I'm having a difficult time figuring out how to start this post {FYI- I could dominate a paper in college, as long as I could figure out where to start....sorry, I digress} Instead of trying to figure out my "hook-line-and-sinker" starter sentence, I am just going to dive right in.....

Monday: I went to my new doctor's office to meet with my nurse, Lori, who taught me how to administer my meds. Interestingly enough, so far, I am not on one single medication that is different, only different methods of delivery. To start off, my Lupron is a nasal spray. That is one less injection!! Well, THEN I find out, my Menopur and Gonal-F can be drawn up into the SAME SYRINGE which means only ONE INJECTION!!! People!?!?!?! Do you read what I am saying here.... from 3 injections....to 1!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Insert happy dance emoji girl in the red dress!!!! I have already started the nasal spray and the rest of my meds will begin on July 5
**for those of you interested, we are now going to Carolina's Fertility Institute and seeing Dr. Yalcinkaya**

The past 2 rounds of IVF, I have been pretty even-keel. I have heard about the mood swings and the "feeling/acting" crazy with all the meds.... but never really felt that way. I prayed SUPER HARD the first time to not experience those side effects, and it worked!! The second time around, I think I was just in a daze the whole time. We went straight into it after losing our 4th pregnancy and we had all the workers in our house for the bathroom and the holiday season was approaching...and I just did it. I didn't think about, really at all. I teared up each night with my injections, unlike the first time, but I gave myself a break that time and decided it was just hormones going crazy between pregnancy loss and IVF immediately. Well, this time.......... TOTALLY DIFFERENT so far......

Let me go ahead and throw out a prophylactic apology to everyone involved in my life. On Friday, I was watching The Tonight Show (btw, on here, it will just be called Jimmy Fallon) that I had recorded. Y'all, I literally laugh out loud while watching his show. No matter if I am alone or not, I laugh. Well, this particular episode, Kip had already watched. We were in the den, I watching my show and he, reading something....when I began to laugh at something on the show. What? you may ask..... I have NO IDEA anymore, because what happened next shocked me so badly I think I just forgot all other details.... so I was laughing so hard, I had tears in my eyes, and then, all of a sudden...I am CRYING. And I'm not talking about silent tears streaming.... I mean FULL ON BOO-HOO!!! I just kept saying "I don't know what is wrong with me!" and Kip just said ....."are you okay?" with a VERY concerning look on his face. Well, y'all, tonight.... having a great time just hanging out and cooking, we went from laughing, to me CRYING. TEARS STREAMING DOWN MY FACE while I am cutting up broccoli. AND I HAVE NO IDEA WHY!!!!!!!! I was almost over-stimulated my first IVF round and NEVER felt like this before. It's like all of a sudden today, the side effects started. I got some INTENSE hot flashes at work today and now this crying business!!!! Every morning I have prayed. I have prayed for strength; emotionally, physically and mentally to get through this stimulation cycle. I have prayed for His plan and continuing to believe in His plan. I might need y'all to join me in that specific prayer. I would like to keep my job (and husband!) through this 3rd round

This picture showed up on my Instagram newsfeed at the absolute right time. It's not a coincidence in my eyes

Basically what I am trying to say is, if we are around each other or talk to each other over the next month, and I sound weird, or not myself or start to cry... PLEASE don't take it personal. It's just my hormones :)

