And off we go after surviving last week

I cannot believe we are on our way to Peru after perhaps the 5th time I had plans to get there.  One way or another each time was not the right time, but now its seems all is ready so we travel tomorrow evening.

So we are packed and  JM is ready to go to my parents for 10 days, of which he will spend 8 with his cousins.    My parents alone with their 3 grandchildren.  Both my parents could not be more excited and my mom has been preparing for weeks now and all is set.  

For Peru we  have planed the usual ( Cusco, Lima, Machu Picchu, etc) plus the highlight for me....
 we are spending Holy Thursday and Friday in Arequipa, Peru second largest city, a beautiful colonial city,  and very famous for its processions and devotions on these days.

They say they are as solemn as in Sevilla, so I hope also to spend some very spiritual days there. In preparation for our trip last night we saw the movie on the life of St Rosa de Lima whose shrine we hope to visit while in Lima (was well as St Martin de Porres another amazing Peruvian saint)

And we are happy to report we survived  last week..... there are no words to describe the whole week.  I am still exhausted from it.

From the highs of a new Latinamerican pope (a Jesuit to booth named Francisco) to the lows of family cancer and the many emotions involved with a move, start of new paths, etc.

I have been over the moon about Pope Francis.   I have very strong ties to the jesuits, having studied at one of their universities and  while there I grew close to a  very , very special jesuit who was my spiritual director for several years.    A saintly Spanish jesuit named aptly Ignacio after St Ignatius.   One of three jesuits in the same family, another brother was a  dioscesan priest,  (who was murdered during the civil war in Spain) and brother to a couple of nuns.   You can only imagine the depth of faith of his family.

And I  owe him in great part my faith.

While I know many Jesuits that are very far from the Magisterium , I also met there some very special ones whose spirituality  and adherence to the Magisterium where truly remarkable.  The ones that really take their 4th oath very seriously.
I also did several Ignatian retreats while studying there and I fell in love with St. Ignatius of Loyola.

Since his naming I  have been obsessed with Pope Francis and have seen most of the videos I could find.  They are still in Spanish in Youtube, but I hope they have subtitles soon.  They are amazing, full of depth (some even funny as he has an amazing sense of humor ) and we are truly blessed to have him as our Pope.  

So I went last week from this high to the low that my favorite aunt is dying.

My dad left Wednesday last week for Germany after finding out my aunt had brain cancer and her prognosis was not good.  My mom in the end did not accompany him and I think it was for the best as my dad needed this time alone with his family.   Please pray for my aunt and her family.  Right now the only thing to hope for is that she has closure and that the pain is lessened by the medicines.    It can be a matter of hours, days, perhaps weeks, a true roller coaster.

While all of this was going on our lives became a whirlwind of decisions and paperwork

We started the legal proceedings to sell our house  (I have been surrounded by papers for days now) , we signed the contract for a new apartment,  JM did the "test" to be able to attend  my former school  and I was very,  very late for it so I am not sure I made a mess of things due to this (I still cringe while writing this), I learned that my position at work will grow with some new projects, etc, etc.

And last we did the U/S  to see what had happened this very first cycle with Femara.   Well I had 2 very nice,  large follicles (24 cm one and the other 18 cm), one of which completely ruptured some days ago.   My CM was horrible this time, but the doctor said it might have been due to the timing of the HCG.

I am awaiting the progesterone and estradiol results of P+7, but all looks OK.

I will try perhaps a few cycles of this and then close the biological path forever.  I need the closure.

And off we go!

the most stressful week ahead....

I just hung up with my dad and he had some very bad news.

Next week promised to be one ot the most stressful weeks of my whole life, but today I received additional news that makes it perhaps the most stressful ever.   If I had anti anxiety  medicine I would probably we taking one right now!

