Why I'm sharing my fertility story
This is the first time I've ever talked about my fertility journey publicly. Telling this story was actually a family decision. The reason? It's personal.
I made an agreement with my husband that I would only share this story once I got pregnant, had a successful pregnancy, had a healthy baby and got to a point where I could find the time to write again. So, today is really a day to celebrate because all of those things finally happened. Our reason for waiting is that sharing something personal can bring unneeded stress.
After three years we have overcome fertility struggles and not only had one child, we are parents to healthy twin girls. When I was going through my own struggles I would sit there late at night and hit up Google to find other women's fertility stories, searching for any tidbit of information that could help me.
I am chronicling my fertility journey to pay it forward, sharing the moves I made that ultimately helped me to finally get pregnant with twins. I hope it helps you or someone you love.
How it all started
It was always my dream to have a family and I got married a little later in life. I was 35 when my husband and I tied the knot and we started trying pretty much right after. 10 months later when we hadn't had any positive pregnancy tests, I learned a close friend of mine had gotten pregnant with some fertility help. I didn't have any known health issues, but I thought it would be a good idea to get my fertility health checked out due to my age. My husband and I chose the fertility clinic in town that took my company insurance and we had a consultation that included some routine tests. At the time, I wasn't worried. I had never had a health issue in my life and I was expecting everything to be fine. Later, we got a call with unexpected news.
The representative of the fertility clinic told me I had low AMH which meant low egg count. I still wasn't very concerned, especially because preliminary tests showed my tubes were open and overall everything looked fine. But the woman on the other line seemed concerned. She told me that my fertile days were numbered. She said weeks and months mattered and that the doctor strongly encouraged me to undergo IVF.
IVF right out the gate? To me, that seemed extreme. I thought we would start small with timed ovulation or a less invasive procedure. My gut told me beginning with IVF was not the right move and I pushed back. I should mention, I'm a journalist and I always question everything. At the time I started treatment I was working for the local CBS news station as an evening news anchor and political reporter at the New York State Capitol. I firmly told the woman I did not want to start with IVF but she pushed back just as hard. She told me if I did not do IVF now, I may never had children. My diagnosis, “unexplained infertility.”
When my husband and I got off the phone, I cried.
A place you never want to return to
When you are going through fertility treatment, there are things people say that stick with you. I was on the way to one of my first fertility appointments talking to one of my best friends on the phone when she said, "Ugh that's a place you never want to go back to."
It was the first time I realized I might be stuck going to these appointments for a while, and that thought filled me with dread. It was so incredibly unexpected. I always thought getting pregnant would be easy for me. For a lot of my life the thought of getting pregnant was a scary, stressful thought. Now, here I was scared and stressed that maybe pregnancy would not be in the cards for me at all. How sad.
The girl boss lie
I started googling articles about IVF and read stories about women who went through fertility treatment for years. It took one woman 6 years to get pregnant after several egg retrievals and transfers between two fertility clinics. Reading these articles made me realize that this journey could be a lot longer than I'd ever imagined. I had been tricked by a society that tells us you can simply freeze your eggs and whamo! You're pregnant. I started calling it "the girl boss lie." That's the idea that you can put off having kids until your 40s to go be a CEO and then magically get pregnant with your frozen eggs. Does it work for some people? Yes. But for many others that idea is a fantasy.
Fertility journeys are a long, grueling, confusing, expensive process. It's not the easy thing I remember reading about in magazines in my twenties. My fertility journey would not only be long, it would reveal that not all fertility clinics are the same and not all fertility doctors can be trusted. It would result in me leaving my career, changing the way I eat and exercise and overhauling a life I thought was healthy. It would also reveal that our government does not support women going through fertility treatment nearly enough.
My first big scare at my first appointment
When I was pushing back against the woman who told me I needed IVF, I had explained I wanted to do a less invasive treatment called IUI.
A quick lesson on the difference between IUI and IVF for those who don't know.