Okay...so now I am going to 100% switch topics and discuss my sweet sweet girl. My Maybelline. My angel on Earth as I tell her all the time. Y'all this girl has prepared me more than I EVER knew for motherhood. Let me just number off the reasons why......
1. unconditional love that I never knew before
2. up every 1-2 or 2-3 hours (at first) to go potty.... and then going to work the next morning. I'm basically relating this to a feeding schedule of an infant. However, with an infant, at least you get maternity leave... with a puppy, you have a life changing experience over the weekend and then return to work on Monday
3. I am HARD HEADED and STUBBORN, and I thought that my being that way could (and would) out-weigh any little one's way of being the same way....WRONG. We have caved on things that I said would NEVER happen with a dog. Makes me legit scared of what we will cave on when a baby arrives
4. Kip and I made a pact, no matter what is said in the middle of the night, it doesn't count! Resentment can grow large and in charge if you start keeping tabs of who does what and when
ie: Kip had been on call the night before, but got to come home mid-day for the rest of the day, and off that next day....I had worked the day before, slept that night and then worked again... and had to return to work the next day. Well, when Maybelline needed to go potty in the middle of the night, and he didn't move, and I got up to let her out ONE HOUR before my alarm went off...I wasn't exactly nice about it. So the next morning, we made our pact.....
5. When our girl is sick, I can't handle it. We got her spayed at the beginning of June. Only 3 hours post-op, I brought her home. The nurse in me was going CRAZY! Where is my IV to give her pain meds because she can't take them by mouth!? I see her respiration rate is up, but she won't eat and the vet said no pain meds on an empty stomach. BUT SHE NEEDS THEM!!!!! She would' lay on the heating pad, she wouldn't snuggle (usually she hard core snuggles) and worst of all, she needed intervention but WOULDN'T ALLOW ME TO HELP!!!!! Finally, 3 hours later, I was able to get her to eat some treats with her pain meds hidden in them and she FINALLY rested for the night
6....a continuation of 5..... on Friday, Maybelline played with her cousin dog, on Saturday she went to doggie-daycare, Sunday, when she was a little more sleepier acting than usual, I didn't think anything of it. Monday, she was WAAAAY too sleepy acting still. I kept telling Kip that she wasn't acting normal and something was wrong [and here is where being an ICU nurse will haunt me with children] This morning, my alarm rang, she didn't move. I offered her to go eat, she didn't move. I went into the kitchen to make my coffee and I heard the most grotesque sound coming from our bedroom. Poor girl was throwing up, all over our bed. That momma instinct kicked in and immediately I exclaimed "I will just call out of work or go in late today, this girl needs to go to the vet!" Well, she seemed a little better by the time I was leaving for work (other than not eating her breakfast, which is NOT like her, girl likes to EAT) Through the day, I texted Kip, she wasn't seeming any better and he was sending me the MOST PITIFUL pictures of our girl ..... well, 12 hours later. She is BACK TO NORMAL. Eating, playing, getting into mischief

Seriously, y'all. Could your doggie momma heart take getting these 

pitiful pictures of your sweet, energetic girl while you were at work!?

Basically, Kip will have to take our children to the doctor. I never one time thought of myself as the possible "helicopter" parent, but I think I will go ahead and take back those thoughts. Lord bless our future children

I'm back!!! and I severely apologize for the neglect. If you follow me on instagram you already know, if not, then let me explain. Four months ago we adopted THE most PRECIOUS little girl into our lives. Everyone, meet #maybellinebyrum (and get ready for a ridiculous amount of cuteness and picture overload)

I mean..... I just can't even tell you the flutters my heart makes looking back at those baby pictures! Y'all, this girl has been THE BIGGEST blessing to us. If you are dealing with infertility or miscarriage or infant loss, and you don't have a dog....GET ONE (and I mean like yesterday!)

Let me start from the beginning. My friend's dog had a surprise litter of puppies and I knew right away, one of those would be MINE! oops... OURS! (Kip still wasn't quite on board of getting a dog yet, even though I've begged for years) The day I went to meet this sweet girl, I also got the phone call from our embryologist that once again, we had sick babies. What happened next, shocked me. My heart felt heavy and I mourned..... not getting to bring Maybelline home with me that day. Weird, right? I know it seems that way, but she was going to be my baby. She was the one I was meant to hold and nurture and love at that time (and lets be real, now too, this girl is SPOILED) Bottom line.... even though my arms would still be empty as far as a human baby was concerned, they would be completely filled by our new fur baby. When I got home, I showed Kip the pictures and guess who suddenly changed his mind about having a dog. And MY GOODNESS, DON'T EVEN get me started once he got to see her for the first time. LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT!!! <3 <3 <3 My MIL always warned me that if we got a dog, I would be second in his life from there on out. And she wasn't kidding!!  After that, we went out and bought EVERYTHING she could possibly need. And we came home, and set it all up, and stared at it. We still couldn't get her for another week. It was TORTURE to look at all this stuff without that sweet girl being in the picture too.

