Jacqueline's Babies: 6 Unique Stories from Conception to Birth

We're back with SEASON 3! Pop the champagne, it's the 1 year anniversary of Motherhood Intended!

In this episode, Jacqueline shares the unique conception and birth stories of her six children - the two sons she's blessed with at home, her three angels in heaven, and a baby girl on the way due in April.

*trigger warning*
the topics of premature delivery, miscarriage, and stillbirth are discussed.

In this episode...

• Infertility, a blocked fallopian tube, hypothyroidism
• Clomid, IUIs, IVF
• Clubbed feet birth defect, cervical insufficiency, polyhydramnios
• Bedrest, premature delivery, the NICU, c-sections
• Miscarriages and stillbirth
• Pregnancy after loss
• Placental abruption
• Genetic testing of embryos
• Surrogacy
• Grief, trauma, and anxiety

Struggling to conceive? Download this *free* Month-by-Month Roadmap to Your Fertility Success to help you stay calm and focused on your journey to baby.

•  Leave a review for the podcast
•  Join the Motherhood Intended Community
•  Follow @motherhood_intended on Instagram
• Apply to be a guest on the podcast
• Want in on the ground floor of Motherhood Intended? Reach out to Jacqueline for available opportunities! --> hello@motherhoodintended.com

If you're interested in helping give the absolute greatest gift to deserving parents, learn more about becoming a surrogate (and earn up to $650 just for taking the first few simple steps!): share.conceiveabilities.com/hello12

Transcript

Welcome back everyone. It's season three of the motherhood intended podcast. I'm so excited to be back on the mic. Christmas and the end of the year was a whirlwind.  Super fun, lots of family time, lots of illnesses. I'm not going to lie. The last month, my whole family has just been, it's always something.

It's always some virus like spreading through our family. And, you You know, I'm feeling pretty 100%, uh, at the moment. However, if you can tell, my voice is a little extra raspy. Um, so if I sound different, that's why I am just, you know, over here battling the latest, the latest cold that's going around. But season three, we're here.

We did it. Um, my birthday was a couple of days ago and I have realized that I absolutely love that I launched this podcast last year on my 35th birthday, because now every year on my birthday, I get to celebrate the anniversary of the podcast. So it's been one year of motherhood intended. Thank you to everybody who has listened thus far.

And if you're new to joining the podcast and you're, this is the first episode you're listening to. Welcome.

I figured after a year of podcasting, it would be a good time to kind of go back and share the story of my children and how I have grown my family up until this point,  the very first two episodes of the podcast go into detail about everything I experienced with infertility and loss and starting our family.

So if you want the nitty gritty details. Head back to episodes one and two, and you can listen there, but today I'm kind of going to break it down on the timeline of my family and bring you up to speed with where we are now,  as we anxiously await the arrival in a few months of our third child here on earth.

So, exciting stuff. It's going to be a great season of the podcast. I have so many interesting guests in store for you, and we're covering some topics that we have not done yet. We are going to be talking about things like gender disappointment, adoption, sleep training, birth defects, feeding and oral ties, birth trauma, rebuilding your identity as a mom and as a person as your kids get older, And so much more. I'm even going to have the opportunity to interview my sister in laws, who are both new moms, and get their take on what's the latest in baby gear? What are the trends? What do I need to know after coming out of a little bit of a hiatus with having a newborn?

By the time our daughter's here, you know, it'll be about four and a half years since Noah was born. And while I feel confident in my parenting skills, and I've learned so much over the last six years about being a mom and raising kids,  you know, I feel a little rusty in the newborn,  era. And as I watch them, you know, get these new fancy new gadgets and things, and I'm like, Oh my gosh, I wish I had that.

I wish I had that. I wish I knew that. So this third time around will be interesting and I can't wait for you to hear our interview. 

Another thing that we're going to be adding into the podcast this year, we're going to be trying it out, is once a month I'm going to be giving you a bonus episode with a dad. I figured it would be time to get the dad's perspective on certain topics. I've got my brother in the books to be on the podcast, my husband, and so much more.

 So while we've had a number of amazing women on the podcast over the last year, I thought it was time to get the male's perspective. So stay tuned for those bonus episodes, but I'm really excited to add that into the mix.

Okay, before I dive into my motherhood story, I do want to put a few things on your radar. We have a closed group on Facebook called the Motherhood Intended Community Group, and if you're not in there yet, I highly suggest you join us. 

It is a safe space with almost 500 women. Whether they're moms, trying to become moms, navigating infertility or loss, it is a group of women that you can lean on during times that can feel so isolating.  Nobody should have to go through that alone.

We've broken out some sub chat groups, one for surrogacy, one for IVF. And let me tell you, it is a great place to reach out to other women for advice. There are always people asking questions in there 

and it's a really helpful resource. Everything will be linked in the show notes, but I wanted to just put that on your radar to join us, join us in the community group. I like to keep you updated on the podcast there as well. And it's a great place. We would love to have you. If you're looking for even more content like anything in the news related to infertility, IVF, surrogacy, motherhood, or you just need a good laugh or are interested in following along with my family's story, you can follow me on Instagram at motherhood underscore intended.

And also I have A whole calendar stacked of all different guests, but I'm always looking for more people.  I love giving women the opportunity to share their stories. And as you just heard, we are going to be incorporating the dad's point of view as well. So if your husband.

It has a topic that they might want to talk about, or maybe they want to give their perspective of your story of trying to conceive and starting your family, I would love to have them on the show. We are going to be doing those segments once a month, and

there's a form linked in the show notes if you are interested yourself in becoming a guest, or maybe your husband would like to be on the show.

And then the last thing I wanted to throw out there to everybody listening is I am looking for anyone who might want to get involved with the podcast. And by that, I mean, anyone who is in graphic design, editing, community management. I'm, I'm trying to build a team of people who really just want to get involved.

Maybe you want to build your portfolio. Maybe podcasting world. Maybe you just want to expand your community outreach and be involved more in the space of fertility and motherhood and family building, I would love for you to join me. 

I am constantly trying to improve this podcast and  helpful resources and have the best guests on for you. But you know, I'm at a point where I could use some help. So if you are interested in just being a part of this show and joining me for the ride that has been this podcast over the last year, please feel free to reach out.

You can email me at hello at motherhood intended. com. I would love to talk to you and see how you can get involved.

If you're passionate about helping others and maybe you've had a rough road to building your family or  have some knowledge to share and maybe you're at a point where you're just ready to give back. I know it's been very rewarding for me to create this community for everybody else.

It's something that I wish I had when I was in the throes of infertility, and I'm so grateful to still have it now as we are navigating surrogacy. So if you're in a space where you really want to be involved at the ground level of motherhood intended and all that's to come with it, please reach out to me.

I would love to talk to you.

As I mentioned, I shared the very detailed version of my motherhood journey. In the first two episodes of this podcast, I started from the day I got married and explained in detail all the way up until present day, which spans about a decade today. I really want to share the unique stories of each of my children.

I have 6 babies 2 are with me at home. One is being safely carried by our surrogate in Texas and three are my angels in heaven. 

So I'll start with the story of Charlotte and Cecilia, our first two babies born.

There was a lot of anticipation leading up to becoming pregnant with our twins. We had been trying to conceive for Over a year at this point, I had had a surgery to unblock my fallopian tube, which was covered in polyps and basically limiting our chances in half because I was only ovulating from  one ovary.

I went on medication to control my thyroid and then we continued trying.

We started with Clomid and IUIs Because all the other tests seemed fine at that point. Um, you know, my thyroid was under control. It was in a great level with the medication. My tubes were clear, my husband's numbers were great. Everything, in theory, was pointing to that we should be able to get pregnant.

Well, after six months of just trying on her own, I should say six additional months of just trying on her own, we decided it was time to move forward with an IUI. Our reproductive endocrinologist told us that if an IUI is going to work, you will be pregnant within three to four tries.

Anything longer than that, it's probably not the route for you. So after the first try. The second try and the third try that failed still not pregnant. We were like, okay, well, he said three or four. So we're going to give it the benefit of the doubt and we are going to do a fourth. I now every time, you know, I  had mature follicles and everything seemed to be looking great, but I just still wasn't getting pregnant.

So the 4th try. We got pregnant. Of course, we knew the increased chance of multiples with an IUI and medication given the number of follicles, but they monitor you closely to make sure you're not like super overstimulated, um, and have, you know, all these mature eggs. So we knew there was a possibility, but didn't think it was anything.

Super grand and lo and behold on that very first ultrasound. They saw two Gestational sacks twins

at this point. Of course. I'm just thinking. Oh my goodness like worth the wait I mean we wanted a baby so bad we've tried all these things over the last probably close to two years at this point and Now we're getting two and it was so, so exciting. From the moment I got that pregnancy test and the first time we saw the ultrasound, you know, 

I felt like I changed. Um, my daughters changed me. I got a glimpse of motherhood. You know, everything I ate, everything I did, all of my thoughts, so much of it was consumed by These humans growing inside of me and I was just proud. I was just so proud to be carrying this pregnancy and it was, it was a great pregnancy.

I didn't have any issues. I had a little bit of nausea, but nothing too crazy. And I felt great. I felt great until one moment  when I was 14 weeks along. And when I say a moment, it was the moment that changed everything. I mean, 

all I did was go to my bathroom.  And before I knew it, out of nowhere, I was just bleeding profusely.  You know, I didn't really know anything about miscarriage at this point. I knew it happened. But I didn't know how common it was. And truthfully, I really only knew what I had seen on TV, which was mostly like, you know, the couples at the ultrasound and then the tech saying there's no heartbeat. 

