Change

Thank you for taking the time to read this!

As you all know we have always wanted a larger family, but we have decided through much prayer, that our family is the size that God wants it to be and are closing the door on the dream of a bigger family.  

For those of you that may be members of our church or who have prayed for guidance from God and received answers, we know you will understand what it means when we say that this “feels right and good”. For those who maybe aren't religious the best way I can describe it is a gut feeling that says, "You've got this! You're doing the right thing." We've already taken steps to get rid of baby items, and it still feels right. So we are continuing with this decision.

We understand many of your thoughts you after having as you read this.

“Have you tried ______”

"You're still young, you have plenty of time"

"Why don't you wait to make this decision after you've finished school"

"What can we do to help?"

We have been blessed with the opportunity and guidance, three different times, to consider adopting a child. We found all the right and necessary materials to prepare to bring this child into our family, only to find out that the child was just barely adopted or otherwise unavailable to us. We saw 4 different medical professionals to guide us on our journey; one was even specialized in my syndrome. We had many tests performed on us to rule things out. We underwent a surgery to make sure that all the tests hadn't missed anything. We tried going dairy-free, the “we” is used very loosely here… =).  We took different hormones that are supposed to increase the chances of pregnancy significantly, only to find they didn't do anything for us other than give weird side effects doctors had never seen before. All of this felt right. Nothing ever felt wrong. We haven't hid much of this journey from Ellie. She came to many blood draws, many doctors appointments, she helped us prepare things for a new baby, she saw pictures of children we were considering bringing into our home, and she understood what the surgery was for. We feel that we have done everything we could in order to grow our family, and for reasons unknown to us, we feel that our family is meant to be its current size.

Yes we are young and still have "plenty" of time. (I find that statement funny given the fact that each year, as a female, your fertility level decreases.) But what you may not see, because we purposefully tried to hide it, is that I cannot emotionally take the loss of a dream month after month as I have for the past 3.5 years.

It's true that we could wait until after school. But we both feel like we will not experience the blessing of watching and feeling my belly grow, the blessing of midnight feedings, the blessing of dirty diapers, the blessing of potty training. What we do know is that it has been a fantastic learning and growing experience for our little family and we will enjoy all the baby nieces and nephews that join the big family!

What can you do for us? Continue to pray for us as we make this transition. As with any drastic change made to your future, it comes with a grieving period for the loss of a dream. We are grateful for all the support you have given us over these last few years. Please continue to love us and to share your joys and journeys with expanding your families! Ask us questions, if you have any, please share cookies with us, and share this with anyone you have been open with regarding our journey! =)

Saying It Loudly, So Others Know They Aren't Alone

Today, October 15th is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance/Awareness Day. I had no idea about this until a few weeks ago! I also found out that there is a thing called the Wave of Light. October 15th, 7-8pm in the time zone you are in, you light a candle and keep it burning in memory of a loss. This creates a wave of light around the world!

I wish I had known about this! Why don't we talk about things like this!? Why don't we celebrate life as soon as you find out you're pregnant? That way if you do miscarry you have shoulders to lean on, people to support you. This way we know that people have experienced the same/similar pain we have, we are not alone.

For anyone who happens upon my very unpopular blog, I want you to know that you are not alone. I want you to know that loss is hard, no matter what stage you are in. You will never forget, and those that you confide in will always be there to support you and help you as you remember and recall your turmoil. 3/6/13 and 11/20/13, these dates will always be hard, but I have grown so much and have increased my circle of sisters who also understand the turmoil as I have spoken out about my experiences.

Tonight, I lit my candle in remembrance of my children that I never knew, and took an extra moment to delight in the miracle child that I do have.

Fertility Drama

Have you seen this comic image before?

It's humorous and truthful all at the same time.

Last November I was the lady at the bottom of the image with her child. I was so nervous to enter the waiting room with Ellie. I knew the anguish I would cause so many women in that room. 

