My Pregnancy Journey: Trying To Conceive our First Baby

It’s a funny thing. For so long, we take every measure humanly possible to prevent getting pregnant. The thought of getting pregnant was so far off my radar, and even terrifying, for so long. When Matt and I first started dating, we were unsure if we wanted kids. We were content living that DINK (dual-income, no-kids) lifestyle and didn’t give the idea of “children” a second thought. As our relationship progressed, our mindset changed. We went from “No kids. No way.” to “We’re open to the idea, but that’s not on our radar now.” to “Probably, someday.” and eventually…” we want kids.” Both of our attitudes toward the thought of having children changed over time. I can’t pinpoint why, but we were lucky enough that they seemed to change simultaneously. I’d like to put something out here: Whatever journey you and your partner choose is yours and yours alone. There’s no “right next step” or “right path to take.” I know some of the most amazing people who choose NOT to have children (a lifestyle Matt and I considered for quite some time). I know some that yearn to and haven’t been able to have children. I know some people who have massive families or aspire to have massive families. I also know some people, like us, who have changed their tune multiple times. There’s no “right way” to feel or “right path” to follow. Keep that in mind before judging anyone’s journey. Ok…so now that I’ve got that off my chest…let’s get back to our trying-to-conceive journey.

After our wedding in December of 2016, Matt and I decided to wait before having children. Given my lack of patience and inability to understand what “wait a little bit” means…I was ready to go after our honeymoon. Keeping in mind my past health issues and irregular cycles, I knew that it would, MOST LIKELY, take some time for us to get pregnant. But, to Matt’s point, you don’t know and we wanted to have one final, kid-free summer. So, I conceded and we waited until the fall of 2017 to “not, not try.” Given the fact that my father reads every blog post, we’ll leave it at that for now.

Trying to Conceive, Phase One: The “Not, Not-Trying” Phase

Disclaimer here: I haven’t been on birth control since high school. It never agreed with me, often making me feel sick and it just wasn’t worth it. So, Matt and I have never used that as a form of contraception. Given that, aside from minor slip-ups or lapses in judgment in the past, we were very careful. If you know my husband, you will understand the level of care we put into preventing pregnancy. So, our initial dabbling in the TTC world meant stopping all “ prevention methods,” cold turkey. We figured we’d try that for a little while, just to see how it went. No sense of urgency, right? WRONG. If you know me when I have something in my head, I want it to happen…immediately (something I’m trying to work on). Plus, I still had a somewhat irregular cycle and I knew that if we were going to make this happen, it would require some extra measures.

So, I decided quickly that it was time to research. I picked up books like Women Code and Taking Charge of Your Fertility. I highly recommend the latter, by the way. Even if you’re NOT trying to conceive, it can teach you a lot about tracking your cycle and natural forms of birth control. I read blogs. I watched vlogs. I even read research papers. I wasn’t kidding around. When November rolled around, I was ready. to. go.

Trying to Conceive, Phase 2: The “By Any Means Necessary” Phase

Armed with ovulation test strips, a basal body thermometer, Pre-seed, pineapple core (don’t ask), and the knowledge of experts from around the globe…I felt like I was armed and ready for battle. At first, I felt like it was a healthy approach. I armed myself with the information necessary to make things happen.  Well….things didn’t go exactly as planned. And what started as something exciting quickly changed into a legit war. It was us against the negative pregnancy test. Sometimes, too much information can handicap you. I became obsessed with tracking everything having to do with my body, researching different “fertility supplements,” making sure we were “on schedule” and testing way, way more often than I should have. I even had my OB-GYN perform a bunch of tests on me after only three legit months of trying to make sure nothing was medically preventing me from conceiving a child. She agreed to run one blood test and everything came back normal. SO WHY WASN’T IT WORKING? I was frustrated. I was stressed out. And my anxiety was running on all four….sounds like a healthy environment for conception, right?

Trying to Conceive Phase 3: The “I Need a Break” Phase (spoiler alert: this is when I finally got a +)

When April rolled around, Matt and I chatted and I decided to chill out. I didn’t have it in me to maintain the same level of “perfection” in trying to get pregnant that had consumed a good portion of my brain storage. Plus, we had a pretty busy end of April/May, including a family vacation to Florida and my bestie’s wedding…so if we didn’t get pregnant it was NBD. I came to terms with the fact that we probably wouldn’t have a baby in 2018. I realized I needed to get my anxiety back under control and focus on things like work, coaching studies, and relationships. A month or two break from my craziness wouldn’t hurt. Plus, I decided that if, for some reason,  we didn’t get pregnant after a full year of trying and I felt like we’d be denied at a fertility clinic because of “the break”..I’d lie and say we tried during those months. I know.  Terrible. But I’m just being real here.

A few things I still did that month:

• I still tracked my ovulation: By now, I knew “around” when I ovulated, so I used this Easy-At-Home OPK kit to track that. Note: I had traveled to Chicago to meet my other “not getting married” bestie around the same time that my OPKs were positive. I typically had 3-day-in-a-row positives on my OPKs.
• I loosely took my basal body temperature: I was far less consistent with my BBT this month. When I remembered, I would take it. I tried to be more consistent around the ovulation time, but I wasn’t perfect and didn’t really stress about it.
• We used Pre-Seed: Again, leaving it at that.
• I took prenatal vitamins: Honestly, I’ve been taking prenatals since before we got married. I heard through the grapevine that it was a good idea to start taking them well before you TTC, so I followed suit. Plus, I typically take a multivitamin anyway, so why not?

A few things I didn’t do:

• Change my lifestyle: If I wanted to go hang out with friends and have a few drinks, I did. And I didn’t stress out about it the next day. I didn’t take any teas, vitamins (aside from my prenatal), or natural remedies to “raise my chances” of getting pregnant. I consistently exercised and ate healthy, nutritious meals with an occasional treat. Also, I drank coffee…multiple times a day.
• Focus on getting pregnant: Because I didn’t have it in my head that “this would be the month,” I didn’t focus on it. I started focusing on the other things going on in my life which, to be completely honest, had lacked some much-needed attention. This also meant NO SYMPTOM SPOTTING..aka thinking that every little twinge, cramp, change in mood, or digestive issue was related to pregnancy.
• Stress out as much: I used some of the techniques that my therapist taught me to manage my anxiety disorder and applied them to this situation. If I needed to talk things out, I did. But I gave myself time. Not sure if this had anything to do with our success that month, as well, but I roped two vacations (Chicago and Florida) into that time. During those trips, I was relaxed and just enjoyed the present. There’s a novel idea.

THEN IT HAPPENED!

On May 1^st, after returning home from vacation, complete with no tracking, testing, or thinking about pregnancy, I took a pregnancy test. And there it was, staring me right in the face…I’m PREGNANT!

I’ll say this now. Everyone told me. when I stopped stressing out and relaxed a little, it would happen. I consistently dismissed that notion, despite all of the research I’ve done on stress and anxiety. Life is magnificently ironic like that sometimes.

Does this work all the time? Heck no. I was lucky enough not to have any medical issues hindering us; likewise for my husband, Matt.  I know how long those six months felt to me, and I know that there are many, many women out there who have struggled much, much longer than that. I know this probably doesn’t mean much right now, but my heart goes out to all the women who are experiencing or have experienced infertility.

Matt and I feel truly blessed, gracious, and honored to have the opportunity to be parents to Pistachio. We are so excited about what the future holds, and I’m so happy I get to share this wild ride with you all!

– Xtina