That's kind of what I knew. And I knew bleeding wasn't good, and that could be a sign as well, but what happened next? Which I wouldn't realize later was not something that was on my radar.  I mean, I could not control the bleeding and ultimately my husband had to call an ambulance.

, he was going to take me right to the hospital, but I just, I didn't even know what to do. I was kind of frozen with everything that was going on and just kind of frozen in fear.

I was taken to not my doctor. I was taken to the closest hospital, which was probably like, 5 minutes closer than our hospital.  But, you know, with the amount of bleeding, they were just concerned. So that was kind of the protocol in the E. R. A tech did an ultrasound, they asked me about the bleeding, they did, they, you know, the whole gamut of questions, um, which I didn't really have much to say, I was just like, I'm pregnant with twins, I'm 14 weeks along,  and I just started bleeding, I said, I, I felt fine leading up to it, I, I'm just bleeding, and so the ultrasound tech came in, did an ultrasound, and then a doctor came in, and, You know, I've processed this moment over the years and, I have a different, a little bit of a different lens now looking at it.

You know, I'm in triage. I'm in the ER. They're there to just like save lives, you know, like they're just trying to make sure that you are well, they are not a therapist. They're not an OB. They're not, maternal fetal medicine. They're not any, any of that. They're just like there to make sure that you're okay.

So after the ultrasound, the doctor that came in said, Did you say you were pregnant with twins? And I said, yeah. Pregnant with twins. 

And she's like, I'm so sorry. We're only seeing one baby on the ultrasound.  And  I just stared at her, to be completely honest. I mean, my mom was there and so was my husband, of course, and I saw my mom cry and I think my husband was just in shock with me because again, at this point, I mean, we are just new to even trying to conceive and all these things first time being pregnant.

I just didn't understand how that was possible. I was like frozen.  Um, and then she was basically like, I, I'm so sorry. There's only one sack. There's only one baby. Um, we're gonna have you follow up with your OB tomorrow and at this point, of course, they had controlled the bleeding. Um, I was healthy enough to go home, but when I look back, it is just crazy to me that that was how that transpired.

You know, it was just. You had a baby and now you don't. And especially at 14 weeks, which I will later find out in my story, like the size of a 14 week baby is just, it's not nothing. So I was just numb and confused. And sure enough, the next day when I went in to see my OB, you know, they confirmed the same thing as if I didn't know they were like, I'm so sorry, but there's only one baby, but there was no explanation that followed that  they didn't say anything.

And ultimately. My daughter, Charlotte, I had delivered her. I had delivered her at home without even knowing it.  There were no signs that I had delivered a baby. Of course, you know, there was a lot of blood, that's all I saw. And I, it, it haunted me for years to come. I mean, I only recently have,  so I think, you know, really dealt with what had happened,  that night when I lost Charlotte.

Um,  but,

You know, deep down, I knew that  it was out of my control. There was nothing I did wrong. There was nothing I could have done to save her, but how it all transpired just really, really ate at me. You know, it's horrifying. I was so proud to be a mom and to deliver a baby and not even know it. 

It's traumatizing to say the least.  So for the next couple weeks,  the ultrasound showed that our other baby Cecilia was Fine. I mean her heartbeat was strong. At that time they couldn't see anything like in my uterus that would obstruct the pregnancy in hindsight, I just I don't know if it would have been helpful, but maybe it would have prepared my mind and my body a little bit more instead of being so ignorantly blissful.

Like, to know the statistics of, like, if you deliver one twin, the chances of the pregnancy continuing on with no complications at all are not very high. Like, they're just not when you deliver. I know that there are, all sorts of scenarios where you can lose a twin and still go on to have The other twin, but in my case, delivering one and not the other is just, it's,  it's not going to work out and of course I didn't know that.

I was just praying and I was on bed rest and Sure enough, two weeks later, at 16 weeks, I was admitted to the hospital because I had a little bit of spotting, and I was monitored the whole day at the hospital, and of course, only being 16 weeks, I was in triage, so I was not.

In, you know, labor and delivery or anything like that, um, which I now know you go to labor and delivery if you're 20 weeks along or more. But at 16 weeks, they just had me in triage and they put the belt on me to try and monitor contractions. I wasn't feeling any contractions at that point. And because of how small I was, I mean, nothing was really.

registering. So the baby's heartbeat was fine and that's really all they could go off of at this point. You know, they didn't see any blood clots or anything like that. It was just a horrific, horrific waiting game. And all I did was just pray. So eventually that day, you know, I was sent home. The doctor gave me the option.

She's like, nothing is changing. You can see. Stay here and we can continue to monitor you or we can send you home, but there's nothing else that we can do You know, like I was just laying there in the hospital And so I went home. I mean my husband was with me. My mom was with me and I just, I don't know. I was exhausted and I just thought, okay, well, if you're okay, if the doctor's okay for me to go home, then I'll just lay at home.

I remember that night. We watched a movie to kind of distract me. And we had you. Picked up food and I was just on the couch and about halfway through the movie. I started to feel like some cramping and Again, never being pregnant before clearly didn't make it to any sort of birthing classes or anything at only 16 weeks.

I didn't think they were contractions. I mean that I had worse period cramps than that and  So while they were uncomfortable, they were not like debilitating at all. Of course, I now know that they were contractions and, they were happening maybe at that point every 20 minutes. So, you know, a few times an hour I would feel this, like, cramping and then it would go away.

And then later that night,  we went to bed. These cramps that I was feeling was not Even remotely painful enough to like keep me up at night. Like I went to sleep, I was tired.  I can't tell you what time it was. I feel like it was like two or three o'clock in the morning out of nowhere.

My body just like went into autopilot. I like shot up in bed  and my first instinct I remember was just, oh my gosh, I think I'm like gonna have bleeding or something. Like, I don't know. I just, my instinct was to just get out of the bed and go to the nearest bathroom and by the time I got to the bathroom, I had spontaneously delivered our daughter, Cecilia.   And what followed was such a blur, but I was just,  Physically, I was frozen. You know, I was just  standing there in my bathroom, frozen, and just honestly screaming at the top of my lungs.

I was screaming and crying because  Logically, I know that there's nothing I can do for my baby at 16 weeks. She cannot survive outside of me. Of course.  I don't know if this is a blessing or not, but  I typically wear contacts or glasses. So in the middle of the night, you know, when I sprung up, I didn't have either of those things.

And so quite literally, everything was pretty blurry and. I don't know. I think I would have had an even harder time if I had that visual in my head, but before I knew it, my husband was on the phone and it felt like a blink of an eye. The paramedics were there. They were, I think, as confused as I was, you know, I, I, at that point, I was just, I died a little inside to be completely honest.

When I lost Cecilia, I just. A part of me just crumbled to pieces and I truly don't think I've ever gotten that piece of me back. I know that the paramedics did not quite know what to do. I don't know how often they've ever they were young guys. I don't think they've ever experienced this situation.

Um, 1 of them found a shoe box. From my closet and you know, they had to cut the cord and they put our daughter in there to transport us to the hospital and I was not doing well at all. I was losing so much blood. I can barely tell them my name. I remember when I got to the ER, you know, my parents were there and my husband, of course.

And,  I remember I was just getting sick. I was throwing up. I was weak. And all I kept thinking was like, where is my baby? Like, where is my baby? There's nothing that can prepare you to wrap your mind  around a situation like that. And of course, no one should have to go through that.

But at that point, I officially was just a shell of myself, you know, going through the motions of what was to come, and I didn't know what to expect.  There's just no words for how to handle it, to be completely honest, and of course, we were lucky enough that time to be at our hospital with our doctors and, social workers and all the amazing people at our hospital, but I wasn't ready.

We weren't ready to name our daughters at that point. We weren't ready. We had just found out like a week prior. That our babies were girls. We were going to wait and find out the sex of the babies, but after losing Charlotte, I just didn't know what the future held and I just really wanted to know I don't know why I just wanted to know and it was of course bittersweet finding out that they were both girls and that we still had at that point one with us and One not and so when Cecilia was born and we were in the hospital

 She was in a little cot next to me in the room, um, there was a curtain, and I remember the nurse asking if I wanted to see her, and I was just,  I was scared. If I'm being completely honest, I was scared. I didn't know what a 16 week gestation baby  looked like.

I was scared to see her and hold her, just knowing that She now is just a dream of what I thought I would have, but eventually, I got the courage and, the nurses were just so helpful and telling me that she's perfect. And of course she was, she was perfect. And I'm so thankful that I got to hold her.

My husband held her. Our parents were there and got to see her.    I remember feeling shame and embarrassed and it was really hard for me to look at my parents and my in laws in the eye at that point. I just like wanted everyone to go away because it, it felt in that moment that  I had failed. I had failed. Everyone was so excited. This would have been the first grandchildren for my parents and  and I lost them and I know that it's not my fault.

But it took me a really long time to grasp that and  while I didn't talk about it, you know, it's just something you can't shake knowing that, like, my body failed us and We are going through this dark time because my body failed and that was really hard. That was really hard to deal with.  But we were not ready for all the the questions and things to come, you know.

