Being that Harrison is the reason for this website, it seems only appropriate that that be where I start...
At the time I got this positive, my husband and I had been trying to start a family for nearly 3 years.
We'd had all the fertility tests (what fun), we knew what the issues were (all mine) and that we would be very unlikely to get pregnant naturally and even less likely to carry to term if we did.
We'd made peace with that, decided against IVF and committed ourselves to adoption. We had, in fact, gone through the majority of the adoption process before discovering that we were, miraculously, pregnant.
We'd lost that pregnancy, and the 3 that followed it, having moved on to medications to help us get pregnant after being told we'd have to wait until a year after the first miscarriage before restarting the adoption process.
We had a great fertility consultant who had agreed a treatment plan in the event of pregnancy and had booked us in for IVF that coming August if not.
This positive pregnancy test brought some excitement, but mainly fear, nervousness and worry...and with good reason.
I started the medications that would help us sustain a pregnancy and hoped it would have time to work, but my body was already fighting it and it looked like this pregnancy may end like all the others.
We went to the Early Pregnancy Unit after a few days of positive pregnancy tests accompanied by bleeding.
After an exam, we were told that we'd likely had another miscarriage.
We knew the drill and had the obligatory blood tests, taken to track HCG (the pregnancy by hormone), and were booked in for follow ups a couple days later.
We continued to take pregnancy tests until that next appointment, expecting the line to become fainter like all the times before, but found that it was actually getting darker.
This was a good sign as indicated that my HCG level was rising, so we were feeling a little hopeful when it came to the second blood draw.
The Dr we saw, however, did a wonderful job of crushing all that hope and we left the hospital feeling deflated and defeated, bracing ourselves for a loooong day waiting for the results.
It was evening before we got that phone call with the wonderful news that our levels had increased - we were still pregnant.
We were told to be cautiously optimistic, keep taking the meds and take bed rest until our 5 week scan.
The bleeding eventually stopped and we were feeling quite good by the time the scan rolled around...but not for long.
It was the midwife's turn to burst our bubble this time. We were measuring behind and there was no heart beat. We knew that this could be normal due to the early stage, but the midwife was very clear that this was not what she wanted to see on the scan and that we should prepare for the worst.
Another horrible, deflated, defeated wait ensued, until the next scan, 10 days later.
Now, the corridor to the scan room is a grim looking corridor at the best of times, but, remembering all the times we'd walked down it before, it looked particularly reminiscent of The Shining on that day.
The scan began, Steve and I held our breath, and the sonographer spoke...'That little flickering on the screen? That's your baby's heartbeat'
*queue tears*
As the following weeks passed, the pregnancy symptoms began to increase, and with each scan showing more progress, we finally allowed ourselves to believe that we had a chance and it was amazing.
I eventually stopped taking pregnancy tests, we announced our pregnancy to the world, we found out the gender (a boy) and we started to prepare to meet our son, but there was still a lingering feeling that something would go wrong. I think that is what infertility does; it takes something that should be so natural and so wonderful and turns it into an unobtainable dream. What should be the happiest time of your life, becomes the most terrifying and it robs you of enjoying every second of magic because you're focussed on the, perceived, impending doom.
Early in my pregnancy, around 13 weeks, I developed SPD, which damages the hips and makes it very painful to move (or stay still for that matter). It got progressively worse and went from being sore at the end of a hard day, to struggling to walk up the stairs, to not being able to walk across the room without crutches, to being in a wheelchair and not being able to have a natural birth.
I'll cover the wonders of SPD in more detail in the future, but for now I shall skip to the day we met Harrison.
A scheduled C Section at 39 weeks and 2 days, due to the SPD and the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that we would be leaving that hospital empty handed; that we'd fall at the final hurdle and that everything would crumble again.
I was prepped and waiting, lying on the table with hubby at side and breath held. They cut me open and that was it, Harrison was born...and then silence.
...for what felt like a lifetime...
I don't know how long it lasted, but I went through all emotions in my mind - he's here, he's quiet, he's gone, it's happened - and then, finally, we heard him cry.
This may have all happened in 3 seconds or in 3 minutes, I couldn't tell you, but as Harrison cried, so did I, and when they brought him to show me I could only see a blur through the tears (a very big blur, mind you)
Harrison James Draper Etherington was born on Monday 12th January 2015, at 10:27am, weighing, a whopping, 9lb 7oz.
And now the story really begins...