Friday, November 22, 2013

Baby Westwood

This is a post that I've dreamed about writing for years, 3 to be exact. How did I finally arrive here? Through the fasting and prayers of probably about 100 family and friends, joined with our faith to create this miracle. That is what this baby is, a miracle.

When Scott and I moved to Arizona, it was like we started completely over with a new OB and a new fertility specialist. We had to go through the exact things we had done 6 months previously in Utah. I had a reoccurance of polyps and a cyst that did not want to go away. All of these things prevented us from moving forward with treatment for months. Many wet pillows and many humble prayers later, we were able to start treatment. We both felt that the most basic treatment was what we needed to do. We both felt strongly that invitro was not for us. We met with our fertility doctor and he basically told us with our history that we had about 4-5% chance of becoming pregnant on our own or with this basic treatment. He suggested a step above that (not to invitro) and Scott and I still felt that we needed to stay with the basic treatment, not just because it was half the price but we just knew the other steps were not for us and we wouldn't do it if we had the money. After that appointment I was a bit discouraged. 4-5% chance of getting pregnant seemed like an impossible endeavor. Fortunately I have a husband who told me that those odds mean nothing when we have faith and words that had promised us this blessing.

During the time that we were trying to get my body fixed before starting the medication, we had a lesson in Young Women's about faith. The teacher talked about a boat and how it has two oars. One of these oars is hope and the other is works, and faith can't move unless we are doing both. I went home and discussed this with Scott and asked him what we were doing to work towards this. Well, we had been to the doctor, we prayed for it each night and fasted each fast Sunday, but what more could we do? We then had general conference and after one of the sessions we both came to the conclusion that we needed to ask for help. We needed to enlist our family in the cause and ask them to have a special fast for us. It took us a few months to finally ask for this. We asked some members in our ward, our immediate families and some of our extended family. We figure there was about 100 people fasting for us that day. We felt so much love that day surrounding us, even though we weren't close to family. At this time we had finished one round of treatment and had started a second. After the first round, I knew we needed this experience to receive an answer to our prayers. However, I was 99% sure I wasn't pregnant when I had to go in for the blood test that month. Every thing in my body felt just the opposite of pregnancy. Needless to say, I was shocked when I got the call saying I was pregnant. I waited until I got home from work to tell Scott (5 hours of keeping the secret). I got home and Scott asked if I had gotten a call from the doctor. I told him we were pregnant and we hugged and cried and then he told me that he had known for about a week (due to my hormonal behavior). We immediatly knelt down and thanked our Heavenly Father for this blessing and prayed for a healthy pregnancy.

I had a scare at 5 weeks, which is when I miscarried with my first pregnancy 2 1/2 years prior, so it was very scary. Luckily everything was fine. We kept it a secret from our immediate family until 10 1/2 weeks when I had another scare and went to the emergency room. Luckily, again, it was a false alarm and everything was fine. But we felt that they should know so they could keep us in their prayers. I'd got texts for the next week from my sister saying she was praying so hard for us, and calls from my parents making sure I was doing alright. After each doctor appointment, we'd tell a few more people in our lives. I've felt very cautious about telling people throughout this pregnancy.

At this point I'm 17 weeks and feeling really good. I feel like myself again which is nice after being sick. Every morning (and everytime I get up in the night to go to the bathroom), I'm reminded of this little miracle inside. I've been feeling movement for a few weeks which is incredible! Sometimes it doesn't seem real and then I feel a flutter and I'm reminded that this is no joke. It's a little intimidating to think that there is a little one that is depending on me to nourish them and make sure they are safe. But I'm so excited to meet our child, I just love that there will be a person that is half me and half Scott, what an amazing thing!

We were able to see our baby this week. This was the first time I've been able to see him/her with legs and arms and a head (Scott got to see him/her when we went to the hospital but I couldn't see the monitor). Baby Westwood (BW) was kicking and moving around. It was so fun to watch him/her. As for the sex of the baby, we will find out but not until Christmas day. The umbilical cord was in the way, so he wasn't positive what BW is but he is going to take another peak at our appointment the week before Christmas.

Our due date is April 28th, 2014. And here's a couple of pictures to prove it's real.