Home stretch!

Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Jeremiah 1:5

Dear Anna Bates,

We have prayed for you before you were even in my tummy. You are such a miracle and we cannot wait to meet you. When we were trying to have a baby, my good friend Lindsey was there for me along the journey and even gave me a special necklace she wore when she was trying to get pregnant with Lilla. It was so special to me. When we went through the months of fertility treatments she checked on me every day, even though she had a much bigger battle she was facing. She had colon cancer that had spread to a lot of places and was very sick. She was the most amazing warrior I have ever met and she met each day with a positive attitude and fighting spirit. She was SO excited when we found out that the IVF worked and we were pregnant. I told her I wanted you to have an incredible role model. Someone to look up to and live your life like she did. One day we were visiting together and I told her your name would have Bates in it. That was her maiden name. She was so excited and honored. When I was 9 weeks pregnant, sweet Lindsey passed away. Her body just could not take the cancer anymore. At 14 weeks we found out you were a girl! Anna is a family name from my great grandmother, aunt, and cousins, and Anna Bates felt like the perfect name for you. I can't wait to tell you all about Lindsey, your guardian angel. You have had so many people praying for you and they cannot wait to finally meet you. 

I am 37.5 weeks now...in the home stretch! You are so active and wiggly. There's rarely a time of day that you aren't kicking, flipping, dancing, or practicing your golf swing. You are already over 6 lbs and very strong! Can you tell how excited we are? Your dad already talks about how you are going to be a daddy's girl and how he will give you anything you want. We'll see about that :) Kappy sniffs all of your baby clothes and loves to walk in your nursery to check on things.

For those who have seen or talked to me lately, you know how ready I am! I know most everyone feels this way at this point in the pregnancy and things get so uncomfortable! But with the Ehlers Danlos, my joints and muscles were already loose/lax, so adding weight and the stress of the pregnancy has been really really hard on my body. It's the first time I've had hip pain since my double hip surgery 10 years ago and my back pain has put me in the hospital several times this past month. Sometimes it just gets unbearable. Other times I just sleep a lot and try to get through one more day. I see all of the doctors in the OB group I go to, but there are a couple of them who really seem interested in the EDS and how it does and will effect me during pregnancy and delivery. 

Several weeks ago the docs said "any day now" because of how quickly I progressed dilating and being fully effaced. We had our bags packed and ready and waited anxiously. Then everything slowed down and Anna Bates decided she would stay put a little longer. It's been hard waiting and in so much pain. Please pray for a good delivery and for the remainder of the time to be easier on my body. I'm exhausted! 

Much love

Riley 

Second trimester update

Sorry it's been a while! We found out that the baby is a GIRL!

We are so excited!!! My hyperemesis gravidarum seemed to stay pretty bad into the second trimester and started to get worse lately. I was throwing up over 40 times a day and not able to eat at all. I was put on home health and it has helped a lot. I have a zofran pump in my stomach with a catheter that I carry around like a purse. I get home IVs that run for 2 days straight when my levels are off. I'm still just eating foods like jello, potatoes, potato soup, and breads. But the zofran pump has helped me stop throwing up so much. Home health checks in on me everyday and it's so nice! Baby girl is doing great despite all of the craziness and I am 17 weeks. Right now I spend most days at home in bed, but I've been able to go out here and there which has been great. Wednesday is my 29th birthday, so I hope I can get out and enjoy it! Here is my latest ultrasound.

 She seems to be very laid back and comfy in there :) I am already learning the sacrifice of a mom! As bad as the pregnancy has been, I would do anything to get her here safely. Please continue to pray for the baby and that my health improves. I want so badly to just enjoy the pregnancy. The power of prayer is great! 

For this Child I have Prayed!

We are so excited to announce the pregnancy to everyone! I am 12 weeks due September 30th! We told everyone at 8 weeks and I know that is early. BUT here are our reasons. 1) David is so excited he tells everyone anyways 2) Ditto to my mom 3) We need prayer and support throughout this journey through whatever the pregnancy brings!

My main reason for writing this post is this: Anyone who struggles with infertility sees their Facebook newsfeed as a giant pregnancy announcement. It seems that this season of life for us brings a lot of that, which is so exciting. But if you have been trying to get pregnant, it seems like "why is it so easy for everyone else?!" I'm here to tell you that behind our announcement was over a year of infertility, heartache, medicine, shots, and a lot of waiting.