Do you have a funeral? Do you cremate your daughter? And then we didn't have all of that with my other daughter. So so much guilt crept in that like You know, we were given a special memory box for Cecilia and thankfully we are just blessed to have this amazing hospital that we  go to and They made a memory box for charlotte as well when we explained the situation.

We were not at our hospital but it was still hard knowing that one daughter  I have photos of her and the other daughter. I didn't even realize that I lost it was just so so much. But that is the story of Charlotte and Cecilia  our twin daughters, our firstborns. We have always talked about them and kept them top of mind in our family, especially once our next child was born, Hunter, you know, as he grew up, we made sure he knew about his angel sissies, which kind of started by default because we had these two bears with their names on them. 

And, you know, I had to, I explained to him, he was young, he was two, three, and I was like, these are your sissy bears.  The angels and all of that didn't really come into play until he was a little bit older. For the longest time, he just called them his sissy bears. Charlotte and Cecilia have always been a part of our family and always will.

And we feel very comforted knowing that they're looking down on us and have been supporting us, through this whole journey of growing our family.

 So after we lost the twins, we took like six months and did not even remotely think about trying again for another baby. We obviously knew that was something that we were going to do, but we really didn't have a lot of answers. I mean, we met with MFM and everything was just kind of chalked up to, well, you were carrying multiples.

There's it's a high risk pregnancy.  There are things that can go wrong when you're carrying more than one baby and, you know, we did genetic testing, everything was perfect with the girls, I did a blood clotting panel, It was discovered that I have one copy of MTHFR, which is a gene mutation, but it was pretty low risk. And so nothing else was determined as to why we lost them at that point.

So the next little part in our trying to conceive journey was kind of a weird gray area because we didn't really have answers as to why we lost the pregnancy,

but we did know that in regards to getting pregnant that an IUI with Clomid had worked for us. So that is felt like the next step for us. So we went back and tried another IUI.

And that was a negative pregnancy test. We tried again. Negative pregnancy test. And again. Negative pregnancy test. And we contemplated doing another fourth try because, hey, last time on the fourth try, we got pregnant.  But at this point, My body had just been through so much and I felt terrible on the Clomid medication.

I know everyone is affected differently by it, but the hormones, I mean, I was crawling out of my skin. I mean, to get pregnant with the twins,  it was four months back to back of the medication and the IUIs followed by, you know, 16 weeks of pregnancy. And then not to mention postpartum,

you know, while I didn't deliver a full term pregnancy, I delivered two babies and my body had babies and no one explained to me that fourth trimester. No one explained that. Even at that early, my milk would start to come in. No one explained that anything obviously about postpartum depression or anxiety, or just any of the changes my body would go through.

I really didn't even feel worthy of it at that point. I was like, well, it was only, it was just, it was, I had a reason in my head for everything, and I didn't  really know at that point that I needed support in more ways than one. It wasn't just grief. It wasn't just dealing with loss. It was physically, you know.

Postpartum stuff  so my body dealt with that and then,  we tried to heal physically and emotionally over those six months  just to go back in to do three more months right after another of clomid medication and IUIs and failed pregnancy tests. I mean, I had had enough and 

it was at that point, too, that we weren't really loving our fertility doctor at the time. We just didn't love his bedside manner. I mean, I'm sure he was a great doctor, but the second we came back in his, his office, he was pushing us to do IVF, and he really didn't have anything to say. Not even a simple, I'm sorry.

You know, he was just like, all right, let's get you pregnant. And we weren't ready for that kind of aggressiveness after The trauma we experienced in losing two babies. So, you know, after three more failed attempts, we were just like, okay, I think we need to get a second opinion. And truthfully, it just helps not to be in that same office.

I mean, it was traumatic.  So I ended up, not only did I switch. Fertility doctors, but we, I switched obese as well and just started fresh.  I actually found our reproductive endocrinologist, Dr. Allison Rogers, from another podcast called beat infertility.

It was the very first podcast I listened to. I think that was probably back in 2014  or 2015. And it's a whole podcast, Talking about and interviewing different women on their experiences of infertility and reproductive endocrinology, and I just found it so helpful knowing what the different options were out there and that other women had had miscarriages and was just thrilled to find out that the doctor that was regularly on this podcast was a local to me. I mean local in the fact that like she's an hour away, but I was like, I don't care. I need to meet her. I love the way she explains things, how passionate she is about her work, and truthfully that she's a woman because I think I was also, and it's probably not fair to do this, but I was a little jaded with a man doctor because  I just had a problem with like you don't know how I'm feeling you don't know how I'm feeling in this loss You don't know how I'm feeling with every negative pregnancy test Clinically, you're very smart, but  I just I needed more and so we were thrilled to meet.

Dr Rogers and she Right away told us that we had been through enough and she was so sorry for everything. We've been through She didn't agree that she's like if it were me, I wouldn't have had you do All of that, and, you know, back to back and all of that, and she's like, let's do this the safest way possible.

And for us, that's IVF. It's more controlled. And, given my age, I was 29 at the time. My husband was 34. We were young, I guess, in the fertility world, young at 29. And so she gave us like a 75 percent success rate with an  transferring 1. that was the other thing is that with IVF, we were able to control.

We could put in one embryo that we can minimize the risk of multiples. If in fact, that was the issue with my body and carrying a twin pregnancy. So we did IVF, we got eight embryos. We did not genetically test our embryos at that time. It's funny to look back now because currently we're in surrogacy and it is a huge expense for us.

But at the time IVF felt overwhelming.  It was a big undertaking and,  an extra 5, 000 to genetically test our embryos just didn't feel like it was in the cards for us. And with our history and being young, you know, our doctor didn't think it was necessary either.

So at that time, we did not test our embryos. We did a fresh transfer with one embryo and became pregnant with Hunter.

I hate that every pregnancy story of mine starts off like this, but it's true. My pregnancy was great. Of course, physically, it was great up until a certain point. And of course, mentally, it was, it's really hard. Anyone who is experiencing a pregnancy after a loss knows. What that feels like, and you're always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Unfortunately,  miscarriage and stillbirth and infant loss. It all,  robs you of your joy to a certain degree. And that's how it was for me. I was just hesitant to celebrate. , all I had in my mind  for the first part of that pregnancy was getting to 17 weeks and then I thought I would be able to take a breath because that would mean I went further along than with the twins and of course at 17 weeks.

I had spotting, discovered that my cervix was starting to open, and I had to have a rescue cerclage placed. So basically, they go in and it's kind of like tying up your cervix to make sure it stays closed. And at that point, they were very confident that it would work. It was called a rescue cerclage at that point at 17 weeks.

Typically if they're doing these cerclages, they're putting them in at 10, 11, 12 weeks. So this was kind of like  oh, it's opening and it needs to be closed. Now it was like a rescue situation, to keep that closed for the pregnancy. So while I was nervous after that, I was like, okay, we caught it.

We fixed it. Maybe if I had had that with the twins, it would be different. Of course I was carrying two babies, which was, more weight on my cervix, but you know, I thought, all right, there's one baby it's tied up. We can do this. And then three weeks later, we discovered at our anatomy scan that Hunter had a birth defect?

We were told that he had clubbed feet which was terrifying at the time and I go into more detail in the first couple episodes, but  it was something that was fixable with surgery and physical therapy, and our doctor himself,  at MFM, was born with club feet too, and he showed us his feet, and he's perfectly fine.

So, while it felt like another huge blow, just thinking that, like, why can't this pregnancy, any pregnancy, just go seamlessly? And so, kind of mourned that information a little bit knowing that the second our child was born he was going to have to have physical therapy and casting and That's what we were gonna be navigating for the first few years of his life was, you know Helping him with this feet and that was that was a lot to swallow but we were just so grateful at that point that the pregnancy was Continuing and otherwise he was perfectly healthy a few weeks later.

We get to 23 weeks and  I went to my,  my mom came with me because my husband was out of town for work. And, as you can imagine, at this point, any appointment is always scary because I'm constantly being blindsided by 1 thing or another.

And at that point, my doctor, decided to do, a cervical exam just to make sure that, everything was staying in place because I had the history of the loss because I had history of my cervix opening. She's like, this isn't usually protocol, but I'm just wanna, I would feel better if I checked it, and boy am I glad that she did, because it was in that moment that she discovered that my cervix was about two centimeters open.

At 23 weeks, which we all know is not supposed to happen. Of course, when you give birth, you are 10 centimeters dilated. And at 23 weeks, I am nowhere near ready to be giving birth. And that was with a saclage already in, which clearly wasn't holding. 

So it was in that moment that she had my mom call my husband, have him fly home, and I was sent to the hospital to be on bed rest until our baby was to be born. And this kind of bed rest wasn't just like, oh, stay in the bed. It was lay flat, don't be on any kind of incline. I could not get up to go to the bathroom.

I really just had to lay and pray, and that's what I did. For some reason, I just always, I don't know if it's the hopeful person in me, or my faith, or if I am just like ignorantly positive, but after a couple days and there was no change and I was just laying there, I was feeling confident.

 In my head. It was going to be a long road. I'm like, okay, I. I'm going to be here as long as it takes to get him further along and healthy and I can do this like I Can save my child and of course I know now that Nothing that has happened to me is anything that I did or anything that I could have changed my children's stories Have been written for them already and the way hunter entered this world it just I look at him today Spoiler alert. He's gonna be six in a couple months, but I look at him today and I'm just like that's your story It has shaped who he is He is a true miracle, but At that point, I just, I thought I was going to be on bed rest for months.

