Mad and Confused

Well, as I said yesterday, I'm mad and confused. There are lots of things I don't understand. One of the biggest questions is: why would God tell us to do something He knows is bound for failure and heartbreak? What I mean is, after the last IVF cycle, Chris and I took time to really pray and think about what was next. We had no alternate agenda, we didn't even know at that point what we individually wanted. We both, separately and independently of one another, got the same answer from the Lord. We both felt led to pursue IVF again. Why in the world would He tell us to do that knowing the outcome? Have I considered the possiblity that we were wrong? Absolutely. But I would think if that were the case, at least one of us would have gotten a different answer in February. What exactly is the lesson here? To be mad at God? Cause that's pretty much all I've gotten right now. Right or wrong, that's how I feel. [Now let me also say, that does not mean I have abandoned faith or God. I'm just mad at Him right now. Have you ever been mad at a friend? Doesn't mean you abandon the friendship.]

I also question whether or not we need a second opinion from a different RE. But truthfully, I don't believe it has anything to do with his expertise. I have full confidence in Dr.Wilshire and his staff. The truth is that if God wanted us pregnant right now, we would be, no matter who the doctor was/is. So I refer you back to the above paragraph.

I'm mad that there are 15 year old kids out there getting into all kinds of trouble, sleeping with multiple partners, getting pregnant. I'm mad that 50% of couples are getting divorced and they can get pregnant. I'm just mad. We are a God fearing, committed couple who wants to raise our child in fear of the Lord, in the church. What exactly is wrong with us? Where did we go wrong? I'm not saying that we are necessarily better than anyone else, God knows that we have our faults. But why are we enduring this? If I just knew the reason, maybe then I could stomach this better. As it stands I may never know this side of heaven.

The News...

Well, the news is negative again. We are not surprised. In fact, we have known for a couple of days now that it was coming. Without being graphic, my period has been trying to start since Sunday. I also took a pregnancy test on Monday, which was obviously negative. So there have already been tears. But honestly, I'm just mad and confused. More on that later. For now, this is where we are. Thanks for your prayers and support.

Here's to hoping

Hello all. I am more nervous than ever. I almost don't even want to take a test. Unfortunately, that's a double edged sword. Anyway, my point in writing is to ask for continued prayer for peace. While I know and trust that all is in God's hands and that whatever His will is, is best; I am already having a hard time thinking of the possiblity of negative news on Tuesday. I want to hope, but I find myself scarcely able. Thank you. Love and Blessings.

Peace? That Trancends Understanding?

Hello all! Well, I'm off bedrest. Thank goodness! I played more Tetris than I care to admit. I'm feeling pretty good most of the time. The past couple of days for some reason I have these moments where I completely freak out for a couple of hours. I'm so nervous to find out the outcome and want with all my heart and everything in me to be pregnant. The thought of a negative test is just too much. So I pray, well beg really, for God to bless us with pregnancy.

It's a strange feeling, the TOTAL loss of control. I know that there is absolutely nothing the doctor can do, nothing Chris can do, nothing I can do, to make it happen. Only the Lord himself has that power. And I am sitting here powerLESS, waiting to find out what God thinks about whether we get to be pregnant. So my answer... pure, unadulterated begging. I'm sure God is up there just laughing a little under his breath, but kinda smiling like "What I'm not laughing?". I can just picture it. It helps me to think He has a sense of humor. I'm just hoping it's in my favor.

Anyway, so I'm praying for that peace that transcends understanding. If you could pray that with me, I would be your best friend. I really need some peace right now. I'm trying but it can't come of my own power. I'm not capable. The waiting is just torture. Until then, I'm glad to go back to work tonight and have something else to focus on for a while. Love and Blessings.

Good Phone Calls

Hey everyone! Yesterday after church, Jaime, the embryologist, called with good news! She was able to freeze 2 little blastocyst embryos!!!!! We are so pumped! It is good news on a couple of fronts. One being, we have two little guys that we can transfer at a later date if need be. Two, it is a good sign for this cycle as well. If they implanted the 2 best embryos in me, they should be growing even better than the ones left in the lab did. Since the ones in the lab continued to grow and become blastocysts, there is a high chance the little guys in my belly are doing the same. The sucess rates for implantation are pretty high if the embryos make it to the blastocyst stage. So this was encouraging news indeed! Of course, it is still in the hands of God, and we are ferverently praying that he will bless us with a child this time!!

Bedrest or Boredom?