Unfortunately my visit was last minute, and I had no time to find a babysitter. 

You see, my blood work from that morning suggested that I might be miscarrying. Because of my blood type, and Mr. Dawson's blood type I need a special shot to make sure my body doesn't try to extinguish any future babies if I do miscarry. 

There I was with my little girl in my arms, holding her as tight as I could.

Not to stop her from squirming, she was perfect, but because I knew deep down that I was yet again loosing my hope of another baby, a sibling for my daughter. 

I wish that I could have walked in with a sign that let all the other women know what was going on.

Unfortunately I was met with glares and women who avoided me completely 

(they all sat on the other side of the waiting room from me)

And the whole time my heart was breaking.

For any of you who may someday unfortunately encounter a fertility clinic waiting room.

I know it's tough.

Good news is received, bad news is received, sometimes you're just waiting for news.

My biggest hope is that if you ever have the unfortunate chance to enter that waiting room, that you please have sympathy for every man and woman in that room. 

Smile at anyone who crosses your path, maybe even give a little hug if you feel so inclined. 

You never know what that person is going through.

Making My Heart Ache On Purpose, Kinda...

Sometimes I go to the website www.adoptuskids.org and look at pictures of kids and their bios.

Occasionally I find a family like this one.

It tricks me because I only see the one child that, according to the search field, we would possibly be able to adopt, then find out he has older siblings.

I know what is written, that as long as he maintains contact with his siblings he can be adopted alone.

But I would hate to make him live somewhere where he couldn't visit.

I wish it was within our means to adopt the whole family!

Then there are these brothers.

They live in the neighboring state!

But they would be older siblings to Ellie.

Could it work?

Possibly!

But we haven't even been together for 9 years!

Would we be okay with that?

So many variables, but they seem so awesome don't they!?

This cute little man.

Oh, how my heart aches!
His video is just so cute!

My heart aches that they haven't found their forever families yet, and I pray that they do soon.
I ache because I know that we are not to be their forever family,
yet I so desire for them to feel that love!

Maybe one of you who stumbles upon my post will be able to help these children out!
I pray that someday we will be able to make a child's hope, dream, and prayer come true and be able to welcome them to be a part of our family!
But until that day, and after too, I will continue praying for these children and their future endeavors!

So many things!

I am so grateful for all of the men and women that serve our country!

I have family history of relatives serving all the way back into the Revolutionary War!

Almost one person in each generation has fought for our country one way or another!

I am so grateful to them for risking all they have to provide us with safety and freedom!

I am so grateful for miracle babies.

I understand that every baby is in their own right a miracle.

But for this gratitude mini paragraph, I am grateful for the ones that give their moms and dads hope.

The ones that parents have been fighting to conceive.

The ones that fight to make it into this world alive.

The ones that try their hardest, but are called back to our Father before we get to know them.

I am so grateful to each and every one of those miracle babies.

I am grateful for families.

I am so grateful that we are so tightly knit to each other!

I am grateful that we get to visit with each of our families a few times a year!

I am so grateful that we can talk on a weekly basis and receive updates!

I am grateful for the opportunity I have to work with the Young Women in my church.

Ages 12-18!

They are an amazing group that keeps me on my toes!

We laugh together, welcome each other, and do our best to always love each other.

They are such a great group of girls that I love.

I love watching the way they face their daily challenges and learn from them.

They are going to be tremendous women and leaders when they leave their nests!

An Update On The Baby Front

The brief version.....
We are still waiting to be found by a birth parent. =) Ellie's been asking more and more about when her "baby and sister" (translation: baby brother and baby sister) are coming to visit. We've resulted to, "when you don't poop in your diapers any more"! And at the rate she's going, this comment will work perfectly! =)

Longer and more TMI version:  Feel free to just click out if you don't want the TMI! =)

Because I am a preparedness freak and need organization, as well as being a planner (I have a terrible phobia of the unknown future and not having goals to reach), we have been making some mile markers for us.

