Broken Promises

Glen and I had a great time in Nashville last weekend! But, we broke our promise to not have so much fun on Friday night that we waste our Saturday away. We arrived in Nashville on Friday afternoon just in time to hit a Krystals for lunch. Then we headed to Dave Ramsey's office so I could have my picture taken in front of his building. That was the highlight of the trip for me!! After checking into our hotel we headed downtown for a little bit of shopping. I found a cute top in one of the little boutiques. Then we went into The Wheel for our first drink of the day. They had a great singer, Megan, that was very entertaining. We had a few drinks there and then headed back to our hotel to get freshened up for the night. Our first stop of the night was at Roberts. We had some great hamburgers and listened to two good bands. They had a wonderful group playing bluegrass which was quite fun! By 7:00 the crowd was starting to get rowdy! So we headed over to Tootsie's. Upon entering Tootsie's at 7:00 there were already bar dancers and stage dancers! We knew we got there at a good time! We stayed at Tootsie's the rest of the night. It was so much fun! We met quite a few people and had a good time talking. By the end of the night, I was one of the stage dancers! I don't know why I do that but I hope to end my stage dancing days there. Saturday we slept in and didn't get out and about until late afternoon for lunch. We went to a great Italian restaurant called Demos for dinner. Printer's Alley was our next stop on the list. There are only a few choices for bars in the alley. One choice was "Nude Karaoke" or Lonnie's for Karaoke. We chose Lonnie's as we had been there before and had a great time. No, Glen nor I did any singing that night! Sunday we got up and headed to Pancake Pantry for breakfast. We had a fantastic time in Nashville but we were glad to be going back home to get some rest.





I went to my Dr. this week to have a sonogram to see how the pills they gave me a few weeks ago worked. Good news...my lining had gone down to a 3 and my ovaries looked good, so we are starting our first month for IUI. I received my medication on Friday and started our first round of injections Saturday night. I have a pen with a little needle that goes on it and I give the shot to myself every night for 5 days. I was a little nervous about doing it myself but after doing the first one it was so easy and I didn't even feel it. Thursday of this week I will go in again to have another sonogram to see how the follicles are maturing. We are over the first hurdle of this process so we are praying that this weeks sonogram goes just as well.

Live Life to the Fullest

I heard about a girl that went to my high school that passed away yesterday after battling several years with breast cancer. What an awful disease. She was married and had a 2-year old daughter that she left behind. When I hear these stories it really puts my life in perspective. Wow, I can't imagine the battle her and her family went through. May God bless her soul and be with her family during this time.

I have been so very blessed throughout my entire life and am so thankful to God for all that He has given me. Glen and I have a wonderful marriage, a happy & healthy family and that is all that we can ask for in this life. I made a promise to myself & Glen a while back to start living life to the fullest. We have seen first hand how things can change in a blink of an eye. We try to do everything and anything that is presented to us that we enjoy doing. That is why we are always so busy these days!

Speaking of living life to the fullest, we are headed to Nashville, TN tomorrow! We are so excited to be going back to one of our favorite towns!!! We are staying right in the middle of all the action. Friday night we will hit Tootsie's and Saturday we hope to visit the Blue Bird Cafe. Glen & I promised each other we wouldn't drink as much as we did on Friday night the last time we were there! We spent most of the day Saturday nursing our hangovers!! I will update with more details of our fun trip when we get back. I am also trying to figure out how to attach pictures to my posts. I think that will make them a little more exciting!

Technical Difficulties

Well, we were suppose to start our new fertility plan this month but we are currently having "technical difficulties!" It is almost becoming amusing. This past month I did not take any meds so I didn't think we would have any issues. After about 35 days of not starting my cycle and not having a positive pregnancy test, I called my Doc to find out what might be going on. They told me that the meds I had been on in the past sometimes linger in your system and therefore my body didn't know how to respond correctly. So, I went in last Tuesday to have a Progesterone shot to start my cycle. They said that it should start within 10 days and then we should be good to go to start the IUI this month. Saturday I finally started my cycle and was super excited to get going! I went to my Dr. yesterday to have an ultrasound and lab work done to make sure everything "looked" okay before starting the injections. Well, as soon as I started the ultrasound the nurse said, "Oh, this doesn't look too good." That is never a good way to start a conversation!!! (If you get grossed out by these terms -- I am sorry but it's the only way to explain it!!!) Come to find out the lining of my uterus was at a 9 and they like for it to be at a 5 to start on the injections. So, it was too thick to be able to start injections this month. She sent me into the next nurse who would tell me what to do from here. Karen gave me some more pills to take to thin out the lining. This round of pills is for 3 weeks. So, we are postponed another 3-4 weeks before we can go back and have another ultrasound. I am hoping and praying that these 3 weeks go by fast and that everything is perfect on the next ultrasound.

The upside of things is that I get to continue my workouts for another 3 weeks! I have been on a really good run of workouts this month and can notice a change in my body! Mom and I tried Yoga this week and it was kind of fun. It is completely different than the bootcamp I am currently doing but it is a good change of pace for once a week. I didn't seem to get that "workout" feeling after I left the class but I definitely felt more relaxed and stress-free afterwards. I think I will try to keep this class up once a week along with the bootcamp twice a week.

Glen and I have decided to take a little trip in a few weeks. We are going to go to Nashville for a long weekend. We took a trip to Nashville a few years ago and had a blast so we are hoping to have another great trip there. We love listening to live music, especially country, and love to have cocktails so this is the place for both!!! Plus I love all the people watching.

Current Life

I just created this blog so I am trying to get you updated to our current life in just a few days. We promise to have much more exciting and good news! Our fun news this past week is that we finally broke down and purchased a new king-size bed! If you know Glen and I we always have a goal in progress. A new bed has been our goal this past month. We went bed "testing" at the Mattress Firm a few weeks ago. As soon as we laid on one of the Tempur-pedic mattresses we knew immediately this was the bed for us. I felt like I was laying on a cloud. The salesman was great but was totally trying to get us to buy the bed that day. He said, "We have 0% financing for 6 months if you would like to go ahead and purchase it today, we can have it delivered tomorrow." Little did he know he was dealing with Dave Ramsey's #1fan!!! We told him we would be back in a couple weeks once we saved up some more $. A few weeks later we returned to the store and the same saleman was there. He said, "I remember you guys, weren't you the Dave Ramsey people?!" That is the kind of service I appreciate!! We bought the bed that day and had it delivered the following day, just like he told us!!!

We never realized how comfortable it could be to sleep on a bed! I understand what it is like to "sleep in" on the weekends now.

Our New Life

Life as we knew it would never be the same. Glen and I are both strong people and strong in our faith so I knew we would be okay! About 3 months after losing Annabelle, we decided to try and get pregnant again. I chose a new OB/GYN this time around. She perscribed me Clomid and sent us on our way. You always hear that after having a baby you are super fertile. We were hoping that luck was on our side. After 5 months of no luck with Clomid my doctor sent us to a Fertiliy Specialist, Dr. Starks. We met with Dr. Starks in May 2009. He told us our plan of action and we were set to go. This time he put me on Femara which is very similar to Clomid. We tried this for 3 months without acheiving pregnancy. We met with Dr. Starks again in February 2010 to change our plan. We are now starting injections and IUI this month! We will try this plan for 2-3 months and then regroup if it is not successful. We are very positive about the route we are on and know that one day we will have another child.

