Are we nearly there yet?

Not quite, but getting closer every day! 36 weeks and 2 days into the pregnancy, less than a month to go until Jade's arrival! Although I have a strong feeling- that she will be arriving the first weekend in December, as long as I don't go into labour until 30th November then that's fine as then Matthew will be able to get home in time!

We had a bit of a scare the other weekend, had niggly pains on the Friday night, Sat morning and then came back with a vengeance on the Sunday night just as Matthew was due to drive up to London to go back to work. Rang the oncall midwife - ended up being passed from pillar to post until local midwife rang me back to say that she didn't think it sounded like labour at all and to just have a bath and go to bed. Needless to say she was right as here I am still feeling like a beached whale!

That particular night I was only 35 weeks and not worried about giving birth at all, just about the fact that the baby was a bit early and the idea of a home birth was starting to fade into the distance. But thankfully, due to this amazing link I have with Jade, I explained to her that it was too early for her to come and that for us both to have the experience we wanted from this, it would be best if she would consider hanging on for just a few more weeks - luckily she agreed as the pain and braxton hicks stopped fairly soon after that :o)

That's one thing that I have really noticed the last few weeks is how in tune Jade is with me. When I sleep, she sleeps. When I have fallen asleep on the settee and wake up a few hours later, she stirs just after I do. She lets me sleep through the night (although I have SPD which makes turning over in bed really uncomfortable) and even lets me get through the night without needing the loo - which is a miracle in itself if the stories from my friends on the baby forum are anything to go by. She is sometimes really active if I have been busy during the day, and other days just seems to sleep when I am having a lazy day. Really hoping this continues after the birth! I can tell what kind of mood she is in by the way she kicks, if she is head down and knocking my cervix (which is not comfortable in the slightest!) then I know I'm squashing her a bit - this usually happens at night, still occasionally forget that I mustn't lie on stomach! Her favourite party trick at the moment is to kick whichever cat happens to be on my lap at that moment :D Though I believe one of the cats sits on me just to get kicked! The others prefer to stay on my lap whereas this one cat climbs up to the top of my bump to get the best prods from Jade, and Jade happily obliges :D

Jade loves music, anything with a strong beat gets her dancing around the womb! Thought we had a mexican wave going on yesterday she was moving so much! Her bottom seems to go from one side to the other and then I get kicked either in the ribs or in the side (seems to have really long legs to reach that far round!). Right now this moment she is sitting on my stomach - heartburn really bad!

That's one thing I have found funny since being pregnant, the biology lessons really come to life! You can pinpoint exactly where your stomach is and your bladder, and then where your cervix is (unless you're a male of course!) just from where the baby is lying :o) I think I have learnt more about where everything is in the last 8 months than I did in any of my biology lessons!

I'm looking forward to the birth, getting my birth pool this weekend hopefully and Matthew is frantically putting up baby furniture each weekend! The baby clothes are washed, but I seem to have lost half the nappies - so really hope Jade doesn't make her entrance until after 24th November as that is when I am buying the nappies - would prefer not to use disposables unless they are compostable ones (can get ones that only take 6 weeks to break down in your garden compost bin! How cool is that!?) but understand that if Jade arrives before the nappies do then I have to use something (and it was the only way I could get the cool changing bag from Boots, by having to buy a pack of Huggies). Think we have nearly everything we need, still have to get a changing mat and nappy bucket and top n tail bowl (though don't remember my mum ever having one of those, she used to use a pudding bowl!). Want to buy an electric breast pump but that will have to wait for a while as our funds are rapidly fading this month! And we still have to buy Christmas pressies! What exactly do you buy for a newborn? Was thinking we should buy more for 3months plus as Jade's birthday will be so close to Christmas she won't have much of a chance to get presents for being six months old etc. So the stocking will be filled with teething rings and cuddly toys :D

Three months to go!

Baby Jade being camera shy! (26 weeks)

Baby Jade yawning :D (26 weeks)

I can't believe that in less than three months I will have a baby in my arms! The time has flown past!!

When I was suffering my way through the first trimester I thought it would never end - endless moments of being sick and sleeping, sore breasts, food aversions, more sleeping :o) I had wondered if the angels had abandoned me as nothing helped to relieve the symptoms until finally the angels did reward me with a GP that gave me anti-sickness tablets. Finally I was able to sleep all night without worrying about being sick as soon as I got up in the morning. The tablets didn't cure the sickness completely though, but at least gradually it reduced from 10+ times a day to only once or twice a week, and then once a week and then finally I stopped being sick!! I took ginger tablets to help me to wean myself off the Avomine, as my midwife was concerned that I shouldn't take them in the second trimester, and the night when I finally didn't take a ginger tablet either and waking up nausea free in the morning was a day to celebrate!! :D (I was at a festival at the time and murray mints were the celebration!).

