Long Story, Short...er...Shortened
If you know us at all, you know we are fairly open about our travels through "Infertility Land" and "Miscarriage Mountain" and "Ectopic Desert". You have probably heard portions of our tales, some large, some small, but we wanted a place to chronicle the rest of our journey and keep all of our friends up to date as much as possible. This blog is the solution. We'll do our best to keep this as current as we can, although if you truly want the inside scoop and the SOS calls for help you should sign up for our newsletter at bit.ly/jsmithfertility.
For those of you that don't know us: we are Doad and Jess Smith.
Hi!
Doad is a mechanical engineer by day and a woodworking craftsman by night. Jess is a newly trained birth doula and doTERRA Wellness Advocate (aka your essential oil guru). As you can see, the side-hustle blood runs deep in our veins, but our biggest passion of all is to become parents. Our adventure so far has been quite twisty-turny so we'll share the "highlights" below to get you caught up.
2013: The adventure begins. Two years into our marriage, we bought our first house that winter and decided that Spring/Summer to begin trying to grow our family.
2014: A year later and not even a hint of a positive pregnancy test we started to look deeper. A doctor mentioned that Jess might have PCOS and we decided to see what we could do naturally to make ourselves a little healthier. We did our first Whole30 in August, started eating clean, ditched the processed food, and felt great!
Dec. 2014: A positive! Jess found out she was pregnant on Christmas Eve! We told the family Christmas Day and had one of the most tearful, joyous Christmases ever.
One week later, we lost our first precious angel to a miscarriage on New Year's Eve. Though we were heartbroken and grieving, we found a sliver of hope in the fact that we now knew we could get pregnant. It was only a matter of time.
May 2015: We were right! It only took us a few months later before those wonderful pink lines showed themselves again. It was the day before Mother's Day and we felt it was a beautiful redemption to a day we thought would be filled only with heartache.
Sadly, heaven claimed this angel baby too. Baby #2 had found its way into Jess's right fallopian tube and chosen to implant there instead of her uterus. Thankfully, we caught the ectopic pregnancy before it ruptured or caused any internal bleeding. Still, we found this loss to be one of the most emotionally traumatic that we've experienced.
Doad chopped down an entire tree in our yard. #grieftherapy
June 2015: We decided to visit the fertility clinic. We still wanted to go as natural as possible but figured it would be best to make sure there wasn't a permanent blockage in Jess's tube or anything else that could be causing issues that we didn't already know about.
Most of our tests came back great. A couple things were on the outskirts of normal, but nothing that raised a huge red flag. Our doctor recommended IVF. We weren't ready for that. We decided to continue researching healthy natural options and stick with that for now.
January 2016: Maybe this isn't working.
We start thinking about other options. We consider adoption. We start moving in that direction and feel God say "Not yet" very strongly to both of us, individually, on the same day. Well, okay then. IVF?
February 2016: We are still considering our options when Jess gets another positive. Ah, we see what you did there, God.
Two weeks later, it's another miscarriage. Jess is prepared. Sad, but numb. She has a work trip. A distraction. Friends to talk to and grieve with her.
Doad takes it a little harder. Three times? He's mad at God, but kind of wants to stay mad. Not being angry feels like it's saying "this is okay" and it's certainly not okay. We're not okay.
Summer 2016 is rough. We're up and down. Our marriage is up and down. This is really, really hard.
Fall 2016 we decide to start a treatment. It's a small treatment called a medicated cycle. Jess will use medications to regulate her hormones so we can time her cycle perfectly. Maybe we just need a little bit of medicated help.
It fails and Jess is thrown into a tailspin. Our marriage is hurting. She's depressed. And her faith is in crisis. We're drowning a little.
December 2016: We decide not to do a second medicated cycle. We decide not to try at all for a while.
January 2017: We start seeing a counselor and meeting regularly with some supportive friends. Slowly and surely we are climbing out of the pit.
April 2017: After a four-month break, we think we might be ready to start trying again. While we know the odds are against us, it's really hard not to hope that something will be different this time.
It's not different. Jess gets her period. On Easter Sunday. Ouch.
June 2017: We're doing a little better and finally ready to talk about treatments again. Our plan is not to do IVF yet, but to do a few more medicated cycles with the intent of moving towards IVF at the beginning of next year if those don't work.
August 2017: Jess is pregnant again - before we could start treatments. Naturally! This pregnancy came a bit unexpectedly - it's a long story you can ask us about some time.
We went in for monitoring right away because of our history and found out about a week later that this pregnancy would not be viable either. Jess was having another ectopic pregnancy in her right tube.
Hello, grief, our familiarfriend feeling.
September 2017: Testing shows no blockage in Jess's tube so we can only assume there is something going on there that is too small for modern medicine to see. We are ready to consider IVF now - especially because the egg will not have to pass through the tubes with that particular procedure.
Doad accepts a new job and our health insurance changes. If we start IVF when our new insurance kicks in we will be doing it over the holidays so we decide to wait and start in January.
January 2018: Insurance. Insurance. Insurance.
