Guest Blogger: When Plans Go Awry

Hello, my name is Maria Sudduth and I'm a planner. I have been married to my high school sweetheart Joshua for almost nine years. After many years of trying to conceive and finally giving up altogether, we welcomed our beautiful daughter Micah in May 2011*. 

So often in life we have a plan of how our life should turn out. We have all our major events mapped out like a well-planned road trip. We know in our head when we will finish school, get married, have kids, buy our dream house and get a dog. Unfortunately, life is not as predictable as the childhood game we all played and once loved. What happens when life doesn’t go according to our plan? 

As I said earlier, I am a planner. That is what I do. I used to use my free time to calculate how much money I could save for the entire year. I would plan a vacation months possibly years in advance (please note there was always an itinerary). I was always trying to plan a way out of my home-city, looking for some place smaller and quieter. I was always planning for the future, when it hit me, what’s the point? My plans NEVER come to fruition. Something ALWAYS goes wrong. 

After I married my husband I thought we would just automatically have kids right away. I took the very thought for granted. Imagine my surprise when six years passed by and there is no child. Once I finally did get pregnant, I miscarried the baby. It took me six months to grieve that child and try again. We had passed the first trimester. This time it was real. We were going to have a baby!

Naturally I did what I do best, I created a plan. I did all my research. I decided I was going to have a natural birth with no medication. I was going to breastfeed for a year for many reasons, but mainly because it was free!!!

Once again, imagine my surprise and my utter disappointment when I had labored naturally for twelve hours and was then told I needed to have a C-Section.  I had been at nine centimeters for five hours. Nothing was happening. The doctor is telling me she is stuck at a transverse angle and is not coming out.  Since this is supposed to be a blog and not a novel I will not tell about my entire traumatic hospital experience. Needless to say, I did not get my planned birth.

I tried to breastfeed. I visited the lactation consultant once every two weeks for four months. I tried everything possibly known to man before they told me you are not producing enough milk for your baby. I had to switch to formula if I wanted my daughter to gain any kind of weight. Another blow to my infamous plan, I was crushed.

So my question is, what do you do when things happen outside of your control? Your baby is born with special needs, your husband loses his job, your spouse leaves you, a family member dies and the list could go on and on. I just chalk it up to life’s not fair, but oftentimes that does NOT make me feel better. 

It’s all about perspective. The only advice that I can give is take one day at a time. Rejoice in the small things. Thank God for what you are going through, even though it is not what you necessarily had in mind, it is what you have been given. Through so many trials in my life, I find myself acting like a spoiled two-year old ready to throw a temper tantrum. 

Two-year olds are famous for a couple of things, but one of them is called the egocentric phase, which means everything is about them. I find that as soon as I put the focus on myself is when I become negative and bitter. The comparisons and the “why me’s?” start and turn into a full-blown pity party. As long as I am thinking of others and those that are less fortunate than me I am able to keep a good perspective on my reality. There will always be someone that has more than me. There will always be someone that has less than me. I thank God that I am smack dab in the middle.

Until next time…God bless.

*We are currently expecting our second daughter in March 2013.

The Back Story: All Systems Go!

When we last left off:

In the beginning of January 2010, I began the process of burying my dreams of motherhood and started thinking of a life of hollow freedom and insignificant travel (I love freedom and travel, but it's not what I wanted). I decided the best way to move past this point in my life was to expel my despair by creating art, specifically photography (I tend to go artsy when I need to work through something...that or I break things I don't care about...which ever works in the moment). I developed a concept and over coffee I discussed my intentions with a close friend. Tears ran down my cheek as I shared my pain and he asked only one thing of me...please wait. Don't do the photo project just yet. Give it a little more time. You don't want to do something you might regret. I did as he asked and I waited...

I did not sit idle while I waited though. I worked on putting our new home together (we just moved into it in November). I finished the last class I needed for my Bachelors degree (I had to take a 3 credit course to make up half a credit...ARGH!). I started thinking looking into Masters programs thinking I would start working towards that goal in the next year or so. I applied for a few jobs that might make use of my newly acquired degree (hahaha...yeah right...I have a degree in history with a minor in literature). Basically, I tried to keep myself busy while I waited...

I waited so long that my best friend couldn't stand it anymore. She was ready to force me to pee on a stick (not sure how that was gonna work).  I refused to do so for fear of yet another disappointment (and those tests can be pricy). Every morning, for nearly two weeks, she would call and ask me if I had peed on a stick yet. Finally, in the beginning weeks of February, I caved into her demands. I stood in my bathroom, nervously staring at my test results. I just didn't know what to think or how to feel. I became so used to seeing "Not Pregnant" on the tiny screen that seeing the single word "Pregnant" left me speechless. Now I had to tell my husband.