I don't quite know what happened to the second trimester. I think that by the time the sickness stopped I was already halfway through my second trimester. I remember going for the 19 week scan at the hospital with a VERY full bladder (nearly wet myself on the table when the sonographer pressed too hard!), we had to move to another room as the scanner we were using wasn't giving enough detail of the heart. So off I waddled to the room next door (not much else you can do with a full bladder!) followed by hubby and the sonographer, got covered in the cold gel again and finally we saw our baby on the monitor.
WOW! That's all I can say really. I was absolutely amazed by how clearly you could see all four chambers of the heart, with the blood being pumped in and out of it! Out of this world! Then we saw the baby's spine and you could literally count all the vertebrae in the spine - it was that clear. This baby only about five inches long with a heart the size of your thumbnail and the spine and the ribs glowing on the screen. This was one techno piece I would love to have in my spare room! :D

We asked gingerly if the sonographer knew what the sex was and he said he was 90% certain that it is a girl, and that he was pretty sure it was. Hubby had the tissues ready, but I felt a bit self conscious crying in front of the sonographer and I was still trying to hold on to my bladder contents :o) but I was so chuffed and happy that I was right, as I felt that I had known it was a girl all along. We saw her move (she has the longest legs!) and doing somersaults is her favourite form of exercise (that and kicking my bladder!). Finally I was allowed to visit the little girls room (never known relief like it!) and promptly burst into tears! I'm having a little girl! I can buy pretty dresses and bows for her hair! Jade is finally here!

The only other major thing I remember from the second trimester was the fact that finally I had a bump! I now looked pregnant and had people - complete strangers - smiling at me in the street :D Now, that is a strange feeling - it seems a rare occurence nowadays for people to actually look at each other never mind smile at someone else they don't know, but it seems that as soon as it is noticeable that you have the miracle of life growing inside your abdomen - it just brings out the best in people and they can't help but go 'ahhhhh' :D
I have had people come up to me on the platform waiting for a train, to ask the usual three questions: 1) When is it due? 2) Is it your first? 3) Do you know what you are having? (the last one always makes me want to say 'well, we tried for a baby - but we think it may be an elephant instead - good to be different!' but thankfully I hold back on that comment! lol!).
As I'm not a person that is used to being smiled at, it often takes me a second to realise that it's really the bump they're smiling at and not really me, but hey if it cheers them up then my work is done :D And I do pat my belly in pride as I realise that this is my creation (and hubby's of course!) and that carrying this little being is a miracle and I feel very thankful that she chose me to be her mummy :D

The turn of the third trimester was celebrated by a visit to another sonographer but not an NHS one. No, unfortunately we had to pay for this visit (they get these free in Australia!!) but it was worth the money. We booked ourselves in for a 4D scan. This is where you get to see your baby in 3D but apparently because it is recording the movements it is known as 4D instead (I get lost further than that). Although, unfortunately baby Jade decided not to co-operate for the majority of the scan and the first pic we got was of her with her hands and feet in front of her face! She was very active in the car on the way - and then chose the exact moment we got to the scanning place to take a nap! (I see her character is forming already - along with her personality!). So there I was, lying on this couch (which surprisingly wasn't as comfortable as the NHS ones) and we were prodding my belly, and shaking it - then I had to empty my bladder and then we tried again - but no, she wasn't budging! The sonographer was about to stop and reschedule the appointment when I suddenly remembered 'Tic Tacs! Pass me the Tic Tacs!!' We're not entirely sure why, but Jade kicks like mad when I eat the peppermint Tic Tacs, so I thought this might do the trick and wake her up. Well, it worked, and we got a picture of her sticking her tongue out in protest! After that she decided to stay awake, though not always in the best position (she's going to be stubborn like her mummy!). The sonographer got her measurements: 24cm long (head to bottom), head circumference 11.5cm, head width 9cm (!!!! She's still got three months to go! How much bigger is her head going to get? - try not to panic ;D) and estimated that her weight was about 2lb 5 oz :D They also decided that her due date was end November not mid December, which hubby and I thought was quite funny as we had a feeling she would be born way before her due date anyway - but we will see what happens.

We ended up with 18 mins of footage of Jade kicking, smiling (yes they do smile before they are born!) and yawning plus 59 photos of her with her hand in front of her face (has done that in every scan) or clutching her toes :D Her face is so clear and I love that we can see what she looks like before she is born :D You can see her little button nose, and little feet and hands - really amazing! Ok, I won't bore you with all 59 photos :D so I've added a few at the top of this post to give you a taster!

Cool huh? :D But then I am biased :D

Hormones!

Hormones in pregnancy have a lot to answer for; they make you cry for no reason, need the loo every 20 minutes and fly off the handle at absolutely nothing!

This has to be the most annoying part of pregnancy. I can be sitting here quite happily, looking through baby magazines or checking emails etc when suddenly I just burst into tears and I have no idea why - just suddenly feel really lonely and lost and need to bawl my eyes out. I was fine ten minutes ago, the sun is finally out and there was a beautiful peacock butterfly in the garden sitting on my buddleia plant - so why the waterworks? This emotional rollercoaster ride is really no fun at all, on the flipside of this I ranted about my husband being in the bathroom too long when I was desperate for the loo (and I'm usually so patient!) and now I need another nap.

Hormones don't just screw up your bladder and your emotions, oh no. They make your breasts feel the size of melons, they may not look the size of melons yet but they sure feel like it. Then there are the 'am I leaking?' episodes. It feels like my breasts have started leaking colustrum, but in reality they haven't (a tad early anyway at 21 weeks). Hormones also cause growing pains. Now, you get warned about the morning sickness (all day) and the extreme tiredness, but no one warns you about the growing pains. It starts off as a mild abdominal cramp, which catches you unaware and occasionally freaks you out until you realise that it is actually a growing pain and not the onset of a miscarriage. Haven't we got enough to cope with during pregnancy without adding this to the neverending list of conditions?