You know, we were given all these scary statistics on what it could look like to deliver a baby. You know, 24 weeks is considered viability. We hit 24 weeks, we hit 24 and 1, 2, 3, but after giving the statistics first off, like a chance of survival is 50 percent at 24 weeks. All the complications that come along with a low birth weight, , the risk of cerebral palsy, vision problems, eye problems, learning disabilities, just so many things.

And I just truly thought that I could control if I could just stay still eat healthy and just. Be positive. I could bring him Earthside safely and after eight days That, uh, was not the case. And when I tell you that I was positive, I mean, I had Amazon snacks to my hospital room, which I literally always want to call a hotel room because  I have spent way too much time in hospitals, but I had a calendar where I would every day mark off a day, like planning ahead that I'm like, I'm going to mark off this whole calendar.

I will be here for at least a month. Like I need to get as far as I can because I knew with every passing day. More developing was going along. And of course they gave me, steroids to help develop his lungs more. And, that was comforting. But at 24 weeks, a baby's lungs are not even remotely ready. So after eight days, with no change, which was good, Without to be TMI, I hadn't gone to the bathroom, bathroom, in eight days, and I was uncomfortable, I could not do it in the bed, in a pan, I just like, ugh, you guys, I, that was just a whole thing, You know, they felt confident enough for me to get up and go like on a commode next to the bed.

Well, turns out the pressure that I was feeling had nothing to do with going to the bathroom and everything to do with Hunter making his way through the birth canal.  You heard me correctly.  I had my husband leave the room. This was like close to seven o'clock in the morning. And I was like, Okay, we've been through a lot.

You've seen a lot in the last year and a half. But like, let's try and keep a little mystery to our marriage at this point.  We've been married for like three years. Let's just, let's just keep some mystery. I need some privacy to try and go to the bathroom. So he left the hospital room. The nurse gave me a call button in case of any emergency and no sooner did I Stand up, and I knew something wasn't right, and I knew what I was feeling had nothing to do with going to the bathroom, and I pushed the button,  she ran in, and I was like, uh, panicking, I was like, I don't know, I, I, I think, I think he's coming, and then, literally, she had me lay on the bed, and I pushed one time, and Hunter was born, she rang this buzzer, and when I tell you that, I don't know the exact number, but it felt like 80 people rushed in, I mean, and, It was like something out of a movie.

was terrifying, you know, everyone ran in and I was grateful because I don't know, I like to think that there were angels watching over us in that moment because it was literally like six 58 in the morning and. There were double the amount of people out in the halls because there was about to be shift change with the nurses and doctors and everything.

So double the amount of people came in and right away. He was taken and  they prepped us for the event that I went into labor, which I didn't I literally just delivered him. My cervix failed and could not carry him anymore. 

So they had his, like, incubator thing ready in the room. We had to sign papers to resuscitate him if needed. And, I mean, it was just terrifying. I knew all the risks right away. It was like, is he. Going to be okay. Like, it was just horrific. And my poor husband, I'm sure, like, the alarm sounds and everyone runs into my room, I can only imagine what he was thinking, and one of these days we'll have him recall his memories from all these experiences, but I do remember that the doctor had wrapped him in like this almost like a foil blanket and handed him to me and like asked for a phone and to like take the picture of me and Josh and Hunter and all I kept thinking was, Oh my God, like, take him just save him.

Like, just take him with you. Like, I don't need a picture. Obviously, he was stable in that moment and they felt confident in that decision. And I'm so glad that I do have that picture, even though it's kind of triggering.  That's the picture. That's the first picture after he was born and it's really all I have because the four months to follow Was him in the NICU and  I didn't get to hold him again and for I think it was nine days And even then you know, it was just in the isolate If it would still be more time before I got to do skin to skin with him at 24 weeks a baby is just Needs to learn how to suck, swallow, and breathe on their own.

I mean, those things are not developed yet. and there are just so many other complications. You know, his legs were all bruised, from the way that he was delivered, which, again, was feet first. Like he was breached and delivered that way. So, his legs were bruised. at one point, he had a grade three brain bleed that needed to be addressed.

He had, it's called PDA, it's in the heart, common of preemies, there's like a little valve in the heart that doesn't fully develop yet if you're born early. when he was born, he was 12 inches long, which is crazy because I think probably the average for a newborn baby is what, like 20 inches? And he weighed two pounds, one ounce, which It was terrifying because that's nothing that's so small, but the doctors kept telling us how big he was and it's only in years later when I, more involved in the NICU community and connecting with other women who have had preemies and micro preemies And then having more children and, you know, you have the apps that you use with their growth throughout your pregnancy.

And,  looking at the app at. 25 weeks and I'm like, Oh, this says baby's still, not even a pound and a half. And I'm like, yeah, so Hunter being two pounds, one ounce at 24 weeks and five days was actually pretty amazing. But he had a lot of work that came and  it was some of the hardest months of our life.

I mean, Josh and I were just robots going back and forth to the NICU all day. And we were so blessed to have jobs that were flexible. I took, I think a couple weeks of my maternity leave. And then I saved my maternity leave for when Hunter was to come home, because other than pumping, there was nothing we could do for him other than be there and I really wanted to save that time to bond with him and take care of him when he was finally able to come home,  he was born March 1st, and he came home the end of June.

He was in the hospital for 120 days. And the 1st month was. Scary, there were ups and downs. And truthfully at the time, again, we were just so grateful that he was here and in good hands, given like our previous experiences that we were just so hopeful. And we even had doctors tell us like, you guys are just always so positive and happy, and we don't see that a lot around here.

People were telling us, like, I think it's making a difference. And we just didn't know any other way to be, to be honest. We didn't know. The severity of some of the things that he was going through. I mean, even though we were told, we were like, no, but you can fix that.

Right? Like, it'll be fine. He'll be fine. Like we're just, we just kept staying positive because there's no way we were going to let him leave us. And sure enough, after four months, Hunter came home. I think he weighed like nine pounds, something ounces when he came home. And I remember thinking at the beginning of our NICU journey, like, Oh my gosh, I hope we can just get him to, four or five pounds.

So he can go in the car seat, then we can go home. And it felt so much about him. Drinking milk and getting bigger it felt like at first, but as the months went on, we learned it was so much more than that. You know, all the other things he was navigating, he had an hernia that had to be dealt with.

And like, I mentioned the PDA of the heart and the brain bleed and not to mention his feet,  and it was a weird blessing because he was born so early that they were able to actually start doing therapy on his feet and casting his feet while he was in the NICU. So even though he shouldn't have been here yet, they were working with his bones, and I think it made a big difference because, you know, Given how young he was, I mean, his bones were like a lot more malleable than if we were waiting four more months for him.

So in regards to his club feet, it was kind of a benefit that he got interventions as soon as he did. He had surgery on his Achilles tendons. He had casting. And then by the time that it was getting close to,  his due date, 

we wanted to know, like, how long do you think, like, once he was stable and we were just waiting for him to get better at. Drinking his milk and growing and, you know, eventually they kept lowering his oxygen and he was able to slowly breathe on his own. We're like, when, when can we, when can we bust out of here?

Are we done here yet? I mean, at the same time, of course, we were terrified to bring him home because we're still new parents and we don't know what we're doing. And there was so much comfort and safety in the NICU. The nurses, we learned so much. We were taught how to feed our baby. We were taught how to change a baby.

We were taught. All the things we would have missed in our birthing classes and parenting classes that we did not make it to, there was a level of comfort in the NICU. But then his due date came and passed and that's when it got hard. Those last two weeks in the NICU, I could feel it. We were getting feisty with nurses.

And it was nothing personal. We were just exhausted, and eager to bring our baby home. We had been prepped with the possibility, you know, with A 24 weeker and someone who has been in the hospital that long and everything he's been through like there is the possibility that he will go home with a feeding tube.

If he doesn't meet those milestones, he could go home with oxygen. If he's not quite yet breathing on his own and miraculously, he came home with nothing. He was breathing on his own and eating well. Of course he had the casts on his feet and we had  physical therapy that continued at home and follow up appointments.

And then he had to wear boots at night, eventually. And all of that continued for, a few years to come. But overall, he was doing really well. He did have some reflux that I remember we had to deal with. Found out he had a tongue and lip tie. So we had that corrected, which immediately helped his eating.

And we were just grateful. Grateful to have Hunter. Excited to be parents. Of course, having Hunter at home with us brought up some feelings of grief of what we had lost with the girls, you know, our immediate grief following my miscarriages. It was kind of like we lost the idea of our family.

We lost the dream of being parents, but we knew that we were at the beginning of our journey, and we knew that we could bring babies home, or we hoped we could, I should say. But then once we were holding Hunter in our arms, it was so apparent what we had lost. You know, we didn't know before, but now, as parents, staring at our baby, grief just loves to come in waves, and they tell you this all the time, but it just smacked us in the face, and, We were grieving a lot during that time.

We were grieving losing the girls. We were grieving the simplicity of just having a baby full term and bringing our baby home.  Really just grieving the idea of how we would become parents. But also just so grateful the whole experience with Hunter and bringing Hunter into the world really had us. Grow closer to God and grow in our faith and really bring us together as a couple you know, we were told after our miscarriages to really lean into each other and same thing with through the NICU there are all these statistics out there of couples who split up because of loss, split up because of complications with their child or a NICU stay or all the things that kept piling up up until this point really brought Josh and I together.

