Yet we rejoice

"But yet we rejoice in our suffering because we know suffering produces perseverance...perservance character..and character hope...and hope will never disappoint us." - Romans 5:3-5

The holidays and the end of the year were nothing short of a rollercoaster....and not just a small roller coaster. They were more something along the lines of Millennium Force.

About two weeks before Thanksgiving, my grandma (maternal) was taken into the hospital due to severe GI issues. After running some tests in the hospital, it turned out she had a bowel blockage and was suffering the effects of this. This bowel blockage was a result of pancreatic cancer progression - we had found out sometime shortly before that she had pancreatic cancer but at her age the doctors were not pursuing treatment (radiation/chemo) and they had talked to her and us about this. So we knew the time would come when she wouldn't be with us..but not how quickly. After this recent admission, the doctors gave her an estimated 2-3 weeks whether she put a stint in or not (though this would allow her to have more liquids and be a little more comfortable). They also said they would do a whipple, a much more intense surgery to remove the cancer) if that's what she wanted but that recovery would be a long and hard road and that the cancer would likely come back in a year. If you knew my grandmother, you would easily be able to guess which option she would choose, with no hesitation and in no more than the blink of an eye. She was ready to meet her Jesus and she had been for a long time. In fact, the first thing she said when Tim and I arrived at the hospital was "Well, they told me I get to go to be with Jesus here in about 2 weeks." Bless her heart, she was nothing if not transparent. So she got the stint put in and we took her home to be on hospice. We took shifts as a family being with her at home 24/7 while we waited for the day to come that she wouldn't be with us.  We never imagined how long we would be blessed to have with her (on hospice) before that time came.

My grandma had a very large family - 8 children biologically and somewhere around 20 grandchildren and 19 great grandchildren. With such a large family, she got a lot of "requests" when it came to her leaving us. First everyone told her "Well you love Thanksgiving so you can't die yet because we want you to have another Thanksgiving with us". And she lived to see Thanksgiving and enjoy spending it with much of her family. Then it was my Uncle Mike's hunting season and so of course she needed to live for that...and the list went on. She was ready to go but she continued to live through these events and told us she kept hearing God tell her "not yet".

Graves Thanksgiving 2017

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Beautiful even on hospice

While this was all happening, Tim and I were going through a lot personally ourselves. As previously mentioned here, we have been on a journey to add to our family and have been battling infertility. Initially we didn't tell many people and still to this day it is really hard to talk about. However, we are doing our best to learn to lean on those around us in our weakness because we know that this, with all its pain and twists and turns, is life. It's hard and painful but it needs to be talked about, because we aren't the only ones going through this and couples should not have to walk through this alone. So we talk about it to bring glory to God in the mess and heartache that it is, because we know He is making it a beautiful story of redemption. We are now about a year and a half into this journey and recently we have had a lot of new twists and turns within this journey. I have been working with a fertility specialist who provides Mercier Therapy, a physical therapist, and a functional medicine doctor for almost a year as we've pursued more of a natural route to restoring my fertility and have seen improvements in many ways. However, I just felt like something was missing and I needed to explore other options as well as time went on. We saw three different specialists and got three different options as far as routes to pursue. We also have gained more information about what specifically is causing all of the issues we've been having.

We got multiple confirmations that I was dealing with PCOS - Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. This means my body will produce follicles, but instead of turning these into eggs when the time is right, these develop into cysts and as a result for women with PCOS their ovaries will be covered with many, many cysts over time. There are a lot of side effects that come with this - poor blood sugar regulation, difficulty with weight management, etc, etc. I had been feeling the effects of this for awhile and honestly wasn't that surprised with this diagnosis. I had everything they look for when they go to diagnose PCOS - cysts on my ovaries by ultrasound, abnormal hormone levels (LH greater than or equal to FSH), and irregular cycles.  What hit harder to home with this diagnosis was that many of the specialists did not believe - looking at my blood work, etc - that I had ovulated in quite some time. This hurt - and for awhile I was really angry about this. I felt like I had wasted so much time and energy the last year trying when in reality I wasn't producing any eggs anyway. We also had quite a few specialists (and myself) that suspected endometriosis due to my history and symptoms. However, we would not know for sure if I had this without a laparoscopy (surgery to look and see).

One of the specialists we saw recommended a IUI (intrauterine insemination) cycle with injectables - so I would inject myself with hormones to develop "follicles", then inject myself with a trigger shot to induce ovulation, then go in for an IUI once I ovulate. Depending on if that worked, we would try another IUI or proceed to IVF (in vitro fertilization). He was hopeful the cycle of injectables would resolve the hormonal imbalance we were seeing but also said there was a risk that we would develop too many follicles (and as such a high risk of multiples) and have to cancel the cycle and move straight to IVF. The chance of it (the IUI) working was around 20%. Another specialist suggested I start Metformin (a diabetic drug to control blood sugar regulation) and also go in for an explorative laparoscopy (and excision, if found) for suspected endometriosis. He said if Metformin worked I would likely need to stay on it well into my first pregnancy and immediately resume taking it after delivering...it was likely I would continue taking the medication for far into the foreseeable future. He also talked about performing an ovarian diathermy if needed for my PCOS (he would cauterize the inside of my ovary with the goal being to restore normal hormone levels by treating the area where the incorrect signals were coming from).