I've seen all those adorable ways women tell their husbands that they are expecting and I can't say that I was anywhere near as cute, adorable, or creative. As I mentioned before, we had just purchased our first home and were in the middle of painting (every single room) and I decided I didn't like the yellow in our guest room (I have since concluded I HATE yellow on walls). So, my way of telling my husband that we were pregnant was by using paint chips. I went to Home Depot and picked out "Baby Boy Blue" and "Baby Girl Pink" and taped them to the wall of our guest room. When he came home I told him I couldn't decided between two colors and he needed to go look and give me his opinion...He was a stunned as I was.

Then after a one doctors (I learned I was 7 weeks along) visit and a few weeks I was able to tell everyone.

I never did the photo shoot (I was blessed to do a bump shoot instead) I discussed with my friend. I have intentions of doing it one day, but I have expanded the concept and want to include other women and their stories of infertility (the highs and the lows). I'm glad I waited. I'm thankful for having a wise friend brave enough to ask me to wait...to not put something out there that I couldn't take back. Neither of us knew it at the time, but I was pregnant that day.

And that degree I laughed about has actually come in handy. In our Hypotonic World, I have to research (a skill I honed while writing papers) the medical maze of diagnoses & tests, insurance double speak & appeals, and government laws regarding Early Intervention & Disability.

Since that day in January, my life has been all about waiting. Waiting for Rae to arrive, waiting for appointments, waiting for test results, waiting for Rae to reach another inchstone, and waiting for a diagnoses. So, in hindsight, my waiting to conceive Rae was just preparing me for the periods of waiting yet to come. I'm comforted to know that I am not alone in my waiting. I have my family, my friends, and my faith. I used to feel like I was alone, waiting on God or doctors or tests, fretting over results or stressing over all the "what ifs". Now, I've come to know that God is waiting with me and I am never alone (a big thank you to my waiting family and friends).

"Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go."

Joshua 1:9

The Back Story: Infertile Myrtle

My husband and I had a difficult time becoming pregnant with Rae. When we finally decided it was time to start trying, we had no idea that it would take us a year and a half to get the desperately desired positive pregnancy test. It was a grueling, emotional, roller coaster with more downs than I care to remember (the worst part is knowing there are people out there that have been struggling longer than we did)!

During that time I was an emotional basket case. One week I was hopeful, the next week I was angry and resentful, and the week after that I was mourning the life I believed would never be. Every where I went I saw pregnant women or newborn babies. Close friends became pregnant and I had to pull up my big girl pants, put on my happy face, and sit through shower after shower (one of which I actually hosted). It was torture! My own, not always so private, hell! Don't get me wrong I was happy for my friends because I don't wish that kind of pain on anyone, but it totally sucked.

In order to increase our chances of conceiving Rae, I monitored and recorded my temperature daily (keeping it in a notebook nestled in my nightstand drawer), with hope of discovering my bodies particular (more like peculiar) pattern. As informative as that was, it didn't really help because I discovered my body didn't really have a pattern. It seemed to do whatever it wanted and there was no such thing as "regular" in my world. I took pre-natal vitamins, quit drinking (for a while), quit smoking (easier for me than others), and made healthier food choices...sorta (we have a horrible Taco Bell habit). But still no bun in the oven. I wept. I raged. I bargained. I tried to envision my life without my desperately desired child. Nothing helped and I felt betrayed by my own body. I am a woman after all. I'm built for just this occasion. So, what's the deal?!?

Eventually, I had a procedure, called a HSG, done to make sure my tubes weren't stuck together. While laying on a cold exam table, my legs suspended in air by stirrups, I was given one of the most bizarre "compliments" I have ever heard, "You have a picture perfect uterus." (Seriouly! What in the world goes through an OB's mind when they say crap like that?!?) So, my "picture perfect uterus" received a clean bill of health and left me with no answers to my infertility. Out of fairness, (and not ruling out other possibilities) my husband was also given the once over. Everything was "normal" (story of our lives at this point). So what was the deal?!?

The next step was a medication called Clomid, which causes hyper ovulation, (meaning multiple eggs are released during one cycle), and side effects may include multiple births...DUH! The thought of that petrified my husband and every month I was on this medication I think he feared we'd end up having triplets. If this didn't work, I was going to (very) bitterly give up the dream of being a Mom. I just couldn't see how we could afford in vitro fertilization (IVF) where prices range from 10K to 15K each round and most insurances usually don't cover the costs.

By the beginning of 2010, it was decided that if I wasn't pregnant by the beginning of summer we were going to move on without having a child (which meant going back on birth control). It wasn't the easiest decision to make, but it was the one I felt was the best. I keep using the term "I" because this was really my choice, my husband would have continued because he wanted to give me what I desperately wanted (he always does)...I just couldn't keep riding the emotional highs and lows. Another factor I had to consider was that we are a May December Romance. It wasn't just a matter of my emotional health, it was also a matter of our respective ages and our future together.

It was time to wait out the remaining fruitless (or so I thought) five months and move forward with our lives as D.I.N.K's.