Annabelle Mae Stach

It was getting closer and closer to my due date and Glen and I were so excited! I already had two baby showers and received wonderful gifts from all my family and friends. We had the furniture delivered, the clothes washed and were just waiting on Baby Stach's arrival. Week 35 came and we had a very busy weekend. That Sunday night I felt a little tired and wanted to go to bed early. I took a bath and then laid in bed for awhile. Baby Stach was always very active in the evenings and that particular night I didn't feel any movement that I could remember. So, I laid on my back to see if I could get her to move. Nothing. Glen and I were starting to worry a bit so we called the hospital. They told us to come on in and they will hook up the monitors to make sure everything was okay. The nurse was trying to find the heartbeat but couldn't seem to find it - she kept blaming the machine. She called in another nurse and she didn't have any luck either. They called the doctor on call that night and she came in and did a sonogram to find no heart beat. When she told us this news it was like our life just went blank in front of us. I didn't know what to do, cry-scream-cuss? After that, the rest of the night was a complete nightmare, blurr to me. I remember them taking me down to the basement of the hospital to do one more ultrasound to make sure their findings where accurate. They assigned us to a room and gave me the inducing medicine. The nurse said, this could take hours or a couple of days so just be prepared. We then had the horrible duty of calling our parents to let them know what was going on. Glen, being the amazing husband he is, called my mother and told her the devastating news. My mom immediately came to the hospital to be with us during this difficult time. This was all around midnight. Needless to say, we didn't sleep that night. Morning came and as more people heard about the tragic news we kept getting more family/friends to be with us at the hospital. Our church was notified and Ann, our pastoral assistant and Father Tierney came to be with us and pray. The many visitors and prayers somehow got us thru what could have seemed like an eternity. I was given the epidural which made the pain of the contractions bearable. Sometime around 12:00pm is when I started having major contractions. The doctor came in the room and in about 15 minutes and 5-8 good pushes our precious baby was born. We had a baby girl, Annabelle Mae Stach. She was beautiful! The doctors immediately noitified us the cord was wrapped around her 2 times which could have been the cause of death. As difficult as it seems we held her like she was alive. Our family came in and everyone got to hold her. The hospital staff was so accomidating to whatever we felt comfortable with. One of Glen's managers called and notified us his wife worked for 'Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep' which is a non-profit photography organization that is able to capture pictures of the only chance we had to be with our precious daughter. We had over 300 pictures taken by Kathy Disney of our beautiful Annabelle with several of her family members. It was a moment I will never forget. We spent the rest of the day holding Annabelle. We had many visitors throughout the day which helped in ways more than words can express. Our nurse during this day was Angelee True and she truely was an angel sent to help us get thru this day. She was the most amazing person I have ever met and we hope to be able to meet her again in better circumstances. The following day we said our last goodbyes to our precious baby and left the hospital. Leaving that hospital was the worst moment I could have ever imagined. When we walked out of our room everyone just looked at us with teary eyes and whispered "I am so sorry." It felt so wrong leaving the hospital without our Annabelle. It was suppose to be the best time of our lives but instead it was the worst moment of our lives. The days following were all just a blurr to me. I was going thru the motions but not living life like I had before. Our amazing family & friends were a significant help thru this time with all the support, flowers, cards and prayers we received. Thank you all for everything that you did!

We learned from genetics test that Annabelle had Mosiac Trisomy 14. Most babies with this chromosomal abnormality wouldn't have made it thru the first trimester but somehow Annabelle was strong enough to make it to 35 weeks. We were so thankful to have her for the time that we did. She will always be in our hearts and missed deeply. We had her ashes placed in a mausoleum at a cemetary close to our house. We visit her quite often and always will.

Pregnancy

We found out I was pregnant February 23, 2008! It was the second best day of our married life!!! Pregnancy was quite an experience for me. The spring came around and I always get spring allergies and this year wasn't an exception. I couldn't take the normal meds I was use to taking so I just tuffed it out. This "allergy" season went on for like 3 months for me. Once that finally cleared up I kept having a bad back pain where I could hardly sit down. After going to the doctor about it he determined the baby was on my cyatic nerve which was causing the pressure and my back pain. It finally went away once the baby got a little bigger. Finally I was good to go! Glen and I decided we wanted to wait until the birth to find out what we were having. I never thought I could wait that long but I did. Most of the pregnancy went pretty smooth after those few episodes until 4th of July. We participated in the Lake Winnebago 5K walk and after the walk I was having major abdominal pains. It got so bad we finally went to the hospital. They viewed the baby to make sure everything was fine. They said that I had gotten dehydrated which was causing pre-term contractions. Boy, those were no fun.