crying on the bathroom floor

On April 16th, I found myself crying on the bathroom floor.  And the tears weren't tears of pain, tears of disappointment, tears of hopelessness...they were tears of hope, joy, and utter shock.  I had dreamed of the day I found myself crying on the bathroom floor with tears of joy, after looking down at the test that read "pregnant" and blinking several times to make sure I was reading it correctly.  I dreamed of the day that the miracle we had prayed for would reveal itself with a positive sign, not a negative, not another negative.  And so here I am, pregnant, still feeling surreal about it all, and finally able to write this post.

I had planned to write this post several months ago.  The tears on the bathroom floor would've been painful, stinging tears, that seemed to never go away.   I would open up my computer, and shut it out of fear.  What if I share too much about our lives?  What if people think I'm crazy?  I let the "what ifs" take over, and never opened up about the pain and hurt that brought me to crying on the bathroom floor.

It took us 10 months to get pregnant.  10 months in the grand scheme of things doesn't seem that long, but in that time we could've had a baby, a school year would've gone by, a lot can happen in 10 months.  Daniel and I always talked about when we would finally start trying for a family.  I had been off of birth control for nearly 3 years, all of the women in my family were crazy fertile.  You'd think they could blink and get pregnant.  My mom would always assure me, "Jamie, women in are family are fer-tile!"  And so we didn't think anything of it.  We didn't even imagine what would happen if we couldn't get pregnant on our own, or even how long it might take us.  And so we embarked on the "get pregnant" campaign.  Everyone gets pregnant, right?!?  I mean, bloggers blog about it all the time.  But what you don't see a lot of is the journey getting there.

After about 3 months of trying, I experienced emotions I never knew before.  And honestly, the 10 months we went through was probably the biggest trial of my life.  After 3 months I thought something was wrong with me, what was I doing wrong?  So we tried ovulation tests.  None of them came back positive.  So, off to the doctors I went.  In one month I became very acquainted to the paper covered beds in the doctor's office.  I knew the drill when I went to the front desk, get out my card, pay the nice lady, sit in the chair and pretend like you're there for just a usual check-up.  I just wanted a doctor to tell me that I was fine, but what I heard instead was that I was stressed.

Basically it went like this...."You're a full-time teacher, in your last year of grad school, you have a history of anxiety, and you're here telling me you think you can get pregnant!  You are crazy."  It didn't exactly go like that, but every time I went, that's what it felt like.  I felt like my doctor just looked at me like I was crazy.  Crazy for doing so much and thinking it would be possible to get pregnant through all of that.

So it was stress that was most likely causing this body to not want to reproduce.  Well, how do you fix that?  And I was left feeling hopeless, devastated, and things just kept going downhill.  I was at a friend's birthday in September of last year, and the minute she saw me she knew something was wrong.  She spoke with Daniel and they both were pretty concerned about my overall well-being.  And I soon realized that I was depressed.  I had never been depressed before, and all of these emotions felt so scary.  I felt like I was in the bottom of a black hole.  There were days it was hard to function.  I was mad one minute, sad another, and then empty-blank the next.  I can vividly remember getting on my hands and knees in our bedroom one night, and crying so hard I could barely breathe.  I didn't want to be there but I didn't know what else to do.

After much talk, Daniel and I decided it would be best if I saw a counselor.  And instead I found an angel.  Our church is closely connected to this amazing therapy group here in San Diego, and I finally to the step to call and set up an appointment.  After my first appointment I came home and told Daniel that she was an angel.  She didn't make me feel crazy or wrong for wanting to have a baby, she didn't make me feel like I was doing too much, and she didn't make me think twice about my actions.  She validated my feelings, helped me work through the stress and anxiety that I was feeling, and gave me hope.  She was the absolute best thing for me.

After 6 months we decided to track my temperature to get a better picture of when I was ovulating.  This helped me know my body better since the ovulation tests weren't doing much.  But months still went by that we were disappointed, sad, and feeling hopeless.  Through the help of my counselor I learned what it really meant to surrender.  And with that I began to surrender things in my life.  Through it I learned that surrendering doesn't mean covering it up, creating a mask for it, and hoping it will change in a little bit.  Fully surrendering meant acknowledging that this was hard, that I couldn't do it on my own, and releasing (eventually) all of the control I was holding onto.

 And with that we surrendered up our efforts to get pregnant... grad school was winding down, I submitted my thesis, passed my exams, and was wrapping up my last papers for class.  It came when we weren't expecting it, and we finally saw ourselves staring down at a test that read "pregnant".  And I cried, we cried, and before either of us could say anything, we looked at one another, fully knowing this is what God had intended for us.  He intended for us to go through this trial.  It had changed my completely.  I'm more relaxed, less stressed, and have this deep peace. And this didn't instantly come when I got pregnant, this was in the works over the last 10 months.  Going through this made me a better person, and prepared me for all of the trial that are yet to come.

There are so many out there that are still dealing with the sadness, hopelessness, frustration, and disappointment.  My heart breaks for them.  I wish more than anything we could snap our fingers and make it happen for those who ache.  

Don't lose hope.  Continue to press on! 

we have some news...

I am just beaming at the seams to finally announce that we are expecting a precious gift this Christmas! 

Yes!  As I type this it still feels surreal, and we couldn't be even more excited. 

This is truly the greatest gift we have ever received, and it is a true answer to prayers.  Getting here has been a journey and I can't wait to share more with you soon.  I can say that I'm finally feeling better, my energy is on the up-side, and count my lucky stars that everything has gone healthy so far.  

Christmas is going to be extra special this year!  

Thank you so much to our dear friend, Allison, for the pictures! 

hemp, it's what's for breakfast

Breakfast is my all time favorite meal.  I have never been one to skip out on breakfast!  I'm pretty sure that I wake up hungry.   That's normal, right?  Well, finding quick and healthy breakfast options is key for me.  Even more helpful is when they keep my fuller longer.  When I eat breakfast by 6:30am and don't eat until about 10:30, it is essential my breakfast stays with me.  My students will tell you that I am quite a bear as soon as I get hungry :)

One of my go-to's is a smoothie, especially mornings I sneak in a workout before work.  Protein powder keeps me full throughout the morning with ease.  I use whey protein powder, not soy, but never really looked at what was in this powder that seemed to make everything taste so delicious.  So when I decided to actually read the ingredient list, I began to second guess this ingredient I used to fill me up.  I decided to take a look at hemp, which is a plant-based form of protein.  I ended up finding a hemp protein powder, and it has one ingredient: ground hemp seeds!  It doesn't get better than that!  Well, I will get to the taste in just a sec.  

The first time I tried it out, my taste buds weren't that pleased.  I'm pretty sure they were rooting for the original vanilla protein powder.  I didn't let them win, and kept plugging along, and by the third time I made a smoothie with it I was sold.  

This recipe is my absolute favorite.  It is the foundation for all of my smoothies, and it is pretty simple, which is nice for busy mornings. 

Tropical Hemp Protein Smoothie:

1 c. vanilla almond milk

3 Tbsp. hemp powder

1 frozen banana

2 handfuls fresh spinach or kale (I used kale above)

3/4 c. frozen mango

1 Tbsp. chia seeds

Place everything into a blender, or my favorite-Vita mix, and blend until smooth.  Sip with a colorful straw, it just makes it more worthwhile.