The first one revolved around the miscarriage. I wanted to get my body back into shape and be healthier. I had gained a significant amount of weight from focusing on the move and not what I was putting into my body. I saw this miscarriage as a way to get my butt into gear and focus on being in the best shape so I can take care of Ellie and Mr. Dawson, as well as any future kids. In order to do this we decided to use contraceptives until August and then make another decision.

Over the summer I had some crazy issues happen that I was a bit embarrassed to talk about, but they fit in with this post! Before Father's Day I had crazy intense abdominal pain that felt like labor pains. This pain also came with severe bowel movements. Told you this second one had TMI! =) Any way, I had had abdominal pain similar to this for many years, but not to this intensity. I decided to skip the regular doctors and jump to a GI consultant because I figured it was intestinal. Zoom forward, I was scheduled for a CT scan while they proceeded to test me! All tests came back negative, but in the CT scan they saw that I had recently had an ovarian cyst on my left side, the size of a quarter, rupture. They wanted to rule out that the cyst was the cause of problems so they sent me to an OB/GYN. The OB/GYN told me that the cyst was the reason for the pain, but most likely not the suspect for severe bowel movements. He also told me, after an examination, that he believed I might have endometriosis. Short story: The medication I am on to help "treat" PCOS is helping to regulate my periods, but can quite possibly be causing me to develop endometriosis. Fun stuff, right!? Well since we are on a mission to make my body healthy and not get pregnant we take the info and let it sit on the shelf. I am scheduled for a colonoscopy and endoscopy to try and figure out my bowel situation. (In case you aren't familiar with those terms, I got scoped from both ends of my body) SO NOT FUN! And....the results came back NEGATIVE for everything they tested and were looking for. I am unfortunately and fortunately a perfectly healthy 25 year old! Because of that they decided to test some IBS, irritable bowel syndrome, meds on me to see what happens. So far it's been pretty good. Hooray!!!

Now that my body is back to "working" condition it's back to thinking about babies again....

August came and we decided to make Heavenly Father our family planner. We were already 3 months into the waiting game of adoption and felt that one way or another Heavenly Father wants us to grow our family. So whether it be adoption or biological we will let it happen and not get in the way.

Towards the end of August and beginning of September I proposed a plan of specific goals. We have studied them together and prayed about them and feel that we will know as soon as we take these steps if they really are what we should do.

If my September cycle finishes without a pregnancy we will set up an appointment to talk with my endocrinologist about our next steps whether it be laparoscopy or drugs to induce ovulation. And go from there.

I know that many people may think, "But you haven't waited long enough, or given adoption a long enough chance. Just hang on." Or something similar. It's true. We haven't been "active" on the adoption lists for very long. But while we are waiting, we want to continue to see what chances we have of conceiving again, as well as what steps we need to take in order for that to actually happen! The more we, and doctors, know about my body the more we can fine tune what actually needs to happen in order for it to work properly to ovulate and conceive.

That's the long winded and informative version of everything happening in our lives right now, revolving around babies that is!

If you have any other questions, concerns, suggestions go ahead and write them! I will read them and answer them to the best of my ability!

Adoption Update

Many people have asked us how the adoption is coming.

We are still waiting.

The agency that we are working with does things a little different than most.

The birth mothers choose the family they will place their child with, 

rather than just pairing us up with someone.

So, we wait.

We have an Aunt in St. George Utah who is getting our name out there!

Thanks April!

We have a friend in my parents ward who works with potential birth mothers and she is getting our name out there for us!

Thanks Sis. Young!

We also have our case worker in Missouri sharing our profile for us too!

Thanks Paul!

Our profile is online for people to find and look at.

What? You haven't seen our profile yet!?

Click HERE 

Know anyone who is considering adoption? 

We would love to send them to people who can answer all their questions!

Or we can try our best to answer them!

