Hello!

Don't forget to come to Midtown's Easter Egg Hunt. The Easter Bunny will be there and the eggs will be full of great stuff! (-:

I've been exhausted today, even though I got 12 hours of Ambien induced sleep last night and took a long nap this afternoon. I'm going to bed as soon as I finish this post, too! Hope I'm not getting sick, and I hope it rains tons tonight and washes away the evil pollen. The count was almost 6,000 several days this past week. People without allergies are having issues, so you can imagine those of us with allergies are oh, so happy....

We did go to the "Reproductive Specialist" Monday. Isn't that a more positive name than the Infertility Doctor? Well, in our case might as well keep it the Infertility Doctor. They will probably put me on Metformin, but I have another test coming up to make sure my main problem is insulin related. The nurse practitioner thinks I have insulin resistance, so Metformin would help regulate my cycles. (That drug is typically used with diabetes patients, and might also help with my weight gain... In fact, insulin resistance would probably explain a lot for both Ben and I.) I do appear to be ovulating, so I probably don't have PCOS, and the HSG test came up normal, so no Endometriosis or blocked fallopian tubes.

Ben's sample had several low levels, so he's going to give another sample to see if it was just a bad day thing or what. If the first sample was typical, they are not really saying he CANT father children, just that it's a lot less likely. Unfortunately, there is a lot less they can do to help a male's infertility than a female's. We'll wait and see, but one topic that has come up is (no surprise) IVF for $17,000. We're thinking probably not, but no definite there. Just seems to me if you'd have to borrow the money to do it, God has a better plan, you know? And, I assure you, while our finances are better than we expected them to be two years into our marriage, we do NOT have $17,000 sitting in the bank!

Another option would be a sperm donor and IUI. (Think of that as turkey baster insemination as opposed to IVF where they take the eggs out of Mama and let them get fertilized in a dish, and then put them back in.) Choosing a sperm donor brings up all sorts of issues, so that is still on the table. Apparently you can choose characteristics like eye and hair color. Weird, huh? From the little I know, though, that would cost a LOT less than IVF, I would still get to go through a pregnancy, and it would be at least one of ours biologically.

Adoption is also extremely expensive, so we might be more likely to look into Foster parenting. God graced me with the gift of truly being able to love ALL children, so that would definitely come in handy!

Anyway, that's the update on where we are at the moment related to becoming parents. It's all speculative, though, as Ben and I both have more tests to take before they make definite recommendations and assessments. Ben also did not particularly like the people (nurse practitioner and doctor) we met with Monday, so he went online and found another clinic with a female doctor who went to Davidson undergrad and Emory medical school. I'm happy to get a second opinion and see if another clinic matches our personalities better. The one last week felt very clinical, and that wasn't the best experience at all.

Thanks for praying for us and asking how it is going. We're sure we'll have a family, so don't feel sad for us. We're just looking forward to how God works it all out! (-: