caught on. I had the miscarriage at home with my husband and mom by my side. I knew it was coming, and I'd been through it before, but it was still awful. I guess you can never be fully prepared for the pain, both physically and emotionally.

About a week after this miscarriage I went back to work. I began having severe cramping and bleeding that felt like I was miscarrying all over again. As it turns out, it was some retained placenta. This would occur again in a later miscarriage and also after Audrey was born.

The ultrasound

2011-02-27T09:34:00.000-08:00

At eight weeks pregnant I went in for an ultrasound. I remember the tech doing the measurements. She measured the sac and said it was measuring at six weeks. I knew she was wrong. I was 8 weeks along, no question. That's all she said and sent me down to talk to the doctor. Aaron was with me and I don't know if he was feeling the same way as I was, but I could tell things weren't right. The measurement was off and she said nothing about the baby.

With great apprehension we met with the doctor. She pulled out the ultrasound pictures and started talking about them. She said there was a yolk sac visible and the gestational sac measured at 6 weeks, but that it was empty. There was no baby. Feelings of sadness and confusion swept over me. She went on to explain that what happened was that I had been pregnant, conception had occurred. But that somewhere very early on in the pregnancy the fetus died and was absorbed into the gestational sac. However, my body had not yet clued in to this fact and continued on with this pregnancy, growing a gestational sac, etc. I was given the option to have a D&C, to go home with medication that would terminate the pregnancy, or to just let it go and have my body expel the pregnancy eventually.

I couldn't fathom taking an abortion medication, even though I knew there wasn't a living baby there, and I didn't want to do a D&C. I think a part of me hoped that this was all some mistake and there truly was a baby in there, so I opted to just let things play out naturally. The doctor sent me home with some pain medication for when it happened. I waited for two weeks. Each day of those two weeks I wondered if there was a mistake, because I still wasn't miscarrying. I know now that I was delusional, but I wanted a baby so badly that I thought just maybe there was still one in there, after all, I was still pregnant.

Trying Again

2010-07-14T20:18:00.000-07:00

When is a good time to try again? My OB wanted me to wait for a couple of months. I couldn't stand the thought of having to wait that long. In my mind, we were supposed to be having a baby on January 3rd. So having to wait another few months to even try again, and then another full 9 months of pregnancy just seemed like such a long time. We decided not to postpone it as it had taken us several months to get pregnant in the first place.

I soon found out that I was pregnant again. I apologize that I can't remember all of the dates now as it has been about six years ago, but I want to say it was about six weeks after having the miscarriage. I was elated, and I think Aaron was too. I know this was some time in July because I remember being at my parents house over my birthday and trying to float the nonexistent Virgin River. I was sick and tired and not "out of the closet" yet. But we were excited. This due date was set for March of 2005. It seemed forever away in my mind. But there it was, we were pregnant and this time we were going to have a baby!

"I will Carry You"

2010-04-28T22:55:00.001-07:00

This song just describes everything that I feel about my unborn babies. The band is Selah, and I give credit to Angie Smith for introducing me to it. This was written either by her or for her, I can't remember which, and her husband's band is who sings it. It is on the playlist for this blog, so you may have heard it. If not, I recommend looking at the playlist and clicking on that particular song. Your eyes will not be dry afterwards, I promise.

Here are the lyrics:

There were photographs I wanted to take
Things I wanted to show you
Sing sweet lullabies, wipe your teary eyes
Who could love you like this?People say that I am brave but I’m not
Truth is I’m barely hanging on
But there’s a greater story
Written long before me
Because He loves you like this

So I will carry you
While your heart beats here
Long beyond the empty cradle
Through the coming years
I will carry you
All my life
And I will praise the One Who’s chosen me
To carry you

Such a short time
Such a long road
All this madness
But I know
That the silence
Has brought me to His voice
And He says…

I’ve shown her photographs of time beginning
Walked her through the parted seas
Angel lullabies, no more teary eyes
Who could love her like this?

I will carry you
While your heart beats here
Long beyond the empty cradle
Through the coming years
I will carry you
All your life
And I will praise the One Who’s chosen Me
To carry you

Depression

2010-04-28T22:41:00.000-07:00

Depression: a state of mind producing serious, long-term lowering of enjoyment of life or inability to visualize a happy future.

I was sad. I later on came to realize how bad it really was. Weeks had gone by and I still couldn't speak of what had happened. Many what ifs entered my head. What if I didn't take enough folic acid? What if I lifted too heavy of a tray at work (I was a server). What if I was under too much stress? What if I caused this?

My brother and his wife were expecting. Their due date? January 3rd. I will always look at Afton, who was born on my due date, and think of the child that would have been her age.

I was in a dark place but didn't really realize it at that time. I knew I was sad and I knew that I couldn't talk to anyone about it. No one understood and everyone said such hurtful things. The few people who may have understood because of prior experiences probably would have been happy to talk to me about it. But I couldn't speak of it still. It was too raw.

I can't remember at which point I had the thought that I might actually be going through some sort of postpartum depression compounded by the loss of the baby. I still think that this is completely plausible. A long while later my husband admitted to me that he had been very worried about me during this time and that had it gone on for much longer he would have sought help for me. I asked if it was really that bad, to which he said it definitely was.

Fetal Development and the LDS perspective

2010-04-28T22:02:00.000-07:00

Perhaps one of the hardest things for me to come to terms with is the LDS perspective on the unborn child. Unless a child is born and takes a breath, it is not considered a child of record and doesn't go on the church records. The reasoning behind this is that supposedly the spirit has not entered the body yet. The reason this is so bothersome to me, is that so many people of my faith see this as a reason to dismiss a miscarriage. You see, it wasn't a real spirit and therefore not a child. Therefore I have no right to mourn the loss of my non-child. Well I did mourn. And very deeply. So much so that I spent a lot of time soul searching this notion of my faith. I have to say that I completely disagree with it for a number of reasons.

There is much debate in the LDS world as to when the spirit enters the body. Is it at conception? Is it at birth when a breath is taken? Is it at quickening? One of the latter-day prophets had said it was at quickening because that is when the baby first moved.

Well, modern technology has proved that to be completely false. Not to mention the words of the Lord himself as spoken to the prophet Jeremiah in the Old Testament. Jeremiah 1:5 states, "Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee."

I had an ultrasound done at 8 weeks on my most recent pregnancy. Guess what, that little baby was dancing around and waving. It was incredible. Just because the mother can't feel it (quickening), doesn't mean it isn't happening. You see, the inside of the uterus has no feeling, so none of this can be felt until the baby weighs enough for other organs to feel it. When a person dies, the spirit leaves the body. Brain activity stops. The heart stops. Movement stops. It requires either a spirit or life support machinery to create those functions of the body. Why would a fetus be any different? Brain activity in a fetus begins at six weeks after conception. The heart begins to beat at 18 days, when the mother is only four days late for her menstrual cycle.

P.E. Rockwell, M.D., Director of Anesthesiology related an experience that he had. This article is used time and again for pro-life arguments, so you may have heard it before. Here it is, ""Eleven years ago, while giving an anesthetic for a ruptured tubal pregnancy (at two months), I was handed what I believed to be the smallest human being ever seen. The embryo sac was intact and transparent. Within the sac was a tiny (one-third inch) human male swimming extremely vigorously in the amniotic fluid, while attached to the wall by the umbilical cord. This tiny human was perfectly developed with long, tapering fingers, feet and toes. It was almost transparent as regards the skin, and the delicate arteries and veins were prominent to the ends of the fingers.

"The baby was extremely alive and swam about the sac approximately one time per second with a natural swimmers stroke. This tiny human did not look at all like the photos and drawings of ‘embryos’ which I have seen, nor did it look like the few embryos I have been able to observe since then, obviously because this one was alive. "When the sac was opened, the tiny human immediately lost its life and took on the appearance of what is accepted as the appearance of an embryo at this stage (blunt extremities, etc.)."

I find it so hypocritical of my religion who is extremely anti-abortion to turn around and not acknowledge a life that was in a womb. If there is no spirit there and it isn't a real baby, then why the argument against abortion? Obviously I have strong feelings on this subject!

I found great condolence in an experience that a LDS friend of mine in England related to me years before my experiences. She and her family had been converted to the LDS religion and had gone to the temple to be sealed together. During a sealing, the parents and children kneel around an altar and the children are placed in birth order. A sealer performs a ceremony that is much like a marriage where the family is blessed to be together for this life and the next. When my friend's family knelt around the altar, the sealer kept shifting the children around. He spaced out the children. Some had three spaces in between, and another had two. He finally felt that he had it right and asked my friend if she had lost some children. She said that she had in miscarriages and the number of spacing was the exact number of miscarriages and in the correct order. The sealer told her that those children were there that day and would also be sealed to their family.

