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Sunday, July 3, 2011

In Healing and Preparation

It's now been almost five months since we lost our beloved little boy.  I can't say that the time passed has made the hurt any less, but God has granted us some healing along the way.  I hear his little voice much less frequently now.  There's still times when I have such vivid dreams of him that I expect to wake up cuddled next to him.  Lately I've been able to go into his room and lay on his bed again.  I lay there and pray for him and think back to the days when I'd put him to bed and would be rejoicing and thanking God for finally filling that room.  Now I wonder a lot about if that room will house another child of ours in the future.

About a month ago, I was finally able to change the sheets and move his stuffed dogs off the bed.  It was such a hard time for me because the bed still smelled like him and was covered in little blond stray hairs.  I broke down and sobbed like a baby into his pillow.  My husband tried to console me, but no consolation was to be found.  The pain of loosing him was revisited all over again that day.  All his toys and clothes have been packed away into storage bins, minus his tricycle and Power Wheels.  Those still reside in the room, but we'll be moving the toys into our storage building soon and the clothes will be moved into the nursery closet as soon as I clear that out.  My husband was very adamantly against getting rid of anything that belonged to him.  I'm so glad cause I don't know if I could part with anything.  His belongings are the only the things we have to remind us of him.  I have pictures and the clippings from his first hair cut too.  One day I'll be able to put those in a scrapbook, but not now.

So as God has been healing our hearts from this loss, He's also been stirring my desire to have children again.  I knew that those motherly feelings would never go away once I got the chance to be a mother.  It's such a strong desire in my heart and my body.  My cycles were perfect while we had our little boy.  It's almost like the increased levels of my own oxytocin actually allowed my body to function normally.  I had a lot of skin to skin contact with him, because there were times (night time specifically) when the only thing that would calm him would be to lay on my chest.   I felt so whole and "warm and fuzzy" all the time we had him.  Even in the normal frustrating times of raising a toddler, I was able to take a deep breath and just smile with pure joy inside.  Chemically speaking that had to be due to my high levels of oxytocin and now that those feelings/oxytocin is gone my body has rebelled and stopped my cycles again. I know that no amount of science can explain the love a mother has for a child, but for me it just seems to make my body work right.

The hubby and I have been talking again about trying to conceive again.  I'll be turning 30 next month (oh gracious how I dread that !) and it's time to get this TTC ball rolling again.  Realistically I only have a few more childbearing years ahead and I'm not getting any younger.  I have a doctors appointment next month and plan to get some further testing done to see where my PCOS is currently at.  I don't know what my doctor will suggest, but at this point we're almost to the point of desperation.  I don't plan to have IVF done, mostly because it's not something we can afford, but also because I still believe that God is able to allow us to conceive in a more natural way.  The idea of taking fertility drugs has been thrown around in conversation.  I simply cringe at the idea, but if that's what it takes to help my body get to where it should be to conceive we may just have to go that route.

Since last July, I've lost almost 50 lbs.  I had hoped that weight loss would help my body to regulate itself and maybe it did for a few months.  But now the harder I work out, the more muscle I gain, the more my body doesn't work right.  I used my progesterone cream a few weeks ago for the first time since last year and the results were very minimum.  In clinical terms it didn't work because it only produced spotting.  In physical terms, it made me a super grouch, moody and slightly sick.  I haven't felt the same since I took it.  In the past, it's almost always worked.  Now that I weigh less and my blood pressure and blood sugar is lower, it doesn't work anymore.  I want to scream in frustration.  Why does my body refuse to work correctly even when I'm healthier?  I just don't know what to do anymore.

So in closing this babble, I'd just like to thank those who've prayed for us since loosing our little boy.  Thank you all for your kind comments and for not immediately sharing your opinions and advice in the matter. I suspect that it'll be a long time before I can think of him without shedding a tear, but we are healing from it all.  Our hearts are open to receiving another child in our lives, albeit not by adoption (not sure if we'll be able to do that again).   Again thank you for being so supportive.

~Melody

P.S.  If anyone comes across any research on the oxytocin connection to PCOS, please send it my way.  I've been doing my own research but haven't found anything yet.  This is something I'm going to ask my doctor about as well....even if he might think it's crazy.  Who knows I may have found the missing link?

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