I mean, we were a team and we were just so, so happy to have Hunter in our lives and it was a wild, wild ride to become parents, and bring a baby home with us, but I cannot imagine this world without Hunter, and I think about it all the time, how  it's so crazy that he's here, and when he's excelling at things, he's so smart, and he's so funny and empathetic, and I just can't picture a world without him.

The gravity of Hunter's birth story and his time spent in the NICU was definitely never lost on me. After he was born and we brought him home, my idea of what life as a mom would look like really shifted into focus for me. I never intended to be a stay at home mom. I liked my job. I always thought I would work.

had a pretty flexible job in that I worked from home already and made my own hours, but it was full time work and I was hosting events in the evenings every week and it was hard, especially with Hunter's therapies, he had his NICU follow up clinic, he had OT and speech and PT and, It was a lot and I was really grateful to be able to be there at any hour of the day for him.

But as he started to get older, you know, I did need help. I couldn't watch him and do my work to its full potential. So, pretty quickly we hired a part time nanny to help. And my husband and I kind of tag team, our work schedules and then with the nanny It was a lot,  but one thing became very clear to me in that time, and that's, I just was so blessed to be a mom, and I really didn't want to let any more moments slip past me.

I wanted to be there for every moment for Hunter, and I wanted to be present and really dive in to this opportunity of being a mom.

So, when Hunter turned one, I decided to leave my full time job and stay home, and stay at home mom. Was never on my radar. My mom worked growing up. She was always there for us, always had a flexible job. My dad worked and I just thought that that's what I would do, but I was very happy staying home with him.

And it became really obvious to us as well that, IVF is how we are growing our family. It's no easy feat. I mean, it's, I've done harder things, unfortunately, but you're doing medications, you're injecting yourself, you're prepping your body to do an embryo transfer.

And then, the pregnancy itself and we knew we wanted a big family. And so I just really, it became clear that this was going to be my season of diving full into motherhood and growing our family and focusing on that.

So after my surplus had failed with Hunter and he was born premature, it was pretty clear, at least to their knowledge, that. My cervix was the issue with my pregnancies. My cervix opened, you know, and I delivered our twins and my cervix opened with Hunter as well. So I was referred to a doctor, which luckily was in Chicago.

But people flew all over the world to see this doctor, Dr. Haney, and he was known for putting in transabdominal surcloges. So it's a similar idea, it's to keep your cervix closed, although instead of like a procedure, this is an actual surgery. So they make a small kind of like a C section incision.

And by doing that, they're able to put the band like around the top of your cervix. So the way it was explained to me, which I thought was really helpful is if you picture say a water balloon and you fill it up and you're tying it, the weight of the balloon is only tightening the knot as it gets.

Heavier and heavier, so that's exactly what the cervix does. As the weight of your pregnancy grows, it's only going to stay closed. It's not going to open because it's at the top and the weight is at the bottom. So, that's how I always pictured it. And the only caveat to having an abdominal cerclage placed is that you have to deliver via C section.

And at 38 weeks, no further along than 38 weeks, they do not want you going into labor because then your cervix will contract and you're at risk for uterine rupture because you have the band in place. So it's suggested that you have a scheduled C section at 38 weeks.

Which for me and my type A personality, I was like, you're telling me I can pick the day that I will walk into the hospital and have a baby? Yeah, that's, that's fine with me.  I know a lot of women might mourn the idea of having to have a c section instead of a natural birth, but I was really in a headspace of just however I need to safely get my children here alive is fine with me.

I had had to throw a lot of things out the window, conceiving naturally, having a fearless pregnancy, So many things were thrown out the window for me that that was no big deal. I was like, okay, a c section, it is.

So given that in 2018 Our medical bills, I'm gonna be honest, were just Astronomical. I mean, thank goodness for insurance. And at the time, I had really great insurance with my employer and we are forever grateful for that because a four month NICU stay with all the surgeries and all of the therapies to follow, I mean, you, you can imagine,  what that year looked like for us.

Oh, and this isn't a story for another day, but I also had my gallbladder taken out while Hunter was in the NICU because towards the end of my pregnancy, they found out I had gallstones. So yeah, another doozy of a year on my body. But we decided, well, while we have already met our deductible and all the things, why not tack on another surgery?

The end of this year.  Hunter was about I think it was eight months old when I had the abdominal circlage placed. And I was told once that's in, you know, give it a month and then you can. feel free to try and have a baby and it will hold it. Your cervix will hold is 99 percent effective. So when hunter turned one, not only did I quit my job, we also decided to do another frozen embryo transfer.

We were kind of skeptical that Our embryo transfer with hunter, just we got lucky and it worked on the first try. I had read enough of other IVF stories and I was prepared for a transfer not to work. I knew that could happen. I think our success rate, we were told 75%.

That's not 100. So, um, we were like, let's just get started in case it doesn't work. And if it does work, then great. We're ready for it. 202. Let's do it. AnD again, we just have them. Choose randomly because we did not know the sex of our embryos They were not tested. We just they were all graded the same structurally so they just chose an embryo and put it in and I became pregnant on the first try and That was with Noah

and I will say that my pregnancy with Noah. I was Confident I was confident in my surclosure. I was confident that We had figured out the reason why we lost the twins why hunter was born early We I just was ready and like confident that this pregnancy would be fine That being said I just never was a person to like it's not like I was too afraid I wouldn't run I wouldn't work out Like walking was the only kind of working out.

I was doing I Still ate healthy. I mean I still like in the back of my mind always was  cautious because I Slightly felt like a ticking time bomb at all times, but my cervix, I was confident in and everything with my pregnancy with Noah went fine until always an until,  about 23 weeks, I had some spotting and of course, now I just have so much knowledge surrounding like gestational age and. babies developing. I mean, I watched my third trimester plus of Hunter happen outside of my body. You know, everything he learned in the NICU in those four months should have been happening inside of me.

And so it's pretty wild just imagining how big the baby is, what he's doing. And at 23 weeks, the spotting obviously concerned me because I was like, Oh my gosh, like this is too soon, obviously. I hope everything's okay because I know that this, and there's no way we're going to get lucky twice with  a baby being born so premature and not having, you know, a million issues going on. I, it's just not possible.

And of course it's kind of like a catch 22. My gut was saying, like, just go. Just go into the hospital. When in doubt, go get seen. That's what I was always told and I always felt. But then, a small part of me was like, oh my goodness, if I go into the hospital right now to get this checked out, I just No, I'm not coming back.

I just felt like one of two things would happen. I was going to be put on bed rest or I was going to lose a baby. And that was terrifying, terrifying. But I had to look past my fear and do what I, of course, thought was best for my son. And that was to go into the hospital. And of course, it's a weekend because things always happen on a weekend.

I am convinced, whether my kids are sick or I need to be seen by a doctor. It's always like. Saturday morning. Cool. Offices are closed.  Luckily, the head doctor, my head OB, was doing a shift at the hospital, so I was able to be seen by her. And she hooked me up to the monitoring belt to see if I was having contractions.

I was not feeling anything. I truly felt perfectly fine. But I did have the spotting, which was concerning, so I just wanted to be checked out. Well, sure enough, I was registering contractions, which was concerning, and so my doctor told me I was being admitted to the hospital for further evaluation.

Tears, streaming, because I cannot believe this is happening again, that I am being admitted to the hospital during my pregnancy, I'm starting to feel like, I'm feeling like an experiment. Each pregnancy is going further and further, and we're figuring out one piece of each of the puzzles. 

But this is not a game. This is my life. These are my baby's lives, and I am just a little scared at this point. Especially because, I have a toddler at home, and being admitted to the hospital means my husband, that's put on him. He is working full time, taking care of our son. And I'm not seeing him, my baby that I take care of and see all day, every day.

So that was ridiculously hard. And I'm not going to speak for Josh, but from my point of view, I would say what was to come in my time spent in the hospital was probably the hardest part. for him in our journey. It was just completely overwhelming.

So once I was admitted to the hospital, they started medication to help me  stop contractions. Obviously preterm labor is not ideal. And the next step was to figure out why was I going into preterm labor? And the whole time as they're going through all of this, 

there's always the factor that I have in this surclage and I can't go into labor. Like it's not safe for my body to. Go into labor and from my uterus to contract with the abdominal in place. Once they did an ultrasound, they showed baby is perfectly fine and. We had already had our 20 week anatomy scan at this point, everything looked healthy with Noah, but they did discover that I had polyhydramnios, which is when you have like excessive amounts of fluid.

In hindsight, that kind of tracked because I felt like I was measuring so big and in my head, I was like, oh, well, I mean, it's it's my 3rd pregnancy. I think I just like popped sooner, but there was a span of time, a few weeks leading up to this, Hospital stay where I was like, I don't know.

I feel kind of big for 20 weeks pregnant. And the next piece of the information that they needed to figure out was why, why the excessive fluid I was told that  sometimes it can signify something wrong with the baby, but genetically everything checked out in the 20 week scan. We did the testing at 13 weeks as well.

There was nothing that presented itself. And he said, and sometimes it's just random. One of the MFM doctors said his wife both times with their kids had polyhydramnios and went on to have healthy full term pregnancies and no explanation as to why her body had excessive fluid.