I have clung to her experience to know that one day I will see my babies again. The facts of the development of the fetus, paired with the promises of the Lord are too much to ignore. The only change that occurs at birth is a change in the external life support system of the baby. The baby is no different before birth than after, except that he has changed his method of feeding and obtaining oxygen.

What not to say

2010-04-28T21:36:00.000-07:00

In my previous post I mentioned many things that my family had said to me when they learned of the miscarriage. First of all, I want to say that I truly understand that these things were said innocently or with well-meaning intentions. But they still hurt. So with the post, I just want to educate. Not to criticize, but to cause you to think about the things that you may want to say or do differently if your friend or family/member experiences a miscarriage.

My perspective on my pregnancy is that this was a child. It was as real to me as yours are to you, be they two years old, seven years old, or eighteen years old. So many of these comments made me scratch my head simply because of the perspective that I had on it.

"It's nature's way of taking care of something that couldn't survive." Really? Heavenly Father just zaps a life out of you because it couldn't survive? Then explain to me why there are so many children born into this world who have terminal diseases from the moment they are born or even later on into life. In the end, none of us survive. Whether we live until we are 20 years or 100 years old, we don't survive. We are mortal, and that's just a fact. So please don't tell me that the mortality that lived inside of me wasn't valid. If your two-year old becomes ill with cancer and dies, is it just natures way? Maybe so, but I hardly doubt you would want me to say that to you.
"It just wasn't the right time." So, my body, or the Lord, whichever one, had better knowledge into when the right time would be to conceive? I had the timing wrong so let's kill the baby? This is so illogical and cruel that it is almost funny. How about all of those teenagers and drug addicts who get pregnant. I guess it must be the right time for them.
"You're just cleaning the pipes." Wow, I was so dumbfounded when I heard that one. I still have no response to that one.
"It's just a mass of cells, not a real baby at that point." While the baby may not have taken on much of a physical form at this time, it is far more than a lump of cells. I will do a further post on this particular subject so I won't go much further into detail here. But, even if physically there isn't much to an 8 week old fetus, emotionally to me I had already imagined this child growing up and getting married. This was a baby, no matter how far along.
"That's why we waited until we were at least three months along to tell anyone." So I should just go through this alone? If I had stayed quiet this wouldn't have happened? I am not really sure why this comment even gets brought up, but it is told to me repeatedly, even now, four miscarriages and six years later.
"At least you weren't further along." Let's just say that I am VERY opinionated about that particular comment. However many weeks gestation a fetus is doesn't give a mother more of a right to grieve than another. An 8 week old fetus is a baby just the same as a 39 week stillborn is. It would be like me saying to someone whose small child died that at least the child wasn't older because that would be a more difficult loss.
"At least you know you can get pregnant." How is this supposed to be a condolence? I just lost a child! If you lost one of your living children, would that be a condolence to you? It is not good news that I can get pregnant. It will be good news when I can sustain a pregnancy and hold a baby in my arms.
"You'll be pregnant again soon with another one." But I wanted this one. I already loved this one. If you lost a living child, how would you feel if I said you could soon get pregnant with another? It doesn't change the fact that this one did in fact die and there is a great feeling of loss over it.

So, what do you say? How about just a simple, "I'm so sorry for your loss." Acknowledge that a loss occurred and don't try to somehow explain away that it didn't in order to make the person feel better. It just makes it hurt worse that no one understands. So even if you don't understand and you feel like a miscarriage isn't a loss, just keep that to yourself and offer a shoulder to cry on.

Grief

2010-01-27T15:09:00.001-08:00

While the physical experience of losing my first pregnancy was an awful thing to experience, the emotional aftermath was a million times worse. To anyone who follows this blog, I apologize for not posting in so long. I started this project shortly after my fourth miscarriage when all of this was weighing heavily on my mind. Then I became pregnant with Audrey. It was pretty hard to go on with the details of the grief when I was full of hope for a healthy baby. So I tabled the project. Now it's time for me to complete the history.

I was devastated at our loss. We had names picked out. We had an empty bassinet at home. Diapers. Maternity Clothes. Baby Clothes. Bottles. We were empty handed and empty hearted. I was eight weeks along. How could I come to love my little baby so much in only eight weeks time?

