My Biggest Fear

Friday night my Mom, sister and I had a girls night in and watched Bad Moms. It was a ton of fun. Afterwards we started talking and one of the questions that came up was what our biggest fear is. I named "getting my foot stuck in a stirrup if I'm thrown from a horse" and "being attacked." Although those are fears of mine they are not my biggest fear.

 My biggest fear right now? It's not being able to get pregnant and carry to term. Not only does PCOS make ovulating harder it also increases your chances for a miscarriage. So I'm scared.

I'm scared that Mike and I will spend 3 years shaping our lives around getting pregnant for it to not happen.

I'm scared that we will get pregnant and we'll have to go through a miscarriage.

I'm afraid that I'll never be called "Mama."

I'm afraid that I'll never get the chance to decorate the nursery I want. (Theme: Baby Farm Animals btw)

I'm afraid that I'll wake up one day and realize we've run out of options.

I'm scared that Mike will be disappointed in me as a wife that I couldn't make him a father.

I'm scared that I will have to go through life not knowing what it feels like to carry a child, or hold their tiny hand, or look into their sweet face and see my husband staring back at me.

I'm afraid that I'll get so lost in this journey that I forget to love and appreciate the wonderful things in my life.

I'm afraid that I won't be able to see my Mom play with my child.

I'm afraid I won't get a chance to teach my child how to ride a horse or to see Mike teach them how to fish.

I'm afraid I will grow more and more bitter as the loved ones around me seem to have children so easily.

I'm scared that the letters I've written to my children over the years (yes, years) won't be read.

I'm scared that I won't be able to pass down the beautiful bouquet from our wedding.

That I won't get to see our child grow up and change their little corner of the world.

I'm afraid I will never have the child I have prayed and longed for.

The thing of it is. I have not been on this journey long. A year. For so many women that is a drop in the bucket in comparison to the years they have struggled to conceive. My heart aches for the women and couples in this situation in a way that I never imagined. I read blog after blog about couples trying to conceive, one currently 10 weeks along with twins, another recently going through a miscarriage, another still fighting to conceive after 4 years of trying and I can't help but cry for all of them. Tears of sadness and joy as I read their entries, mirroring so many of my own thoughts, feelings, and hopes....and fears.

This has been where my head is at the last few days. I'm working on getting back into a more positive headspace since that is what this journey needs. You have to remain positive as much as humanly possible. The what ifs, the fears, the uncertainties, the unanswered questions, the BFNs, and everything in between can drag you down so fast if you let it. But that's what this blog is for. I'm not here to sugarcoat it. I'm here to share my thoughts as we wait for our Mini Bays. Now that it's in the open, written down, acknowledged. I can move forward. These fears will always linger but I refuse to dwell on them any longer. Here's to being afraid and saddling up anyway. 😏

Let's Answer Some Questions

I'm sure most of you are friends on my FB seeing what allllll the commotion is about. So here goes nothing.

On October 27th I was diagnosed with PCOS. What is PCOS? Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. It is the most common hormone disorder that causes problems with ovulation, roughly 1 in every 10 women deal with PCOS. Symptoms range from anxiety, depression, unwanted hair growth, acne, weight gain, mood swings, fatigue, irregular periods, infertility and cysts on your ovaries. One doesn't necessarily have to display all of these symptoms. For me it was anxiety, weight gain, fatigue, random chin hairs, irregular periods, infertility and on top of it I have over 20 ovarian cysts. The typical "string of pearls" the cysts are often called surrounding my ovaries. 

Mike and I have been trying to get pregnant for well over a year and haven't been preventing pregnancy for about two years. At the end of September I was so emotionally exhausted from trying to get pregnant that I was leaning heavily towards just not having kids. Going on birth control and just sticking my head in the sand. I was tired of wondering each month if this was going to be our month or if we were going to have another BFN (big fat negative.) I was tired of being asked when we were going to have kids when I wasn't sure if we could at all. I was tired of getting on FB and seeing another pregnancy announcement and wondering if it was ever going to be us. I felt so bad when I saw Mike's face fall when I told him my period started. I just didn't want to do it anymore. 

Luckily my Mom is amazing and knew that if I just gave up and didn't get any answers that I would regret it. So I made an appointment. I had my third pelvic ultrasound (where they stick a camera into you to see your uterus and ovaries....yep super fun), blood work, and then my follow up. Before the follow up appointment my Mom and I were pretty confident I had PCOS but to hear the official diagnosis was hard. 

The thing with PCOS is that it causes weight gain because it causes insulin resistance. What's the best way to combat PCOS? Lifestyle change. Healthier nutrition and exercise. So PCOS=weight gain. Weight loss=less PCOS symptoms. Seriously?! Why don't you just add that it sucks all the energy out of you too? Oh wait. It does. 

So that's what has been going on. I thought about dealing with this and keeping it in our home and with our close friends and family. But you're talking 1 in every 10 women have to go through this. So I'm sure there are women on my FB that may be facing this very thing. Who may feel just as lost, broken, and angry as I sometimes feel and I want you to know you are not alone. 

I also want to be able to share this journey with you. We're trying to start a family. The most exciting, miraculous, amazing blessing that can happen to a family and we're still not sure if it will happen for us. That's a scary reality. It's hard every month to wonder if this will be it. To go through the exhausting, nerve wracking tww (two week wait), to face another BFN, only to push all of those insecurities, anger, and sadness away to try again in 10-12 days. To take my temperature before I even get out of bed in the morning, to quit drinking coffee, to track my cycles, to make sure I remember my prenatal and Metformin pills in the morning, my Metformin pill at night, to get a workout in no matter how tired I am, to say no to bread and chocolate ice cream, to drive my husband crazy because I'm sitting on the bed bawling my eyes out, to go between pinning pregnancy announcements in the hopes of it being us, to pinning the feelings of dealing with PCOS, and to deal with all of the above alone just seemed too much. So I decided to share our journey.

This blog will not be all doom and gloom I promise!! Most days I am very positive in this journey. Mike has been amazing and has dealt with my mood swings and the side effects of the Metformin so well. I haven't gotten the best start in the lifestyle change in the last week, except for quitting coffee, but that gets started next week. So I'm planning on sharing our favorite recipes, the funny happenings around The Zoo, and other topics that strike my fancy. Hope you join us on our Adventure to our Miracle.