So not only was I given. Drugs to help stop contractions, but they did also give me steroids in the event that I was going to deliver. That first week was so touch and go, and one of the things they give you is magnesium, and That is by far the worst thing I've ever experienced.  It feels like your body is on fire when they are putting the magnesium through the IV and it's over a process. It's like over an hour and it was late at night and I was there by myself because you know, my parents had to work. My husband had to work and he was home with our son and I was just in the hospital, like on fire, trying to get through it. I think eventually my mom came at like 2 a. m. or something crazy because I was like, I am not well, like I cannot do this.  And then my contractions stopped and calmed down. Every so many days they would monitor the fluid. They gave me medications to help with that. And. it would go down a little, 

so those first two weeks were really like a lot was going on and I was doing a lot of praying and, you know, it was, Encouraging to get past the 24 week mark, encouraging to hit 25 weeks, but again, I just know that  baby's not ready. Baby's not ready. He has to stay in and continue to grow and develop.

And so the second two weeks I was in the hospital, I think was more cautionary than anything else. I think they just wanted to be positive that, you know, I was not going to be sent home and something else was going to happen. And I was fine with that. While it was extremely hard. Being away from my family and it was very hard on Josh trying to juggle all of the things be there for me be there for Hunter continue working.

overall, it was probably the best that they kept me because once I hit 28 weeks and entered my 3rd trimester, I was able to go home on. Like a modified bedrest basically, if I'm home do nothing, but I can go to the bathroom and do take care of hunter as I need and things like that. But that's how I spent my 3rd trimester.

Everything was fine. I was seen further with them. They monitor the fluid. It continued to go down to a regular level. And and the 1 thing that they did decide to do is they moved up my C section date. it was in the 38th week. They moved it up to, I think it was 37 and 2 37 and one weeks, which again, from my point of view, I'm like, oh my gosh, 37, that's full term.

37 and up. That's full term. He'll be fine. This is gonna be a ginormous baby. Hey, like comparing everything to a 24 week or and younger and seeing a baby at 16 weeks and 24 weeks, 37 sounded glorious. Sure enough, I made it to my scheduled c section and Noah was born. He was perfect. He was 7 pounds, 3 ounces. 

It was simply amazing. Seeing him for the first time and holding him and knowing he was just. Healthy and I was healthy and we made it and we did it was surreal. And I definitely obviously didn't know it at the time, but noah would be the only baby that I ever carried full term and it is so, so special to me.

Of course it wasn't without its hiccup, but overall that pregnancy was my biggest experience with being pregnant. Granted, there's so many things I didn't experience. I didn't go into labor. I did spend a month in the hospital. It was not without fear, that's for sure.

But all of that washed away when I saw Noah for the first time. And I saw my husband beaming at me with pride and it was just Amazing. I will never forget that moment. 

Once the excitement settled and we were in our room in Mother Baby Unit, and, it was time for me to start trying to feed him, and family members were visiting, of course, we have a video of Hunter meeting Noah for the first time, which she called him Baby No No at that point.

You know, Hunter was 20 months old. It was just awesome. It was amazing. But then once everybody left, my husband stayed with Hunter. I was in the hospital myself for those, I think I was in the hospital for three days. Maybe four. I don't know. I milked it with my c section because I was terrified to go home.

You know, this is coming off of having a child and having four months in the hospital to prep to bring him home. I just, I was scared, especially because it felt like I was a mom kind of for the first time. Looking back, it was unfortunate that everyone kind of treated me like I knew what I was doing.

I mean, I had never breastfed before. That was not Hunter's journey. I pumped for him. I never took a class. I never learned. I also wasn't used to all of the crying and, Noah just cried and cried and cried. And it was so overwhelming that first night because I mean, I had a little PTSD just being in the hospital and with a baby and then I was by myself, but my experience with Hunter was just so different. He Had so much going on. I mean we weren't hearing him cry when he needed something everything with him was very Scheduled even when he came home, he was amazing at sleeping and he was fed on his schedule he wasn't fed on demand like because he needed to get so many calories in and It was just a completely different experience.

So I was having a hard time breastfeeding with Noah, ended up just going home and deciding that I'm going to exclusively pump because I was overwhelmed. And of course I've got like a 20 month old at home as well. And so now all of a sudden we have two babies and I don't know, I'd say the first five months of Noah's life, After the initial bliss, the only word I can use is overwhelmed.

I was overwhelmed.  Not knowing really much about postpartum or the fourth trimester at this point. I was just kind of thrown into it and I kind of had this mentality, like I'm tough. I got this, like I've done harder things. So. I'm fine. I'm fine. What I know now, and that I've learned over the years, is the fourth trimester is very real.

I mean, you gave birth to a human. Your body went through so many changes, and On top of all of the regular things that happen postpartum,  I always had this layer of trauma and grief and it doesn't go away just because you bring a baby home

NOah was born November, 2019. We were in a townhouse, we were deciding that we need more space. We need a bigger house. we sell our. townhouse in four days and now need somewhere to live. And then the world shut down with COVID.

So that was stressful. We have a four month old and almost two year old and nowhere to live. We took one weekend. I mean, homes were like on the market and then off the market, you know, no one knew what was going to happen. Everyone kind of paused, but it really just wasn't an option for us because we needed somewhere to live.

We went out one day with our realtor, looked at six houses, put an offer on the first one we saw and. Two months later, we're moving in now at this point, not only with COVID going on, but having, two under two, we were like, okay, we're going to pause on the whole family building situation. You know, we knew we wanted a big family.

We always imagined four children, but we needed some time. I needed some time, not only just to like have nobody touch my body for a little bit and stay away from doctors, but also I just wanted to enjoy the boys. And. In a weird way, COVID just heightened all of that, which was slightly amazing. March, 2020 into 2021, that year was one of my favorite years so far of parenting.

I loved enjoying the boys at their ages, you know, six months and two and It was just so fun. We did preschool at home. We did activities. We spent so much time outside and so much time as a family that I absolutely loved it. And it was a blessing in disguise because I soaked in so many amazing moments with those two and it was awesome.

that is the story of Noah, and yes, we did name him Noah after Noah's Ark and the Bible story because I just truly believe that Noah helped save us. He saved us from a very dark time and is our constant reminder to just listen to God.

Once COVID kind of, I'm just going to say, calmed down, I think we all know the story of 2020  into 2021, you know, we decided. This is just me at the beginning of every year. I start to evaluate everything, you know, like everyone does. We set goals, I look at our family and, I just want to know when are we going to try to have another baby?

And we knew we wanted to wait longer than we did last time. So we were kind of thinking, closer to maybe Noah's second birthday. You know, he was born in November 2019. So we're like, okay, fall 2021, I think we'll do a transfer. And given our history, we were like, you know, it's probably going to work on the first try.

So let's just be prepared for that. I think we'll wait closer to Noah's second birthday. other plans because in May of 2021.  I missed my period, and after 8 years of never being able to get pregnant on my own, never being on birth control, I got a positive pregnancy test.  And did I believe it?

Absolutely not. I was like, sick joke. This is a fluke. I need another test. Well, multiple tests later, I absolutely was pregnant. Told. Josh right away. It wasn't our plan, but we were ecstatic and thrilled. And you know, my surplus,  stays in. So I was not worried about my cervix that was still in place.

And we knew it helped Noah get here safely in full term. So I was like, Oh my gosh, we just got pregnant on our own. Like. Holy cow.

I remember I told my parents right away and was just like beaming from ear to ear It's to be mentioned and it's not proven that this is why I got pregnant But during this time my husband and I were following a keto diet I had lost a little bit of weight nothing crazy, but I was just so much less inflamed I felt healthier.

So I'm slightly convinced that during this time of being very active and healthy, coming off of COVID, we didn't have a lot to do. So we worked out a lot at home. I was in a run club. 

We walked outside a lot and I was at a pretty healthy state. So that's my theory on how I got pregnant on my own. Is it true? I don't know. It's not that I was unhealthy in the past and that's why I couldn't get pregnant. Um, I don't know. It was just part of God's plan. So I got pregnant and, tale as old as time. You know, my pregnancy was great.  Felt amazing. Was feeling confident. I have now had a baby full term. A healthy baby. So I was convinced that it would happen again. We did find out the sex of the baby at around, I think it was 13 or 14 weeks. And were ecstatic to find out that we were having a girl.

We actually came up with the name Marin pretty quickly, with all of our kids, we said the name and like the first one we agreed on, we were both like, that's it, that's the one. I mean, same thing with Hunter, we really liked the name Hunter, it sounded like a strong name, and we had that ready to go before. 

Anything, anything happened in my pregnancy were like, if we have a son, his name is going to be Hunter. It's a strong name and we like it. Little did we know how strong he would have to be and how strong he is, but it's a very fitting name. And then Noah, of course, I told you that story. And with Charlotte and Cecilia, there wasn't a whole lot of thought behind it.

Our girl name was Cecilia. That was before we knew we were having twins. We were like, we love that name. We'll call her Cece. We love that name and then when we found out we were having twins, we did toy around with some ideas. We didn't know at that point that we had two girls. That was just a name on our girls list. We had a girl's list and a boy's list going. And then when we found out that we were both girls, we didn't talk about naming her at that point.

It wasn't until we lost Cecilia and they were asking us what's. What's her name? Does she have a middle name? And  it was so overwhelming. And so, you know, we knew Cecilia, we named her Cecilia, we decided not to give the twins middle names. Um, at that point, you know, we didn't have children yet and we didn't know what the future held.

