Please excuse the mess....blog under renovations !

Monday, December 31, 2007

Reflections on 2007

Even though I didn't look or sound so great, I finally got a successful videoblog recorded and uploaded. You can really tell I was tired and a little stuffy(nose stuffiness) in the video. If you watch, please let me know with a comment. (You can turn off the music on the right.)



~*Mel*~

BTW, Happy New Year !

Sunday, December 23, 2007

Merry Christmas to All

First of all.....YAY!!! I got my header back to what it's supposed to look like. After Blogger's auto-sizing change last week, I thought my header was a gonner. But thanks to a lovely tutorial at Testing-Blogger-Beta I figured out how to get my page looking pretty again. I'm just so thankful !

Ok well I just wanted to post a very Merry Christmas to everyone. I send you all blessings during this very special season.

I'll be very busy for the next few days, but hope to get one last entry for 2007 up. I want to do an overview of where God's taken me in 2007. I encourage everyone to sit down and take the time to do this. It's a great time of self-reflection and can help you focus on areas to work on for next year.

Ok I'm off to bed now (it's 3am yikes) cause I only have a few more hours till I have to get up for church.

~*Melody*~

P.S. If you haven't already or lately, check out my other blog at Creative Radiance for details about all my latest creations. Soon I'll be posting pics of all the Christmas presents I've been working on and sneek peeks of future projects for Etsy.

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Transitions to a Natural Approach

Well I've decided to change my previous plans about seeing the specialist my doctor referred me to. I went shopping with my mom last Wednesday and told her I was feeling some major hesitations about going. The night before I had shared those same hesitations with my husband, who shared his own hesitations as well. He told me that he'd stand behind whatever decision I made. To fast forward a bit, I woke up last Thursday morning with the immediate thought that I should not go to the specialist and about 5 minutes later the phone rang. The specialist's office called me to confirm the appointment time and to inquire about the $100 deposit to hold my place. I had no idea what she was referring to when she asked me to send in the $100 or give my credit card number. The lady kept telling me that I had some sort of package, which I didn't have, that explained their policies for new patients. When I finally understood what she was talking about I immediately knew that this was not the doctor's office for me. I felt very uneasy about giving an office money before I'd even been seen by anyone there. In fact this office is 2 hours away from my house and I don't even know its exact location. The lady asked again for my credit card number and I told her I didn't have it at the moment, which wasn't a lie. She instructed me to call back that afternoon with the information. I told her I would call back, but I wasn't planning on giving out my card number to her. I'm calling back in the morning to explain to her that I will not be keeping my appointment and that my insurance will not cover their services.

So I guess you are wondering where that leaves me. After a lot of research and thought, I've decided to take a natural approach to healing my body. It will involve a series of vitamins, herbs, minerals and supplements added to an organic diet (as much as possible) and exercise. I have a prescription drug that I'll be starting on Wednesday to help start the first part of my healing, and will take this medicine for the next three months. Meanwhile I'll be slowly introducing my body to the natural regimen. My goals for the next three months are modify my diet by cutting out processed foods, establishing a low impact exercise routine and to loose at least 5 lbs a month. If I can accomplish these goals, my normal cycles should return and I can continue to work on the health of my female organs by introducing more natural items. I'd like to loose 30 lbs and then actively try to get pregnant again by only using natural supplements and herbs to increase my fertility.

I believe wholeheartedly that natural is the way to go for me. I've used the natural approach before when my immune system crashed. All conventional pharmaceutical drugs had failed me and only made my condition worse, so natural was the next alternative for me. My body responded well and reduced my overall recovery time dramatically. I'm hoping that my body responds well again to this natural approach at female reproductive health and increasing my fertility.

The next few months are going to be difficult. I already know I'm going to have a hard time with my diet. I also need to cut out as much caffeine as possible and eventually eliminate all sodas. I'm doing well with introducing organic items into my diet. I've found I actually prefer the taste of organic foods much better than the other ones. I'm even enjoying organic milk, which is amazing because I typically don't like milk and it usually makes me sick. Organic milk doesn't give me that sick feeling and I'm able to drink more of it. Let's see I've purchased organic potatoes, carrots, canned corn, canned refried beans (yummy), canned green beans, milk, and a chicken flavored whole wheat pasta mix. The organic potatoes were awesome and I found that they didn't have that strange green color under the skin that other potatoes have. I've eaten organic carrots now for a while and only see a minor difference in taste. The canned corn and green beans are still in my cabinet to try. But the canned refried beans and the pasta mix were much tastier than their counterparts. My husband even liked the pasta mix and went back for seconds. I don't think I'll have a problem eating organic foods, but I may have some problems finding them available in my area and within my budget. So far budget wise, I've not saw a huge change, only a few cents here and there.