I quickly learned how alone I truly was. Outside of my family, no one had even known that we were pregnant. That left our families to be the only ones to offer support. This is where the loneliness and hurt really came. It was those closest to me who dismissed this so much. I was told, "It's nature's way," "It just wasn't the right time," "I guess you cleaned the pipes for the next one," "It's just a lump of cells, not a baby," "that's why we waited until we were at least three months along to tell anyone," "At least your weren't further along, I knew so and so who had a still born, or who lost their baby at 24 weeks," "at least you know you can get pregnant," "You'll be pregnant again soon with another one," and the list goes on and on. In another post I will speak more about these words of "comfort." These were supposed to be the comforting words from the people closest to me, my own family and even husband. How could everyone be so insensitive? This was my baby. I was truly alone in my grief. No one understood.

On top of that, I was the Relief Society President in my ward and I had the hardest time attending church and looking at everyone's pregnant bellies. If that wasn't enough, I was responsible for coordinating meals for them, making sure they were taken care of, etc. Of course I loved these women and was happy for them, but it was a glaring reminder of what was no longer in store for me. I struggled so much with my grief that there were times I had to cut out of church because I couldn't hold the tears back anymore. I did finally let my presidency know and they were very supportive.

I couldn't speak about what happened. I was drowning in grief, but couldn't even speak of it. I was constantly on the verge of tears and if anyone mentioned the miscarriage to me the tears would spill over. Not everyone was insensitive. But I couldn't even speak to those who offered a shoulder. My cousin, Whitney, had heard about it and sent me a note in the mail letting me know that she had recently miscarried and would be there for me anytime that I wanted to talk. My sister-in-law, Robin, called me one day to offer her condolences. She told me that when she heard that she just cried and cried. She was crying on the phone as she spoke to me. This is a conversation that I will always regret because I couldn't even speak back to her. I was at my mother-in-law's home and I didn't feel like I was given the right to grieve, so I left the room to take the call. I couldn't even answer back to Robin. She must've wondered what that was all about. It meant a lot to me that someone else cared and was even sad about this. But I still couldn't speak. Robin has since passed away and I regret that I never let her know how much her caring words meant to me.

Then there was Tammy. She is my brother-in-law's sister. I don't remember what the occasion was, but we were at a church meeting together with the entire family. After the meeting ended, she caught me out in the hall and gave me a big hug. She said that she'd had a miscarriage before and was so sorry for my loss. The tears that were always present in my eyes quickly spilled over as I hugged her tightly. Once again, I couldn't speak. I felt like I had to hide my emotion from my family because as everyone had said, I was just "cleaning the pipes and it wasn't a real baby." I shoved the tears back as quickly as I could and moved on.

January 3rd. That was my due date. How did May 24th trump that date? I put the admission sticker from the hospital on a shelf in my closet facing out to where we could see it. It was all I had left of my baby. It simply had my name printed on it and May 24th. I left that sticker on that shelf until we moved.

May 24, 2004, Miscarriage

2008-10-14T21:18:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, May 23, 2004, I started to get some really bad cramps. They hurt so bad, and I was definitely worried about what was going on. However, being a Sunday, my doctor's office was closed. I couldn't really do anything but wait until the next day to call the doctor. As the day went on, the cramping got worse. And then the bleeding started. Heavy, heavy bleeding. I was still naive enough to think that things could still be okay.

I prayed fervently for Heavenly Father to stop whatever was going on in my body. I had Aaron give me a priesthood blessing. I remembered all of the teachings about having the faith of just a mustard seed would make it possible to move mountains. I honestly had never had more faith in my life that the Lord would fix whatever was wrong. I believed it in my core and with every prayer I said that day. I just knew things would be okay.

Aaron's family was getting together at Leslie's house for dinner that night. I asked him to apologize to them for me, but that I thought I'd better take it easy and lay down so that whatever was happening would stop. However, it didn't stop.

We went to bed that night with a lot of questions on our mind. It was pretty late and I finally called the E.R., hoping that they would give me some insight into what was going on and what I should do. They wouldn't give any information over the phone and said that if I needed any opinion from them that I needed to come in. I recalled my doctor telling me that I should go to the E.R. if I was soaking through more than one pad an hour, and I wasn't at that point. I wanted to call my sister, Stephanie, to ask her because she is a nurse. But it was midnight now and I didn't want to call her so late.

We decided to go to bed and call the doctor in the morning. I don't know that I ever fell asleep. Aaron did, and I tried not to wake him. The pain was so much and kept coming in waves, closer and closer together. I had never felt cramping like this. I went into the bathroom and was bleeding so heavily that I just sat on the toilet. I was still dumb enough not to go to the E.R. because I hadn't technically soaked through a pad in an hour, it was in the toilet, and how would I prove to them that I had soaked through a pad if I hadn't really? Someone obviously needed to clue me in, but I had never been through anything like this.

