Harper Harper Kindness I want to tell the story of our sweet Harper Kindness. I don’t know how to begin telling the story of yet another sweet little one that we weren’t able to
The Dialectics of Mom Guilt In case you didn't know, I'm a psychologist who specializes in Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT). My favorite part about DBT is that these skills are helpful for everyone, and I use them every
Enjoy the Time 3:20am insight Enjoy the time when he wakes you up in the middle of the night, just needing just few more rocks and cuddles Enjoy the time when he wants the pacifier
Riley Post IVF Transfer #2 - Where Are We Now When You don’t move the mountains I’m needing You to move, When You don’t part the waters I wish I could walk through, When You don’t give the answers
Riley Still Looking Up I won't give up on us Even if the skies get rough I'm giving you all my love I'm still looking up, I'm still looking up. I Won't Give Up by Jason Mraz
Riley Family Tree When Andrea gave us the Luke Isaiah Tree, she sent us with an assortment of small birds, so that we could add and update it. We've added a new tiny bird for our
Riley HCG Graph So, I made a graph. Because, well, what else do you do when you have continuous data observed over time? And here's a view of the story of our Riley, told in numbers.
Riley Naming Our Little Love We chose to name both our first three babies that we lost through miscarriage, Avery Miracle, Hayden Promise, and Hadley Hope. It was important to us to cherish the lives God gave us,
Riley Recovering... Slowly My recovery was slow and with many bumps along the way. I developed several complications post-op: insomnia from the anesthesia, a thrush infection from the medications during surgery, and GI difficulties from the
Riley Not Alone I am not alone, I am not alone You will go before me You will never leave me I Am Not Alone by Kari Jobe Even during very difficult physical and emotional times,
Riley Post-Surgery The surgery went very well, but took longer than expected due to a surprising turn of events. The doctors found that the baby had implanted in my left fallopian tube - oh, you
Riley Here Again On Saturday, I stayed strong until Jessi went in for the emergency surgery, then I walked out to the lawn outside the surgery center and cried. What else could I do but cry,
Riley Week 6 On Friday, February 26, I was six weeks and one day pregnant. We had just had amazing news from the doctor the day before, and I was still giddy. Friday is always "
Riley This Could Be It Jessi just called me with fantastic news! Her HCG is all the way up to 350! That's a huge improvement over what we'd been seeing and a very good sign that this pregnancy
Riley Catching Up Today I stepped out from a meeting to received some good news from Jessi! Her HCG is continuing to rise and it caught up to the threshold they were looking for. They were
Riley Choosing to Tell Our Family Evan and I have always chose to tell our friends and family very early. In a previous blog, I explained our views on telling our friends and family like this: Call me old-fashioned,
Riley Are We Pregnant? We had been counting down the days until we could find out if the embryo had implanted, and if we were officially pregnant. It was extra special that my parents and brother happened
Riley Transfer Day! Transfer day is the most magical day. It is the first opportunity that you get to see your little love, and you are seeing your baby so much earlier than you normally would
Riley Transfer Day Today’s the day! It’s Transfer Day! Today’s the day we’ll go in and get that embryo transferred over from the waking station into Jessi. It’s a super fun
Riley IVF Transfer #2 IVF starts with stimulating the ovaries to harvest eggs that will be used during fertilization. We had the harvesting done in July, 2015. We chose based on our beliefs about life to only
Hadley Post IVF Cycle 1 - Where Are We Now We have had a lot of life change in the last few months. In July, we began our first IVF cycle, and found out we were pregnant. In August, we found out we
Hadley Love Poured Out The Lord really lavished his love on us during this time. He was there in the waiting, in the stillness, in the decision-making, and in the gut-wrenching tears. I am so grateful for
Hadley Musical Encouragement The Lord definitely ministers through music to me. I listened to a lot of 90’s Christian music and there’s so much that’s relevant. It’s so helpful that I already
Hadley Naming Our Little One We chose to name both our first two babies that we lost through miscarriage, Avery and Hayden. It was important to us to cherish the lives God gave us, even if we could
Hadley Here We Are Again And again we have no new answers, no fresh understanding, no enlightenment to ease the pain of our sorrows and our trials. Here we are crying out to the Lord. I went to