=)

We know it will happen at some point and are excited for that day! 

Expecting

I write this post hesitantly because of all the strong opinions people have.

But it is something that I just need to get out and share not just with Mr. Dawson.

I have a hard time when people announce they are pregnant.

Not always, 

but often enough that I think the times it doesn't affect me I am holding it in until I can't any more.

This is where the opinions roll....

"But you already have a kid, it's not like you are completely empty armed!"

and other thoughts similar to that

Yes this is true.

And Mr. Dawson reminded me of something last night when I broke down after another friends announcement.

"They are just joining the 'getting a second kid club' that we are in too!"

That is also true!

That's when the lightbulb moment hit me.

It's not necessarily envy that they are expanding their family, because we are planning on ours expanding too!

It's the envy of them having a date and knowing WHEN their family will expand.

It's that due date that gets me.

Our due date can be anywhere from this week to any day in the next many years!

(however long we are up for keeping our adoption account active!)

Now that I've publicly shared this I don't want people to not share that they are pregnant!

I love hearing about it!

Just know that I might feel a bit sad for 15 minutes, and then I get over it!

okay? 

Okay!

Placing a Child for Adoption

A friend of mine posted a link to this video on facebook today.

Of course I had to watch it, since it's about adoption!

It's fantastic!

I love being able to hear a birth mother's perspective on things.

How bitter sweet her experience has been.

Then I found Tamra's blog.

(she's the one in the video, in case you didn't catch that)

So beautiful!

I read just three posts:

"talk i wrote for church", "my keynote address for the Central Region Families Supporting Adoption Conference in Denver", and "THIS JUST IN"

So beautiful and amazing!

I am so glad that she is sharing her experience with everyone!

She is shining a light on adoption and helping it become less of a mysterious, scary thing!

I hope that with our journey, being the adoptive parents, that I can share things that will help others understand adoption and be more open to it as well!

What I do know so far is that it is a beautiful thing that strengthens everyone involved!

And that lots of HARD WORK, PRAYERS, FASTING, SACRIFICES, TEARS, and HUMILITY are involved.

Leaving behind BLESSINGS, JOY, LOVE, COMPASSION, PEACE, and FAMILY.

There is a Silver Lining to Every Cloud

If you will recall these two posts:

Adoption Language and Patience is a Dirty Word

Between these two posts, a crazy roller coaster ride came our way.

The clouds on this ride were ever changing,

Sunshiny, overcast, gloomy, overcast, cumulonimbus, and then back to overcast, and sunshiny!

A few days after writing the first post we found out that we were pregnant!

With shock and excitement and wonder we called the fertility clinic to tell them the news!

Immediately lab work was scheduled to be done to make sure that everything looked good.

Everyone was so excited and shocked that this could be happening!

We pondered why we would feel inspired to start the adoption process if we were to be blessed with a biological child!

I even told Mr. Dawson that if this pregnancy didn't work out, that having already started the adoption process and being so far into it would help me not stick in a funk for very long. 

Then we got some news along with many questions

The numbers weren't looking good

I was told to continue with the last scheduled lab work session, take a certain prescription, and then they would see about an ultrasound.

The last labs didn't come back as happy as they had desired, so an ultrasound was scheduled for the next day.

The doctors and nurses thought the pregnancy might be ectopic.

Ectopic is when a baby implants anywhere but the uterus, most often the fallopian tube.

As the baby grows the tube cannot expand enough to hold the baby....and then the mothers life becomes at risk.

So in we went.

During the ultrasound we found out that it was not ectopic!

BUT the gestational sac was measuring much smaller than it should have been for almost 7 weeks.

They told us that we would do more lab work and continue watching and see what happened

A few days later I miscarried.

Hard as it is to miscarry, I found out in the middle of my day of teaching and still had 2 hours to go.

I put on my brave face, texted Justin, called the nurses in a 5 minute break I had, and continued on.

