Details

I'm about 13 weeks along now, just entering the 2nd trimester. The baby is officially due Dec. 15, but both my boys were born 2 weeks early so we'll be ready for it to come by the end of Nov. That's three Dec. birthdays! (I think we're going to start celebrating half-birthdays instead.) I've been feeling pretty sick, but it seems to have subsided a little so I'm hopeful that stage will be over soon! The ultrasound picture is from 11 weeks. I was having a hard time really 'connecting' with this pregnancy. My last pregnancy ended in miscarriage at 11 weeks (the baby had died at 6 weeks) and I just couldn't get over the fear that this one would end the same way. So the ultrasound was purely for my reassurance that everything was okay. I can't tell you the relief I felt when I first saw the baby on the screen and it was moving! The heartbeat was strong and it's growth on target, even a little big (this is my family after all.) After that I felt confident enough to tell the boys. They were/are soooo excited! They immediately told everyone. My older ds keeps saying "I can't believe it's not a dream!" I think he's more excited about the baby than about Christmas. It's really cute.

This next part may be TMI, if you're not into NFP or other fertility stuff. You've been warned!

This baby is actually sort of a surprise. I say sort of because we've been trying for another child for over a year now, though without much hope. I use NFP and my charts were showing that my pre-peak cervical fluid was not of the quality or quantity so important to fertilization. We finally went to see a fertility specialist who uses the same NFP system in her practice that we use to see what our options were. The first step was to do several blood draws at different times in my cycle to determine what my hormone levels were. After some thought (and prayer) we decided that it was too much to undertake right now and that maybe adoption would be the best option for us. So that's where we were when, to my amazement, we were pregnant! My cervical fluid hadn't changed at all, and according to our "timing" I really shouldn't have been pregnant. So this is our miracle baby, there's really no other explanation!

I'll let you know in 8 weeks if it's a boy or a girl

Baby Steps

I was very excited to see the article "Natural Methods Offer Pill Alternative" in Sunday's Salt Lake Tribune. I'm a big fan of Natural Family Planning (NFP) and it's always exciting to see something positive about it in print. However, after reading the article I was disappointed with the information presented.

The insert "Natural Family Planning: How it works" presents CycleBeads as THE method of NFP. Actually, this is probably the least effective method of NFP available, being only slightly better than the old "rhythm method". And though the other, more effective methods are mentioned in the article, no details are given on how they work or where to find more info about them.

I am glad that, at least in Utah, health care professionals are beginning to take more notice of NFP, even if they are still woefully uninformed. At least they are willing to re-examine their ideas about why women don't use hormonal birth control and are willing to offer alternatives. As mentioned in the article, NFP isn't a good sell for pharmaceutical companies! The companies who do support NFP don't have the commercial clout of pharmaceutical companies, so they get drowned out by ads for hormonal birth control.

I hope that the trend started here will continue, and hopefully grow to embrace more effective methods of NFP as well. Though a small step, it is a step in the right direction!

For more information on other methods of NFP see these websites:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fertility_awareness
http://www.creightonmodel.com/
http://ccli.org/
http://www.woomb.org/

Naturally,
Alberta