IUI stands for Intra Uterine Insemination. During IUI, what typically happens is a doctor prescribes you medication to help mature your eggs. After about a week, a catheter is used to place sperm in the uterus at the time of ovulation (ovulation is when the egg is released into the fallopian tube).
IVF stands for In Vitro Fertilization. During this more invasive treatment, eggs are surgically removed and combined with sperm outside of the body to create embryos. The embryos are then transferred into the uterus to hopefully implant and result in pregnancy.
IUI is a very quick procedure, as opposed to IVF which requires surgery. IUI doesn't require anesthesia, where IVF does. IUI takes only minutes and you walk away pain free. You can return to work the next day. IVF can require days off of work and bedrest. IUI costs hundreds of dollars, IVF costs thousands.
When you compare the two you can see why a fertility clinic might push you toward IVF. The more invasive procedure brings in a lot more money for the clinic. One has to hope doctors are working in good faith. That's what I was hoping when I was continually pushed into IVF by the fertility clinic despite making it clear I wasn't interested. Their constant statements about my low egg count and time running out got to both me and my husband. So despite my apprehension about IVF, there I was at my first IVF appointment.
This appointment was memorable because it ended with me in tears. The ultrasound tech, who seemed very inexperienced, saw something on the ultrasound that concerned her and left the room frazzled to get another nurse. I was so alarmed, I started crying. "What if it's cancer?," I thought. I was so scared.
It turned out, I had ovarian cysts. The concerning part was I had more cysts than eggs. Something like one egg and two cysts. It was nothing to cry about, but it meant that I may not be able to do IVF. It also confirmed that my body was not making a lot of eggs.
The IVF plan I was on ended up getting canceled because the drugs that I would need to take to help grow the eggs could potentially make the cysts get bigger, and if the cysts got bigger it could cause complications that could lead to surgery to remove the cysts.
For several weeks I took medication to get rid of the cysts and when the cysts resolved, I was prescribed medication which included pills and shots to try and mature my eggs for a potential egg retrieval procedure for the IVF process. The medication cost around $2,000 out of pocket.
When it came time for a follow-up ultrasound to check and see if any eggs grew mature enough for an egg retrieval, there was bad news. I only had two follicles that could be carrying eggs which was not enough to make sense for IVF egg retrieval. The nurse wasn't even sure both follicles were healthy. One she said could have been a cyst. In the end, she suggested doing IUI, the procedure I had been pushing for from the beginning.
This was one of the first red flags I experienced at the fertility clinic. Up until this point, all of the medical professionals had ignored me when I said I didn't want to start my journey with IVF and had continued pushing it. Now, I was doing the procedure I wanted in the first place, but not because I asked for it, only because their IVF plan for me had failed.
With IUI it's better to have fewer follicles (follicles hold the eggs) because you can end up with multiples. This clinic would not allow you to undergo IUI if you had more than four follicles. At the same time, the clinic would not let you undergo retrieval surgery for IVF unless you had at least 6 follicles. Common sense would tell you IUI would make more sense in my situation with low egg count since you can’t do that procedure unless you have four eggs or less, but up until this point they’d been pushing me into IVF.
Over the next several months I underwent two IUI procedures that failed and had one scheduled IUI procedure canceled became of a cyst reoccurrence.
Then in the winter a blood test would change my life as I knew it.
Doctors orders: "You should stop working"
In January 2023, after seven months of unsuccessful fertility treatment, I got a concerning call from a nurse. I just had my blood taken and the results weren’t good. The nurse said one of my hormones was elevated to an extremely concerning level that could mean I was going into perimenopause. I searched for information on that particular hormone online and found that a spike in the hormone could also be a symptom of brain cancer. I was panicking. The nurse said they were elevating my case to the top doctor at the hospital. He was one of the clinics founding doctors located in Syracuse and I would have to meet with him virtually.
