Me, Myself, and I... Empowering My Conception

Is Shame Getting The Best Of Your Fertility? Are you worried about getting pregnant? Do you think all your eggs have gone bad? Are you mad at yourself or your partner for waiting too long to try for a baby?Did someone tell you that you are too old to get pregnant naturally?  These are the types of worries I hear about day in and day out in my clinic.  And, I wish it weren't the case, but it is: women are dealing with a tremendous amount of shame surrounding their age and their ability to get pregnant.  

As a women's health and fertility expert who got pregnant naturally at the age of 40 (after only a few months of trying!) I am here to quell your fears.  I have been helping women optimize their health and fertility for over a decade and what I see over and over again is that your ability to get pregnant has less to do with your age and more to do with your overall health.  You see, pregnancy is a physiological luxury—one that all women, up until their mid to late 40's—should be able to enjoy if they are in optimal health.  As I always say, when a women's body is in optimal health, getting pregnant comes naturally because that is what the female body is primed to do. However, when the body is under duress or is malnourished or sleep deprived or depressed it does not have the reserves to procreate.  Rather, it is in survival mode and creating another life and nourishing and nurturing it for ten months it is out of the question.  Think about it, how can a body that is barely surviving itself get pregnant?

On top of that, the hard data does not support the fact that fertility declines dramatically with age. Yes, fertility declines as we get older, but not nearly to the extent we are led to believe.  Most information out there on age and fertility tells us that one in three women (about 33%) over the age of 35 will NOT get pregnant naturally after one year of trying.  Yet, the science says something different: a women's odds of conceiving within one year of trying from age 35 to 40 is only about 7% to 8% less than that of a women aged 27 to 30 (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/07/how-long-can-you-wait-to-have-a-baby/309374/).  Furthermore, there is emerging scientific research that supports the fact that physiological age (meaning how old our cells are) plays a much greater role in fertility (and health) than does chronological age (how many years old we are) (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3857638/)

What does all this mean to you?  Bottom line: you can shift your health and improve your fertility.  Yes, you can!  Even if you've been told you have low ovarian reserve, you can still improve the quality of the eggs you do have left.  You can always improve the quality of your overall health and it is from a place of abundant and flourishing health that life can be created.  My advice: focus less on your age and more on your health. 

My C-Section... and the healing thereafter.

Watching birthing videos, and hearing about all these vaginal births fills me with so much love and hope. However, I can’t help but feel hurt and bitterness towards my cesarean...

April is Cesarean Awareness month, and every motherhood page I follow has been acknowledging C-sections as equal of a birthing experience as natural or vaginal birth. In my head I’m thinking, 'Damn right, they are!'. But, that’s completely opposite of what I feel, and the broken heart for the natural birth I wanted shows. My first born, Elias Foxx, was my fighter babe, delivered via cesarean.

3 weeks and 5 days was how far along I was when I visited the clinic. It was also when I found out my blood type is Rh negative. What? What does that even mean?? So, the Rh factor is a type of protein on the surface of red blood cells. If you have the Rh factor, you are Rh-positive. If you do not have the Rh factor, you are Rh-negative. When you are Rh-negative, you may develop antibodies to an Rh-positive baby. If a small amount of the baby’s blood mixes with your blood, (which often happens), your body may respond as if it were allergic to the baby. Your body may make antibodies to the Rh antigens in the baby’s blood, in which then you become sensitized, and your antibodies can cross the placenta and attack your baby’s blood... resulting in serious illness, brain damage, or even death in the fetus or newborn. Scary thing to first hear as a new mother, right? So schedules for Rhlg (Rhogam) injections throughout my pregnancy were made aside from the usual pokes and pricks.

Around week 16 for blood samples, I learn I am a carrier for fragile-x. What?? Onto lesson number 2... Fragile X syndrome is a genetic condition that causes intellectual disability, behavioral and learning challenges and various physical characteristics. (I will provide links so you can find out more information about being Rh-negative and about fragile X syndrome. Also, I'll have a partial video of my C-section.) Of course, fear is planted.  We get an amniocentesis (the scariest thing aside the cesarean itself), only to find out our baby has all 46 chromosomes, not even a carrier, and a boy. I was tired of feeling like a lab rat and at that point of my pregnancy, all I wanted was a natural birth, the way our womanly bodies were created for. From week 34 through the last 39, there was no change in Elias’ position, and my OBGYN scheduled me for the cesarean.

I couldn’t help but feel helpless, and a sense of guilt, as if I was not good enough and that my body was failing to perform up to it’s God-created potential. I was beginning to enter a dark place. I was angry with myself, feeling undeserving to my child, and I constantly thought my OBGYN just wanted another (c-section) so she could go on with her schedule of other deliveries (mostly cesarean at that hospital as so I’ve discovered). It was towards the end of my pregnancy that I finally sat myself down with my journal and just prayed for peace with having the cesarean, and that if there was the possibility of having a natural, vaginal birth that God would make the way of having that happen.

