And the results are in....

Yeah. Not pregnant again.

Guess there's always next month....

At least the medical professionals were very accomodating, so I can go get my arm stuck with a needle any time I want, and if I do get pregnant, I will be prescribed progesterone if my numbers are low.

My mom came over yesterday to play with the baby. I think she may be teething--she was fussy and less hungry than usual, and today her cheek seems swollen....

So since Firstborn did not require my constant attention, I managed to get a lot done:

I cleaned the guinea pig cage and litterbox.
I cleaned all three end tables.
I cleaned out and stashed three or four boxes that had previously occupied the middle of my kitchen.
I made homemade applesauce.

The only thing I intended to finish and did not was cleaning Firstborn's room. That's especially tricky because I can't do it during nap time.

There are now more clean areas than unclean in our main living/dining/kitchen room downstairs.

Clean and/or cleaned up daily:
2 couches
4 end tables
floor
sink

Still a mess:
coffee table
kitchen shelves
kitchen table
magazine rack

Getting this one room done will be a huge accomplishment. It is where Firstborn and I spend the majority of our time, and M'Love spends the most time with us (though he's in the computer room when he has to work).

Perhaps when I prayed for God to help me be less lazy, it worked? At any rate, I am thrilled with the progress, and M'Love appreciates it too. The problem is, we end up getting to bed late because I end up doing housework after I put Firstborn to bed. I need to get more done earlier, I guess.

After stuff is clean, in addition to keeping things picked up, I need to work out a schedule for actual cleaning, in which (hopefully) I only have to do one major task a day, maybe two.

Babies

Firstborn is, as always, gorgeous. She enjoys pulling up on someone's hands, nursing, and chasing cats (followed by tormenting them if she can catch them. She crawls by using her left arm and right big toe. Her hair is getting curlier.

I'm on metformin and looking into progesterone. I'm having no sugar and have drastically slashed carbs as well (trying to have them only at dinner, sometimes lunch). I've been having goat cheese omelets for breakfast, which is working very well, though there is more prep time.

Hopefully I will be getting a blood test this week, and then, if I am pregnant, I may be able to get progesterone.

I would appreciate prayers. Not for me to get/be pregnant--only that if I am, my son or daughter lives.

Cleaning up

Over the past few weeks I've been making amazing strides toward picking up my house and keeping it in a picked-up state. So far I have no clutter on the couches or the living room floor, no dirty dishes being left out over night, and I'm caught up on laundry. And I am beginning to think that picking up the rest and keeping it neat is doable.

So my plan is to keep pluggin' on and clean one small area at a time. Once everything is picked up I will make myself a schedule for actual cleaning. And then things will stay picked up and clean.

Praise God!

Random small update

Friday is my birthday, so my mom took Hannah and I shopping and then had all three of us (plus my dad) for dinner. Got some cute baby clothes and also bought a pregnancy test. Didn't tell my mom anything, and don't think she saw the test.

I'm not pregnant.

Didn't really think I was.

Haven't heard back from the doctor yet.

Life goes on.

Spiritual Warfare

Last week was a difficult week for me. (No kidding, right?)

Saturday night, after Firstborn was in bed and before m'Love came home (he was out judging all day), I was reading Matthew and it was a really awesome experience. You know how sometimes when you read the Bible you actually feel like God put those words there for you, and when the Word says "you" He really does mean "you"? Well, it was like that. I've never really had that experience before. I know that the Bible was written for me, that the Word is living and active, and all, but I haven't felt anything supernatural when reading the Bible before.

And last night a thought popped into my head. It went something like this:
I would renounce Jesus Christ to have more children.

I don't think that was my thought. I immediately recognized the thought as wrong, and after thinking hard about it for a moment, I told Jesus that I would not renounce Him to have more children. I would not even renounce Christ to save my children's lives. And I am glad that I can honestly say that to Him. He is more important.

I can't remember much else in the way of spiritual warfare in my walk with God so far. But I do want to be totally sold out to Him. I hope that my faith is deepening--and I want to make every effort to add to my faith, goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. And maybe something about losing Ebenezer has deepened and strengthened this. I try so hard to find meaning in these tiny lives; I can't figure out what God is doing. I would never choose to lose a child to deepen my faith, and I don't think that one ever really does have to choose between being a good Mom and a good Christian. But what God chooses for me, in His perfect will and His perfect understanding, it is not mine to question. I mean, obviously, I cry out, I ask why--but I have to trust in Him, that His will for me is good. I know God loves me and wants what is best for me. So if I had a miscarriage, God will work through it to bring about my best interests, in His perfect wisdom. In this as in all things He works for my good, and my husband's, and my daughter's, and Ebenezer's, and that of my other children. Not that miscarriage is good--it is part of the great evil in the world that stems from the fall, as is all death--but God is still good.