I plan to blog as much as possible on my road to a natural approach at healing. I want to include the specifics on the supplements so that I might help someone else out there with PCOS. There's lots of research to be found, but nothing beats a personal account of someone's real-life experiences. And if you have any questions, please feel free to ask at anytime. Just please remember that this is a learning process for me too. And don't forget to give the encouragement anytime, cause I'm sure I'll be needing some along the way.

I desire your prayers as I transition into this new diet and lifestyle change. It seems that lately my life is one big change after the other. I'm hoping this will be a much needed positive change though. I'm looking forward to a more healthy me. My weight and appearance aren't a huge issue for me, but my health is very important and it's something that I want better control of.

~*Melody*~

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Transitioning to God's Will

It has been WAY too warm here in NC (I'm talking about in the mid 70s). I know that some of you are thinking, "I'd give anything for it to be warm right now." It's just so incredibly strange to be wearing short sleeves in December. But I must say I am enjoying it quite a bit. Yesterday, I just couldn't believe how beautiful it was outside. My hubby and I drove up to his parents house. They live on the top of a small mountain. I took my crocheting with me and sat out on their porch absorbing the sunshine and enjoying the clean air. It was great, but extremely strange for December.

I've had such clarity over the past few days. Even though it's been almost a week since I received my 'fertility death sentence,' I feel at such peace. I don't have any idea how things are going to transpire over the next few months, but honestly I'm not super concerned about it. I'm feeling quite relieved of the burden of trying to conceive. I can only attribute this to the prayers of my family and all you friends here online.

At our last women's small group and in church that morning, God gave me a great revelation through my pastor and pastor's wife. The pastor spoke on something completely different, in fact it was a Christmas message of sorts, but he included this scripture...1 John 5:4-5 "For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?" He explained that so many of believe a common lie and we tell it to ourselves all the time....."I've always been this way, I'll always be this way" or "It's always been this way and it always will be". This scripture completely busts the bubble on these thoughts though. Jesus came to overcome the world, so that we can overcome the world. We usually think about that in terms of doing something great for God or rid ourselves of worldly behavior, but it goes so much deeper. The world, more specifically, Satan wants you to believe that you are stuck right where you are and nothing will ever change. He gets you to believe his lie and that becomes worldly thinking (in other words: thinking just like the world thinks). The key though is that OUR FAITH is the victory that overcomes the world. Our faith will push us beyond thinking things will never change. OUCH did that step on my toes !

That same night in the women's small group, our pastor's wife shared a very personal story about her own road through infertility and asked a lady there to speak specifically about her journey through having a child with cancer. We've been studying a book on women and prayer. This month's lesson was on praying for God's will. I won't go into the specifics of my pastor's wife story, but I want to focus on the story of the other lady. Her daughter was diagnosed with cancer at a very young age and came to the brink of death on at least two different occasions. During a routine chemo treatment, her mother left the hospital one night to go home to gather some clean clothes and things for their extended hospital stay. She explained that she was very upset that night and had been praying on the way home. As she was gathering the last of the clothes and about to leave, God spoke to her (in her words "in the loudest voice I'd ever heard") "Ally is going to be ok. She will come through this." She went on to tell about a time a few months later when her daughter was at death's door. Janet, the mom, began praying and her prayer was simply this, "Lord have Your will in Ally's life." To make a long story short, a few weeks later Ally had a full recovery and now some 15 or 16 years later Ally is a healthy gorgeous young woman who's just began college.

I guess you are wondering how this was beneficial to me. Besides being in a large classroom full of crying women, I was in the midst of someone in a similar situation to me. You see Janet knew what God's will was for Ally. She didn't know all the details, but she had God's promise to carry her through. She didn't know when the end would be or how God would bring her to the end of her child's suffering. But she did know there would be an end and that it would be something she could look forward to. The thing is God already gave me a promise and I know His will is for me to have a child. So I've really had my answer all along. I don't really need the details, cause I know the outcome. I've long said that I'll be glad when I can have an end to my story, but I already have an end...God will allow us to have a child (more specifically a little girl who already has a name). I know the end, just not all the in between details. I have a promise that's specifically from God and yet I've been upset and down about things. How foolish of me to not be thankful for His promises !

That night as we joined in prayer at the end of the small group, I feebly said "Lord let Your will be done in my life." It was hard at first, because I kept thinking about how serious those words were. Did I really mean it or was I just saying it ? I searched my heart some more and found out that I really did mean it, I was just scared of it. Each night that followed I prayed the same prayer and finally last Thursday arrived. I sat there in that little exam room thinking about everything. The thoughts whirling in my head ranged from thoughts of miscarriage to thoughts of playing with my little one, but in the end only one thing came to mind..."Lord let Your will be done in my life."

