Our Journey to a Family

It’s been quite a year since the last time I wrote, filled with many life changers. We’ve had a few CF husbands receive new lungs, one for the second time and celebrating a year for the husband I last wrote about. It’s amazing what a miracle can come out of being an organ donor!

To sum up a year’s happenings would be quite the task so I’ll try and capture it as best as I can. I started RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) to enter fully into the Catholic Church after Labor Day. We had classes almost every Sunday after 9am mass until the Easter Vigil service. I have to say it truly was a great experience entering into the faith and growing spiritually with my husband.

We finally went on our first trip as husband and wife, with a couple of our great friends, to New Orleans in September around our 2nd anniversary. The guys had been there before and thought it would be nice to go back and see how it has changed. We had a great time despite all the rain and humidity, especially since our lovely husbands surprised us with a day at the spa while they toured the war museum. There was a lot of good food and great company and I have to say the best part was the swamp tour full of gators and wild hogs.

In November we welcomed our first nephew, JT, and shortly after my Godson, Eli, was born on Black Friday. As we drove around getting all the good deals, I anxiously awaited more news via mass texts from Boston. It was so nice and refreshing to welcome some boys into our family considering we already had 3 nieces.

We went down to NC in December for Eli’s baptism, which was our second big trip together. It was also a celebration for my husband’s big promotion at work – Category Manager. He had been working so hard for a year and a half to get here, which is exactly why we moved down to IL in the first place. To say I was proud would be an understatement!

January brought amazing news – IVF coverage! Finally, we were offered up amazing insurance benefits which was a dream come true. We waited a few months to go back to the doctor’s office and fully started the process in March with all the initial blood work. Then in April I came back and to my dismay we had to do more tests. For being such a top office, they sure did a terrible job of communicating exact procedures and timelines.

We went back in the middle of May and got my meds ordered along with going over a timeline of the process. It wasn’t until that afternoon when I got a call from my doctor that I was a bit concerned. They now wanted me to do more CF carrier tests because the one I did in 2010 was only a 32 panel and they have a more comprehensive 97 panel. I was furious that they could toy with my emotions when they’ve had all my tests since January of 2011. You can’t possibly imagine the emotional stress preparing for this life changing event to just have it taken away so quickly.

To make matters even more stressful, we fell in love with a home back near my hometown in WI, put in an offer and got it! We picked a closing day of June 7th and were contemplating having to switch that when they initially told us of our IVF schedule. I’m thankful now that we didn’t go through with it because the moving process was stressful enough.

Fast forward one week and we welcomed our fourth niece, beautiful little Sydnee Mae, into our family. We went to visit her a few hours after she was born, after waiting for a big storm to blow through. When walking in, big sister Kenadee was holding her, saw me and said, “Kiki, this is my baby!” They are too cute for words.

It’s been a few weeks and we absolutely love our house and being close to friends and family. I have to sadly admit that we’ve had plenty of issues with our house that I’m still sorting through, but overall being back in the state I love with the people I love is priceless.

Furthermore, as we are pretty much settled in our home and life, I started my stimulation shots yesterday, July 19. The first morning shot, 75 IU of Menopur, stung going in but I was so thankful my mom came to help me. The night shot, 150 IU of Follistim, was just like my husband’s insulin pen so it was a piece of cake and I had him give me the shot just to be safe. This morning I went ahead and took care of the shot myself – it wasn’t too bad!

I can only hope and pray everything goes as planned and in a few months we will be parents! I would be overjoyed with just one baby, blessed with two and God sure would be funny giving us triplets. I’d have to ‘blame’ my husband and mother- in-law who actually is a natural triplet, because he keeps having dreams and she just feels it will happen! Imagine that! :0)

Until then, breathe easy my friends. I’ll try not to be so infrequent with updates!