When I met with him virtually the next day he asked me a series of questions about my stress levels and lifestyle. I explained that my work had been extremely stressful. I had been reporting on New York Governor Andrew Cuomo for the past few years during the Covid pandemic. I closely followed Cuomo's resignation from office amid accusations of sexual harassment and the transition of his replacement Kathy Hochul. Covid combined with newsroom stressors and a heavy workload had me extremely burned out. There were months where I worked seven days a week to keep up with the news cycle and plenty of 12-hour days. I felt like a hamster that couldn't get off the hamster wheel and I was totally fried. I was always very passionate about my job, I had worked at this news station for almost 8 years, but right now I was pretty miserable.
After hearing all of this the doctor gave me some pretty extreme advice. He told me he suggested taking a leave of absence from work, but he also said if my job was that stressful I should leave my career altogether. He said the stress could be leading to my fertility issues and hormone irregularities.
The doctor also put me on a diet. I always had thought my diet was pretty healthy. As a news person I was always watching what I ate and exercising. The doctor told me I had it all wrong. I told him I had always tried to eat in moderation, but he said moderation isn't good. He said the Carnivore diet would be ideal, but instead he put me on a strict Keto diet consisting of mostly meat and whole dairy products. Steak, eggs, hard cheese and whole milk products were encouraged while vegetables and fruit were strongly discouraged. The thought was vegetables and fruit cause inflammation and even organic vegetables have pesticides and toxic qualities. The doctor pointed to new research that says most vegetables have natural toxins that are released as defense mechanisms which can be bad for fertility, more evidence he said vegetables are not good for you. Sugar in fruit he said also causes inflammation that could be bad for fertility. He warned me of processed foods, sugar and bad oils like sunflower oil, vegetable oil and soybean oil. He also warned against fake milks like soy milk, almond milk and oat milk, telling me these are some of the most processed things you can eat. Steak he said is one of the best things for you and gives you the energy and nutrients you need to get pregnant.
In terms of my plan for getting pregnant, the doctor doubled down on the thought that I needed IVF treatment. I asked why he wasn't suggesting IUI and he told me that he thought IUI wouldn't work. IUI was roughly $800 per procedure not including the roughly $2,000 in medications for each try. IVF costs thousands for each egg retrieval and then hundreds for each embryo transfer, plus an annual fee to store frozen eggs. IVF was much more expensive, but the doctor told me he didn't expect IUI to work and said it could cost more in the long run if I underwent many failed IUIs and then had to move on to IVF anyway.
A few of the things the doctor said were red flags but I was trying to be open-minded. He said that in the past that other patients' husbands had called to yell at him over some of his recommendations. He expected me to push back on the diet recommendations, but I didn't. I was used to going on diets having worked in television for almost 20 years and I was willing to try anything to fix my hormone situation.
The doctor also talked about his Christian faith on the call. I am Christian so this didn't bother me, but I remember thinking it was bold of him to bring religion into the conversation considering I could have been any religion or even atheist. I could see how this guy could be offensive to people.
At the end of the phone call we settled on a plan that I would take a leave of absence from work, start the Keto diet, take medications to further eliminate the cysts and then start medication for IVF egg retrieval after at least 30 days.
The next day I informed my company's HR I would be taking a leave of absence and filled out paperwork for paid family leave and for our company's paid leave through our private insurance provider. I was qualified for unpaid leave, but I would have to apply, wait and see if I could receive paid leave. Because I was a public figure in Albany, my leave of absence was even covered in the local newspaper.
Ironically, the same week I had this meeting with the doctor I was contacted by NBC News about a job I had applied for. I had been interviewing for jobs at the national network level for more than a year and I had already been through several rounds of interviews with NBC. I had been a finalist for a different job that I ultimately didn't get and had randomly checked back in this past week. To my surprise, I almost immediately got an email back about a new correspondent opening. The executive producer wanted to meet the following Tuesday. That Tuesday ended up being my first day of leave from work.