The last specialist was a Napro specialist...their goal is to help a woman to conceive as naturally as possible by resolving whatever the underlying issues are..so they don't use ART (assisted reproductive technology).  We wanted to get his opinion on surgery for endometriosis, as we had been told by my current providers that the type of surgery he would do would be the best in regards to minimal adhesions. These specialists are not very common and of the few of them many don't do the surgeries associated with this specialty. There were only 3 in the state of Indiana who would do surgery as well...two in Mishawaka, IN and one in Fort Wayne, IN. We had our initial consult with a provider in Mishawaka, IN (about 3 hours from us). Typically they will have a woman start with creighton charting - this charting is meant to help a woman achieve or prevent pregnancy (without birth control) and can also be used as a diagnostic tool to determine whether a woman has underlying issues that may impact fertility and what they are. Once the woman charts, they can move onto diagnostics to look more into what is going on - blood work, ultrasounds, etc. Then they can determine whether they need to add in medications, supplements, etc or look at surgical intervention. In our case, we had already done a lot of the diagnostic testing to figure out what was going on versus starting with creighton charting so we talked about proceeding with surgery with him and then going onto creighton charting afterward. He suggested a two part surgery - the first being an explorative lapascopy to check for endometriosis and to observe my ovaries and uterus for other abnormalities (including PCOS). The second part would include excision of the endometriosis should they find it as well as an Ovarian Wedge Resection for the PCOS. The wedge resection would involve cutting out a portion of my ovaries and then sewing them back together...the goal of this is similar to the diathermy...treat where the incorrect signals are coming from and restore proper hormone levels by doing so. It would also restore my ovaries to a more normal size (as with PCOS they are enlarged). Once he did the surgery, we would start creighton charting and then proceed with medications as needed - including potentially using clomid or injectables as needed to induce ovulation should this not naturally occur after the surgery.

All of the specialists were wonderful about taking their time to sit with us and talk through all of our options and answer all our questions. Each of them sat with us for an hour or more and were more than happy to answer my (many) questions. They were more than happy to support us no matter which path we chose. Ultimately, we chose to pursue surgery with the NaPro surgeon. For us, we chose this due to a couple different factors. The largest factor was that we felt this was the next step God was calling us toward. After we left the appointment with him, I kept hearing lines from the poem "The road not taken" in my mind. This surgery definitely felt like a path less taken - not many people knew about these providers and I didn't know any woman that had undergone a wedge resection. I kept hearing the last line of Frost's poem repeated in my mind - "Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference". I felt like God was telling me to take the path less taken but also to walk boldly forward in His grace - not to second guess myself as I took this path. I also felt he was telling me not to second guess myself for the choices we had made thus far. It had felt like such a long road for us so far and I was having some serious moments of discouragement - wondering if I would have done this, would we have gotten pregnancy faster, etc. I also felt like we had come so far trying to get pregnant as naturally as possible and I just wasn't ready - and didn't think my body was ready - for these new (and somewhat) harsh medicines and hormones to be introduced. I didn't want to force my body to do something it wasn't ready to do because I didn't feel I was healthy enough that this would be good for a baby or me - I was struggling with fatigue, and nausea, and migraines, and a whole list of other problems and symptoms due to these conditions and felt these still needed addressed before I could carry a healthy pregnancy. I also was discouraged by the idea of having to proceed with IUI, metformin, etc again should we get pregnant with them - as they would help me get pregnant but I was likely to have the same problems after I delivered. In my heart, I still desired to try to fix the root problem (hopefully, God willing) so that this and future pregnancies would not involve medical interventions like IUI and other drugs - and that I would begin to feel better in the process. Not saying I am against these options or procedures for me or the countless other women that have chosen them - there may come a day when we would need them should this not work and I pray God will prepare our hearts no matter the outcome. However, at this time they weren't where I felt I was being called.

So, we prepped for surgery. We would go in for two surgeries in the month of December - one around my birthday (Happy birthday to me, right?) and another just after Christmas (Merry Christmas?).

