Poland
China
Bangladesh
Ukraine
India
United Arab Emirates? What even is that?
Indonesia
Hong Kong
Spain....
Russia
Switzerland
Philippines
United Kingdom
Australia
France.
I feel like this is the end of my blog. I don't know how much more I'll have to say... and this isn't how i wanted to end my blog. I'm upset and angry and confused. I don't feel like thinking about what's happened. I don't feel like talking about it. It just sucks. And yet there are thousands from all over the world waiting for something. What is it? Are you all following this journey waiting for the next bit of news? Are you just interested in being a gestational carrier and are looking for information? Are you friends that stay anonymous? Are you accidentally happening across my blog, and not even giving it a second thought? Are you childless mothers searching for hope? I don't know what you need me to be. I don't know what you're looking for from me....
We got terrible news yesterday. We're not pregnant. It's most likely a chemical pregnancy, which is another way of saying a really early miscarriage. The embryo just didn't make it. My numbers from all my HCG levels are starting to plateau, and the doctor is expecting the numbers to start to drop. We technically have another blood draw on Monday, a week from yesterday, just to try to know a little more about what's going on. Is this a dangerous ectopic tubal pregnancy? Is this simply a chemical miscarriage? AM I ACTUALLY FREAKIN' PREGNANT?? My numbers on Monday were 72.8. It took 72 hours to go from 65.7 to 72.8. That's where the numbers aren't so much "rising" as they are "plateauing."
I was getting so bloody frustrated with the fertility clinic. So was Corey. They would call one day and be all, "YAY YOU'RE PREGNANT!" And the next day it was, "Things look bad, we're concerned." And then "NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT, YOU'RE PREGNANT!" and then, "You're not pregnant at all, you miscarried." But the entire time they took us on this roller coaster ride, they wouldn't answer any questions. Not one.
What does this mean? Can't you just get in there with an ultrasound and see what the crap's going on?? Are we pregnant or aren't we?? You can stick a vaginal ultrasound up there willy nilly days on end before the transfer, but then two solid weeks after the transfer when we need to find out some information, you can't stick one up there?? We were just confused and desperate. Corey was angry and crying and told the nurse to call back when someone could answer some questions. Dr. Conway wasn't even working that day, and she finally called from home on her cell phone to address questions that desperately needed answers.
I would rather you just tell me we're not pregnant at all then have no answers at all for days on end. YEARS ON END! It was absolutely maddening.
Dr. Conway at least explained that they wouldn't be able to see anything on an ultrasound until we had higher HCG levels. Good. That seemed like it was really hard to explain. That's all you needed to say. We just needed to know there was or wasn't something more we could be doing. We just needed to know something!! I was devastated. And I knew that what I was feeling couldn't even remotely compare to what Corey and Randy were feeling. I didn't feel like I could justify feeling hopeless and full of despair, when I wasn't the one that lost my last chance at having a baby.
I couldn't shake the feeling that I couldn't do this again. I couldn't be the last chapter in someone's heartbreaking story. The ending that they didn't want to remember. The ending that they wanted to forget. I've heard lots of intended families say that if it didn't work out, they wouldn't want to stay in touch with me. They would just want to forget. That never seemed like it could even become a reality, because after all, everything will always work out right? Nothing can go wrong. Everything will go right. Well when reality sets in, and your the nightmare ending to someone's own personal hell, that kinda sucks. And I decided I just couldn't do this again. I couldn't fall in love with a family, with another intended mother, and grow to trust her and care for her family, i couldn't invest everything I had physically, emotionally, mentally into helping another family's dream come true, just to have it ripped out from under me. Out from under them. To have that friendship mean nothing. To lose someone you care about, someone who trusted you.
I could hear Corey's voice tremble on the other end of the line. I knew her tears covered her cheeks, and she was trying to keep it together for Jaxston. She didn't want him to see her hurting. She wanted to protect him. She's a good mother, and it showed. Why do these wonderful women all over the world miss out on the chance to love God's children. Why do they get denied the chance to love and cherish and protect these precious souls. There is so much evil in this world. There is so much danger, and hatred. Confusion, destruction, neglect. Children who don't know love. Children who live in fear. Parents who don't deserve these sweet innocent children have them. Parent's who could offer the world and who deserve these children can't have them. It just doesn't seem fair, it doesn't seem right.