From the breech positioning to the Rh-negative scares,  and being a carrier for fragile-x, all I wanted in the end was my baby boy in my arms. Unlike other mothers, I did not struggle with gestational diabetes, my uterus was not abnormal, nor was my baby too large to deliver vaginally. During my cesarean, actually, I was having contractions that ended up prolonging the procedure, and his head got stuck in my uterus through the incision! So they had to cut more to get him out. (You'll see where one of the nurses ask my sister to stop filming.) If only I had planned out this pregnancy and found the support I needed. Perhaps I could have had the birth the way I believe women were so divinely created to... But, the cesarean happened... and my son is here alive and well.

Don't get me wrong… I'm more than grateful for the wellbeing of my son.  Nor am I shaming those who choose to have a cesarean out of convenience.  But, the fact my son was not born the way I dreamt, naturally, is still a hard pill to swallow. When my husband and I decide on the time for our family to grow, we will take the initiative to do our research, look for a doctor who is willing to go for a VBAC as long as I am eligible, and that the hospital or birthing center doesn’t have a high cesarean percentage.

For you mothers who look at your scars everyday... I am with you. When you see those beautiful birthing videos and photos or crowning and prolonged umbilical cord cutting... I am with you. When you hear about other mother's water births and how many hours of labor they were in... I am with you. When you think of how you were not the first to hold your baby... I am with you. When the memory of being alone in that OR while your baby was taken off... I am with you. I pray that the voids in our hearts our filled with love, hope, and peace. I pray this will bring unity for the mothers out there with this same hidden hurt that we realize, “Hey, I am still upset about this,  and that’s OK.” 

One day I'll heal,  I'm sure.  But until then, I have every right to mourn over the reoccurring moments of grief not having the birth I wanted for my son. So do you.

http://americanpregnancy.org/pregnancy-complications/rh-factor/

Fragile X Syndrome - National Fragile X Foundation

7/11 Lotto Ticket

"Truth is, what those dear, sweet people (carrying nothing but positive intentions) seemed to be missing, was that the baby that I carried for 10 weeks in my womb was real, and should have been reverenced as so."

I was pregnant...Receiving this news in June was kind of a big deal. My mother's birthday was in June. She had passed away two years prior, and finding out this news during her birthday month felt as though she had personally whispered in God's ear to hear our prayers for a baby. Jon and I had decided that after waiting eight years to add to our family, (our oldest being eight), it was officially time to "try" for a little one. And so we did...We found out we were pregnant in June, and were completely over the moon. We sorted through baby names. Played guessing games regarding gender. Attended multiple garage sales. Loaded up on bassinets and bouncers, all in preparation for our little light's entrance into our world.

July 4th..I'm awake. I go to the bathroom to find that I am bleeding. I am bleeding. I'm not on my period. I am pregnant. Why am I bleeding? My husband calls the midwife. We try our best to describe what we are seeing. We see blood. That's what we see. My midwife instructs me to lay down, as my bleeding wasn't heavy, AND  (fun fact), there are some women who spot during pregnancy. I lay down and fall asleep. I wake to find that my bleeding is minimal and barely there. We run to the hospital, as a precaution.  After a vaginal exam and an ultrasound..we see our little one is still there. Heart is beating. Life is there. The doctor who performed my exam said, "Your body is deciding whether this is a viable pregnancy. Go home. Take it easy." 

The next couple of weeks consisted of me "taking it easy" and my body "deciding". I would visit the doctor again, to find a heartbeat, and our baby & my body still deciding. I didn't leave the house unless I was going to acupuncture or the doctor. I did all the "right things". THIS baby was going to happen. Surely, losing a mother two years prior and then an unborn baby was not part of my story. 

Two weeks later, I'm in the bathroom, cradled at the toilet... only to see the tiny hope of the heart beat that I heard two weeks prior. This could not be my reality. This was the baby that we prayed for. This was the baby that my mother had nudged the hand of God concerning (at least it was comforting to believe so.)  I sat there stunned... numb... in shock... How could this happen? How did my body fail in the one task that women are "supposed" to be able to "easily" complete? (or so I was told)...How did I fail? I ran through scenario after scenario regarding what could have gone wrong. Surely it was my fault. After being poked and prodded by three doctors. Three vaginal exams. Three ultrasounds. I had miscarried. I was 10 weeks pregnant. 

One of the things that I learned through this experience is that people really don't  know what to say to someone who has endured a miscarriage. Afterwards, I was met with the occasional, "I'm so very sorry for your loss" (which is the best thing to say in that kind of situation), OR I was met with my personal favorite, "Well, as least you can always try again," which for the record, is the WRONG thing to say in that kind of situation. Hearing the words, "You can always try again", felt as if the provider of that disclaimer were announcing that OUR baby and/or experience was comparable to that of a 7/11 lotto ticket... we could just simply try again. Truth is, what those dear, sweet people (carrying nothing but positive intentions) seemed to be missing, was that the baby that I carried for 10 weeks in my womb was real, and should have been reverenced as so. Yes, we could try again. Yes, we would try again. However, THAT baby deserved to be acknowledged for the light that he or she was... if even for a quick flicker.