As far as me, my health and pain over the summer and early fall was very well controlled. I had one bad flare up that took me to the emergency room for the first time in about a year in the beginning of August (the night before my High School Reunion in fact). I did end up making it to the reunion fortunately. As the weather started to turn colder in late September, early October, my pain gradually started getting worse, which is pretty common for me. I am very sensitive to low pressure systems and can literally feel it in my bones when one is headed our way. By the beginning of November as my pain continued to get worse, I realized that it had been 9 months since my radio-frequency procedure at Vanderbilt. THe procedure is supposed to last any where from 6-12 months so I was right in the middle. I called Vanderbilt and scheduled the procedure. I had the right side done last Monday and I am getting the left side done next Wednesday.....just enough time to recover before we head to Hawaii for 10 days with Harrison's family. Yep, that's right....Hawaii. Go ahead....be jealous. While I'm so excited to go to a place I have ALWAYS dreamed of going, I am a little anxious about how I am going to feel and especially the long travel day and flights. I do not travel well. Flying is really hard for me. The airplane seats are very uncomfortable for me for some reason and it usually takes the life out of me and a few days to recover from a big traveling day so please, please pray that my body handles it well and that I feel well for the trip so that I can enjoy it to the fullest and enjoy Christmas!!
There is one more pretty big thing going on with us...I can't tell you how many times I have come to this space and started writing a post, only to stop myself because I haven't felt ready to say anything yet. (Disclaimer- this part of the post will be a little personal.)
When I decided to try to wean off my fentanyl patch last summer, I was doing it for my health of course, but the main reason I felt so strongly about it was because we were talking about wanting to try to start getting pregnant. So after 3 months of weaning, by November of last year, I was off my patch and stopped my birth control. After a couple of months and a meeting with my GYN, we discovered that I was not ovulating properly. This was not a huge deal since there is a nice little pill called Clomid that helps in this process. I was on this drug from March to September with no results so after more discussion with my GYN (who is one of the best infertility specialists in Knoxville) we have moved on to injectable hormone medication to try to get pregnant. We are currently in our second month of injections (I will try for 3 months on the injections before we move on to Invitro Fertilization). I have to be monitored very closely because these are very powerful drugs and I definitely don't want to be an octomom, so I go to the doctor every couple days to get blood work and other tests done. This has been quite a journey for us and has been hard and emotionally draining on both of us as we have gotten negative results month after month. I always kinda had a gut feeling for some reason that it would be hard to get pregnant but I guess I never thought we would get to this point. So here we are, a year of trying and hopefully it will happen soon. Please be praying for us specifically about this process. I am trying very hard to stay calm, relaxed (stress is a very big contributor to infertility), and positive about the process. I pray everyday that God will bless us with a child according to his timing and plan.
So there it is....that's whats been going on with us for the last several months! As always, thanks for reading and thank you for your prayers and support.