I posted this on facebook the other day. I know most of you get sick of hearing my opinions and ramblings on facebook, you probably don't want to hear repeats here on my blog. But what I had to say here is something I keep thinking about. Maybe it can help someone out there somewhere...
I know everyone struggles with trials in their lives. I've had more than my fair share of trials myself. And I'm learning more and more each day that friends and loved ones carry heavy burdens. I have friends with mental disorders. PTSD, depression. I have friends that suffer from eating disorders. i have friends that struggle relentlessly with infertility. I have friends and family that struggle with their faith. I have friends that struggle with financial stability. Friends that struggle with their marriage, custody battles, infidelity. Sickness, pain, terminal illness, death of loved ones, deployment, addiction, abuse, loneliness. Insecurities, and low self-esteem. Friends without love. Friends that no longer know how to trust. Friends that have lost hope. Faith. Friends struggling though their education. I am constantly reminded of their pain and suffering. My heart goes out to them. I have learned to give my suffering away. To give it to the Savior, who has already suffered for my pain, and my sins, so that I don't have to. He is the only one who can truly know what we are going through. He offers us peace, love and refuge from our own personal hells. He asks us to fall to our knees. He asks us to endure to the end. He never gives you more than you can handle. And although you cannot see it now, he is working on you, as he does a diamond. He is polishing you and making you the person you are meant to become, so that you can reach your full potential. I wish I knew how to help every one of you. I offer my love, and a listening ear. I hope to in some small way, lighten your burdens. And I hope you will offer the same for me. Life is a hard thing to experience. But it can also be beautiful, and full of joy. I love each and every one of you. Be strong. And trust in the Lord with all your heart
I feel so helpless today. Corey called.
Bless her heart.
She was able to make me feel so much better. I told her how I was feeling and she was able to say just the right thing that made me feel better.
That's not right. It should be me comforting her. I was trying, but what do you say to someone who might feel like they have nothing left? That this is it. The end. I am grateful that Corey and Randy got to be my intended family. I'm grateful that with both of my journey's, I was blessed with families that were true, honest, trusting, trustworthy, deserving, and just plain good. There are worse endings. She wants to stay in my life. She doesn't want to pretend I never existed, and I'm grateful for that.
I've never publicly went into detail about my past life. I've always wanted to write a book, or somehow share my struggles and trials with the world. I've always hoped that my past could change someone else's future. I've never really known where to start, or how to tell my story. I tend to be a very honest person, and I tend to over share. I can make people uncomfortable. I talk to much. I probably talk so much that you all lose interest halfway through my rambling.
I only share a small part of my past with you right now because I want to illustrate a small part of how I can empathize with loss. I have no hesitation to share more, I even yearn to do so, but like I said, I don't know how to share my story, and I would simply need all the time in the world to even begin to illustrate what I've been through. If you're not interested, please feel free to skip the next paragraph.
I got pregnant with my son when I was 14 years old. I was young and foolish. I kept my son, and he was the only thing in my world that made sense. My family didn't know how to deal with my defiant, stubborn, reckless self. My son's dad was 16, selfish, and certainly not dedicated. It's okay, I look back and I understand that he was young himself. How much can you really expect from a 16 year old pizza delivery driver/football player. Well a few years went by, and we were pretty off and on. I learned that we would probably make better friends than boyfriend and girlfriend. I learned that when you're 14, and you say you want life to be a certain way, everyone you know will hold it against you if you grow up and want better things than you did when you were 14. I learned that a 16 year old girl that wanted to be a family, despite knowing there was no life here for her, would be accused of being emotionally unstable when she found out her child's father was chewing tabacco, drinking regularly and cheating on her. I learned that people you called friends will turn against you in a heartbeat, and will turn an entire town against you in order to get what they want. When my son's father decided he wanted a different life than the one my son and I had to offer, I fell apart. I was angry, lonely, confused and desperate. I was too stubborn to go home to my family. I was too prideful to admit we wouldn't be a family. Yet I was miserable being with him. We only knew a life with no love. I knew a life with no emotional support, no dedication or commitment. No strength, no faith. Just misery. Just selfishness and an every growing realization that it could never work. We liked each other at 14 and 16, and that was it. A child resulted, but that was it. When he decided it was time to move on in life, I didn't know what else to do, other than be confused and lost. I just didn't want to start over. Being surrounded by a sad, depressing loveless life was better than going into the unknown. I was