After the first surgery, we found out that I did indeed have endometriosis - though thankfully it was considered "Mild". We also found my ovaries were enlarged and stretched due to my PCOS. Both expected. Somewhat unexpected, we found out I had a uterine infection. So our surgeon suggested a three part plan to address these....We would go back in for excision of the endometriosis and a wedge resection of both ovaries after Christmas. We would also do a month long round of antibiotics to address the uterine infection. He knew we were somewhat hesitant on the wedge resection (since we didn't know that many people that had done it), but we were hopeful and leaning toward it due to the statistics - a 60% chance I would start ovulating again! He was happy to wait on the wedge resection should we have chosen this and wanted to try clomid or other medications again (with creighton charting this time) first, but said if we were at our "boiling point" with everything he was also happy to do the surgery now. We were definitely at our boiling point...and felt we had been there for awhile...so we chose to proceed with the surgery.

Post 1st surgery

It took my awhile to heal from the first surgery - my incisions had bled unexpectedly and the gas from surgery had been worse than I expected. So no sooner than I was feeling somewhat back to myself, we went in again for the second part. This time, it was a little longer procedure and I had 5 incisions instead of 2. Luckily, just as the doctor had said, the gas was better with the second procedure because it had more incisions to escape from! However, my incisions hurt more this time also and I cramped a lot more. As Tim said - "Well he did cut your ovaries in half, so you do have reason to hurt." You've got to laugh or else you'll cry right?

Post 2nd Surgery - definitely swollen

My sweet snuggle buddy - begging for a treat. I had a bad migraine spell after the 2nd surgery for 4-5 days and apples were all that sounded good! Ali thought so too...

Cue back to our time with my grandma...Right before I went in for the first surgery we had told my grandma more about what was going on - I had been spending a lot of time with her at her home while she was on hospice and had talked to her about what we were going through. I had explained to her about how I likely wasn't ovulating and we were looking at our next steps. Her reaction reveals a lot about her faith....She said "Oh that is a problem. Well....I'll be praying you'll have a baby while I'm here but if it doesn't happen while I'm here I'll be praying for you to have a baby when I'm in Heaven. You'll have a baby, I just know it. " Sweet, sweet soul. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. In our typical fashion, my family and I kept telling her she had to stay with us "just a little bit longer" to pray for me as I went through these surgeries. So she made it through my first surgery and recovery and we continued to care for her at home. And then we prepared to go in for my second surgery and we told her she had to make it through that one of course too. She kept telling us God kept telling her "Not yet." The day of my second surgery, my aunt was staying with her and was telling my mom that she was praying for us with my aunt as we went through the surgery and when my mom called to tell them the news that I was out and doing okay she was excited. Since these were both outpatient surgeries, we went home the night of (rather late, since it was a 3 hour drive there and back) - so we were home that night and spent the day after resting up. That next morning after my second surgery, my grandma went into a coma while at home and we knew the end was near - she was happy - smiling and peaceful - but unresponsive. Much of my family went to be with her - to sit with her that day and night - but we couldn't due to the weather being bad (icy/snowy) and the fear I would fall and mess up one of my incisions. She ended up passing away early Saturday morning - just shortly after my second surgery which took place on Thursday morning of that week.

Since we had so much longer with her than we expected - about 7 weeks  instead of the anticipated 2-3 weeks - we were thankful for all the extra time we had with her. Tim and I were especially thankful to have her as our "prayer warrior" during this time. But it was also hard when the time finally came to say goodbye. Recovering from the second surgery was hard - emotionally and physically. My body hurt but my heart hurt even more as we said goodbye to this sweet angel on earth. When she was diagnosed, and when she eventually passed, it was really hard for me personally knowing that she would never meet our children, that they would never know her and the many unique and wonderful facets of her personality. She truly was a woman like no other - you had to meet her to know what I mean. For awhile, I was really angry with God that he would allow us to go through this journey of infertility and also that it would last thing length to where I wouldn't get to see her hold my children, love them, and pray over them. Thankfully, as we prepared to say goodbye, God slowly worked on my heart. As I talked with her, I knew in my heart of hearts that she wouldn't get to meet our children here....but that she would by all means have her prayers, blessings, and hands all over them before they ever meet us here on this earth. I know in my heart of hearts that when the time comes that God calls this journey we're on to an end and we get to experience the joy of being parents (biologically or not) that she will be smiling and looking over them. How blessed are our future kids to have that kind of a guardian angel?

 The world will definitely not be the same without her - but how beautiful that her life and story as she ended her life will be a sweet reminder of her when we eventually have kids? And how beautiful is it that she will live on in our kids and her (many) family? Even in the "family" that isn't blood related - those lives she touched so deeply that they became family? We are so thankful that she is finally with her Jesus - something she has longed for so long. As the priest said at her funeral, she definitely had the mentality that when her time to go had come she was ready, heart and soul - because she knew being in Heaven was far better than being here.

We mourn that we don't get to be with her here on Earth, but we rejoice for her that she is home. Until we meet again, we know she is with the Father, interceding for her family as she talks to the Father, just as she talked to Him in her prayers here. Until we meet again in Heaven, we remember her sweet spirit and find peace knowing she is at rest in His presence.

Back at our wedding - August 2014