After I received the doctors report and words, somehow they just didn't sting as badly as they should have. I knew God's promise to me and I knew that he doesn't let you down on promises because He's more than able to make them come to pass (Romans 4:21).

My husband and I left the doctors office and we went a little further to go shopping for a while. I bought a few Christmas presents and we didn't really talk about anything specific. It was dark on the way home when we began to talk about things a little bit. At one point I fell silent because I noticed how brightly the stars were shining down on the water to my right. I felt God in that moment. I looked over at my husband and was quite surprised to see how illuminated his face was in our dark van. And then these words came from my mouth before I even had a chance to think about them, "Intervention or not, we WILL have a baby." A big smile came across his face as he looked at me and said "that's exactly what God just told me."

So really through this I've been blessed and given reassurance. God knows exactly where I am right now in His grand scheme of things. I'm in the Master's daily thoughts and He knows me well (Jeremiah 29:11). As I sit and wait for His will to be manifested in my life, I've got something concrete to hold on to and for that I will be forever thankful.

In short, I did receive a great gift already this holiday season...the gift of peace, a thankful heart and warmth to my soul. I feel joy again like I haven't felt in a long while. In the midst of a painful situation, I'm very joyous and at ease. Wow, what a God we serve !

~*Melody*~

Thursday, December 6, 2007

Transitions of Infertility

My husband and I went to the doctor's office yesterday in high hopes that we would find out we were expecting again. The nurse who took me back into the exam room had a worried look on her face as she looked over my chart, but I just shrugged it off. I guess it should have given me a clue about what to be prepared for when the doctor came in. The nurse was hesitant but decided that she'd take a urine sample if they needed it. This is pretty much standard procedure for me, so I really thought nothing of it.

After getting a great blood pressure reading, I gladly went around the corner, gave my specimen and came back to my room. I sat there for what seemed like an eternity, it was more like a little over an hour. I stared at the walls and became increasingly uneasy that it was taking so long. When the doctor finally came in, she had that same grim look on her face, so I knew that I was to expect bad news. I was prepared to hear that I was miscarrying and nothing could be done, but what I heard shocked me even more.

She basically sat me down and said that there was nothing more that she could do for me. She explained that the lining of my uterus is getting thicker everyday. This thing happens normally, but mine is abnormal and too thick. The bleeding/spotting is coming from my body not being able to contain all the wall. She said this wasn't serious, but is something that could become serious very quickly. She prescribed a medication that will make me bleed heavily for 2 weeks to a month. She thinks that will help clear out all the 'gunk' left inside me. She also told me that my cervix has been through a lot of damage from past pregnancies and she thinks that's the reason I've lost so many children in the past. Now my cervix is hardened and won't allow any sperm in, that's why I've not gotten pregnant in over 2 years. The next step in trying to get pregnant would be fertility drugs, a sugar lower medication (to enhance the fertility drugs capabilities), and a IUI (inter-uterine insemination).

I was just dumbfounded by all this. It was information overload for me and I couldn't believe that I'd hit this point in the road. And then she says this, "You are running out of time." I knew I was and even stated that before, but to hear it come out of her mouth so bluntly was quite a shock to me. It was almost like hearing a death sentence. Now I know that she can't know the exact time or date when my chances will be over with, but I believe she has an idea.

She referred me to a specialist who helps patients with PCOS and infertility. The first measure of treatment will be to get all the bleeding to clear up and possibly manually scrapping out my uterus. The specialist will probably do some internal probing and possibly even a exploratory surgery to find out if anything else is wrong. Then would come the actual fertility treatments, all of which will not be covered by my insurance. I'm not sure how far we will go with this, but I am going in for the first visit to get his opinion and discuss some options.

My husband and I took the evening out last night, did some shopping, got our minds off things for a bit, and then did some serious talking on the way home (over a nice cup of Starbucks no less). Both of us feel that intervention or not we WILL have a baby. We're praying about where we should go from here. The first step is to get me healthy again, of course. But the rest is still a mystery.

Last night both of us felt a definate peace about things and I believe that's a direct effect prayers from all over. I didn't want to write anything last night because I wanted things to settle in my mind and for God to be able to speak to me about it if He wanted to. Today I still have a peace about things, but I have been delaying calling the specialist to confirm an appointment. I'm not sure why I'm procrastinating. I think it's largely due to the fact that my husband is at work right now and I'd feel better about it if he were here. Anywho, that's my very LONG update.

~*Melody*~

My Bookshelf

Shelfari: Book reviews on your book blog
I Took The Handmade Pledge! BuyHandmade.org
The Breast Cancer Site