Thankfully the morning (all day) sickness ended at 18 weeks (i.e. the last time I was actually sick) I'm not as sensitive to smells as I was during the morning sickness - that was horrible! I was the only one that could smell this sickly, stuffy smell permeating the entire house and one whiff would have me retching! I still can't tolerate aftershave, artificial fragrances and especially not dove soap products or any kind of red meat! I can still only use one type of showergel (Happy Hippy from Lush - grapefruits!) and I have to wash my hands with it too, cos I've now gone off the herbal soap. My food cravings change every week, which makes shopping a nightmare. Last week I was eating bananas by the bucketload, this week it's green grapes and twix bars. I like to have lots of butter on my new potatoes but funnily enough not in mashed potato. I could eat a whole tube of original pringles in one sitting (but I do restrain myself) and an entire pack of jam doughnuts! (Restraint fails on that one) I have completely gone off green beans and broccoli - which is bad news as that is great for the baby, but I still love my swede! Sweetcorn is hot on the menu - but have to be in the right mood for peppers (used to eat those everyday!). The other hormonal related problem is the metallic taste in my mouth which is always there regardless of what I eat or drink. It taints everything - from roast dinner to B&J Icecream, for the first few months I was convinced that everything had gone off, it just didn't taste right - hubby assured me that it was all fine and nothing was wrong with it, but to this day nothing tastes right and I'm still left with this aftertaste.

On the plus side of the hormones (trying to be positive) at least I know that they are doing their job with looking after the baby. The baby is growing well, heart functioning properly, has the right number of limbs etc and no abnormalities which is great news, and she is kicking everyday (especially likes to use my bladder as a bouncy castle when it is full). She is now over 5 inches long - growing up to 10 inches long by 24 weeks. She likes certain types of music and icecream - get kicked more at those times. Promises to wake up just as I'm going to bed and sleeps the rest of the day, unless I've been very active. Just waiting for her to kick strong enough so that a) hubby can feel her kicking, and b) she can kick the cats when they lie on my tummy! :o)

All in all, I know that the hormones have their place in pregnancy, just wish us mums got more warning about the effects beforehand!

And the first symptom is ... (week four)

I had made a little card for my mum to give her on my birthday to let her know about the baby - as 32 years ago that day she became a Mother for the first time, and here I was making her a Grandmother for the first time on that very day :o) She was stunned and didn't quite believe it, then started crying (in the middle of a busy train!) but they were happy tears and also tears of worry, as every mother will know what their daughter is about to go through in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and she was concerned that history may repeat itself again and so didn't want me to get my hopes up. Although from that first moment that I realised I am having a baby - I knew that this time was different and the baby was going to stay this time.

On the way to meeting my mum on the train (she was getting on a few stops further down the line) I was watching the fields as we sped past and it felt like I was seeing everything for the first time, then I realised that I was - my child was seeing everything through my eyes :o) Everything looked so beautiful, and as I watched the views I suddenly felt this amazing feeling of love sweep through my abdomen and up to my heart - like a pink blanket of love and joy, and I realised that my baby was sending me love to let me know that she was definately here to stay this time. That was my first connection to her since I had taken the test, and I felt very honoured that she has chosen me to be her mother.

I had been suffering from extra tiredness since the moment I conceived, I thought that the M.E. had got worse, then realising I was pregnant was great as I knew what was causing the tiredness finally. The first symptom I got apart from the tiredness was terrible breast pain, especially when I was cold. It seemed to start at around 5-6am in the morning and lasted for about 30 mins, it was pure agony, like someone had clamped my breasts in a vice of ice!! Then it happened again at about 5-6pm in the afternoon, I tried keeping warm, using heated pads, rubbing them to get the circulation going (not easy to do in public!!!) before I realised that despite the pain I just had to try and ignore it and it would eventually ease. I remember ringing my mum one evening feeling I couldn't cope with this anymore - and she laughed at me! 'That's just your hormones dear and it's a good sign, happens to everyone!' Until she realised that I was not finding this funny in the slightest and then tried to reassure me by offering advice on how to cope with it. Thankfully that only lasted for about a week, but things were to get worse before getting better...

A Journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step...

And ... the first step is getting that postive test which I got last week on my birthday!!!

Well, actually it was the day before my birthday, but as I miscarried last year the day after I got a positive test I decided to test again on my birthday and was so thrilled to get another positive result! Then I tested each day just to make sure that I was still pregnant by the end of the week - until I ran out of pregnancy tests :o)

This blog was originally set up to help me to come to terms with losing my baby - it was also meant to be about the spiritual connection between myself and my angel babies that were due to be born to me in this lifetime. I know that I have gone off subject in most of my blog entries, but this one is going to make up for all of that - as even though I have only been officially pregnant for nearly two weeks, I have had a spiritual rollercoaster ride already, regarding my baby.

I had thought this month that there was no way that I could be pregnant as I had really bad stomach cramps all Sunday night and during Monday when my period was due. I had resigned myself to the fact that nope, it wasn't going to happen this month and I had already mentally prepared myself for the events that would eventually occur later that day. Until that is I got a feeling to do a pregnancy test - at lunchtime. Now I know that most of the pregnancy tests state that the first sample of the morning is the best time to test, and because it was already early afternoon I thought that maybe it was a bad idea to test, but my heart over ruled my ego (nothing new there!) and I did the test. Imagine my pure shock when I got two pink lines!!! I nearly fell over, then burst into tears - then couldn't stop laughing and dancing around the bedroom (really freaking out the cats here!) before eventually calming down and trying to think rationally about it. I kept thinking, don't get your hopes up - this has happened before, and it is fairly faint - we'll just acknowledge it and then if it's positive again tomorrow then I'll celebrate properly :o)

I had an agonising wait that day before I could speak to my hubby to tell him the news - he was happy for me but also concerned too that we may be celebrating too early - luckily I already had an appointment booked with my Dr for later that week. Trying not to tell my mum too early was especially difficult, but I knew I had to be sure this time.