Finally, we got to bring Maybelline home. OMG. Even though I grew up with dogs (and so did he) I had NOOOOOOO IDEA what it would be like caring for an 8 week old puppy on our own. Lets just say, I think we are now fully prepared for nights with a baby.... which is what I know y'all are all sitting on the edge of your seat waiting for.... an update on our #thejourneytobabyb. I'm getting there. Sorry, it's been a while and I am feeling a little long winded on my fur baby still. I've been telling Kip that I feel like I don't know how to be a dog mom. I treat this girl as if she was a human child without even meaning too. I will say though, Kip caved night 3 of having her and took her out of her crate and put her in our bed. At 8 lbs, sleeping in between us, it was lovely. Now, at 6 months old, 41 lbs (and still growing) she is still in our bed and this girl can SNUGGLE. And when you have a husband that sleep stalks you, you get pictures like this....

This one was at the beach a few weeks ago. This girl LOVES the beach

Okay, now back to the baby part. For the first few months of having this sweet girl, a baby was THE LAST thing on either of our minds. And then, one night, suddenly when I was taking a shower and washing my stomach, it hit me. There hadn't been a baby in there in months, and I missed it. I told Kip that the momma urge was coming through again and I was ready to start thinking about what we were going to do next. As I have said before, I'm stubborn and hard-headed. Sometimes to my advantage and sometimes not. You can decide on your own what you will categorize this one under. I felt like I just needed one more professional opinion. Even though I had been praying for a sign and on our way to see Maybelline, there were literally billboards for foster care and adoption. Got it! I prayed for a sign and You LITERALLY gave me some. But, it wasn't that easy. My heart needed to catch up with my mind. I knew my brain and my heart wouldn't match up though, until we had a consult with the new doctor. This doctor is the one my OB/GYN wanted me to see from the start (again, being hard headed, I had to see the doctor I wanted to see first) so I made an appointment. Honestly, we went into the appointment wanting to talk to him about donor embryos. I know God is tugging at my heartstrings for adoption, but I want to be pregnant and deliver our baby...so this would be a perfect compromise, right!? WRONG! After talking to this doctor for almost 2 hours, we walked out having decided to try one more round of IVF. He felt very confident that he could get us that baby. He has consulted world renowned embryologist and molecular biologist. NOBODY can find ANYTHING that would be causing these problems

So here we are. On Friday, I will begin Lupron. But guess what!? He prescribed me a nose spray!!! That means ONE LESS INJECTION!!! {insert happy dance} If this round doesn't work, then adoption it will be! If I don't think too hard about it, I get excited. If I let my mind do it's normal thing and over think, I get a mix of emotions. Y'all, the 4 things that bother me the most about not having our own biological children are as follows 1) what would their personalities be like? 2) what would he/she grow up to be? 3) would there be blonde curls!? 4) blue eyes, yes or no? Okay, maybe the last 2 are sort of shallow, but I can't help it. As I have said before, if adoption ends up being the route we we take, none of those things will matter anymore when we have that baby in our arms. That baby won't be "that baby" anymore; he/she will be OUR baby, that will be loved more than life itself

Whew! That was a LONG post! and believe it or not, this is the toned down version! I could have said so much more! I guess I shouldn't go so long without posting again. Check back because I will be updating you all frequently. And, before I end this, I want to say thank you. Thank you to all of you who pray for us and long for baby b as much as we do! I swear we feel those prayers wrapped around us and giving us strength