Our story

Our road to parenthood has been a long one, filled with twists, turns, hills, and valleys.  To understand how I got to be where I am at as a parent, it is important to understand how I got here.  I wish our story was always filled with grace and poise, but instead it was often filled with selfishness.  You see, if you know me, you know that I am a quiet person.  I like things organized and neat.  I like predictability and shy away from conflict and often things that make me uncomfortable.  The truth is infertility is none of that  -- it is unpredictable, unorganized, messy, uncomfortable, and full of conflict.  While the infertile couple often remains quiet about the struggle, the issue is loud and permeates to the deepest depths of the relationship.  That is our story.  Sorry it is long, but the journey has been quite long......

I wish I could say that I aways wanted to be a mom, but that's not the case.  I was not a natural born nurturer.  You will not see me lining up to hold random babies and volunteering to work with toddlers. Neither is Jason:  as therapists, we prefer to see adults over children.  Assign us a client who is heavily addicted, has dealt every drug under the sun, and has a history of violent crimes, and we are in our element.  Assign us a three year old and we are out of our comfort zone.  I didn't know I wanted to be a parent until the day that Jason and I lost our first child.  It was right after Christmas our first semester in grad school.  We were both devastated.  I had suspected I might be pregnant but didn't know for sure until the miscarriage occurred.  Here's where some of the selfishness comes in, I didn't want to be pregnant when I suspected it.  I wasn't in the right place.  After we lost the baby, however, things changed for both of us.  We realized we were meant to be parents and wanted a big family.  The grief we felt and the connection we had to something we didn't know existed was intense and painful.  Our marriage went through a lot at that time, to the point where Jason and I had to make a decision that we were going to actively work toward staying together instead of growing apart.  It was an all-or-nothing scenario.  We decided we wanted to grow together instead of continuing to stay in the patterns of arguing followed by silence we had gotten in.  We recommitted our marriage to God.  Losing a child often destroys a marriage and it was heading there for us -- even if no one knew about it.

A short time after that, I started going through a lot of pain.  Those who were in grad school with us know this.  I was sent from one doctor to the next to find out what was wrong.  I was often medicated and even fell asleep in class a few times -- luckily I had understanding and compassionate professors who helped me through this.  Finally, I was diagnosed with infertility (however the wrong kind at first).  I began receiving expensive shots not covered by insurance to get rid of the pain.  They were shots given to cancer patients and had nasty side effects.  For six months, I didn't sleep more than two hours a night.  I was exhausted, nauseous, weak, and dizzy.  I couldn't even walk from one end of a building to the other without feeling winded.  Most people who go through these shots (Luperon) give up before the end of the treatments; I stuck it out)  Then, it was found that while I was infertile, my diagnosis was wrong.  I ended up having a few surgeries and cysts removed.  I had been placed on many different fertility medications and had different procedures done. This would go on for over five years  --emotional and physical side effects and all.  Then in April 2011, I found out I was pregnant again.  That day was my happiest thus far and the worst all rolled into one.  In the morning I tested and found out I was pregnant; that afternoon I began miscarrying.

Devastated over the loss, Jason and I felt a call to move to Indiana and we ended up doing so August 1st.  You see, Jason and I had both received signs (Jason in a dream and myself a calming wave of peace) that were were going to have a child in 2011.  When figuring out dates, we realized the baby would have been due right at the end of December and felt it was God's providence -- then that was all over.  Despite this, we still held on to the hope and faith that our signs were not just coincidence.  The month we moved to Indiana, we became pregnant with our daughter..........Some people say it was lessened stress that led to Isabella, but that's just another one of those things people say to infertile people that has no medical evidence (Sidebar:  Please never tell anyone who is struggling to conceive that they just need to relax and it will happen -- medical evidence doesn't suggest that lower stress leads to conception and it is just upsetting to the person you are saying it to.....).  We knew it was God's providence, having faith and making a sacrifice.  You see....

Jason and I had an attitude change about two years into our fertility treatments.  We actively prayed and worked on changing our attitude from "God please give us a baby for us if it is in Your will" to "God let your will be done and if that includes us having a child, let us give that child to You".  We had realized that we wanted a baby for many selfish reasons -- hundreds actually --and none for the reason you are given a child by God:  to glorify Him.  We began bargaining (even though this isn't necessarily a good thing):  "God, if you give us a child, we will raise him/her sacrificially, forsaking our desires for Yours".  We often read 1 Samuel 1, where Hannah struggles with infertility and gives Samuel to God after making this promise.  We made it our commitment and recommitted to it once Isabella was conceived.  The first decision we made to this effect was to change the names we had picked out for our children.  Isabella Dawn and Jason Brett Jr had been the names we had picked out for five years (so, no 'Bella isn't named after the Twilight series--yuck!).  We wanted names that stood for our commitment, so when people asked how our child got his/her name, we had an immediate door opened to share our testimony and God's love-- a testimony of faithfulness and God-fulfilled promise.  We picked out Isabella Hannah and Isaiah Samuel for that very reason.

Fast forward almost a year and Isabella is 11 weeks today.  We are starting to feel our obligation to the promise we made to God almost four years ago  -- a promise that we hold in extreme importance.  We believe that our daughter was given to us because we sacrificed everything we had living in New York and moved to Indiana because we felt it was God's calling:  Jason and I were comfortable and happy with dream jobs and a great place to live.  We feel that this was why we moved here:  to show God our promise was real.  We struggle with how to fulfill our promise and this blog is part of how I am going to do it.  I need to kept accountable -- out of my comfort zone and transparent about my struggles.  We need prayed for within our weaknesses and strengths as parents.  We need help to come-to-terms with the possibility that we may not have the huge family we dreamed of having.  We had never stopped feeling that God was calling us to have Isabella -- right now, we are feeling God wants us to be still and peaceful with her.  We need help grieving -- after all, our grief from infertility treatments, failed cycles, and miscarriage didn't go away when 'Bella was born -- we do have her joy to share now though.  It affects how we parent and how we view our daughter.  We need help in sharing our joys with the people who shared in our pain over the past six years.  We are so thrilled that we get to do that!

God is good, all the time.  That's something I have felt over the past six years (some days less clear than others).  Being a Godly parent means sharing that good with my daughter.  This is something I am looking forward to doing.  I humbly ask for your help and example.....

~ Bella's mommy