The next morning I was up at 7.15am!!! This is an unheard of hour for me - especially on my birthday :D I bounced out of bed (gently of course!) and did the test again with baited breath. I could hardly bear to look at the result in case I had imagined it the day before, but there again were two stronger pink lines!! WOOOO HOOOOOO!!! I am having a baby!!!!

Failure to launch

The worst part when trying for a baby, is the feeling that you've failed as a woman. For some unknown reason, I seem to be able to conceive, I even manage to get as far as implantation, but after that... for some reason it all goes pearshaped and I miscarry instead.

Last month when I was convinced I was pregnant, I think it was very likely that I was. I think I had another miscarriage. I knew the exact moment I conceived, and I had implantation spotting about seven days after conception. I got all the same symptoms of pregnancy I had last time I was pregnant, and then it was all over too quickly again.

I feel like a failure, I feel that I'm not a 'real' woman if I can't carry a baby full term. I'm on the dreaded two week wait again, but I'm not feeling at all hopeful this month. I feel that I have let go of the outcome this month, handed it over to God and the Angels to take care of, I thought that if I did that then I would feel less stressed about it, but instead I feel even more down - and I can't stop crying.

People keep saying that I should let go of the situation and then it will happen when it's meant to. They also say I should stay positive as miracles are possible. But how can I stay positive and let go of the outcome at the same time? If I start thinking positively about it, I start getting my hopes up, once that happens I find it's even harder to fall when it doesn't happen yet again. On the other hand if I let go of the outcome and leave it to happen on it's own, I lose hope completely, and seriously wonder if I will ever be a mother.

I feel I can't talk about this to my friends and family, as I don't want to keep going on about it - and boring them. Some of my friends say I'm getting obsessed with getting pregnant. Well guess what? THAT'S WHAT WOMEN LIKE ME DO! We get obsessed, we get heartbroken every month when our period starts instead of having a positive test, we try not to get obsessed, to not think about it - but it's impossible, because wherever we go there is a baby in a pram, or a lady who is heavily pregnant and it just brings it all home to us that we're not.

One reason why I'm finding it more difficult at the moment is that Christmas is approaching, the decorations are up in most of the shops, the Christmas catalogues are out, but I don't want to think about Christmas, because when I do I remember that my baby was due on 27th December, I thought I was going to have a Christmas baby, but no, not this time.

I try and function normally, but I am so tired at the moment - why is this so difficult? I don't know what I'm meant to do, I'm trying not think about it, I'm keeping myself busy so that I don't think about where I am in my cycle, so that I don't think about the fact that my period may be due soon. I started to use progesterone cream last week, on the offchance that if by a miracle I am pregnant this month, that the extra progesterone would help the egg to implant and stay implanted, as I think that I may have a deficiency in progesterone and that's why the egg un-implants each month. So, keep all your fingers and toes crossed for me and pray that I get the result I want this month. I'm off to get another box of tissues ...

It's Not Fair!

Yes, I'm going to act like a child and stamp my feet on this one. If I had the energy I would probably throw a tantrum too - but I don't, so I'll leave that for now.

As you can probably guess, my period came today - a day early, just to add insult to injury.

What am I doing wrong? Is there something that isn't right in my life to make the baby not want to come to me? It's so heartbreaking to go through this every month, I try and do everything right, I watch what I eat; I take my prenatal vitamins; Baby Dance (think about it) on the right days of the cycle, and then wait - for what? To be disappointed once again.

I feel that I want to scream in grief. That's what it feels like, grief - for the baby that hasn't come. I feel that my heart has been ripped out for no reason whatsoever.

I had so many signs this month that it was going to be ok - my angels kept telling me to stay positive, I had an aura reading where the lady said she saw Archangel Michael handing me a baby, I'm seeing signs of birth everywhere - even yesterday on Dartmoor I saw a cow giving birth to her calf, which was amazing, she had no help she just did it and the calf looked healthy and was feeding well. I thought it was a sign that I would have a baby soon. Not to be though.

I want to go to the top of a big hill and just scream WHY! Why is it that people who don't want children, who even try and prevent having children get pregnant so easily by mistake, but those of us who really want a baby more than anything else have to wait so long? Why is nature so cruel like that?

I feel that I don't even want to tell my friends, don't want to hear their sympathy, the words 'it will happen one day - don't worry', don't help me.

Got to try and stay positive somehow, even if I don't feel it at the moment. It's the beginning of a new cycle, maybe this one will give me my wish. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Patience? What patience?