I took the interview with NBC News and the executive producer essentially said I had the job. She was honest, telling me this was the toughest job they had. It was a breaking news correspondent job and I would be traveling non-stop. Four weeks of travel at a time. The old me would have jumped at any opportunity to get my foot in the door with NBC News. It was my dream to eventually work for Dateline NBC and to be a network anchor. But this entire experience had changed me. I teared up on the Zoom call telling her, I want to take this job but I can't. I told her that I was newly married and that we were trying to have kids. I had to choose my family over my career. The woman couldn't have been nicer. She told me she herself was struggling with work/life balance and she completely understood. I got off the call feeling embarrassed for tearing up but at peace with my decision. I knew it was the right thing. Now I could focus on my health and having a baby, which mattered to me more than anything, even my dream job.
A controversial IVF egg retrieval
After 30 days of "priming" which is the term for the process I was going through to get rid of the cysts and prep my body for IVF egg retrieval, I had a good ultrasound. My cysts were gone, but I only had three mature follicles. Three follicles was a good number for IUI, but not good for IVF, since you want to retrieve as many eggs as possible during an IVF egg retrieval surgery.
I had another meeting with the doctor to go over these results. He decided he would approve me for egg retrieval even though I had less than the six follicles that was baseline for green lighting the egg retrieval procedure. He said we needed to be aggressive. He thought it might be my only chance to get pregnant.
Doing the math, the thought of this was scary. First of all, not all follicles have eggs inside of them, so it was possible we could end up with zero eggs after surgery despite me having three follicles. Second, the retrieved eggs have to be mature enough to withstand the process of combining them with sperm to create embryos outside the body. And third, there was a chance the embryos may not be strong enough to be approved for transfer. The egg retrieval process also requires general anesthesia.
The doctor remained convinced this is the path I should take so my husband and I went forward with it.
I cried on the way to my scheduled egg retrieval appointment. The thought of something going wrong with the anesthesia scared me. The thought of surgery on my ovaries was scary. What if it doesn't work? All of these things were weighing on me. My husband held my hand on the way to the appointment and the doctor and nurses eased my worries before I went under. The doctor performing the surgery was different than the doctor who did the consultation. They successfully retrieved three eggs. Two out of three eggs survived getting injected with sperm and became embryos. Because I had so few embryos the clinic didn't wait the recommended number of days before freezing them.
On a follow-up call the doctor from Syracuse recommended doing another egg retrieval. He said I would be a good candidate for a type of retrieval that can be performed almost immediately after the first. It made sense because I would be able to use some of the leftover fertility drugs from the first process and the doctor explained my body might respond better the second time. The idea was maybe now my body would "know what to do."
The second retrieval produced only two eggs which resulted in one embryo healthy enough for transfer.
At this point I had embryos ready for transfer. It was go time.
Months of waiting for pregnancy tests
Over each of the next three months I had a single embryo transferred into my uterus.
I was filled with so much hope. During this entire time I had been keeping strong faith. I truly believed I could have a baby and that I was meant to be a mother.
But month after month, transfer after transfer, each pregnancy test came back NEGATIVE.
The worst part about this entire process is the anticipation of the pregnancy test result. You wait and you wait and you wait. You try not to get your hopes up, you try to stay positive. Getting a negative result is so hard on your mind. "It's ok," you tell yourself. "It'll happen when it's meant to. But oh gosh, what if it doesn't happen? What if I'm not meant to be a mother? What if, what if, what if?" Then you tell yourself, "No. Keep going."
The third negative test during my IVF treatment was the worst.
Now I was out of embryos. Back to square one.
Now what?
The plus side of low egg count
Something a lot of people don't realize about fertility clinics, you can't move your frozen embryos to a different clinic. That means if you have say 12 embryos, you have to do 12 transfers at said clinic or you have to forego them. You have to pay for embryo storage, so if you decide to switch clinics and leave your embryos, you must continue to pay to store them, or you face the ethical challenge of destroying them or donating them. This is also an issue people face with IVF if they have a successful pregnancy early on and still have a lot of leftover embryos that they don’t plan to use.
It was the only positive thing about not having a lot of eggs, now we could move on and get a second opinion with nothing holding us back. If we wanted to try treatment elsewhere, this was our chance, and we took it.