Earlier that morning I had allowed myself to hope for the best.

Lab work continued, followed by another ultrasound.

My body was doing it's job correctly

More lab work would be necessary to make sure my body finished it's job correctly.

The doctor and nurse appeared to be amazed at how well we seemed to be handling the situation.

I responded by telling them that it first helped in thinking that it was an ectopic pregnancy, my brain was prepared for the fact that I would lose this child. 

When it became apparent it wasn't ectopic and I prayed for strength and knowledge as to what I needed to do, I was comforted. 

I knew that no matter what things would work out!

We will be having another child whether by adoption or biologically!

The best part out of all of this!

Yes, there is a best part, remember I ended with "sunshiny" up top!

My body works!

Well, at least when it decides to work, it can work!

This is amazing news!

We weren't even sure that my body could really conceive on it's own!

And it did!

Who knows how often my body "works"! 

It took us 10 months to get there....

But we are excited about that, to have the knowledge that you aren't as broken as you thought, that is great news!

So we are continuing with the adoption process.

Yes, even though we were able to conceive we feel that we still need to do this and continue with the adoption process. 

We have felt, when we first started the process, that we would someday have another biological child

But today is not that day. 

We are to adopt first and love this child and raise this child with all the love that we have!

Have I mentioned how excited Ellie is to be a big sister!

SO STINKIN' EXCITED!

She claims she is going to have a baby sister.

She is going to play peek-a-boo, feed the baby bottles, hold the baby, and sing songs.

And we are so excited that we get to have another child as well!

Adoption Language

Don't worry, I'll update you on all our snow and recent adventures in the past 11 days

....tomorrow.

But for now, just wanted to do a quick little post on the words we speak.

Since we are adopting, OUR PAPERWORK IS ALMOST COMPLETE, I figured I should start letting friends and family know and understand terminology.

It's mainly to understand how things can be said with the greatest of care but still sound terrible, and how to prevent that from happening to you!

The terms on the LEFT are the NEGATIVE

Terms on the RIGHT are POSITIVE

Here goes:

"Gave up her child for adoption".............."Placed her child for adoption"

"Real parent; natural parent"..............."Biological parent, birth parent"

"Adoptive parent".................."Parent"

"His adopted child".............."His child"

"Illegitimate"...................."Born to unmarried parents"

"Adoptee"............."Child who was adopted"

"To keep"............."To parent; to raise"

"Adoptable child; available child"......................."Waiting child"

"Foreign adoption"............."International adoption"

"Track down parents"............."Search"

"Unwanted child"................."Child placed for adoption"

"Is adopted"..............."Was adopted"

"Keeping the baby"..........."Deciding to parent"

"Child of their own"..............."Birth child; biological child"

I am sure there are more but that is all that I can come up with right now!

Would you alter your past?

On Wednesday at mutual the girls were discussing their plans for the future.

Many of them revolved around "marrying into money". This thought process being so they could travel the world, not have to really take care of the kids, not have to worry about being a starving student, or being a starving student with children. Go to college to get an MRS rather than a degree that could help support a family if necessary. And then many mentioned that they wanted to be in their late twenties when they got married.

Honestly, this was the conversation going on while we were sewing hats for kids with cancer.

When I was their age my thoughts were no where near this!

I knew I would go to college and get a degree that could help me if I didn't get married.

It's always your dream/hope that you will get married while you are in school but this doesn't always happen! I have so many friends who are proof of this and they live amazing lives doing what they love doing because they got the education they needed!

Marry into money?!?!

I have to say, it would be awesome!

But realistically? It is highly unlikely.

I kept my thoughts to myself, gotta let them have their dreams/fantasies right?

Well when they started mentioning that they wanted to not get married at a young age a few of the leaders started chiming in too.

They said that if they could go back they would wait to get married until they were 25-28.

Their reasoning, 

"There are so many amazing things that you can do when you are young and single! Travel the world, do things that are hard to do with kids like going to sporting events, attend runway shows, concerts, travel whenever you wish....."