The two week wait is almost over - only three days to go! I have been SO patient, making sure I don't test too soon. But, today I buckled and caved in to temptation, I know - it was too early - but, the tests I have are supersensitive and on the instruction leaflet (which I should know off by heart by now!) it says you can test as early as 7-10 days after conception. Well it was 10 days today, and I couldn't resist. What happened was that this ever so faint second line showed up on the test. I am actually feeling quite calm about it, I'm not taking it for granted (yet!) and I also can't guarantee that I won't test again tomorrow. Did you know that the HCG levels double each day from conception until proposed period is due? It is handy reading these instruction leaflets occasionally, you can actually learn something :o) So, on that note I am hoping that if (when) I test tomorrow then double the HCG will be present which means I shall get a stronger reading. Ah, positive thinking, you can't beat it! I FEEL pregnant. I have this horrible bitter taste in my mouth (which I had last time I was pregnant) food is tasting different, though funnily enough the only food that tastes different is the food I should be cutting down on; Boost chocolate bars, jammy dodgers, even prawn cocktail crisps tasted off today! Grapes on the other hand are yummy :o) Had that as a craving last time too (my mother said she had the same when she was pregnant with me!) and I can't seem to get enough marmite each day - though not too strong, made that mistake earlier - made my eyes water! :D

Not really feeling queasy as such, think that any queasy feelings I'm having are more down to nerves about the tests rather than actually being pregnant. I almost couldn't look earlier when I was doing the test, was really nervous that it would be negative - while at the same time telling myself, if it is negative it's because you've tested too early - there's still time!

Matthew is sure that I am pregnant due to the fact that we are part of the way through October and I haven't turned the heating on yet! Usually as soon as it's officially Autumn, on comes the heating! Truth is that I have been feeling really hot lately, especially at night, keep kicking off the duvet feeling that maybe I've got early menopause rather than early pregnancy symptoms, isn't it cruel how nature gives you the same symptoms no matter what stage of womanhood you are?

Plus I keep falling asleep. Now this isn't unusual for me really as I have had M.E. for the past twelve years, but the M.E. is practically cured and my energy levels have been amazing this past year, until the last two weeks that is, where without fail every afternoon around 4.30pm I fall asleep if I'm at home. I think to myself, I'll just relax for a bit, maybe have a short nap then I'll feel better. Then next thing I know is that three hours have passed and Matthew is home from work. Really, nothing is getting done this week! Also I'm having strange dreams during these 'naps'. Today I dreamt of finding two magpies, I thought (during the dream) that's cool - that means two for joy, excellent! Then I saw three eggs in the magpies' nest and then woke up as Matthew walked through the door. I told Matthew about the dream and he said 'what does three symbolise with Magpies?' and I said 'three for a girl'. He's getting smarter than me with this intuition thing, I saw it as maybe I'm having three babies, but no, I think he got it more than I did, maybe the dream is telling me that joy is coming to my life with the pregnancy of my little girl. What do you think? Only time will tell :o)

Well, I'm off to bed now - the annoying thing about having these naps is that I end up wide awake late in the evening and end up going to bed in the early hours of the morning instead, no wonder my sleeping pattern has gone crazy (that and the fact that my cat has learnt how to turn the hifi on at 4am! The other day Matthew thought he was late for work as it usually comes on at 8am and he has to leave at 7am! Bit of a panic, but ok in the end - still managed to wake me up too though :o( )

So, hopefully my next post will have some good news - I will keep you posted :o)

Creation of Love

I had a wonderful dream last night, it was a strange mixed up dream but with one constant throughout. I saw figures in the dream of people I recognised, but I didn't see myself as human - more as an energy and I saw my hubby as the same. I knew it was him but we didn't look like us at all. The amazing part of this was that we were always connected somehow - it felt like we were holding hands all the time, but we had no hands. I know that sounds very strange, but I think that I was seeing our souls not our physical bodies. Various things were going on in the dream, like we were preparing for something or organising something. The most poignant part of the dream was the love I felt between us, like our energies were separate one minute but then combined the next. The feeling of love completely engulfed us, and it was an amazing feeling. At one point our souls combined, as though we were hugging each other, and we both said that we couldn't work out whether I was in him or he was in me, like our souls had combined into one. I felt his energy in me, and I felt that we had created a new energy out of our love for each other. I woke up still completely surrounded by this amazing feeling of unconditional love, and .... ovulation pains. I feel that we have conceived our baby.

Two week wait

This has to be the worst time of the month (except menstruation of course) when you're trying to conceive. The longest two weeks of your life. You try so hard to 'chill out' or 'just relax' about getting pregnant - as your friends who have no intention of having children themselves will point out to you again and again. How can they possibly understand what these two weeks feel like? I know that all I can do in this time is to relax, I know that the result is completely out of my hands at this point in time, but people who keep telling me to relax is NOT HELPING!

I know that they mean well, I know that they care that you are getting stressed out each month, or depressed because yet again your period has started. I just wish that they would at least try to understand what it feels like to be going through this. I am a fairly chilled out person, my whole motto in life is 'don't worry about it until you have to', which has served me well for most of my adult life. By worrying about it I am basically saying to the universe - I don't have this in my life - therefore the universe responds by saying 'you don't have this in your life'. But when you are like me and you see the bigger picture in regards to getting pregnant, all the wellwished comments do nothing but dent your confidence even further.

Not being judgemental here but, if you never want to have children, how can you possibly say that 'if you relax it will happen'? how do you know? You spend more time stressing about getting pregnant, and as Murphy's Law goes, you'd probably be the first one to get pregnant, because that's the last thing you wanted.