It didn't seem important to us. We were like Cecilia and the other name we liked was always Charlotte and it sounds beautiful together. And so Cecilia and Charlotte.  It was, and Marin was, again one of those names. We just, we liked it. It was unique. Marin Morris, the country singer is really the only Marin I knew.

And you know, I'm a fan, so that was her name from the start. And pregnancy was flawless until one weekend. It's always  one life changing moment. I was. About to be 20 weeks and I was having some lower back pain, of course, over the weekend. It was fall, we had went with our family to, one of those pumpkin patch fall festival ordeals. And, we were walking around and everyone's always cautious around me. I mean, when I'm pregnant, everyone's like. doesn't even let me lift a finger and which is frustrating because I'm just like a strong person and I'm like, I got it. I got it. I'm fine. I'm fine.

Like I'm fine. Pregnant people lift things all the time.  . Like, do you need to sit down? I was like, no, I'm just, I don't know. I think I just, the weight of the pregnancy is starting to wear on me. Like my back is hurting.

Went to bed that night, woke up the next morning still with some back pain and it wasn't  Later that evening around like dinnertime and I had some spotting and I was like,  oh You've got to be kidding me. Obviously history has shown that every to any time I have spotting. It's not nothing it's always indicative of something And I always had this horrible feeling in the back of my mind.

Like this is too good to be true I got pregnant on my own. We're having a girl like  it was hard for me to see the future of this pregnancy just because I couldn't, it was so hard for me to imagine something coming so easily to me. And so when the spotting came, I just had this feeling in my gut If I went to the hospital again, I'm losing a baby or I'm not coming home for a while and knowing how hard that was on my husband the first time with just one child.

And now we have two. I was really scared. Really, really scared. I tried to ignore it. I hoped that it would get better, but it didn't. And when we put the boys to bed, I told my husband,  I think I do need to go in and be seen. I think that's the best. I think I should go to the hospital because my back was hurting more and, the spotting.

It didn't stop. And so it wasn't anything concerning like in the past yet. But by the time I got to the hospital,  you know, I was in the ER and I was waiting for my OB to get there and waiting and waiting. And sure enough, I was registering contractions. WHich, as I've said, is not good, because I have my circlosion and my uterus cannot be contracting.

Now, of course, at 20 weeks, that's not far along enough a baby cannot come.  I was scared that I was about to endure another stressful hospital stay. Given what I experienced in the past, I was like, it'll be okay, right? It'll be okay. They'll just give me medications. They'll stop the contractions. There's got to be an explanation.

Maybe it's the polyhydramnios again. But when I tell you within 30 minutes of being in the hospital, I was in full blown, I'm going to say labor. I've never felt a pain like that. It was so bad. And at this point I had started bleeding pretty heavily and  they kept checking on the monitor, Maren was fine, she had a strong heartbeat. 

By the time the doctor got there, she's like,  given your pain level, and the contractions, and the bleeding, she said,  I'm so sorry, but  we need to take you to the OR. And of course, my mind is putting this all together, and It's not time. I can't, I can't choose to deliver my baby right now. I mean, I know I have to have a c section.

I know it's not safe for my body. I'm at risk for uterine rupture. I know I'm bleeding. I knew all these things logically, but I was just frozen and I cannot say the words. I can't say,  wheel me back so I can say goodbye to my baby. Like I can't, I can't do it.  But the pain increased and increased and it was Getting very scary and then all I can think about were my boys at home.

All I could think about was my health this time. I, I knew too much. I knew how scary it was. I knew that I could not only lose my uterus, but I could, I could lose my life. I mean, it was, it was pretty scary. And  I just looked at her and I said, okay, okay, we have to. And it was in that moment that she did one more ultrasound and she said,  I'm so sorry, but if I have to tell you if you had any doubt,  At all.

Um, there's no longer a heartbeat.  Your baby has passed and at that point,  I just kind of, I couldn't wait to get in the, I just wanted to be knocked out, literally, I, they, they put me under so I can go have a c section for my stillborn baby and it was horrible, but I at least was grateful that I didn't technically have to make any sort of decision, everything that took place happened on its own and I was just at a loss.

For words, a loss for my feelings,  I was grateful to be safe and  being able to go home to my family and my boys and be there for them, but completely devastated to lose another daughter and. blindsided. Everything happened so quickly within 24 hours, I went from a little bit of pain to delivering my child.

And obviously nothing can prepare you for that.

At that point. I would think it was 20 weeks in one day. So we did not make it yet to the anatomy scan, but all of the genetic testing showed that Marin was Um, the next few days I was in the hospital recovering and we were able to hold her, take pictures with her. She was in a cuddle cot next to my bed.

This time I knew the importance of taking it all in. It's a very, very weird thing. Experience knowing that the moments that you have with your baby is all you get like you have to remember every inch of them like their fingers, their toes. I remember unwrapping her. I needed to see her. I needed to see her toes.

I needed to look at her face and  I'm grateful that we have a photo album of pictures of her. My mom and my sister were able to hold her as well. buT it's just absolutely heartbreaking to say hello and goodbye in the same breath.

It was later determined, after testing the placenta and, you know, doing more testing on Marin and everything that. We lost her due to a placental abruption, which, of course, is nothing I had experience with, to my knowledge. At this point, it kind of brought up questions of, is that why I lost the twins?

I mean, the way I lost Charlotte, all of the bleeding, and how it came out of nowhere, is pretty Indicative of what placental abruption would look like. no denying my cervix did not hold Hunter. So, in any case, it might be an issue of both. 

The story of Marin is so beautiful and heartbreaking and it will always hold a special place in my heart because  she was proof that I could get pregnant. On my own. And I know in the midst of all of our story, that sounds so silly, but I always kind of went with the knowledge that  this isn't going to happen for me.

It's not for me. Like we need interventions to get pregnant. And the fact that we just miraculously conceived her on our own after so many years of not being able to, was just so special to me. It gave me a small glimpse of what a typical pregnancy might look like, you know, you and your husband, nothing clinical, just living your life.

In love, getting pregnant, and then carrying her for as long as I did was so special.  I had so many dreams for Maren. I envisioned so many things with my daughter.  We had always wanted four children. And I kind of just assumed that out of four, we, we might, have a boy and a girl.

I never thought we'd have all boys or all girls. I didn't know how it all shake out, but I was like, yeah, I envision experiencing both a son and a daughter for whatever that means, you know?  And so once we found out that Maren was a girl and we were expecting a girl, I just  couldn't stop my brain from racing of all the dreams, all the things that were to come with my little girl.

It also kind of lifted a weight off my shoulders of, let's take it one step at a time. I got pregnant on my own with Maren. And now that we have a girl,  you know, pregnancy has never been easy for me. And it had never been just pure bliss. I was always stressed and anxious and worried to some capacity.

So after finding out we were now having a girl, I just thought, I don't know, maybe  Maybe this is it for us. Maybe this is our family's complete and maybe it's not worth the risk for me to ever be pregnant again. At least the pressure is off. Cause at this point too,  we hadn't tested our embryos.

We had six embryos left and we did not know if they were boys or girls. There was always the risk that there were no girls in there, you know? And so I at least was like, Oh my gosh, well we have a girl. We got pregnant with a girl on our own. So now we have both. And that's pretty, pretty exciting.

So losing Mirren was a true loss of a dream, a loss of potentially completing our family, a loss of her beautiful life, and, you know, it's one that we still deal with. That was a little over two years ago, and while I've learned a lot more about processing grief and, we've moved forward with her loss.

 Maren was special  and that was her story. We had her cremated and just like Charlotte and Cecilia is a part of our lives.  Our sons know about Marin. We had explained just weeks before to them that  they were expecting a sister and that mommy was growing a baby in her belly.

And, at their ages, at four and two, they gathered what they did from that. And then we had to be honest and blunt and,  we had help from social workers and books.  And then we had to tell them that Marin died. And That got tricky because now I felt like they thought that every sister is an angel sissy We really used it as an opportunity to teach our children, age appropriately about God and religion and our faith and  we really turned on that in this situation we wanted them to know that  they have angels looking over them 

That some babies are born to stay here and some go straight  to heaven. And, it started some conversations around our faith and it's continued over the years. While it's not a part of our daily conversation talking about Charlotte, Cecilia and Maren. We have ways that we honor them. Every Christmas we have little stockings that we put up. This year  now that the boys are old enough, we started an angel tree, we have a smaller Christmas tree and we call it our angel tree. And since losing our dog, last year as well, that's kind of like our, our tree for them.

And they get to pick out ornaments every year to add to the angel tree. And, you know, there's certain points in the year that we. Talk about it with them. But it's definitely something I never thought I'd have to explain to my four and five year old

  A few months after we said goodbye to Marin, I needed to pay our MFM doctor a visit. I couldn't let my mind wander anymore. I was grieving her loss, but also just confused as to what the future looked like for me, and our growing family. You know, we have these six embryos. I'm terrified to ever be pregnant again.

I'm not convinced I can even mentally do it, let alone physically. So I set up a consult with our MFM doctor that we trust so much because of COVID, I had to go by myself, which ended up being okay. I was nervous, but I needed to hear whatever he had to say about the situation. And basically he told me that there is just nothing we could do differently.