During this week.....we are  deliverying all paperwork closing the sale of our appartment, renting a new place, I start a huge new project at work, we need to deliver the last papers from JM adoption and the rest for our second adoption and all of this this needs to be ready by Friday....The 18th is a holiday here and on the 19th of March we were to leave for Peru so all needs to be done before the holidays (Holy week and Easter are major vacation time here)

plus  my local napro doctor decided this cycle to change me to  Femara and do an U/S series  which start tomorrow  and continue all week

plus my DH has his annual physical which is a full morning and it  took months to book

and JM has the "evaluation"  to start pre kindergarten  in August  at the same school me and  my family have attended for 5 generations. Its a long story, but the school now is perhaps one of the most sought after in the whole city  and they have a mile long waiting list.   In the last years they have won all kind of achivements for education, yet have not grown their classes so demand is extremely high even in kindergarten. In order to be accepted now  they have a kind of eval with both parents so they can decide if the child is ready and also to check the fit to the school.   Classes are very,  very small so even if I am an alumni this eval will decide if JM is to join my former school.  Its crazy and I hate it, but at the same time I cannot avoid it.  The evaluation is this week on the 13th for one hour....Arghhhh!

 And today in addition to all of this.....  we just found out that my dads younger sister who has been battling a recurrence of breast cancer is now battling metastasis in the brain.  My dearest and most loved aunt.

The news that puts everything else in perspective and adds another dimension to the stress of the week.

So my mom and dad are struggling right now to find a flight to Germany so my dad can spend the next days with her saying his goodbyes, maybe even be there when she dies.   We do not know what to expect.

My dad talked today with my cousin who told him to come ASAP, after weeks of saying that both her and my aunt preferred he not come.

 A few weeks ago when we found out she was very sick from a bad reaction to chemo my dad had wanted to go to Germany, yet they stopped him.

They had found some spots of cancer in the lungs and was battling fluid there from the chemo and it seemed she had only a few days to live, yet she asked my dad not to come.  She wanted to be only with her daughters and husband.

An aunt and an uncle decided to disobey her and traveled to Germany and disaster ensued.  They traveled in the middle of a major snowstorm from a mid sized city to the hospital where my aunt was  (she is staying at an alternative medicine clinic in the middle of the Black Forest when not in the hospital for chemo) , getting stuck in the snow without adequate clothes, car, nothing.  My poor cousins had to rescue them while caring for my aunt.  (my dad has 6 brothers and sisters evenly divided between Germany and Mexico and an brother who died)

The last calls were very optimistic.   Her lungs and breasts were clear and it seemed she would be Ok.

But now this.  Brain cancer.

And now my aunt wants him to come (they are the closest of the 8) and my dad is planning to leave as early as he can. Tuesday is most probable.  Weather is much better now and my dad knows the area well so knows where to stay and how to move around.     My dad is horrible with hospitals and anything related to pain, but somehow he is finiding the strenght to travel and my mom is accompanying him.

To write that my parents are under tremendous stress would be an understatement.

So right now its a flurry of calls, emails struggling to find flights to a mid size city with only one day to do all and they have the added pressure they need to return to Mexico in less than a week.

The additional  issue right now is that my DH and I  had planned a trip to Peru leaving on the 19h.    My mom and dad had sent us an email inviting JM to their house and telling us to take a few days off since they would also be hosting my sisters children.   She is traveling to Asia with her DH and her children were coming to stay for 12 days.   This has never happened and my parents were ecstatic.

My parents were eager  to have the 3 grandchildren visiting and my mom even said it was easier for them than having JM alone since they could play with each other.   So my DH and I  took them up on the offer and planned a 11 day trip to Peru.  an anniversary gift and the last trip (we hope) before our second adoption.

But now this...

We do not know if we need to move our dates around or cancel our trip, if my mom and dad can return in time, etc.  and even if nothing moves my poor parents will arrive after this whirldwind trip  to 2 pre teens and a toddler.

My siblings and I are so worried for them.

So my parents are looking to some very tough weeks ahead. .....

I think them and I will need to take some sort of medicine to survive the stress of the next days!

Praying right now to St Anthony so my parents can find decent flights!

And praying for my aunt  and her family

Prayer of thanks

So many things to blog about, and for a change all of them amazing.  