We had heard great things about the other clinic in town, Boston IVF (BIVF), but we hadn't chosen it because they didn't take our insurance. We decided to make the switch to BIVF anyway. This meant our care would be totally out of pocket. Now, the ultrasounds which used to be covered would be several hundred dollars a pop. It would be expensive because multiple ultrasounds are necessary for most fertility procedures.
Another thing, both fertility clinics charged $400-$500 just for a consultation and getting an appointment could take a month or two. We might have chosen Boston IVF from the beginning, but we had already paid for a consultation at the first clinic, so we got roped in since we already had money and time invested.
Now, we were regretting that we didn't just pay for multiple consultations from the beginning, because at this point some things about our experience at the first clinic just were not sitting right. My husband and I felt like we wasted our time and money and I felt like I put my body through a lot unnecessarily. Those sentiments would only get worse.
Did I get scammed at the first clinic?
To add insult to injury, my husband and I got a bill for $10,000 in the mail from the first fertility clinic.
Wow. We were in debt for treatments that didn't even work, AND we had insurance.
The bill was a surprise because of the wacky way the clinic and the insurance company cranked out our statements.
The amount we owed kept going up every month and the billing statement was like trying to read another language.
I would call the clinic for answers, but I couldn't get through to anyone to explain the bill. After months of not getting through to anyone, I texted the doctor and he texted me back telling me to just pay whatever I could to avoid a late fee and said they were short staffed in the billing department. WHAT THE HELL?
After a few months someone finally called to explain the bill, stating she couldn't tell me how much insurance was going to bill me, but she could tell more bills were coming. She explained that the insurance company billed us per procedure and there was a lag so they were still processing procedures from months ago. It was unclear when exactly the bills would stop coming but she said it would likely be soon. Ummmm, ok?
Thankfully my husband and I could afford to make payments on this and wouldn't be paying late fees, but anyone could see how this billing process could absolutely tank a family financially. Even though we could pay the amount owed, we were still really stressed because no one could really tell us how much we owed or how much we would have to pay in full.
The financial woes of the first clinic were only one element that made this entire operation feel scammy.
When I looked back there were a plethora of things I didn't like about my experience at the first clinic:
1.) This clinic made me feel like cattle. There were SO many patients because they took insurance and labeled themselves as inexpensive. In the end, it wasn't really that inexpensive and the care was not that great.
2.) They had pushed me into IVF when I had made it clear I didn't want to start with the most aggressive process.
3.) The clinic took forever to process my leave forms and the doctor didn't clearly state why he thought I should go on leave on paper. I ended up getting paid leave through the state, but not through my company's private insurance.
4.) The aggressive plan they made for me against my wishes had FAILED.
A major career decision
Before transferring my third embryo I made a life changing decision, after 18 years in the business, I quit my news career.
I recorded a video announcing my decision and it made headlines in the local newspapers.
It was a big deal for my community because I had been a main face on the local TV news for 8 years and in recent years had made a name for myself covering politics. It was a bigger deal for me because the choice meant leaving behind my entire identity. I had never planned to leave the news business and I loved anchoring and reporting.
I called to tell the general manager I wouldn’t be returning to work in June 2023. I could barely utter the words without crying. The news team was like family to me. I had even purchased a home within walking distance of the news channel to be close to work. I was used to getting up every day, working out, getting hair and makeup ready for TV, making calls and doing interviews for the day’s story and anchoring three newscasts.
I had moved from Arizona, to Oregon, to Tennessee and finally to New York all for different news jobs. I was interviewing at the network level prepping to make my next move which would be the pinnacle of my career at the national news level. In some ways quitting now seemed insane, especially because the fertility treatments hadn’t worked, but I decided to quit anyways.
Why I quit
After taking about four months off, I felt so much better. I didn’t even realize how much the stress of my job had been affecting my body until I took a break. It took months until I stopped clenching my jaw at night from stress. I was grinding me teeth so hard I had migraines when I would wake up in the morning. I wouldn't have quit if it was just one thing that was bothering me.