Hello all! Well, this is one of the diversions on the agenda today. As you all know I have been on bedrest since Thursday after the transfer. Chris has been very good to me and really I cannot complain. It's kinda funny how if you don't have to be on bedrest you can really not do a whole lot and be okay with it. Maybe it's because you know that at anytime you can get up and go do whatever you want. However, when you are forced to do nothing, how quickly the boredom sets in.

Let's see, a list of my diversions so far.... Well, Chris rented a whole bunch of movies which I have tried to spread out to make them last. We started with Kung Fu Panda, a nice animated funny flick, glad we rented it instead of saw it in the theatre. Next was Frost/Nixon--very good, made me wish I actually remembered what I learned in history class about Watergate. Then, the next morning, I began with an old favorite, Pride and Prejudice. I really could watch that one a million more times! Today I watched Hotel for Dogs--cute little flick. I've also played a lot of Tetris on the Wii as well as Galaga. The classics, you gotta love 'em. No Guitar Hero though as I prefer to stand to play the guitar. I have also played alot of spades online. I love spades and it can entertain me for several hours if need be. Of course, there's the usual email and facebook. Oh yeah, I watched Chris clean this morning! Exciting isn't it?! Just a few more days to go.

Dr.Wilshire said I can go to church tomorrow so I'm looking forward to that outing and seeing PEOPLE!! My dogs are great company, but you do get a little stir crazy for other human contact. I've had lots of time to practice that whole pray without ceasing thing too. Just tossing up little ones here and there throughout the day.

Tomorrow sometime we should hear from Jaime, the embryologist, about or remaining embryos and whether or not any will be able to be frozen. Otherwise, we are still waiting and trying not to think about how far away 10 days is from now seems.

Thanks for checking in, hope I wasn't too boring! Ha Ha!

Get in My Belly!

Well, this morning was the big transfer day! At around 8:30am our little embryos got to come home (get in my belly)! We treansferred our 2 best lookin embies. One was at 9 cells and getting ready to compact down, which is on it's was to being a blastocyst (that is the stage when they implant in the uterus). The other one was a 6 cell embryo, Jaime the embryologist thought that it was in process of splitting into the 8 cell stage because of the size of the cells. Dr.Wilshire seemed to be very happy with the 2 we transferred and how the procedure went. Now it's hurry up and wait.

Our other embies will continue to grow in culture until day 5 or 6. Then Jaime will take them out of the incubator and see how they're doing and whether or not they can be freezed (meaning continuing to grow and develop). We have 2 embryos that have pretty much stopped growing that we know of and a 5 cell and another 6 cell that are still in culture. We have hope that the latter two will continue to grow and be able to be frozen!

In the meantime, here I sit on bedrest for the next 3 days at least. I had already switched my schedule around in anticipation of a Saturday transfer. So I have an extra 2 days off in addition to my 3 of bedrest. I will probably continue to stay on bedrest those additional 2 days. The embryos will continue to grow and expand in my belly the next couple of days and then implantation usually takes place on day 5 or 6. So in hopes of implantation I will stay down through day 6 or 7. Hopefully, boredom won't kick in too bad. Back to work on Wednesday of next week. I will actually return on the night shift. Strangely enough, I'm kinda glad to go back on nights that week because it is less stressful and busy. I can sit more and in general it is just a more mellow shift. (This is not to say that we don't work on night shift, we do, it's just a different pace.) I'm hoping that will also help encourage implantation and continued pregnancy. Of course, ultimately it is all in God's strong hands!

Thank you all so much for your prayers and continuing to check in with us. Your support is precious and much appreciated. I would ask mostly for the prayers for patience in this long wait to find out, 2 weeks seems like forever. And as always, pray that we are pregnant with baby Earhart!

Tomorrow, Tomorrow

Hey everyone! Sorry I missed posting the update yesterday. We left to go down to Springfield so Chris could get some work done in the Nixa McAlisters. He will be rolling out some new menu stuff in about 2 weeks there and needed to prepare. I went with him and met up with my dear friend, Marilyn for lunch. I also got to catch up with Laurie, she was/is a wonderful godly mentor to me, especially while I was living there. Chris' parents also drove over from Joplin to have dinner with us. So I got to do all the fun stuff, and Chris did all the work stuff, well and some fun stuff.

Anyway, 8 of our 10 eggs fertilized. That is good news, about 80%. Anything over 70% is excellent. They called again this morning to update us on where the embies are today. We had

5 - 2 cell embryos
1 - 3 cell embryo
2 - 5 cell embryos

Good, bad? I don't think it's either. Normally on day 2 you want them to be at the 4 cell stage. However, the embryologist looked at ours very early this morning and she said that the 2 cell ones may still divide into 4 cells, just that she looked at them so early that they hadn't done it yet. So nothing to worry about there.