If you were to be pregnant again, there's nothing we could change. He's the one who brought up the idea that maybe placental abruption was the scenario with the twins. We just, we just don't know. And my health is at risk. Uterine rupture is an extremely high risk at this point because, I have now had to see sections. I had the abdominal surgery to place the surplus. And given the fact that I just have a history of preterm labor, I'm And complications,  having that cerclosion has now posed to be more of a problem than anything else because yes, it will keep the pregnancy in, but if I can't have a healthy pregnancy, it's It's kind of a burden to have in there.

He said, you know, I'm not telling you, you can't get pregnant and he's like, could it be fine? Yeah. Could it not be fine? Yeah. He's like, we just don't know. There's no way of knowing we've put all the precautions in place with the knowledge that we have. And there's really nothing we could do differently.

He said, but I do know that you have a beautiful family to think about and you have children, he said. So my opinion is that I don't feel comfortable with you carrying another pregnancy. And I think he was surprised by my reaction because I took it very well, at least visibly  at first.

It honestly kind of felt like a weight was lifted off of my shoulders. It was devastating to hear, to know that somebody. That I trust, a doctor, does not want me getting pregnant again. And it's saying it's not, it's probably not safe for me to carry another pregnancy.

But the fact that I like didn't make the decision myself, I guess, made it easier. I never had to wonder. It was just like a hard fact. And something that I would have to mourn, you know, 

Um, obviously I'm not saying it was like this grand awesome time anytime I was pregnant, but as a mom and as a woman who has been pregnant before, you know, how special that is. And even for moms who are ready, say they want to get their tube side, or they know that their family is complete.

Or even when women go through menopause, I mean, there's some sort of grief that happens when you are moving on to a different phase in your life. And that's exactly what I felt. And he nailed it on the head when the doctor said, you know, when I saw you on the schedule, I knew you were coming in for one of two reasons.

You were either coming in to see me because you want another baby or you were coming in. To see me for permission to stop  to not have any more kids  and I didn't realize that at the time, but I didn't know which one I was coming in for, but I just needed someone to tell me what the answer was like, I'm done trying to get pregnant and carry a pregnancy.

Or, you think it's fine and I can do it again, and at that point I would have to really dive deep into my soul and figure out if that's something that I could do.

So it was at this point that, we discussed surrogacy. And I had brought it up because actually the very first time I started researching surrogacy was when I was On bed rest for a month pregnant with Noah, and I remember my dad came to visit me in the hospital and I remember telling him like that I was googling it and just like looking into it and it just seemed so unattainable.

I thought it was something that only celebrities did and it was super, super expensive and It just didn't seem like something that we could do, but in that moment, I just remember thinking, I can't ever do this to Josh again, my husband. I cannot put this burden on him. I mean, every time that something goes wrong in my pregnancy, it's, it's more trauma for him.

It's more grief for him. It's putting more responsibilities on him when I'm on bedrest and, and we have a child at home and we're about to have another. And I know we want to grow our family, but I just don't know if I can carry that burden again. But that was the extent of it, of course. And then we had Noah and all those feelings went away.

And I was like, I can do anything. We did it. We have, this full term, beautiful baby. And, and so I moved on, but it was at this point that I asked my doctor about surrogacy and he agreed, he said, I think the safest way for you to grow your family would be through surrogacy. And this was because we have these six embryos.

We went through IVF, we had six embryos frozen. And had we not had those embryos, I don't know what we would have done, but we definitely would have explored other options. If we didn't have any embryos left, we would have either had to decide to do another round of IVF. And at this point, you know, I'm 31.

Which is young, still fine,  but just, you know, another financial burden to do another round of IVF in hopes of getting embryos, or we might have looked into adoption. It's really a conversation that we never got to, but because we had the embryos, surrogacy seems like the best fit for us. So it was at that point that we started looking into it, and with a quick Google search, I realized that it's going to be a long process.

And because of COVID. Everything was taking longer matching with the surrogate was taking longer. There wasn't as many surrogates out there because everyone's family plans changed in 2020 priorities, changed jobs, changed,  everything changed with COVID. We started to get the ball rolling just because my quick search told me that it'll be probably two years before we would even maybe have a baby home with us.

It's a process, you know? So. Five months after that meeting with our MFM doctor, we signed with a surrogacy agency. We contemplated doing an independent route to try and save money and figure it out on our own. But once we started diving into all of the details of what a surrogacy journey involves, legally, financially, just trying to protect ourselves all around, we really came to the conclusion that like, you know what, we have been through enough.

We've been through a lot. We have two young kids at home. We're working, like, there's a lot going on. I don't think we can manage this on our own. So when we found our surrogacy agency, we signed with them and it was 11 months later that we matched with our surrogate so it was right before we signed with our agency that we decided to have our embryos genetically tested. We were told it was a less than 1 percent chance that we could lose an embryo in the thaw because they basically take the frozen embryos.

They have to thaw them, biopsy them, test the biopsy, and then refreeze them. Sure enough, we're pretty awesome at statistics, and out of those six embryos, we did lose one in the thaw. So we had five embryos that were tested. Two came back abnormal. One was missing a chromosome, one had an extra chromosome.

They were not viable for a transfer. One, it came back mosaic, which if I understand correctly, basically means that there wasn't enough information to really label it as a normal, viable embryo or not. They only take so many cells in the biopsy. And I think it was just like one of those things where it, it could be fine.

It could be fine based on the number of. normal and abnormal cells we have, but it could also not be fine. So a mosaic is kind of just like they're unsure. And then we had two perfectly healthy, normal, viable embryos. So that was kind of something that we really had to digest as well, because we went from thinking we had these six embryos.

I mean, they were graded perfectly, but that was not anything to do with genetics. So genetically, it was pretty crazy to us that we had Say three embryos in there that might not have been viable for a pregnancy, or there could have been health complications. And we just looked at our two perfectly healthy sons and were like, holy cow, like how, how were you chosen?

You were chosen by random and you were healthy embryos and It's just pretty amazing to think about. Knowing that we had two healthy, normal embryos was also a blessing because in order to go on a surrogacy journey, that's kind of like the minimum requirement is that you have with an agency, at least is that you have two healthy, normal embryos, not a lot of surrogates are going to.

want to be matched with somebody who maybe only has one embryo. I mean, it's a lot of pressure. And then the event it doesn't happen, everything is paused or stopped because there's no other embryos. You know, the couple has to go through IVF again, create embryos. And at that point, they'd probably just be rematched.

So it really prolongs the process from the surrogate's point of view. So with our agency, it is a requirement to have two healthy embryos. Once we had that in place, signed with the agency, like I said, it was 11 months later. We matched with our surrogate and it has been a whirlwind ever since. I feel like time stood still as we waited and waited and waited to get the process going and find our match.

And then we had to do an embryo transfer. So our surrogate is in Texas. She flew to Chicago to our fertility clinic. For initial testing and then came back when it was time to do the embryo transfer. We were there with her. Her husband was in town too. We got to spend time with them. And then my husband and I flew down to Dallas for the eight week appointment.

Once we found out she was a pregnant, saw the first ultrasound, which was amazing. And then we were back in Dallas for the 20 week anatomy scan, which we are so pleased to say. was a healthy scan. Everything looked perfect. Baby is growing right on track. Our surrogate is feeling great.  Like I'm just in awe and just amazed every week that we catch up.

I'm like, how are you feeling? She's like, I feel great. Like I'm feeling great. Like she was tired in the beginning. Like anyone in the first trimester, but. It is just amazing to me. She looks great and I'm so happy that she's doing well. And we are now 26 weeks along and ecstatic .

In a few weeks is the next appointment, which we will be FaceTiming in for. And then around 33 weeks, we are going to go back to Dallas and at that point, we are going to bring our boys with us. We're going to take the whole family and to introduce them to our surrogate and her family. She has two kids of her own, slightly older than our boys and just make a whole day of it. Hopefully we'll get one of those 3D ultrasounds, take some pictures and really just celebrate, being. little over a month away from her delivery. She's due April 17th. And, if I forgot to mention, we are expecting a girl. We decided to only find out the sex of the two healthy embryos, knowing that those would be the ones that we would transfer. If it came down to it and we needed to utilize our mosaic embryo, we would ask , but We just wanted to know the two healthy embryos and we found out they are both female.

So, that was an easy choice. They just put one in and now we are expecting another baby girl who is being carried so safely by our surrogate. And I am so hopeful with this whole process. As you can imagine, there's always this level of fear and just It's kind of just hard to imagine this actually panning out, but again, we turn to our faith and prayer and it's getting real, we've started on her nursery, which is super exciting and I would just love all of the prayers and good vibes from listeners that we will bring our baby girl home in April.

And that is the story of all of our children.  Beautiful babies, two with us, three in heaven and one on the way. If you're new to the podcast, I hope this kind of gives you some insight as to why I started this podcast. I've been through a lot. I'm blessed with a lot and you know, I'm excited to see how.

Our story continues to unfold. And in the meantime, I just hope to help any other women out there who are navigating, hopefully not anything remotely close to my whole entire journey, but maybe a piece of it, whether it's IVF, miscarriage, surrogacy, whatever it is, I'm here for you. I'm here to lend an ear to listen.

I will continue to be bringing experts on this show and other women to share their stories so you don't feel alone. Thanks for listening. I know this was a longer episode, but, you know, we were on hiatus for a month, so I figured I'd come back with some solid content for you,  get excited for the episodes to come. We have quite the lineup for Season 3.   I appreciate you all for listening and you'll hear from me again next week.