So they seconded the girls ideas of waiting to get married, or at least postponing children until they had reached these amazing mile stones that are hard to do once children come into the picture.

Don't get me wrong. I love these ladies and these girls!

I think they have valid points

But here are mine:

1. Go to college to get a degree you love. This way while you are hoping Mr. Right comes along you can be working on things that you love, rather than make you feel like you want to die!

But also so if Mr. Right does come along and he isn't Mr. Money Bags you can help him!

Whether it's helping by putting him through school, helping pay the bills, saving money so you can travel, or saving money for the future family and house you want to have!

2. I got married a few months after I turned 20. Sure I missed out on some fun adventures because we became two poor college students with meager bank accounts rather than just individuals, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. I honestly don't regret not getting to travel as much as I would have liked before getting married, but hey! I will travel again, and I think it might mean more to me because I have to save up and wait for a little longer!

3. Kids do put dampers on somethings, sure traveling with them can be hard depending on their age, but by-golly! I love my little girl and wouldn't trade her for a trip to Europe!!!

4. If I had chosen not to marry Mr. Dawson and post-pone that by serving a mission for my church, or telling him I wanted to finish my degree first. 

(All very good things and I understand why people choose to do that)

I most likely wouldn't have Ellie.

With my knowledge of how my fertility is all screwy, I believe it to be a miracle given by God that Ellie is here with our little family!

Who knows what one year or more later than me getting married in 2008 might have done to my chance to be blessed with such an intelligent, beautiful, energetic girl!

So to sum it all up, I understand the thoughts that people make about wishing the could change little things about their past.

But it's not for me.

I think that everything that has happened in my life was supposed to happen the way it did because I can look back and see how perfectly things lined up for me to be where I am today, doing what I do.

That's my rant for today!

=)

Right Direction

I was asked a question today by one of my friends at church.

She was asking about our plans for adoption and if we were so stressed about it.

My answer, "No, not as stressed as thinking about fertility treatments!"

Which is totally true!

But I didn't realize until asked this question that I am honestly not stressed.

Life seems so much easier, better, happier!

I am really not stressed at all about doing this paperwork and better understanding adoption.

By realizing this I am realizing that this truly is what our Heavenly Father wants us to do.

We are on the right path, going the right direction.

I actually couldn't be more excited about all of this!

Adoption

On our Christmas card this year, and on a blog post about miracles, we told everyone that we needed prayers as we started treatments to try and conceive a child with medical help.

Our plan has changed.

Remember my last post about our New Year goals and how we want to align our desires with God's?

That is what we are doing!

We took the end of December and the beginning of January off of making life changing decisions and just enjoyed the holidays with our little girl, each other, and family.

We decided to just ponder the two decisions that we felt so right about making. 

Fertility Treatments and Adoption

To reanalyze it all and focus on not making a decision immediately, but to focus on our family and our Heavenly Father's desires for us.

Amazingly it was just what we needed.

There we were, Mr. Dawson and I, the evening of the 6th discussing what we had fasted for.

Clarification:

In case you don't know, every first Sunday of the month our church has fast Sunday.

To fast is to go without food and drink voluntarily for a certain period of time. 

We believe that fasting combined with sincere prayer can strengthen us spiritually, bring us closer to God, and help us prepare ourselves and others to receive His blessings.

Some times we are asked to specifically fast for something. 

Moisture because we are in a drought, health for a member of our ward who's health is failing....

Other times we are not asked to specifically fast for something and we decide on something as a family that we may need guidance or answers to. 

For one reason or another Mr. Dawson and I never talked about what we were going to fast about until the day was done. 

We ended up fasting for the same thing, different wording of our prayers, but same thoughts.

We came to the understanding that now is not the time for us to seek fertility treatments to try and conceive a child of our own.

We are to follow through with the promptings we received back in September/October about submitting paperwork for adoption!

