Last year in August I was contacted by Prevention Magazine to add to one of their articles on knowing your body and listening to it. I had never heard of Prevention Magazine at that point. Ok, so I do not generally read magazines. Who has the time with little ones? I can tell you that has changed. I do not have a subscription, but I do pick it up once in a while when I see something that I feel is more applicable to me.
I am not the work out kind of person. I am simply not motivated to do so. I will do it if it is disguised as sports. That’s my kind of work out. I cannot stick to something that takes a huge amount of time or discipline. I know I am sharing my soft pink underbelly, but it is truthful. One of the things that I wanted to change in this year is that I wanted to be more disciplined in all areas of life.
When I was at the grocery store I saw the January release. The title was, “Win Back Your Metabolism!” I would kill to have my old metabolism back. So I bought it. I got home and immediately got into the tub. (My only place I read and my place of respite) The children were at school, the animals were shut out and the whole world melted away. I started reading the article entitled, “Fast Track your Fat Loss”. It was a concept of walking 3-4 times a day yet in 10-minute slots. That was something I could live with. That is about the limit of my attention span so I thought I would give it a shot. It was still working out 30-40 minutes a day, but it was disguised as only 10 minutes of my life. Could I build a habit of good health instead of sabotaging myself into letting my perfectionism and expectations of myself get in the way?
Last week I was really wondering if I could give myself that break.
I am taking the baby steps. I started yesterday. I am actually nervous that I might actually succeed. If that isn’t nuts enough I keep wondering if I should actually keep up with this that I might be healthy again. The thought of it seems so simple. I have been fighting PCOS for so long that I have accepted myself long ago for who I was and where I was physically, emotionally, medically…etc. To think that by taking 10 minutes of my life 3 times a day is something that I don’t feel I would get bored with. I think I could live with this. I pray I can do this every day. I had given up long ago that PCOS would rule my life. I laid down and let it trample me. For the first time since I was 20 when we first saw the signs of this terrible disease I feel hopeful and a spirit of lashing out, rebellion, stubborn. I feel my spirit rising as if to have the fight of my life. Truly it is. Truly it is the fight for my life.

As I face this week I wonder to myself why I am even having to face this decision. Obviously it is something that happened because of PCOS taking over my body, but why? Why is there not more research going into understanding PCOS?
According to this 7% of women face this and as many as up to 10% because some do go undiagnosed. That is a huge percentage when you think about leading causes of death. Of the leading five causes of death in women, PCOS can cause all five.
I swear this is going to be my mission and my bandwagon. May be I’ll start an organization to make people more aware and raise funds to get more research and battle it. Who knows how far this will take me?

Thank heavens for family. That’s all I have to say. Yesterday I was tingly from here to there so my sister offered to take my car and pick up my kiddos. She also brought my goddaughter over for a visit and to stay the night to help. Let me tell you…she was a help. At 16 she’s a HUGE help with the children.
Today is a better day. There is some feeling returning to my legs and midsection. Although my midsection is not improving as fast as the other.
Thank you again for all of your well wishes and prayers. I can officially report that I can at least walk around a little and I forcast an even better today.
Hugs to all

After I had Hula Girl I started talking with my one friends about how wonderful being a mother was and how exciting it was. She had been married for 2 years. I did not know that they had struggled with fertility. I kept wondering why our friendship seemed strained. I had never been so happy but she wasn’t sharing in my joy. Well…duh they were struggling. I did not know though. I went along talking about how I wished they would have children so we could do play dates…etc when our children got older. Finally she cracked. She poured out her heart as to how she felt every time she saw me with Hula Girl. It took a piece of her away. It bothered her to the core of her being because she wanted a child the same way I wanted our lovely Hula Girl. I felt horrible. I supported her 100% in their quest for a baby. I listened at midnight when her husband was asleep, I helped give her shots a few times for the treatments. Recently I held her hand while they did ultra sounds and poking and prodding AGAIN.
For years now there has been zero progress with them until now.
I can finally share it. YAY! After 12 years of marriage and 4 IVF’s they are now 32 weeks along. This has been a terrible secret to keep! I am thrilled for them. Of course they shall remain nameless BUT I have named them Blessed.
So the Blessed family will have a little bundle of joy the middle of August and I am thrilled. Oh and the catch to this little story is…this is an adoption. Their niece that is very young is having the baby. Everything is set and in place. Now we are praying for a healthy delivery and a smooth transition. Congrats and you know who you are!!
They wanted me to pass along a little glimpse of hope for those that are reading this and struggling with fertility. There is hope. Whether the joy comes in the form of a child between the struggling couple or a gift from another it is truly a blessed gift. Keep the faith.

A few months ago I wrote about a friend of mine that had a tubal ligation. 2 years after the ligation she found herself pregnant again. What they decided happened was that she had the tubal the day after her delivery and everything internally was swollen. This resulted in a tubal ligation that did not take.
When I was 18 my mother became pregnant again. This was indeed a very strange thing to us because after my sister’s birth my mother got her tubes tied. My sister was 17. The baby did in fact die after being delivered at 26 weeks.
I have been hearing more and more people tell their stories of pregnancy after sterilization. I have been wondering the cause. Reasoning for this is that my husband had “the big V” and we (meaning he) do not want any more children. I do not want to get a tubal but he thought it might be good if we were both done to prevent pregnancy all together. So I asked my gynecologist about this. This was his response…
Generally most women want a tubal after giving birth. A one stop shop so to speak. He will not do this. He feels that after birth the internal organs are swollen from birth. So when everything is clip, snipped, tied, burned, whatever the case may be it goes through a normal healing process just like giving birth but with a little twist. There is more of a likeliness of pregnancy (regular or ectopic) if the procedure is done right away as opposed to waiting 6 weeks. Swollen internal organs go back to their normal size, thus causing the surgery to may be not be as effective as once planned. Now if one should have a c section then yes it would be good to go ahead and have the tubal at that point because you are already open and they are up and personal with your insides and can “calculate” a little better.
OK the thought of this still scares me. Hubby thought that it might be good to have double insurance. My response is still the same….Nope! I’ll take my chances!

This post is not for the weak at heart. If you are suffering with fertility issues THIS MAY BE A POST YOU WANT TO SEE.
When my husband and I were first married we wanted children right away. We got pregnant about 3 months into our marriage and at 8 weeks we lost that pregnancy. Then about 1 year later we found out that we had a positive test again. We went in and they said that the urine test showed positive but the blood test showed negative….
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