Loooooooong

I’m in the middle of yet another very long cycle, 45 days, and it’s so frustrating to never know from month to month how long or short my cycles will be. I’m sure those of you who have been in similar situations know how tough and challenging it is to go through long cycles. I’m extra crabby, extra PMSy, and it seems to go on and on and on forever, my body doesn’t seem to know what it’s supposed to do and it feels confused.

It doesn’t help when I’m going through a long cycle like this, to have people ask, “So do you have kids yet?” It just makes me extra sad and extra crabby. LOL, I do feel very sorry for my poor husband during these times, having to put up with me. Thank you Lord for a patient and understanding husband!

I am hoping that soon I will start seeing results with this Red Clover Tea I’ve been drinking, but I’ve only been drinking it a little over a week, and I’m not supposed to start seeing results until after 3 weeks that I’ve been drinking it. So perhaps by next cycle it will start doing good things to my body, I certainly hope so.

In other random news….I can’t believe I’ll be 25 on the 9th of February. Seems like just yesterday I couldn’t believe I was 18 and graduating, now look where I am and what I’m doing. Crazy how life speeds up as you get older!

And now….I will go drink my coffee and relish in the quiet afternoon that is the Lord’s day.

Haiti

For some reason, up until last night I hadn’t thought too much about Haiti, I guess perhaps because it’s so far away from the US and wasn’t at the forefront of my mind. But last night as my husband and I were watching the live telathon dedicated to raising money and support for Haiti, things changed.

We had only been watching it a few minutes, when a special report started on the medical need in Haiti – and a doctor showed a tiny precious baby whom he had cared for, probably only a few weeks old, that’s when my heart felt like ripping from my chest. This morning as I type this, my heart is aching yet again.

Then there were more children in the special report, and more babies, oh I can’t tell you how fast the tears started flowing. So many children and babies are going to be orphans after this major tragedy, and I feel such a burden to help, even in some small way, and I don’t know if we’ll be able to do anything, but I found myself thinking, what if our baby is over there? What if we were meant to rescue one little life and change it forever?

I researched Haiti adoptions online last night, and found that all Haiti adoptions are being put on a standstill, because of the tragedy – and it makes total sense, what if a child got adopted, and then someday the parents of that child were found alive and looking for them, oh that would be awful!

But I definitely want to stay updated, because I know after a few months or longer, when all of the parents have been found and yet there are still so many orphans, I don’t know if the Lord will want us to look into adoption, but my heart is open and so ready, I want to be prepared always.

Will you join me in praying for the country of Haiti? And ask yourself, what can you do to help this tragic stricken people?

Natural Remedies

So a friend of mine who’s mother is a natural herbalist told me that she has helped many a woman regulate their cycles and get pregnant. I would love to try a few more natural things before I do anything too medically invasive, so this woman has recommended Red Clover Tea for me and Ginseng for Jesse.

I researched both online and they seem to have really good articles on how both products help with fertility. From what I have been reading, red clover is one of the most popular fertility remedies. It has phytoestrogens that help with hormone imbalance, and it’s supposed to help nourish the uterus and relax the nervous system, which helps enable conception.

Ginseng is also a popular herbal remedy, and is supposed to increase testosterone levels, sperm count and sperm motility. Speaking of male fertility, my husband is going to finally get tested and is making an appointment for sometime next week. I highly doubt anything is wrong with him since my cycles are so wacked, but it will be nice to have him tested and hopefully be able to rule him out.

I’m very excited to try these natural remedies, and I might even start taking my temps again if I can find my thermometer, and I might get some ovulation predictor kits and try them again, who knows, maybe now that my cycles and periods aren’t as wacked as they used to be, it might be able to tell me whether or not I am ovulating.

I’ll keep you updated on these natural remedies, maybe they’ll work, I’m at least hopeful enough to give them a shot.

Live.....because Life is Everything!

I found a wonderful and beautiful poem online today, and I wanted to share it. The author is unknown.

“Smile – It makes a world of difference.
Dance – Who knows when you won’t be able to.
Cry – Holding those emotions in is bad for you.
Hug – Helps you and helps another.
Laugh – What’s the point in hiding happiness?
Live – because life is everything.”

How many times do I want to curl up and cry, or be depressed that I’m not a mother? Well definitely many more times than I can count. But reading this poem, I am again reminded that I must live in the moment and enjoy life right now while I’m waiting for the Lord to grant my wish. I can’t miss big and even small opportunities, right here and right now just because I’m so wrapped up in the sadness of my trials.

And I wish this were a lesson that I only had to preach to myself once and be done with it, but alas I will have to preach it to myself many more times. And I will have to be constantly reminded of it, whether that’s what I want or not.

I must ponder this poem and try to take it to heart….it will make my life so much fuller.

Our Baby Journey

My name is Anna Sullivan, I have been happily married for 3 years to my wonderful husband Jesse and we live in Minnesota. We have been trying to get pregnant now since May of 2008 and it is proving to be a LOT harder than we originally thought it would be.

I thought it would be a neat idea to start blogging about this difficult journey so someday we can look back and see how the Lord completely worked through every aspect and detail of the entire journey. And hopefully I can help encourage others who are going through similar situations.

So where are we right now in this journey? I got off of birth control in May of 2008, and since then my body has not gotten back to normal, and who knows when it will. We haven’t done really any testing because of busy schedules and/or finances, but my husband is actually going to get tested this next week and I believe it takes a couple of weeks for those results to come in. That was the first step we wanted to take, so after that, we’ll probably look into some more testing options for myself in the spring since in May, we will have been trying for 2 years.

I would love to look into adoption and have considered it and thought about it quite a lot, in fact I would love to adopt even if we are able to have our own children someday. We probably won’t look further into adoption until I have had more extensive tests done, so we’ll see what happens with those and go from there.

The Lord has been teaching me a lot during these past 19 months, some I’m still learning and will probably never full learn or understand, and it’s hard to not get down and depressed about the whole thing from time to time. Especially when I see so many people who have gotten pregnant right off of birth control and have no issues whatsoever. I find myself asking “why me?” all the time, because when we first started trying we truly believed that the Lord was wanting us to get pregnant and have a baby. So why has it taken this long if it was His will and He’d given us peace? I don’t know.

So many questions, so few answers, but I do have a huge God that knows what He’s doing, He just hasn’t shared it with me yet, so hopefully He will soon. And if now, I have to just keep trying to patiently wait and trust on Him.

I hope you are encouraged by my blog, and please feel free to comment on anything that I write, I’d love to hear from you.

Anna