Bosses can change, circumstances can change, but the thing that wouldn't change is the hours and the workload. I didn't want my future to include 12-hour days and no time with my kids. I needed to make some changes in order to make space for kids in my future. Leaving my job was the first step. It was one of the hardest decisions I've ever made. At this point in my life my career was everything I worked for and here I was just walking away, but hopefully this would lead to something better. All I had was my faith and hope it would work out and I was making the best decision for my health.
Scary.
A break from fertility treatment
After the last IVF transfer failed, I couldn't get into Boston IVF for a few months so I had to take a break. It was needed and I took full advantage. I took a trip to the West Coast for a friend's bachelorette party in West Hollywood and visited with a best friend in Orange County. I also spent time with my aunt, uncle and cousins who also live in Los Angeles. I drank alcohol for the first time in months and just had fun. My last transfer was in July and I couldn't get a consultation with Boston IVF until October so I had a while to wait.
News that made my jaw drop
I told you I noticed some red flags at the first fertility clinic, but I wasn't sure if I was just bitter about the process not working. That was until we had our consultation at the new clinic, Boston IVF.
The new doctor was a breath of fresh air.
First off, I was meeting the doctor that would be my doctor through my entire experience. At the last clinic, there was a team of doctors and you never knew who you were going to get. Also, all of the doctors at the last clinic were male. At this clinic it was all women.
My female doctor had reviewed all of my paperwork from the last clinic and started off with some concerning info.
First off, the doc told me the last clinic failed to follow standard of care with my IVF process:
-She said she never would have recommended IVF for me because of my low egg count.
-She said she never would have green lighted IVF egg retrieval because I didn't have enough eggs.
-She said my embryos were not up to standard and that she never would have allowed them to be transferred into my uterus.
And the worst part, she said that under the standard of care for IVF only a total of three egg retrievals are recommended because more than three surgeries can damage your ovaries.
I had already undergone two egg retrievals, meaning I only had one more shot at retrieving eggs if we went that route.
After looking at all of my old charts, the new doctor had come up with a theory about my fertility issue. Remember I had been diagnosed with "unexplained infertility" meaning the last clinic had never determined why I wasn't able to get pregnant.
This new doctor believed my issue was that I was ovulating before my eggs were getting mature enough to fertilize.
She said we could go two routes. She could refer me to an expert in New York City that specializes in mini-IVF, a process where you are given micro-doses of medication to grow more eggs in hopes of a successful egg retrieval, but I'd only have one chance since I blew my first two at the first clinic.
Or there was option 2, get treated at home in Albany at Boston IVF and get medication to pause ovulation along with micro doses of fertility medication to mature the eggs in hopes of undergoing a successful IUI procedure.
IUI was the procedure my gut told me was right from the beginning. This was a no-brainer. We went with option 2.
A clean slate at a new fertility clinic
A lot of people have gotten mad for me when I tell them about what happened at the first fertility clinic.
Are you going to try and sue them? That's a common question I get asked.
The answer is no.
Do I think the first clinic pushed me into IVF to make money? Yes.
However my husband and I decided getting into a legal battle about our bad experience wasn't going to help matters.
Stress is not good for fertility.
The other reason I wouldn't sue them is because I did take away some positive things from the first clinic. I believe the diet and healthy lifestyle changes may have helped me. And while the advice to leave my job was probably extreme, I actually think this doctor was placed in my life to move me into a different direction I probably never would have taken on my own. This was a doctor telling me to make a change or you might not have kids. That's pretty powerful and I think he was right.
What I can do about the bad medical plan I was given is to tell my story and warn others that they might get pushed into expensive procedures they may not need. I can remind people that while fertility clinics do help people, they are still businesses that are trying to make a profit. I can encourage people to get second opinions and to say no when their gut is telling them the medical advice they are being given isn't right. And I can tell my story to try and make healthcare better and to bring attention to the things government can do to support women going through these journeys. Those are the paths I would rather take.