I can only thank God for all the He has bestowed on us these last months.

So many happy things, yet I have a hard time believing this is my life after all that we have been through the last years.   But it really is.

Lets start with the most glorious news.

Two couples, one specially very,  very close to my heart since they are part of my family,  are pregnant with Napro and I am their practitioner.

 I have been working with both for over a year and have felt their pain, longing,  desperation each time we have talked.  

With very limited resources still in place here its a nightmare to try to be faithful and try to find an answer to IF.  Finding doctors, medicines, medical tests, etc that are acceptable takes forever.

Somehow after all this time I see that my IF has a purpose and its to help other couples find what most probably I found too late due to my age.

I knew it had one, yet I am seeing so clearly for the first time.  

The horrible pain I felt for so many years  helps me  understand their pain and help them in ways I could not have ever imagined.  

I know what miscarriage after IF feels like, how an U/S appointment can be the most terrifying experience ever, what each BFN feels like.

And with my IF I have been able to help several couples find help and finally get pregnant.  My last count is 9 babies,  including 1 adoption.  Wow.  

But this is the one that I have felt closet to my heart.

I was also  the very,  very first  to know that they were for sure pregnant.

 An immense privilege.

She had been late with her period after the first cycle with Fe..mara, but was terrified of doing the  home pregnancy test so she waited for P+17 .  I knew this was an important cycle (new medications plus U/S)  and I had been waiting for her call.

 The call never came on Friday and on Sunday I had to call them for another thing and after several minutes,  she told me:   "I think I am pregnant".   Yet instead of joyful she was terrified.

The test was testing positive, but was very,  very faint  and  since she had taken HCG that cycle was sure it was a false positive.

She could not believe her eyes.

She called the doctor afterwards who ordered a b/w panel with HCG and progesterone.

On Monday I called her later in the day and she was still waiting for the b/w results.  The lab,  out of the ordinary, was late with the results.   More than 4 hours late.

We were on pins and needles hour after hour.

But as I was driving home her number appeared on my phone.   She could not get a hold of her doctor and her DH was driving on a freeway  and she was afraid to tell him the news,  so she called me so somebody could confirm what she was reading on the lab email.  

And read out loud the reading.

HCG was over 3,000.

Progesterone: 40

She was pregnant, finally after more than 4 years of waiting and 1 year of Napro.

 She started sobbing on the phone and so did I.

I was soooo happy for them. Truly ecstatic. A joy I only felt when I also was pregnant for the very first time.  

And although I have not been able to get pregnant again and might never be, I saw a purpose to all that my DH  and I had been through.  

We were being fruitful in ways we could not have imagined years ago.

Although many persons will not get pregnant even with the right treatment (like us), I know that having somebody that understands is already a major gift.  Like this blogging community which was my only way to feel somebody understood.

And this combined with many good things have made for some truly glorious weeks.

• Our second adoption will happen most probably this year and we are closing all the adoption follow ups with JM  (2 years of medical and social worker visits finally come to an end!).  
• My work is going amazingly well, with the additional blessing that I am doing a huge project to help several NGO`s, including the largest crisis pregnancy network here.   And the results are  amazing.   3 times more women seeking  and finding help than ever before.   I truly could not be more happy for this.  
• We are moving soon to a better location for our family life.   The buyer for our apartment has made the final offer and we have accepted and the apartment for rent that we fell in love with is still available.   All timings are coming together much better than I could have ever dreamt of.  We will probably be moving end of April, much nearer to our families and my work.  

 Still.....

My nature is to wait for the other shoe to drop.

My life the last 5 years has been mostly a nightmare  of IF, medical emergencies, job loss, deaths in the family.   I reached my lowest moment 2 years ago after our miscarriage,  horrible medical complications and the job loss of my DH.

Only our adoption of the most amazing little boy was able to lift me out of the nightmare.

After all that we have been through I am having a hard time believing this is our life, yet it truly is.

The life we have worked so hard to build.  

This Lent my prayer is of thanks.