Before David and I got married, we knew we would have trouble getting pregnant. We discussed it in premarital counseling and a lot with each other. To get deep, I had not ovulated in over a decade. That's right! 10 years! Why? I am not totally sure, but the doctors think it has something to do with the part of my brain that tells my body to release hormones etc. My hormone levels were all out of whack and without ovulating you just can't get pregnant! As soon as we got married, we saw a specialist and talked about our options. For a year I was on lots of medicines, hormones, shots, etc trying to get my body to cooperate. No luck! Last summer, after a lot of prayer, we decided to get a second opinion from PREG (Piedmont Reproductive Endocrinology Group) cool name huh? We felt so informed and optimistic in the initial meeting with Dr. Nichols that we jumped on board immediately. I fell in love with the staff there and felt right at home. It didn't take long to get my levels where they needed to be, and we decided to try IUI (Intrauterine insemination). That was this past fall. I was SO excited. But one morning in early November I woke up to the most intense cramping and pain ever. I ran to the bathroom and it happened. It was over. Just like that. It was the most physically and emotionally painful experience. I sat in the bathroom and cried all day. Why God? I just want to be a mom! I have prayed for this for so long.

We decided after that to jump to IVF, In-vitro fertilization. The big guns! It was more than we could afford, but after talking to my parents, they decided that would be the perfect Christmas gift. I could not be more thankful for that gift. On Christmas Day we started the meds.

This has been our counter since then. Oral meds, shots, needles, sharps containers, etc. David has learned to give me shots and has gotten very good at it (most of the time). After a few weeks of intense meds, it was time to retrieve the eggs! They put you under anesthesia since it is a painful procedure! I wore some superwoman socks a friend gave me because I was sure feeling like it that day! I felt so at peace with God's plan for us and really gave it to him that day. 

We had 20 eggs, and 12 of them fertilized. Every couple of days the embryologist would update us on our embryos. After 5 days we had 4 great looking "blasts" to choose from. We opted to put two in to have a better chance of getting one to stay. (PS it is just one) We froze the other two to hopefully use in the future. Science is so amazing! After the "transfer" came the dreaded "2 week wait" as it is commonly called in the infertility world. It is the 2 weeks after your transfer until you see your doctor to tell you if it was successful or not. Our appointment was on a Monday and of course the Friday before, it snowed. We were stuck at home and I was SO anxious. So I took a test. I closed my eyes and prayed, please Lord let there be TWO pink lines. And in his perfect timing, there they were. The 2 lines I had prayed for soooo long to see. And man, they were beautiful! 

I started sobbing and thanking God over and over for this gift. Then once I pulled it together I took the test to David. He looked at it for what seemed like forever and then said IT WORKED?!?! Yes! Then he had some funny questions like why are the lines pink? It's not already a girl is it? After hugging and crying he ran to the store for the usual Greenville snowpocolypse items: bread and milk. And he came back with the most beautiful pink and blue flowers and arranged them himself in a vase. He was so excited!

On that Monday we went to PREG and got the blood work done and they confirmed and congratulated us. It was the best feeling ever! Then came some more waiting and more praying until the first ultrasound. At 5.5 weeks I started spotting and I literally lost my mind. I was shaking and crying and begging for it not to be over. Luckily I had my appointment that very morning and my mom drove me (since I was a hot mess and David wasn't home) They were so sweet and did an early ultrasound to calm my nerves and there it was! All safe and sound in my uterus. It was "normal" spotting, which totally didn't seem normal to me at the time! A week later David and I went for our next appointment. We saw the little baby in there and its tiny fluttering heartbeat. And to our surprise we HEARD it too! It was so surreal. God had created a tiny human being and it was now growing inside of me. How amazing is that?! There is nothing more miraculous. We go back Tuesday for our "graduation appointment" where we leave PREG and move on to a regular OB. I might cry. I probably will. They have been like family to me and helped us fulfill our dream of being parents. I will forever be grateful for everything they did for us. 

For those wondering and are afraid to ask... We did do genetic screening before hand and were surprised that I did not carry ANYTHING! So we are praying this baby is as healthy as his or her daddy :) I will be very closely monitored throughout the pregnancy, but I know that God will see me through this. As for when the baby comes, I have a lot of help from family and have already researched a lot of baby equipment that will work well for me without lifting a ton and bending over too much. It's amazing what is out there!  Sorry for the long post, but we are SO excited and feel so incredibly blessed. I wanted to tell the whole story because I know so many people pray for my health and like to keep up with things AND maybe this will touch someone who has been struggling to get pregnant. Keep the prayers coming! Love you

Riley