The One Where She's Just Trying to Survive

To my beautiful child,

Okay cutie, you’re about to get a lesson in real life. I mean, you’re brave for coming down here to Earth. Like…BRAVE. Ha! Are you scared yet? 😉

I believe we all chose to come to earth. Our Heavenly Father let us choose and we chose to become like Jesus, to be tried and tested so that our souls would grow. I believe that life is 50/50. 50% really hard, terrible things you wouldn’t choose for yourself and 50% amazing joy. You couldn’t truly feel the joy without the hard. Well, right now I’ve been in the hard “endure” part of life.

I’m tired, so I’m gonna keep it brief. Starting a few days after the embryo transfer, I started sleeping really poorly. I would wake up at about 3-4 am and not be able to go sleep. It consistently has gotten worse and worse, and I have been getting night sweats that are totally out of control. I will wake up literally drenched in sweat. My pajamas will be drenched, my underwear will be drenched, and my sheets and bed will be covered in sweat. It’s unreal. The only other time I’ve experienced night sweats this bad is after my twins were born. All of my hormones were going crazy my body were draining all of the water after the preeclampsia. I’ve talked to my doctor and got my blood drawn and my levels seem fine, but the continued medications that I’m supposed to take until 10 weeks of pregnancy are really messing with me. I went to see my friend Juanique from Provo Health and she suggested a few supplements to take to help support my adrenals. I have also added more high quality fat into my diet, but that hasn’t helped me stay asleep at night because it’s not my blood sugar, it’s just the medication I think.

I have tried melatonin (which is fine but doesn’t keep you asleep), Unisom (which was an absolute nightmare because it stayed in my system for 24 hours and gave me such bad brain fog I could barely function), and magnesium powder to help calm before bed. The only thing that is working for me (I use the term “working” loosely…we are in survival mode over here lol) is to go to sleep really early to just prepare for the fact that I will wake in the middle of the night wide awake. Last night I went to sleep at 9 and woke up at 11:30, then was able to fall back asleep until 3:30 am and have been up ever since. I plan to take a nap today. I am praying that my sleep schedule can get back to normal once I stop taking these meds at 10 weeks. I was doing some research online and I haven’t run this by my doctor, but I will most likely start tapering off my medication starting at 8 weeks, then taper it more at 9 weeks and be completely done at 10 weeks.

The thoughts getting me through this right now are that this isn’t going to last forever and it’s only temporary. I couldn’t live like this long term, but I see a bigger picture and I know there are better days ahead.

My kids are do dang cute. I love you, Harris and Goldie! They are soooo challenging to get to bed at night (in part because they are just playing and having fun with each other and making lots of messes in doing so and in part because my energy is completely gone). But the rest of the time I just sit back and look at how magnificent they are. Their innocent questions and the way they say things are moments I just don’t want to forget. It’s hard to imagine loving another little human as much as I love them but I’ve heard from all the mamas that it is, indeed, possible. They are the most delightful little creatures and have been so sweet leaving me surprises, drawings and notes everywhere. The funny part is that they will do things like sneak into my office and use my good cards to write me letters, or on Saturday they went downstairs and got into the Easter items and gifted me something I was going to mail to my sister. They have the most innocent intentions though, so I don’t want to even let them know that they are gifting me items that I was saving for someone else because they really think it’s a gift from them. It’s so sweet!! I love my babies. Goldie kissed my belly the other day while I was getting dressed and Harris is always so precious to me. He always has my best interests at heart and, for example, when Tyler and Goldie were teasing me the other day they were going to throw away my pajamas that I left on the floor, Harris went into my closet and got them to show me and said, “See mom? They didn’t throw them away” so I wouldn’t worry that they were thrown away. That boy has a heart of solid gold and I love these angels. They are in part what’s getting me through these hard days because if I wouldn’t have suffered through my infertility and pregnancy before, I wouldn’t have them, and they bring me so much joy.

Here’s praying for at least 7 hours of solid sleep tonight! A girl can dream (hopefully literally).

Mama

(For anyone reading this who is tired of feeling alone during infertility, join my free Facebook group as your first step)

Harris stayed home from school on Friday because I thought he had pink eye so he came around to my appointments with me trying to figure out how to function!

Me in bed on Saturday trying to have a brave face and then the photo below is an accurate depiction 😉

On Friday night, I felt well enough after taking a nap to meet with my mom and take my kids to go to get Mexican food for dinner! Harris had bought a little stuffed bunny at CVS earlier that day (he said, “hi, bunny!!” as soon as he saw him) and he paid for it with his own money. When Goldie got home from school, she wanted to go buy a bunny too, so this is them as Harris helps Goldie count her money to give to me. He had already given me a wad of his money to pay for his. They are so precious!

One of the many notes that my kids have left me as a surprise! It is their way of showing love and I think it is the sweetest thing. This is Goldie’s picture of me being pregnant!