An ordinary snapshot

My lifeguard stand is the rocker in my bedroom, a safe distance from the flurry of splashes.

I know how long I last in a warm bath. And I know the twins passed that marker minutes ago.

Fingers are undoubtedly wrinkled prunes. My bathroom floor is sopping wet.

I didn't move the bath mat far enough away.

And yet they play on, giggling and splashing.  Octonauts, sea creatures, goggles, and dive toys.  Swim suit bottoms.  

Such an enormous treat, swimming in Momma's big tub.

And We're Off!

First prescription was called in for our next embryo transfer!

Start birth control tomorrow.  Lucky for me, I only have to endure bc for about two weeks and then I get to drop that evil to the curb (based on last time, I'm not a nice person to be around while on bc).  Then, a few days later, I'll start adding in the cocktail of estrogen and, a bit later still, progesterone to ready my womb for our two waiting snowbabies.

Reminder - since we are not doing a natural transfer (one timed precisely with my own cycles), the clinic manipulates my cycles through the use of hormones.  This clinic uses birth control; my Virginia clinic used lupron injections.  Some places use a combination of both lupron and birth control.

November 22 is the day!  Prayer warriors, start your engines!

And, tentatively speaking, it looks like I'll get to do my beta check (first pregnancy test) while we are taking a mini-family vacation.  We've decided to go more for memories rather than items for Christmas this year and are taking the kids to Great Wolf Lodge for one night (thanks Zulily for the discount!).  And as our little trip coincides with my beta test, I'll get to scout out labs in the Dallas area.

I'm in an interesting place mentally.  I've been longing for more children for so long now yet I'm emotionally guarded after our last failed transfer.  There's a big race that I hope to compete in in May if I'm not pregnant.  Yet I want very much to be pregnant.  I want these "baby seeds" to live.  I have no idea what will happen next on our journey to grow our family if this transfer fails or if I miscarry.  Basically, my brain works this way right now:  Option A:  transfer is a success - healthy pregnancy!  Option B:  not pregnant - compete in Spartan Race in May with group of friends. 

Option A is preferred, but Option B sounds like great fun other than the whole "not pregnant" part.  :-/

So I get to wait and see how the future unfolds.  One of these days, I'll really learn just how little control I have over it AND how everything works out okay in the end.

Please don't think I'm equating pregnancy or future motherhood with a race.  Pregnancy is always on my mind but intangible at the moment and for an unknown future length of time.  I just competed in a little mud run at the end of September, that is more "real" to me right now.  Not better by any means, just more tangible.  I can work towards a race - I have more control over that outcome.  A pregnancy?  A successful FET?  Those are things I cannot control, despite my efforts.

So much for a nice, chipper post, sorry about that.  At any rate, we're off again!  Revving up the engines, prepping for embryo transfer number four.  God, please hold those little "baby seeds" in Your hands.  Please hold all of us in Your hands! 

I want to be a triplet momma

Though I do not show it, I feel things more acutely as a mother.

Back in 2009, in the time "before children", I knew each embryo we adopted was a person.  And yet it's not until now that I can SEE it.

I love these little lives even more because I can see, or at least, better imagine their existence.  Milk coma babies, snoring away - I've seen it.  Sweat tousled hair, arms flung over head in the depths of sleep - I've seen it.  Precocious mud splattered toddlers - I've seen it.  Therefore I can imagine all my adopted embryos this way.

I know now what I hope for, what realities I pray for when I pray for these embryos.  In a way, I may love these new embryos more, only because I love with a mother's affection whereas before I loved in desire to be a mother.  This is not to say that my "before children" affections were lacking, but more that my love "post children" has deepened, grown, and matured.  The growth of my family size has prompted the growth of my heart, of my capacity to love.

I pray that all of our adopted snowbabies may flourish, first through a healthy full term pregnancy, and then through an uneventful birth.  And then in daily life growing ever closer to God.

God alone knows how many of our adopted snowbabies will greet us here on earth.  Five are already in heaven, interceding on behalf of their adopted siblings. 

I cannot and will not envision life with anything less than triplets.    I cannot and will not even allow myself the "hope" that one or two may not make it.  Statistically, that's likely.  Morally and ethically, I am not a good candidate for embryo adoption if I go into it hoping not all survive.

So I pray for life.  For courage and strength (mental, physical, and spiritual).  I pray that I become a triplet Momma, because I can do no less.

Of course, it is only logical that prayers for strength, sanity, good helpers, and courage follow a prayer for triplets.

Lord, you alone know the strengths and concerns in our hearts.  Grant us life and the means to live in grace and with grace.