We are doing embryo transfer tomorrow instead of day 5 this time. There are a couple of reasons for this. First, I have "thick zonas". The zona is the membrane that surrounds the egg. As the egg divides and grows, the zona should thin out so that the cells can "hatch" out to implant in the uterus. So we are going to do "assisted hatching". This is where they put a teeny, tiny slit in the zona or membrane around the egg to aid the natural hatching process and facilitate implantation. Last time I had slightly thickened zonas, but they thought it shouldn't be a problem. So this time, we're gonna try and change that and help these little guys out. Assisted hatching can only be done (at the clinic we go to) on day 3. Second, the embryologist and Dr.Wilshire think that the sooner they put them back inside me the better. They think the embies will grow better in their natural environment. Which I guess is probably true. There is alot of literature out there both for and against waiting to transfer until day 5. We have to trust in the expertise of Dr.Wilshire and the embryologist on this one. Plus, for whatever the reason was, last time didn't work. So we need to look at why and what things can we change to increase the possibility of us getting pregnant. So here we are, tomorrow is the big day! Transfer Day!

I'm feeling surprisingly fine about everything. I'm not worried, I'm not nervous, just going with the flow. It's kinda freaky though. Laurie said this was me letting go and giving it to God. I hope that is the case. This is just a completely foreign feeling. At the same time, I do know that whatever the outcome, it IS in God's hands. It will be for the best, and I have to focus in and trust in the Lord!

Please pray for a smooth, uneventful transfer. Pray for our emotions as we enter the long wait to find out whether or not we are pregnant. I will be on bedrest the next several days--pray for compliance and lack of boredom. Of course, pray that we will be preggers!!!

Blessings,
The Earharts

Retrieval Day

Good afternoon everyone! Well I'm finally awake again and hangin' here at home. Man, 5:30 am comes really freakin' early!!!! All went well. I, of course, don't remember a thing. They retrieved a couple of basketball teams today (that's 10 eggs for those of you non-sporty peeps).

We got home around 9 am. I then proceeded to nap for another 3-4 hours. I'm awake and feeling fine. A little crampy, but that's expected and the least of all the worries and pains! Now it's just the waiting game, the hardest part of all. Thank goodness that over the next few days we will get updates on the eggs (hopefully embryos tomorrow). That helps pass the time for the first few days.

Thank you for all your prayers up to now! We would love to have your continued prayers for PEACE in this time of waiting, good fertilization rates and that our embies grow, grow, grow! And as always, that the Lord will bless us with a healthy little Earhart in a couple of weeks (starting to grow for 9 months anyway, not that he/she would actually be here in a couple of weeks)! Okay I'm rambling now. Ya'll know what I mean!

Monday is Egg Retrieval Day

First off, Happy Mother's Day to all ya'll moms out there! We are so thankful for the wonderful Mom's that God has blessed us with!!!

We went back to the doctor yesterday morning, in a break where I could get away from work. Everything looked good on the ultrasound, my follicles grew ALOT in a day. It was pretty cool to see on the screen! So retrieval is Monday morning at 6am, we have to be at the office at 5:30 am. Mornings are sooooo NOT my thing, but it will be worth it. Ol' Dr.Wilshire and staff may just have to see non-makeuped, sweat pants, and a ponytail me. We should know how many eggs they were able to retrieve tomorrow. Tuesday we will start getting the daily report on how many fertilized and how they are growing. Thursday or Saturday will be embryo transfer day.

Pray for good sleep tonight, lots of eggs, a good fertilization rate, beautiful little embies that grow, grow, grow! Of course, in the end that we have a healthy little Earhart!

Retrieval and Thoughts from my Journal

"For we do not have a hight priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just was we are--yet was without sin. Let us approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." Hebrews 4:15-16

"During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission." Hebrews 5:7

I find it interesting that God is so intune with our lives. How amazing is it to think that He truly does want to walk right next to us?! He provides exactly what we need to hear, exactly when we need to hear it. He cares, deeply, about little ol' me.