scared of the unknown. Even though deep down I knew that moving on and being rid of him was the best thing that ever could have ever happened to me, I was still young, and i let my emotions stay too close to the surface. I threw a fit, and I rebounded. My son and I moved out, and I tried to start over. I was working graveyard in a nursing home, and trying to take care of my son on my own. I wanted to prove something, I just didn't know what. I made the second biggest mistake of my life and I rebounded with a loser who ended up being dangerous. I didn't know he was dangerous. I was young and naive, and he was a devious, dangerous sociopath and pathological liar. I got pregnant by him, and felt stuck. I hardly knew anything about him, but was now pregnant with my second, and had nowhere to go. My son's dad took my son from me. I was accused of abusing my son, I was accused of knowingly putting my son and myself in a dangerous situation. Once I learned that there was something to be worried about with the new fling, I left the new guy without a second thought. Friends that took me in and gave me a place to stay were my saving grace. Despite my small hiccup of bad judgement, and not because I was a reckless partying drinking teenage mom who needed to be on one of those stupid tv drama's, I lost my son. I was young and naive to the ways of the world, and I was taken advantage of. From that point on, I couldn't be trusted with my son. I couldn't be trusted with children. People I nannied for accused me of beating their children. I was accused of taking advantage of elderly people in nursing homes. Oh my goodness, It just continued to spiral out of control. I was a good person and a good mother. I put my son before myself, I loved without holding back, and I made myself vulnerable because I trusted those around me. That is why I lost my son. A nasty custody battle ensued. It went on for years. The chance to be there for my son's first day of school, to see him dress up for every Halloween in his entire childhood, to be there when he lost his first tooth, everything was taken from me. The only thing that got me through my 14 year old hell was taken from me. My childhood had been taken from me, and it all seemed to be worth it as long as I was able to dedicate my life and care for the only person who truly loved me unconditionally, my son. He was 3 years old when he was taken from me. I had a little baby girl, right after he was taken. I lost my will to carry on. I felt hopeless, like God had abandoned me. Everyone that had been a part of my life; the only life I knew, turned their back on me. They slandered my name all over town. I had to start a new life, and they wouldn't even allow me to do that. Then there was a day. An ordinary terrible day where I was allowed to visit my son for 4 short hours on a Wednesday. My son's dad met me in the driveway to exchange our son. I don't remember what was said. I just remember yelling back and forth, angry and hurt. Wasn't I a good person? A good mother? Someone who just wanted to love. All I wanted was a family, and not a broken family. I wanted to spend my life with someone who wanted those things too. Why was I left abandoned and alone. I had been tricked, taken advantage of and left to rot from the inside out. I ran back into the house and got down on my knees and I sobbed. I pleaded with the Lord, and I begged him to show me what I did to deserve this. That's when I knew. I knew that it didn't matter what I did. My life would never be whole again if I relied on anything but the Lord. I could be a millionaire, with everything including my son, but none of it would matter without the Gospel in my life. Without my Heavenly Father and Christ's Atonement. I knew then what I needed to do. I needed to go back to Church. My testimony grew from that moment on. I moved away, worked towards my GED, started college, was hired as the assistant manager of a video store. Most of all, I became active in Church again. I strived to do the things that would please my Heavenly Father. I continued to fight the custody battle. I met Clark, my husband, while he was serving his LDS mission in Washington state. I was a nanny for a friend, and he knocked on the door to visit the family that lived there. Over the next year and a half, we grew to know each other on a spiritual and emotional level. Our growing relationship was founded upon Gospel principles. It was centered around the Lord. There was nothing physical to get in the way, and it continued to grow into a marriage founded upon the Gospel. A truth that would bring us an eternal marriage and an eternal family. That's all I'd ever wanted, I had just been young and went looking for a good relationship on a rocky unstable worldly road. The end of the custody battle grew near. My son was taken away from me permanently. There was no explanation for it, there was no justice. My son's dad was content to win the battle, that's all that really ever mattered in the first place. He reveled in his victory. He celebrated the separation of mother and child. The whole town did. It was sick. I was 21 years old now, yet he held against me a 14 year old girl's weaknesses. He never had to face his 16 year old boyish selfish mistakes. He never had to truly be accountable for anything. He always had his following and his hometown cushion. Who needs to have integrity when you have all that. I lost my son based on lies, honest mistakes, and deceit. I had to move on. I had to find peace in an unjust and cruel world where children could be taken away from good mothers without a second thought. Where people could lie and hurt so ruthlessly and never feel regret or remorse.
So although I know what it feels like to be a mother, a blessing I've always known since I was a little girl, not yet even a woman...
I also know what it feels like to wonder how life could be so cruel. I still search for the understanding to know how children can stay in abusive, loveless, Godless homes when so many out there could offer children safety, hope, and unconditional love.
On February 13th, 2013, (tomorrow) Clark and I will celebrate 4 years of marriage together. He loved me when my life seemed worthless. He understood the atonement, and he knew that Heavenly Father had forgiven me. We started our life together and I learned how to rely on the Lord when it hurt so bad I was surrounded by darkness. I learned how to see through the darkness. I look back now and recognize the Lord's hand in my life, every step of the way. He never abandoned me. He only gave me as much as I could handle, and it only made me stronger. My testimony and my faith are unwavering. I want to stand at the top of the tallest building and cry out for all to hear, that Christ lives. He loves us. He tries and tests us so that we may testify of him with authenticity. I would not know the Lord if he had not truly tested me. I have been blessed despite my mistakes. I have been forgiven. I have learned how to forgive myself. I have spent years learning how to forgive my son's father, step-mother, and family. I had to give my hatred, disgust and hostility over to the Lord. I could not live a full life while I was consumed by dark and hopeless feelings of hatred and blame. And if I continued to allow those feelings to take over my life, I would never know true happiness. I doesn't matter if they don't feel like they need the forgiveness, I don't think they'll ever recognize that they ever did anything wrong. They've always thought they did everything right. Which is why they need forgiveness. Either way, I needed to forgive, and give that hate away. I moved to Utah with Clark, where he was born and raised. I love it here. I have the most beautiful life. I have two smart and beautiful daughters. I have the most dedicated, loving, attentive husband I could ask for. I have the best friends, a life full of joy and blessings, the Gospel, and a wonderful son who spends the summers and a short Christmas visit with our family every year. I won't let my past define me. I think back over my life, and it's like watching a movie. I don't know that life anymore. I'm not that young girl taken advantage of and lost. I have found the peace I need to move on.
I share this because I've spent years needing to get it out. There are so many meaningless details left out. I could never write it all down. But a good reflection, one that might benefit another, is healthy. The real thing I hope you can take away from my struggle is that you can still find peace if you fall to your knees. You can still lead a beautiful and happy life despite the hard parts.
That's what I told Corey today. That I wanted to watch her life move forward and be beautiful and whole.
Randy sent me an email tonight.
I. Sobbed.
Randy, I hope you don't mind that I'm sharing. This was a wonderful part of my day.
Vanessa -
I know this has be so hard on you the past few days. I want you to know that I will never forget what you have done for us. You gave us hope and possibility when we could see none. I am grateful that we found you and we knew when we started this that the final outcome no matter what it was is really out of our hands.
It is important to me that you know and believe this. The last few months have been awesome and as much as this hurts right now, Corey and I are further along in this process than we have ever been. I appreciate that you were willing to particpate and invest so much of your life and love in this process for us.
We will never understand the plan while we are living it, but we have to trust that this will all make sense at some point and for right now we aren't supposed to get it......
Please take care of yourself and your family as they need you the most right now. By the way, I never give up, so I will always hope for the best and plan for the worst. Try to stay positive and please tell Clark my comments are the same for him. You guys are really truly amazing and you shouldn't forget that now or ever.
Randy
Dang it Randy. Now I'm sobbing all over again because I re-read it all over again. You and Corey are so wonderful.
I feel like this is a good stopping place. I dunno... maybe someone will call me and ask me to consider this all over again. I get emails daily asking to talk more about another journey.
I want to end my journey with two wonderful families that proved to be more than just good intended families. They have set the bar way too high.
Corey and Randy, I wish I could have been enough. Thank you for being in such a good place. That's where I would hope for you to be. I hope you can truly find beauty and joy in your future. I hope you can feel whole. I sure love you guys. I'm glad this isn't the end of our friendship.
we'll see what happens on Monday. but I think I'm in a good place...
we'll see what happens on Monday. but I think I'm in a good place...
-thank you friends for following along.
keep in touch <3
God Bless
I'm so very sad for all of you. What a trial. I wish I had words to give peace, but I don't.
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