So instead of trying to give out (un)helpful advice about relaxing, 'it will happen when it's meant to', 'don't get yourself stressed out over it' - try thinking about it from your friends point of view; she's desperate to become a mother - yes that's right, desperate. That doesn't mean that she's lost her mind and will do something manic, it means that the only thing she wants to be right now is a Mother. There's nothing wrong in that, surely? I mean if women decided that they didn't want that anymore, then the future of this world would come to a screeching halt wouldn't it? Yes, it is natural when you have been trying for more than six months to get more anxious as each month passes with yet another negative test. Yes it is good that I can get pregnant by the fact that I managed it before, even if it did end in miscarriage. Yes I know that I am without a doubt boring you senseless by talking about babies and what new discovery I may have found that will help me conceive, and yes, I already think of myself as a mother - I just need that little stick to give me the proof. So during these two weeks, why not show your support for a change? Why not get excited by the prospect that your friend will hopefully get her wish to be a mother? Let her talk about tiny baby clothes and baby names. Let her work out when the proposed due date will be, and how different types of exercise may actually help her to have a healthier pregnancy and more contented baby. Just let her talk as much and as often as she wants to - show her that you CARE. You know the saying 'if you don't have anything nice to say - don't say anything at all.' ever so true at this stage of a woman's life, if you can't be supportive and at least try and understand how she feels, then don't even bother. Bite your lip, and think of something original to say instead.

Remember what it was like when there was something you really wanted - so much that it was all you could think about? Now multiply that by about ten and you will understand how I feel right now. It is COMPLETELY NATURAL to be like this. My body tells me far more about whether I am ready to conceive or not than any Doctor or friend could. Yes, I may get concerned when I feel a strange twinge; is that ov pain or IBS? Or, when exactly did I ov? Will I get the implantation spotting or is that my period starting? These things are real to me right now, this is the first hurdle I have to get over - the getting pregnant hurdle. Being told that 'your flat is really too small to have a baby in' or 'wouldn't it be better to wait until you can afford it' are really not helpful comments to make. I know that when I get pregnant, then everything else will work out to help us. I know that we will be able to get a bigger place at some point - and if that means that the baby will be in this flat with us for a few months before we can move, then so be it - babies have survived in far smaller dwellings. As for being able to afford it - the great thing about being pregnant for nine months is that you can split the payments, you can save a bit each month for the essentials - you don't have to go and buy the whole lot in one go. What I hate is the fact that everyone is so concerned with how are we going to manage this? Or, why don't they just chill out over it? WHY won't you just be happy that we have decided that we want to become parents? Is that really so difficult for you? Why not focus on the fact that we will be having a beautiful baby, something that is so unique and individual that will only have our DNA and our characteristics - that nature is so amazing to create this for us? Focus on the positive not the negative, and try really hard to be as excited as we are about the prospect.

So for the next two weeks, just be patient with me, and think before you speak.

If you have read anything in this blog that you find offensive, my hormones are to blame - not me.

When did you forget to play?

Play - a word that you associate with children, not usually for adults. But why not? In every one of us there is an inner child that still gets excited when it starts snowing, or about the joys of Christmas. Do we really forget about all this when we become an adult?

I still don't really feel like an adult, I hit 30 last year and it was the worst birthday ever. I had a nice day, but I just didn't want to be 30. I kept thinking, now I have to act like a grown-up :o( It may be because I still have young siblings, the youngest being 12 this November, so I don't feel old enough to be an adult at all. I still get caught out when I hear a mother say 'mind that lady!' when their child accidentally walks in to me, or when someone calls me Mrs Whorlow - and I think they're talking about my mother-in-law :o)

I was a serious child, I took things to heart and too seriously. I was the eldest child, the responsible and conscientious one (hated that word, had it in every report I remember!). I was the one that the younger ones could look up to and follow examples led by me. If I wanted to do something silly, I was told to 'grow up and act your age'. This resulted in me being very shy, and I felt that I could never really be 'me' with anyone, not even my family. So instead I buried my nose into books, escaping to worlds where I could just be a child.

When my husband first suggested about building a sandcastle on the beach, I thought 'What if someone I know sees us?' which was really stupid. I quickly realised that finally I was being allowed to play and do daft things, and not care whether people thought I was too old for it or not. Because at the end of the day, it is good to have fun and to laugh in life. So the two of us every year when we go down to Cornwall, we build a big sandcastle on the beach, with a moat or two around it and then stand on top as the tide comes in, and the aim is to stay on for as long as possible until you get washed off, or the castle collapses. The great thing about this is that everytime we have done this, someone else has copied us. The first time, a group of children kept watching us, bemused - and then started to build their own, until we eventually had a competition going between us to see who could stay on the longest! Isn't it great to have that influence on kids - so that they too start to use their imagination to have fun?

The second time we did it, we saw another group of adults on the beach doing their own version - which was really great to see! So what if people think you're mad! I say 'It is better to be mad and happy than sane and boring!' :o) It doesn't matter whether you are 30 or going on 50, everyone should be able to have fun once in a while, I'm not saying that I don't have serious moments, I still have bills to sort out each month and debts to pay, but the trick is to keep the balance right, to mix fun into your life. Another saying of mine 'The less you play as you get older, the more wrinkles you get.' Did you know that it takes less facial muscles to smile than it does to frown? Did you know that on average an adult only smiles about 17 times a day, whereas a child smiles over a 100 times? Grow old gracefully and with less wrinkles and smile more whilst having fun :o) Don't become a BOF! (Boring Old Fart!) Unleash your inner child and start playing today!! :D

If you really feel you don't know where to start in order to have more fun in your life by playing more, here are some suggestions to get you started:

As we're approaching Autumn - go out for a country walk and 'crunch' all the dry leaves or splash in the puddles (splash your partner for even more fun and laughter!)