And you're caught up! Gold stars for everyone who made it this far. And this is the shortened version! You love us, don't you? ;)
Seriously though, thank you for walking this with us. We're so grateful for all the support we've received from our friends, family, and even strangers. Infertility is often a lonely road and we're so blessed to know that you are here with us.
We love you guys!
Doad and Jess
For those of you that don't know us: we are Doad and Jess Smith.
Hi!
Doad is a mechanical engineer by day and a woodworking craftsman by night. Jess is a newly trained birth doula and doTERRA Wellness Advocate (aka your essential oil guru). As you can see, the side-hustle blood runs deep in our veins, but our biggest passion of all is to become parents. Our adventure so far has been quite twisty-turny so we'll share the "highlights" below to get you caught up.
2013: The adventure begins. Two years into our marriage, we bought our first house that winter and decided that Spring/Summer to begin trying to grow our family.
2014: A year later and not even a hint of a positive pregnancy test we started to look deeper. A doctor mentioned that Jess might have PCOS and we decided to see what we could do naturally to make ourselves a little healthier. We did our first Whole30 in August, started eating clean, ditched the processed food, and felt great!
Dec. 2014: A positive! Jess found out she was pregnant on Christmas Eve! We told the family Christmas Day and had one of the most tearful, joyous Christmases ever.
One week later, we lost our first precious angel to a miscarriage on New Year's Eve. Though we were heartbroken and grieving, we found a sliver of hope in the fact that we now knew we could get pregnant. It was only a matter of time.
May 2015: We were right! It only took us a few months later before those wonderful pink lines showed themselves again. It was the day before Mother's Day and we felt it was a beautiful redemption to a day we thought would be filled only with heartache.
Sadly, heaven claimed this angel baby too. Baby #2 had found its way into Jess's right fallopian tube and chosen to implant there instead of her uterus. Thankfully, we caught the ectopic pregnancy before it ruptured or caused any internal bleeding. Still, we found this loss to be one of the most emotionally traumatic that we've experienced.
Doad chopped down an entire tree in our yard. #grieftherapy
June 2015: We decided to visit the fertility clinic. We still wanted to go as natural as possible but figured it would be best to make sure there wasn't a permanent blockage in Jess's tube or anything else that could be causing issues that we didn't already know about.
Most of our tests came back great. A couple things were on the outskirts of normal, but nothing that raised a huge red flag. Our doctor recommended IVF. We weren't ready for that. We decided to continue researching healthy natural options and stick with that for now.
January 2016: Maybe this isn't working.
We start thinking about other options. We consider adoption. We start moving in that direction and feel God say "Not yet" very strongly to both of us, individually, on the same day. Well, okay then. IVF?
February 2016: We are still considering our options when Jess gets another positive. Ah, we see what you did there, God.
Two weeks later, it's another miscarriage. Jess is prepared. Sad, but numb. She has a work trip. A distraction. Friends to talk to and grieve with her.
Doad takes it a little harder. Three times? He's mad at God, but kind of wants to stay mad. Not being angry feels like it's saying "this is okay" and it's certainly not okay. We're not okay.
Summer 2016 is rough. We're up and down. Our marriage is up and down. This is really, really hard.
Fall 2016 we decide to start a treatment. It's a small treatment called a medicated cycle. Jess will use medications to regulate her hormones so we can time her cycle perfectly. Maybe we just need a little bit of medicated help.
It fails and Jess is thrown into a tailspin. Our marriage is hurting. She's depressed. And her faith is in crisis. We're drowning a little.
December 2016: We decide not to do a second medicated cycle. We decide not to try at all for a while.
January 2017: We start seeing a counselor and meeting regularly with some supportive friends. Slowly and surely we are climbing out of the pit.
April 2017: After a four-month break, we think we might be ready to start trying again. While we know the odds are against us, it's really hard not to hope that something will be different this time.
It's not different. Jess gets her period. On Easter Sunday. Ouch.
June 2017: We're doing a little better and finally ready to talk about treatments again. Our plan is not to do IVF yet, but to do a few more medicated cycles with the intent of moving towards IVF at the beginning of next year if those don't work.
August 2017: Jess is pregnant again - before we could start treatments. Naturally! This pregnancy came a bit unexpectedly - it's a long story you can ask us about some time.
We went in for monitoring right away because of our history and found out about a week later that this pregnancy would not be viable either. Jess was having another ectopic pregnancy in her right tube.
Hello, grief, our familiar
September 2017: Testing shows no blockage in Jess's tube so we can only assume there is something going on there that is too small for modern medicine to see. We are ready to consider IVF now - especially because the egg will not have to pass through the tubes with that particular procedure.
Doad accepts a new job and our health insurance changes. If we start IVF when our new insurance kicks in we will be doing it over the holidays so we decide to wait and start in January.
January 2018: Insurance. Insurance. Insurance.
And you're caught up! Gold stars for everyone who made it this far. And this is the shortened version! You love us, don't you? ;)
Seriously though, thank you for walking this with us. We're so grateful for all the support we've received from our friends, family, and even strangers. Infertility is often a lonely road and we're so blessed to know that you are here with us.
We love you guys!
Doad and Jess
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