The above verses are from our Bible Study this week. I definitely needed to hear that He, my God, sympathizes with me. As we are now getting closer to retrieval and embryo transfer, it's hard not to get fixated on what our outcome will be...Will we be pregnant? Will we have to face tough news again? Will we get to be elated to know that we finally have a little life growing and waiting to see us? I don't have the answers to these questions. God knows that it is hard for me not to know the outcome and to feel out of control. I think that is why He gave me these verses this week. How hard it must have been to face death on a cross, to know exactly what you're in for, to know that God tells you, you have to do this. He wants you to be obedient. Even when the answer wasn't what Jesus wanted. He was obedient so that I would one day get to see His glory! I can't say that my struggle here even compares to that--I definitely haven't sweat any blood! It helps me to realize my struggle in perspective. Yes it is hard, but it brings me one step closer to my Lord. It brings me one step closer to being the woman he desires of me. It is one step closer to "Well done my good and faithful servant". And I have no idea what sharing our struggle will do for others. Maybe through it, the Lord will bring someone new to His kingdom, or someone else finds comfort in the fact that they are not alone. I will try to focus in on the eternal outcome rather than this one event's outcome.

Whew, now that that's out there, here's the skinny on where we are. We went to the doctor bright and early this morning. My estradiol is still rising and looks good. The ultrasound showed 9-10 follicles. We are switching to Menopur tonight instead of Follistim. Then we go back in tomorrow to get checked again. Dr.Wilshire is predicting a Monday retrieval. I guess we'll find out tomorrow. Here's hopin' and prayin'!

Tuesday's Update

Well, it's not Tuesday, but we went back to the doctor Tuesday. The appointment went fine and the follicles are growing! They measured 4 of them, but you could see others in there, you just couldn't measure them yet. My estradiol level was fine and we keep trucking along with my same dosage of Follistim.

They always call me in the afternoon to let me know if there needs to be any changes in my medicine after they look at my estradiol level. That's also when they tell me when the next appointment needs to be. So my appointment is Friday. This translates into retrieval being pushed back, so no Saturday retrieval as of now. My guesstimation is Monday or Tuesday for retrieval, which also pushes back embryo transfer. All this is fine, I'm hoping that my current work schedule will still be okay. I had taken off all next week in expectation of retrieval and embryo transfer. I have to be on bedrest like 6 out of 7 days or something like that, so I just took the whole week. If retrieval doesn't happen until Tuesday, that means bedrest will probably spill over into the following week. I'm working at the beginning of that week, so I may have to switch some things around. We'll see.

So pray for continued growth and that retrieval would go well, whenever that happens. Also pray that if need be, I would not have trouble switching with co-workers to get my schedule worked out. Of course, pray that we will have BIG news at the end of this process!

Go with the Flow

Yesterday was a long day, but a good day. We started with our first Dr.'s appt after starting the Follistim. As you've seen from Chris' post, we had 2 good sized follicles that they measured, 2 other ones, and some small ones that Dr.Wilshire said will start growing each day as we continue on the meds. He seemed pleased with how things were going. My labs came back fine and we continue on our same dosage.

I'm really trying to focus in on just being at peace with where we are in the process and being in the now. No worries to what lies ahead and efforts to judge whether or not we're in the ideal spot in the process. Just letting it go into the hands of our Father and trusting that whatever happens, whenever it happens is exactly as He planned it. If He is in charge of it (as He is) then I know that the outcome is the best for us. He knows what He's doing. And what a relief it is to fix my eyes on that. What good is worrying anyway? It brings nothing but stress and heartbreak. It is wonderful to just relax and go with the flow!

Next we were off to Kansas City for Julie Bookless' (now Julie Wood) wedding. On the way we stopped and had lunch with The Banks. It was good to catch up with them and just talk. We were able to reminisce about their late dog Rusty and share stories about our dogs. We talked about his job hunt and the boys. All in all a very good 2 1/2 hours with family.

Then it was off to the wedding. They, of course, got married, which is the most important. Julie looked gorgeous and the ceremony was beautiful. It was great to be a part of their special day and we wish them all the best with God's blessings for their marriage!

Our First Follicles

We just got back from the Dr.'s office. Amy's been taking the follistem for 4 days now. We have 4 follicles that are at a good size which is about where we were last time or just a little better maybe. The Dr.'s shooting for only 9 days of medicine this round, we did 11 days last time, so maybe just 5 more days of the follistem. We did 200 units of follistem on our last round, this time he started her off at 300 units and is keeping her at that level for the next three days too.
Continue to pray with us through this process.

Yesterday I was asked, and accpeted, to be on the Board of Directors for Midwest Foster Care and Adoption Association. Here is there website www.ccfosteradopt.com. I'm looking forward to this new experience.

Today we are heading to Kansas City to see the Banks' for lunch and then to Julie Booless' wedding.