Build a sandcastle - or a snowman (depending on the weather)

Put on your favourite music and sing and dance to your hearts content! (no one's watching you so go for it!)

Go out and play frisbee in the park - or even better, go feed the ducks!
(We took my mother-in-law to Henley-on-Thames for the day this summer for a nice walk, and she was really surprised when I handed her a bag of bread to feed the ducks with - she said she hadn't done that in over 20 years!!! AND she had a great time :D Think of the hungry ducks this winter :o))

Go to a funfair and spend time on the dodgems! Great fun!! :D

Ok, now it's your turn to think of some of your own, or to start on these!


One thing that my mother said to me this summer, that was the best thing she could have said this year, when we told her about us building our sandcastle; 'You two are definately ready to have children!' I took that as a compliment, what do you think? :o)

Nature's Way

A strange thing happened after the miscarriage, I suddenly went off the idea of having a baby. It wasn't that I didn't want a baby anymore, it was just that I wanted a break from everything. When I went out I didn't feel 'drawn' to peeking into pushchairs to see how cute the baby was, or even looking at pushchairs full stop, I just wasn't interested at all - which was really quite a strange feeling. I put it down to the fact that maybe I was still grieving, or that I had let go far more than I thought was possible. It only lasted for about six weeks - and looking back I realise that it was just one of those things that happen in life. I was feeling a bit messed up personally - didn't know what I wanted to do in my life or where I wanted to be, and I realised that this was nature's way of giving me a break until I sorted myself out. It worked, I managed to sort things out mentally and just step back from work and really look at what I wanted to achieve in this life, and what steps to take first.

One thing that really helped was that my husband never gave up on me. He was there behind the scenes confident that I would 'snap out of it', which I did of course - wouldn't be sitting here now if I hadn't. I realised how much I really love my husband and why we got married in the first place and that most of all - the really important thing in my life was that we shared how we felt and talked more. It's one of those age old solutions isn't it? But how many of us really listen to the advice and act upon it? Luckily I did, and our relationship has been the strongest it has ever been so far in our relationship, and I will be eternally grateful that he didn't give up on me during that time.

It wasn't long after that, that I became 'baby mad' again :o) Not in a really mad way this time though, but just being more spontaneous about it. Hubby and I went away for more weekends camping in the summer, met up with old friends and family - did mad things on the beach: our favourite pastime whilst on holiday is to build a HUGE sandcastle with a moat or two around it and then wait for the tide to come in and wash us off :D It is great fun, and you get to act like a kid again which is never a bad thing which brings me to my next blog post ....

Can a miscarriage be a positive sign?

You never know how you will cope with a miscarriage until it happens to you. I consider myself to be a spiritual person, I understand that if something isn't meant to happen, it won't - and if it is meant to happen but you don't like what has happened then there is a lesson to be learned from it to help you go forwards in life.

I believe in all of this, and often tell my customers this when it happens to them. Why then, the moment I go through a miscarriage - all these beliefs go out of the window?

I blamed myself for it, I yelled at God and the Angels 'Why did you do that? Why give me a chance of being a mother and then take it away from me straightaway? What lesson am I meant to learn from that?!'

When the anger subsides, the tears take over and you sob like you've never sobbed before. I wasn't just crying for the loss of the baby, but for everything else that I should have/should not have done the past few months - analysing it over and over in my head trying to understand why I had to go through this, all the time knowing but not admitting to myself the real reason why it happened. I had become desperate to be a mother, I always vowed I wouldn't be like that - watching my cycle every month like my life depended on it, measuring my temperature - counting the 'optimum' days for getting pregnant. I almost became obsessive about it.

I had been getting messages left right and centre: 'Let go', 'Have faith' and 'Divine Timing', but still I didn't listen to the true meaning of those messages - I kept missing the point completely. This baby wasn't going to turn up when I wanted her to, she had a strong personality - she was going to come when she was ready, and I couldn't tell her otherwise.

After a while you just become numb, you've basically cried yourself out, released all the grief and guilt you felt until you're not quite sure what you feel anymore. It's at that point I realised that I had let go. I knew that I couldn't control the outcome, I knew that the miscarriage was teaching me that I had to let go completely, and let nature take it's course - I had to stop trying to get pregnant and just let it happen of it's own accord. Obviously nature can't do it all on it's own, but I had to stop planning the date to get pregnant, stop thinking about whether the moon cycle was right to conceive etc. Looking back now, even though these methods are a great way of getting back in touch with your own body cycles I was taking this to the extreme and this wasn't - isn't - me.

One thing that this miscarriage has taught me that is far more important to me than whether I let go of the outcome or not, is that I can actually get pregnant. I was speaking about this to my mother on the day it happened, and she said that while I am emotionally ready to be pregnant, I wasn't physically ready. I don't mean that in the way that my body wasn't able to hold onto the pregnancy, but more that my circumstances weren't favourable at this moment in time for me to have a baby. I have been suffering from a cold for the past few weeks, I am rushed off my feet trying to organise Mind, Body & Spirit Fairs and study for a degree in Herbal Medicine, and on top of that I am living in a tiny flat with far too much clutter, that certainly isn't helping to bring the fresh new energy in that manifests a baby.
It was a bit of a discovery for me, this statement. In the past I always knew that I was physically able to have a baby, but wasn't ready emotionally. I thought that once I felt ready to have a baby it would all fall into place, and it will of course - just it will happen more likely when I least expect it.