The best news ever and signs from above
It still didn't happen right away at the second fertility clinic.
I had the first IUI procedure in November after I attended my friend's wedding in Arizona.
The first pregnancy test was negative.
I had my next IUI procedure right before Christmas. After you have the IUI procedure (which is pretty much painless and lasts about 5 minutes) the nurse schedules your pregnancy test for about two weeks later. It's the minimum amount of days you have to wait before a blood test. The date they scheduled me for was my birthday, January 4th,2024.
"Yikes. I'm not sure I want the test on my birthday in case it's negative," I said.
But then I changed my mind.
"Wait, never mind. My birthday is lucky and if it's bad news at least I can have champagne!" I told her.
My husband had proposed on my birthday January 4th, 2020, so I was hoping I'd have more birthday luck. On New Year's Eve my husband and I celebrated with best friends and went around the room declaring what we wanted in the New Year.
"I want to be a mom!," I said. We all cheered.
Four days later on my birthday, my dream would come true.
I didn't tell anyone I was going to have the pregnancy test. My mom and my husband thought I got up early to go to Orange Theory Fitness.
I had to wait a few hours to get the test results.
By then, my mom and I were celebrating my birthday at Spa Mirabeau in Albany.
I got the call in the locker room. When I answered the phone, my mom knew something was up by the smile on my face.
She said she'd never seen my smile like that before.
It was the best birthday gift of my life. A positive pregnancy test exactly four years after my husband and I got engaged to be married. I believe in signs and I know this was a gift from God.
But there was more, the nurse said, oh and your HCG levels are very high, which indicates a very healthy pregnancy.
Upon Googling, I learned HCG was also a sign of something else. An early indicator of twins.
How we were almost certain it was twins
My poor mom had to go through spa day not knowing what my big smile was for, but I finally spilled the beans when I stopped at Orange Theory Fitness to pick something up for my husband.
My husband and I both workout at OTF and for months I had been eyeing a man bag that had the words "Dad Stuff" stitched on the front. It was leftover gear from Father's Day. I went to buy the bag to put a positive pregnancy test inside to surprise him.
When I brought the bag into the car, I showed my mom what I had bought for my husband Chris and she burst into tears of happiness.
When I told her about my HCG levels she immediately declared, I bet you're having twins!
She said I had too many pregnancy symptoms too early for it NOT to be twins.
Later that evening, on the way to my birthday dinner I told my husband I had free merch from OTF, and gave him the dad bag.
He did not believe me, until he saw the positive pregnancy test inside the bag.
I told him about the thought it could be twins and he did not believe me. He was just trying to digest that I was finally pregnant after our long journey.
We sat through my birthday dinner happy as clams with our little secret.
The ultrasound that changed our lives
At 7 weeks pregnant you have your first ultrasound.
My husband was so convinced it wasn't twins, that he convinced me it wasn't twins.
But he said he knew I was right when he saw the ultrasound tech's face.
I wasn't looking at her, but apparently she had a shocked look the second the image popped up on the screen.
She turned it around for me to see and the tears cam. Sure enough, there were two little sacs on the screen indicating we were indeed pregnant with two.
More happy tears.
My message to anyone going through this
Everyone's journey is different. Hearing about other people's journeys can either be helpful or triggering.
We all have different types of hard in our journeys.
Some people suffer miscarriages, others go years before getting a positive test. There are many different health problems and scenarios.
My only advice is to keep the faith, don't lose hope and keep praying.
The month before I got pregnant I remember coming to the realization that maybe I was not meant to be a mother and that that was ok. God knows what is best for my life. I asked that He help me find my purpose and that He would lead me down the right path. I let go of control and I accepted whatever outcome was before me. I have no idea if this was the lesson I was supposed to learn, but it was as if I came to a certain peace the month before I got pregnant.
Prayer helped me in my despair of not knowing. It helped me stay faithful and I believe ultimately God answered our prayers and blessed us with our babies at the exact time it was meant to happen.
I love you and I am here for you with any questions as you live your journey.