So I will strive to hold on to God, through depression, through death, through hardship, through all kinds of evil. I will try to hold on to His joy and His promises, because on my own I have nothing. And it does seem that something is happening, if I can feel both God and Satan working in my life.

And God might have been telling me that I am still pregnant with Ebenezer's twin brother, and that I should call him Matthew. But that's almost certainly my having an overactive imagination.

Feel free to pray for me and my family.

Ebenezer

I had really hoped, after Hannah, not to have a period again. I didn't really think too much about why. After all, no one wants to get periods. They're messy and inconvenient.

I thought that getting pregnant with Hannah fixed everything--that it meant I worked now. That I wouldn't have to go through all that stuff any more. My depression was healed. I figured my infertility was healed. The same people that said "if you adopt, you'll get pregnant" (not that I believed them, or it influenced my decisions) also said "once you have one, you'll have more" with plenty of anecdotal evidence to back it up. And I did believe them.

When my period started coming back I looked at the bright side--at least it meant I was probably becoming fertile again. I didn't think about the possibility it might happen again. I don't know why, really. I guess I just figured that I was fixed, that everything worked.

I have been trying to enjoy Hannah. I know there's no guarantee I'll have more, and that even if I do I want to enjoy her. She's getting so big, and it would be so much harder if I thought I might not have another. That thought had occurred to me.

Even when it started I didn't think that's what it was. I passed some tissue. I looked at it. It didn't look like a baby--but at 10 days it wouldn't. It wasn't much--but how much would there be at ten days? There wasn't a lot of pain, like with Ruby--but Ruby was 21 days. I ended up calling the nurse hotline from our insurance.

She was using some sort of diagnostic tool (like WebMD). She was very nice and very talkative. I asked how I could tell the difference between a very early miscarriage and a heavy period. A blood test, she said, or maybe having the tissue analyzed. She said she'd send me more information in the mail. She said it sounded to her like I probably had a miscarriage. She also thought I might need medical care right away. I told her I'd had these symptoms before, and I didn't think so. She said to get care if the symptoms got worse or I felt faint.

I called my doctor's office yesterday. I talked to a nurse. She didn't know how you could tell an early miscarriage from a heavy period. She would talk to the doctor and get back to me. There is no way to tell. A blood test wouldn't show anything--not at ten days. I asked the nurse if there were other explanations for what I'd seen. She said it could be uterine tissue. But there's no way to tell.

I cried last night. I think it had finally sunk in.

The internet says that Metformin might help with recurrent early miscarriage associated with PCOS. My doctor had mentioned it for insulin resistence, but not for this (and she knew that I had a history of possible early miscarriages, I think). Presumably she didn't know about those studies. So I have emailed her about that. I have decided to cut refined sugars out of my diet, cold turkey. That's the only thing I can think that might have been different with Hannah; I might have been off candy then. I'm also going to get back to exercising more, but that's a seasonal thing. I don't know what might or might not help. But if I can give my babies a better chance, I want to.

I am so grateful for my baby girl. Maybe she's just a miracle; maybe she will never have biological brothers and sisters on this earth. At timees it still seems unreal, after more than 18 months since her conception, that I could have a baby. A daughter. I am sad right now. I am so afraid of losing her. I love her.

I don't know how I can keep going through this. But what choice do I have? To risk never holding another newborn is a greater risk than to risk losing another baby. To love at all is to risk loss. I can't think what form of birth control I could justify, because I am not at any physical risk. And I think God knows more than I do, and I wouldn't want to thwart His will. And my children--God knows them. He created them, and He is infinitely capable of caring for them. I do not even know how many I have, but he knows how many cells were in their tiny bodies. I have never seen them, but I think--more likely than not--they are gazing on His face. I will never hold them, or teach them; I will never know their voices or their gifts. They will know nothing but being loved by their Father in Heaven. No, it is certainly not better for them never to have existed. There is no loss for them. And someday I will know how many children I have; I will hug them and love them.

But for now I have grief and pain, and the awesome responsibility of training up a single, beautiful miracle. To die is gain, but to live is Christ. God, use me.

He is my Stone of Help.

Ebenezer Cooper
2/21/09-3/2/09