As soon as we arrived in Lawrence, we gathered the paperwork we had received from the agency months ago, filled it out, and mailed it off!

Within the week we will be starting our home study.

We are still figuring all this out, especially the lingo!

As we do, I hope to keep you informed of what is happening and/or clear up any misconceptions!

We would still appreciate your prayers and also prayers on behalf of a birth mother that we have yet to meet!

We are so excited for this new adventure!

Happy New Year!

I think that 2013 is going to be amazing and full of so many good things!

I am just filled with excitement and hope for this year!

My sister will graduate from High School

We will each turn a year older

We are in our 5th year of marriage

We are seeking out the best way to grow our family and beginning to at on them.

We are starting to look for possible summer internships for Mr. Dawson

We are getting Mr. Dawson ready to officially enter the PHD program this fall.

There are other family resolutions/goals that we are working on, but I think that the biggest one is to make sure that our desires are aligned with our Heavenly Father's desires for us.

Happy New Year Everyone!

Miracles

For the month of December I was wanting to share ways that I have seen God's hand in my life.

But I realized that there are many that are too personal to share.

There is one, technically four, miracle(s) that I am finally comfortable in sharing with you!

I have been diagnosed with PCOS

Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome

Basically I have a hormonal imbalance that has affected my reproductive system.

If you want to know the details about PCOS click HERE 

I was diagnosed in NM, after having Ellie, with PCOS but the doctor kept using the words:

"maybe, kind of, looks like, not certain..."

So for the past two years I was never really certain about it.

I was told that it was possible that Ellie was my miracle baby.

Miracle number one!

When we moved to Kansas I knew that I needed to see a doctor who could clarify things 

AND give me a solid answer.

I was visited by two ladies from our church and we got to talking about finding doctors.

One of them mentioned looking into the KU med school program because the doctors they bring in are some of the best in their field and are doing research to learn more!

I followed her advice.

Low and behold I found a doctor who's field not only consists of helping people with fertility problems, but she also specializes in PCOS!!!

Her name is Dr. Sacha Krieg

It was miracle number two!

I set up my appointment and immediately she started me on a bunch of tests to truly find the source of our fertility issues!

On December 6th I met with her and she confirmed that I really do have PCOS.

Miracle number three!

(Yes it is a miracle, because finally after 28 months I have an answer!)

Because I have PCOS I have a 3% chance of getting pregnant on my own each month.

A person without any fertility problems has a 12-25% chance each month

To answer many of the questions that I hear going on in your head:

How is it possible that you didn't need any medical help to have Ellie?

In all honesty, it's because she was meant to come into our lives at that time.

We were ready for a child, and we desperately wanted one.

Our Heavenly Father's timing matched ours and it worked out wonderfully!

We have been so blessed with this little girl!

There are the medical reasons of:

I had symptoms but they weren't doing a number on my body yet; once I got pregnant the changes that came from hormone fluctuations brought the PCOS into light.

And various other reasons.

What do you do now?

Well, the doc is going to put me on a medication called clomid, ovidrel, and perform an IUI.

This should increase my chances of getting pregnant from 3% to 12%!

Miracle number four, medical technology!

My doctor will only perform 3 rounds of this, if they each fail, then we discuss other options.

Is there anything I can do for you?

Just keep us in your prayers.

We realize that all of this is in our Heavenly Fathers hands.

All we can do is try our best to do everything in our power, and acknowledge that he is in control.

I also want you all to realize that we aren't sharing this for pity.

We are sharing this information because we finally have answers that we can tell people!

It's felt like a big secret part of our lives that only our immediate family and a few friends knew about because we've been in the dark for so long! It's nice to finally be able to tell people a true reason why we aren't pregnant with a second kid yet, or why Tresann acts wacky sometimes!

=)

But most importantly, so that way if there is some other couple going through this out there they know they are not alone and hopefully we can help each other!