So it is possible to turn the negativity of a miscarriage into a positive sign. This is my chance to take a break from life for a bit, to clear the clutter in the flat to 'make room for the cot' and to find some peace within to prepare my energy too, for this huge change to my life that will be the baby, when it decides to come to me - in perfect divine timing of course.

'To be or not to be...'

Miscarriages can take you on a rollercoaster ride of emotions. First you start with disbelief, then the unfairness of it, then you get angry at God (sometimes only temporarily) and think ‘Why me?’, then you start to doubt that you’ll ever be a mother, and then you can’t stop crying for the loss of your baby.

This happened to me this morning. (13th June 2006) This was my first baby, but my story started a few years ago…

My father died nearly in 2003, a few months after his death I had a dream about my baby. I always had a feeling that I am going to have a little girl one day, and always wanted to call her Elizabeth Jade after my Grandmother (Elizabeth Jane). In my dream I saw a little girl of about five years old, who looked very alike my youngest sister when she was that age. She spoke to me telepathically in the dream and said that she was my daughter, it was not time for her to come yet, but she would let me know when that time was. She said ‘my name is Jade’ – I felt that this was meant to be her first name not her middle name, as she said it very strongly (I’ve been told!) And then I woke up.

I felt very blessed to have been given this chance to connect with my daughter, to prepare myself for her arrival. Last year whilst on an Angel course in Glastonbury, we did a ‘baby walk’ where we all stood in front of the class, and the others would clairvoyantly ‘see’ how many balloons were around us at the time, which meant how many babies we were going to have. Just before this I knew that I wanted at least two children and had been thinking that I would maybe like a third too. The others in my class couldn’t decide whether there were two or three balloons around me, so we decided that two possibly three babies would come to me in this lifetime. While some of the others got possible dates of when to expect their babies, for some reason I didn’t – but a couple of months later, whilst meeting up with one of my friends from the course, she told me that she had seen three years as being the time I would have my first child. As I was at university at the time as a mature student, this fitted in with when I was going to finish my course, so I felt that was good timing.

In September last year, I took another Angel course, and the tutor said that although my friend had seen three years for me, it did not necessarily mean three years from then, it may mean that 2005 would be one year, 2006 the second and then giving birth in 2007. He saw me as getting pregnant fairly soon, and that the energy of the baby was very strong and that he too saw a little girl who would be a powerful being when she incarnated. This made me start to think more about being a mother and really looking forward to it. A month later I was at a Holistic Fair and one of the stallholders read my aura and gave me some healing. She said that she saw me having a baby in March, but didn’t say which March and needed to send myself healing to my sacral chakra first, which I have been doing ever since.

2006 - March came and went and I didn’t get pregnant, so I thought, well maybe I’ll be giving birth next March instead? In April this year I had really strong ovulation pains, and was almost worried that I was having an ectopic pregnancy as the pains were in my left side where my fallopian tubes are blocked. It passed after about 10 minutes and I went to work as planned. On the way to work I mentally asked Jade to please make sure that she was ready to come before incarnating, as I really didn’t want to have a miscarriage (who does?) and I suddenly had a strong vision of her as I had seen her in my dream, and she said ‘Don’t worry Mummy, everything’s going to be alright’. She was so real to me that I almost reached out to touch her, then I instantly felt calmer and able to let go of the situation.

In May my period came and went, and I drew the conclusion that I wasn’t pregnant. Then last week my period was due and didn’t show up. My period has never been more than three days late in all the twenty years of menstruating, so I began to think that maybe, there was a chance of me being pregnant. Even though I had the period in between, I knew that some of my friends had experienced this and had still been pregnant, so I decided to wait for about a week before testing.

Last Friday I did a test but it came back negative. I thought ‘perhaps it’s because I did it in the evening instead of the morning, when it might be a stronger reading?’ So I did it again the following morning, but still it said negative. I couldn’t remember exactly when I had ovulated last month, but vaguely remembered that I had some ‘kind of’ ovulation pains on Bank Holiday Monday, so I decided to wait a few more days and then if my period still hadn’t turned up to do another test. I decided that I was going to wait until Wednesday, and then test again. However, yesterday I got a strong urge to do a test, and when it said positive on the test, I nearly fell off the toilet in shock! I was so happy, I couldn’t believe that finally I was going to be a Mummy! I told my husband, my mother, my family and my friends on a forum that I belong to – everyone was so happy for me, it was wonderful!

The kind of test that I had used was digital and the result only stayed on there for an hour, and unfortunately my hubby got home from work after the test had turned itself off. He was really happy too and we went out for a meal to celebrate. I really wanted him to see the result too so after the meal I bought another digital kit, and did the test when we got home.

But for some reason this time it said ‘not pregnant’, I didn’t understand, I thought that maybe it was because I had been drinking a lot of water, and it had maybe diluted the result, so I decided to do it again the following morning. I got up this morning, and did the test again, but again it was negative. Thinking that it may be a faulty kit, I decided to do another one later in the morning as I was never usually up that early in the morning, so maybe it wouldn’t show until the time I normally got up.

I went back to bed, my hubby went off to work and when I got up a few hours later, I did the test again. Again, negative. Then I started bleeding heavily and realised that the niggly pains I had been feeling during the night were actually period pains, and that in the space of 24 hours I had miscarried the baby. I was devastated.