I know that typically Aerika writes the blog, but we decided we wanted to write one together. We hope that this might bring hope to those that are going through their own struggles and so that Lizzi will know by much faith that she was brought into this world and can see of our testimonies of Jesus Christ and the gospel. Aerika and I were married on March 4, 2011 and were so eager to start our lives together. It didn't take long after we were married that Aerika started having this incurable hunger, the baby hunger. I'm sure this is typically among most newly weds. I just kept trying to put her off and explain to her that we couldn't afford a baby, we didn't have a car that could transport a baby. So I would come up with excuse after excuse to try and put off this hunger.
Aerika began having dreams about babies, which those of you that know her family it is a common thing to dream about things to come. At first secretly, I was having my own struggle. Growing up, I always wanted to be a dad, and could not wait for that experience, but for some reason I was struggling. I all the sudden felt as if I wasn't ready for that, I questioned if I wanted to be a dad, and tried to understand all my struggles. I still never really came to a conclusion.
We had talked before we got married that we would wait till I was done with school or close to being finished before we had a baby. She kept persisting, and it continued, she began to feel like she was being lead that we needed to have a baby. We talked a lot and expressed my concerns which we talked about a lot. We finally came to the conclusion that we needed to have a fast and attend the temple together. This was a huge leap of faith for me to even want to receive that answer. We picked a day to fast and decided we would attend the temple to end our fast.
We went to the Logan temple and attended a sealing session. As we both sought for answers through prayer and pondering, we both received an answer. It was an experience I will never forget. Aerika, shared a birthday with her aunt that passed away when she was young. She has always felt her presence in her life, and especially when we have attended the temple. This time was no exception. She felt her again. She had received her answer, and prayed that I might feel something. I am not one that has ever felt the impression of those from the other side, but today was something different. I felt as though her aunt was there with me giving me my answer. After we left the temple we discussed are experience and shared what we had felt with one another. We needed to have a BABY!
This is where the true test of faith came for me, stopping birth control. I still didn't feel at peace with my concerns and was struggling a lot. I knew that Heavenly Father wouldn't give us more than we could handle, and tried to keep my faith in him. I often prayed for comfort and understanding to help me through this trial. Little did we know, this would be the beginning of our trial.
We thought that we would just start trying and pregnancy would just naturally happen. Things didn't just happen this easy.
Aerika-
So I knew that I might potentially have a problem getting pregnant right away. I have had irregular periods since I started puberty, I would sometimes go months without having one. When I first started I just thought that it was my body getting used to this new system; that after it realized "oh I am supposed to do this", they would be just like clockwork like most women are.
They never became regular.
I had friends tell me that they thought it was because I was so physically active with my dancing that the physical strain was stopping my body from functioning the way it was supposed to. I was at a doctor's once for an unrelated visit with my mom and we thought we would just ask their opinion if it was something to worry about. First mistake we didn't ask a specialist on the subject we were with a regular practitioner who I don't think had any idea anyway. We asked anyway and he said well if it doesn't bother you I wouldn't worry about it, I know my daughters would love to have that problem. No it didn't bother me I rarely had to worry about cramps, or being moody, or worry about changing feminine products throughout the day. At the time I was in high school so I wasn't thinking about the possibility of it causing issues with pregnancy or my ability to become a mother. So I just kept on going and didn't let it bother me.
When I went in for my physical before our wedding I told them about my irregularity and asked if that was something to worry about. Because now it was potentially a problem for me as I was getting married and obviously we would want to start our family at some point. The OB/GYN told me that for some women once they get on birth control and their body is forced to work correctly it will just right itself and they never have a problem. This put me at ease since I figured I would be on birth control for at least 3 years, or close to, so Curtis could finish school before we were going to try to have a baby. I figured by the time we would start trying my body would be fine and working normally and we could start our family right away.
This was not the case.
Yes my body was regular while on birth control I ran like clock work for the first time in my life. As you read above we got the impression to start our family earlier than we thought that we would. We were married in March and by July we had our experience at the temple that confirmed we were to have a baby. So July 2011 I stopped birth control, they told us that it takes up to 3 months to be fully out of my system so if I didn't get pregnant those first few months don't worry about it. My birthday is in August and Curtis bought me the "mommy docs guide to pregnancy and birth" and the "potentially sane mothers activity ideas for kids" books. I was so happy and started reading the pregnancy book that morning even though I wasn't pregnant yet. I missed my period in August and we thought we were pregnant already it was very exciting! I took a pregnancy test and it was negative, it hurt worse than I thought that it would. I was prepared for a negative reading because they told me it could take months for the birth control to be fully out of my system. But a negative pregnancy test is not an enjoyable thing to look at.
I was worried that my body was going irregular again since I missed a period and obviously I wasn't pregnant. My period started a few days later so it was just late but I did have one so that gave me some hope. I missed again in September so I waited a week past my predicted start date to see if I was just behind on my schedule again. It never came so I took another test, negative again. It hurt even more than the first time. I knew there was an issue now because I was irregular again. In October I got a job with benefits so we decided we would go get a check up and talk to the doctor about our concerns with my body. I was not a fan of this doctor... he seemed almost irritated by me being there. I had read in my pregnancy book Curtis bought me that there is only a 20% chance of getting pregnant each month we had only been trying for about 3 months so I knew my chances were still slim but every thing makes getting pregnant seem easy. My mom had 6 kids, my grandma had 6 kids, my dad's parents had 10, my dad's sister had 9. On the flip side I also have a cousin and an aunt and uncle on my dad's side that can't have kids. As well as two very sweet cousins on my mom's side that are unable to as well. All of my cousins adopted and have darling children! My cousin on my dad's side was even blessed after adopting their first to have 3 of their own! But this doctor didn't seem to understand my concerns... I was 21 for pete's sake and I wasn't having regular periods and I was having a hard time conceiving I felt like he was using those as an excuse of why I shouldn't be worried, you're young...it's only been 3 months...you have time... None of these answers were comforting to me.