I finally woke up Aaron at around 2:00 a.m. to let him know that things were getting worse. He felt really badly for not realizing that I had been up all this time with so much cramping and stuff. We decided to go to the E.R. I remember my mom telling me a story of when she had a miscarriage that the doctor was upset with her for not bringing in the tissue in a baggie or something. I wondered what to do about that, but didn't think I could really scoop it out of the toilet at this point. So we got ready to go when suddenly I felt better. I told Aaron that maybe we should just go back to bed because the cramping stopped. So we did. Five minutes later it started again. We got up to head out and I could barely walk, so Aaron was helping me. Then after a couple of minutes, it stopped. So once again I suggested that we wait until morning. After a couple of minutes, it started again, and Aaron insisted that we get to the E.R.

While driving there, the pain subsided again. I contemplated turning around and going home because they would surely laugh at me if I showed up and nothing was going on anymore. Aaron had the good sense to keep going, and just like that, it started again. I realize now, after having a child, that I was in labor, hence the contractions/cramps coming every couple of minutes and then subsiding.

We checked into the E.R., and I don't remember a whole bunch from there. I don't think we waited very long. I was taken back pretty quickly and the nurses started to give me morphine in an IV for the pain. From that point on I was pretty out of it, but I still was crazy enough to think that they were somehow going to be able to stop the cramping and bleeding and that we would go on to have a healthy pregnancy. I'd seen it on t.v. plenty where the doctors give some sort of medicine that stops labor. I figured that's what they were doing and that soon enough, everything would be fine.

Finally around 5 a.m. a resident doctor came in to examine me. She said that she believed that I had passed everything but that she would need to examine me. After an exam, she said that there was still a little placenta left that she thought she could clean out on her own without doing a D&C. I was still hooked up to a morphine pump and didn't really notice much of what was going on. But suddenly it hit me, the doctor was cleaning everything out. She said that I had passed the fetus at home. The fetus. Wasn't it a baby? And then it hit me. The baby was gone. It had happened sometime around 2:00 in the morning on May 24th. What do you call it? Time of birth? Time of death? The medical term is spontaneous abortion. That's what's on my medical records. How awful is that?

Aaron and I drove home around 7 in the morning, stopping at the pharmacy to pick up some pain meds. He practically carried me into the apartment because the pain was so great still. He had to call my work to tell them that I wouldn't be in for my shift that started in an hour, and had to explain why. We went to bed and just held each other and cried. All I could tell him was that I was sorry that I lost our baby.

Spotting, week of May 16, 2004

2008-09-22T13:00:00.000-07:00

I started spotting a dark brown color. This was very concerning to me because this is what always happens prior to my menstruation. During that time, I will spot a dark brown color for about 5-7 days prior to my actual period. I was nervous about this spotting as it wasn't unfamiliar to me.

I called my doctor to ask about it, and they said that they didn't need to see me or check anything out unless I was having severe cramps, bleeding through more than one pad an hour, or passing tissue. I was told that since the color was dark that it was old blood. That didn't totally make sense to me since in my experience with menstruation, it was a lead up to a bigger flow. At any rate, they wouldn't see me.

I continued to have this spotting for several days. This culminated on Sunday, May 23rd when it became full bleeding (one week after Mother's Day).

I noticed that during that week of spotting, one of the roses that Carol gave me was wilting and dying. Just one. I pondered the significance.

Mother's Day, 2004

2008-09-22T12:58:00.000-07:00

Today we celebrated Mother's Day with Aaron's Mom and family in our University apartment. There was a lot of exciting baby talk, and Carol (Aaron's mom) brought us some roses out of her yard. She brought three, one for Aaron, one for me, and one for the new baby. They were gorgeous and I put them on the table.

What to do next? Early May 2004

2008-09-11T22:49:00.000-07:00

As any first time pregnant woman would do, I spent hours thinking of baby names. Aaron and I had already decided that if it was a girl, we would name her Kensington. We were thinking of Ashton for a boy. Now that our families knew the news, everyone was offering advice. My sister, Stephanie, made sure that I knew to call an OB to get an appointment set up. I found one close by who was a woman, Dr. Brown. I called for an appt. and was surprised to find out that they didn't want to see me until my 12th week. That was standard procedure they said, doctors just don't see pregnant women prior to 12 weeks. I thought that was weird, but hey, I was new at this and if that's what they said then I guess that's the norm!

