Finally, something to update about.

Well, it's been over a year since my last update here, mainly because there hasn't been anything new to report in the TTC realm. We're still in a holding pattern while we focus on building up our business and trying to achieve some financial stability. But today I saw my lady-parts doctor, and I got some news. And it wasn't very good.

I turned 40 last month, which you're probably aware of if you follow my main blog, and of course I'm dealing with a hefty amount of baby panic as I am keenly aware that our window of opportunity won't be open much longer. So today I went in for my annual checkup, and Matt and I had a talk with the doctor about the considerations of trying to conceive at my age, with my history. She had looked at my chart before our meeting and told us something that surprised us: that thrombophilia workup that they did on me a few years ago, that I for some reason was under the impression that it came back negative? Turns out it was actually positive. Which means that I have a high risk of blood clotting that puts me at a higher-than-average risk of miscarriage.

So. This is what we're dealing with: I'm 40, which already puts me at a disadvantage both for being able to get pregnant and for being able to have a healthy pregnancy. I have PCOS, which makes it hard to get pregnant. AND I have thrombophilia, which makes it hard to stay pregnant, and if I do, it also increases my risk of things like pre-eclampsia, stillbirth, and an abrupted placenta. And the PCOS puts me at risk for developing diabetes, which in turn puts me at risk for gestational diabetes.

I don't know what we're going to do. I do know that we're heartbroken, and we need time to process this information. I know that there are things that can be done to mitigate the risks. I can take Metformin to keep my blood sugar stable during pregnancy, and I can take anti-coagulants to decrease the risk of blood clotting.

But even so, the risk is high, and I just don't know if I can go through another miscarriage. And I DEFINITELY don't know how we'd be able to handle a stillbirth. I feel like that kind of makes me a wimp; that some of the wonderful women whose IF blogs I've followed have gone through several, and most of them, to my knowledge, have ended up with their babies eventually. Part of me feels like if we don't persevere in this, we're betraying any potential future babies who are counting on us for their existence, if that makes any sense. And of course, as a woman of faith, I feel like I should trust God to get me through whatever happens, even if it feels like it might break me. And trust that if God's plan for us includes children, then all of these obstacles won't matter.

And I do so very much want to be somebody's mother. And to have Matt's baby.

But a big part of me feels like maybe God is trying to tell us that we're not meant to have children. And that it would be such a relief to just make up our minds to be child-free, and get on with our lives.

And I'm also angry. Because it's not fair. Not only for us, but for all of the couples out there dealing with IF and all this related crap, who are kind and loving and level-headed people who would make great parents and want so badly to be parents, while there are people in the world who don't want children and yet don't seem to be able to NOT have babies, who literally treat their babies like garbage. Right after we got home, the TV was on and tuned to the local news, and -- warning, this is not pleasant -- there was a story about a newborn baby being found and rescued from a sewer pipe after his parents flushed him down the toilet. I didn't hear the whole story because I had to turn the TV off before I threw something at it. I will never understand why God allows this disparity -- why there are so many people who don't want to be parents who have NO PROBLEMS getting and staying pregnant, while there are so many people who would give anything to have children of their own but can't. I guess that ensures there are good people available to adopt the unwanted babies, but then again in this day and age it seems like it's rare for the unwanted babies to survive long enough to be adopted, and as a result the adoption waiting lists are so long that even adoption feels hopeless.

Anyway. That's where we're at right now. Like I said, we need time to process this new information, and to talk it out and pray about it. But we need to come to a decision soon.