He put me back on birth control to get my body working again, he said it may be an issue with ovulation, my body might not be ovulating and that obviously would make getting pregnant difficult if there is no egg to be fertilized. I went on birth control and then he had me taking metformin which is typically a diabetes medication which I did not understand but I figured he was a medical professional and wouldn't give me something I didn't need. The metformin is a hard thing for the body to adjust to, he told me start with one a day until I no longer felt sick and then I was to move to two a day until I no longer felt sick then three a day was my maximum. It only took about 2 weeks to adjust so I moved to two a day this took me a while longer to adjust, I felt really nauseous all the time and lost my appetite because I just felt yucky. After about 3 or 4 weeks I moved to three a day, HUGE MISTAKE! I was so sick I couldn't get off the couch for a few days but I couldn't eat either. I asked Curtis and our neighbor Andy to give me a blessing because I didn't know what else to do. After the blessing I felt a little better not quite as ill, but I dropped back down to only two pills a day. A short time later I stopped taking the pills all together I didn't feel like they were doing anything. I went through one cycle of birth control and my body responded like it was supposed to. After that cycle was over we started trying again, I want to say this was the time we got pregnant but as you could guess it's not.
We had reached a point when we had decided we needed help and support from others. Up until this point we had kept our struggle to ourselves and dealt with it personally and confided in each other. We were visiting my parents house and pulled them aside to tell them of our struggle and ask for their prayers during this difficult time for us. A few months later they were visiting for my birthday and we still were struggling, I was hitting my breaking point and felt I needed a blessing. Curtis felt too close to the situation that it would make it difficult for him to feel guided by the spirit so we asked my dad to give me the blessing. The part that stood out with the most comfort for us was that I was blessed that I would be a mother and bear a child. It was hard to remember that blessing during the difficult times but when we would talk about it, it would bring comfort to us.
When January came around I couldn't take looking at negative tests anymore so instead Curtis got to thinking that buying a house was a good idea. We were looking at the difference money wise between renting and paying a mortgage which were surprisingly comparable. So we instead focused on looking for a house. You saw that whole story in previous posts which resulted in us ultimately finding a house in Clarkston, UT May of 2013. That took up most of our time and we had pushed the thoughts of trying for a child aside for the time being. We had decided that we would get Curtis through school, into a steady job, then we would go to a specialist to find out what was the matter. Looking for a house and the stresses of our move helped keep me distracted and with a plan in mind I felt better. We moved into our house in May, we were asked to be apart of the Martin Harris Pageant in June-August. It was a wonderful experience! Curtis kept saying a few months before we got pregnant he felt like we needed to show our faith, have an act of faith. I would ask him how, he said he wasn't sure but he felt like that was what we needed to prove our faith to be parents. Later he bore his testimony that he believed that him taking the leap of faith to be in pageant was just what we needed because I got pregnant during the pageant.
Thanks to the pageant I got a new job, which I blogged about before as well. I had started in August and in September I was started feeling really strange, I was tired all the time, I felt like I had a cold or something. Curtis was really worried for me he thought I might have had mono or something. So I got to a point where I thought about seeing a doctor because I had felt this way for weeks. So I talked to Curtis about it, he suggested I take a pregnancy test before we made the appointment. It had been 2 months since my last period, which as you now know what normal for me. We just wanted to be able to tell the doctor for certain that I was not pregnant only irregular. So the next morning I got out a home pregnancy test, took it, while it was processing I was doing a few things preparing myself to see yet another negative test. As my timer went off for the 3 minute mark I was walking to the bathroom thinking to myself when should we make an appointment. I got to the bathroom picked up the test and just stared! Blinked and stared again... I thought I saw two lines. So I called to Curtis "Hey Hon?"
"Yeah?"
"Can you come here for a second?"
Curtis comes into the bathroom "What?"
I show him the pregnancy test "Is that two lines?" Emotion was tickling the back of my throat.
"Ya it is."
"We're going to have a baby!"
"We'll now we know why you've been sick."
I lost it I started bawling and I just hugged Curtis and cried all over his shirt. Tears of relief, joy, worry, happiness, anxiety, and love. Curtis later told me he didn't think I was going to stop crying. I wasn't sure I was going to be able to. I cried all the way to work and had to keep it together while I was there because I didn't want anyone to know yet. We wanted to wait until the 12 week mark for more comfort that everything was okay.
When it came time to find out the gender we were excited. Curtis, of course, wanted a boy what man doesn't? But we had the feeling she was a girl. Aerika had picked out a name when she was in high school that she wanted to name a little girl. With our experiences that we had it only fit that it had to be a girl, and that she would be named after Aerika's Aunt Lizzi that we both felt in the temple that day. When the ultrasound tech said baby is a girl, I was a beaming and I looked to Curtis to see how he was feeling. I could see he was a little disappointed but he was still excited. Little did he know this little angel was going to have him wrapped around her finger.
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| Our little miracle! |