Aaron had just secured a job in Orange County, CA, with Deloitte, upon graduation in December. He would actually start the first week in January. Hmmmm, how would we do that? The baby would be born January 3rd. We came up with plans that we would stay in SLC until the baby was born and then he would have to immediately move out to California. I would stay behind for a few weeks with our new baby until I was up to moving.

It was getting really hard to keep this secret from my friends, especially when people asked me where I was going to work or what I would do after graduation. My secret was that I wasn't going to work anywhere, I'd be at home with our new baby. There were a lot of plans to be made, but we were already making them. I was feeling sick all the time now and was very, very tired. Google let me know that these were all standard pregnancy symptoms. It wasn't very fun managing my work and school load feeling the way I felt. Oh well, the excitement of the pregnancy numbed the discomforts.

Pregnancy excitement

2008-09-08T22:56:00.001-07:00

I was so tired that I could barely stay awake in my classes. I was nauseous all the time, but I wasn't throwing up much. I just had a "blah" feeling. I was finding it hard to keep the pregnancy secret because we were both really, really excited!

Aaron and I went to California at the first of May to take a vacation between semesters. We stayed with his brother and wife, Jason and Robin, in Orange County, CA. They had just had a baby girl, Hailey, the December before who was now six months old. Aaron and I had plans to go to Disneyland, and Robin and Hailey decided to join us. Hmmmm, our first road block in keeping our "secret." We had to explain to Robin that I couldn't go on the roller coasters. She asked why, and we hemmed and hawed about it until she finally looked right at me and asked excitedly if I was pregnant. We couldn't deny it at all, we were bursting with excitement. She was so excited and said that she knew how we should tell Jason when he got home from work.

We were eating out at a restaurant that night and we handed Jason a tiny little diaper where we had written on it that Baby Groff would be joining the family on January 3, 2003. He was surprised and excited, and of course we were too.

Disneyland ended up being an adventure. It actually worked out really well because there were so many rides that I couldn't go on and I just stayed back and tended Hailey while Robin and Aaron were able to enjoy the rides. We all had a good time.

Robin was so excited to pass some things on to me and sent me home with a bassinet and a breast pump, as well as a bunch of diapers that were too small for Hailey, maternity clothes, and baby clothes. I went to the store and bought two little Disney baby outfits to commemorate our Disneyland trip, since our baby was technically with us the whole time.

On our drive back to SLC, we stopped in St. George to visit my parents. We decided that since the cat was out of the bag, that we would go ahead and tell our families, but no one else! So we did the little diaper thing for my parents as well, and they were of course so thrilled. We were growing more and more excited by the minute.

When we got home, all I wanted to do was set up the bassinet in our second bedroom and get started on the nursery right away. I held off on this though because we still weren't spreading the news to everyone just yet and I didn't want all of my friends/neighbors to see the nursery since we weren't telling yet. It was very difficult to suppress that, I wanted so badly to decorate!

April 2004, good news!

2008-09-07T15:54:00.000-07:00

The test was positive! I had taken many of these before, but this was the first time that I had the little plus sign. I was elated. I told my husband right away, who was also elated. We were very new at this, and didn't know quite what to do next. We'd heard that you aren't really supposed to say anything to anyone until the first trimester is over. I didn't really know why, but that's what we decided to do. It was our little secret. I Googled a due date calculator, and my due date was January 3, 2005. Perfect timing. We would both definitely be finished with college. So I'd walk down the graduation aisle nine months pregnant........ who cared?! I was pregnant!

Nov. 2003: The decision to start our family

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Aaron, my husband, and I had been married for a couple of years. It was November 2003, and we each had one year of college left. We knew that we definitely wanted to start a family, but we had wanted to wait until we finished college. With the end in sight, we figured it was time to start talking about trying to get pregnant, since these things don't usually happen over night. So, in December 2003, I went off of my birth control pills as the first step in the direction of having a child. We figured that it would take us a few months to actually get pregnant, so by the time the baby arrived, we would be finished with school.

Month after month went by, and the pregnancy test was always negative. I even invested in those ovulation predictor kits, but it didn't seem to help. Hmmmm, maybe we will have more trouble with this than we originally thought! My sister and Aaron's brother each had experiences with their respective spouses where conception happened practically overnight, so that's the outcome we had hoped for, but it seemed that it would no longer be that simple!