Introducing Lucky Bud

I have wanted to be a mother for as long as I can remember. When I think of a younger version of myself, I picture myself with my little brother always on my hip. As a young girl I always thought I would follow in the footsteps of my mother, and get married when I was 19 and start having babies when I was 20. Things didn't necessarily go as I had planned. When I was 22 I decided to do some traveling. Time flew by, and after 4 years I finally decided to come home for a year break. It was durning that year I met Mr. Lucky Bud. Who would have thought that I would travel around the world, and find the love of my life right back in my old boring home town?! Mr. Lucky Bud and I were married in September 2005.

That first year we were in marital bliss, and having so much fun together. We started our marriage with plenty of debt, and wanted to clear that up before having children, since we both wanted me to be able to stay home with the kids. I had a feeling it was going to be difficult for us to conceive, so we agreed that I would go off of birth control before we were actually ready to be pregnant. Can you believe that one day I was actually in tears thinking that I might be pregnant? They were not tears of joy. I thought that Mr Lucky might be mad at me for getting pregnant too soon! How ridiculous! Now it has been over 5 years of charting, taking temperatures, ovulation tests, timing things out every month, disappointing pregnancy tests, and all that fun stuff, and still nothing... In retrospect it would have been a great thing to have been pregnant back then, even with some debt.

After about 8 months of TTC we went to a fertility specialist. I set up all of my apts. After having HCGs, ultrasounds, blood tests, etc... there was still no cause for infertility found. Finally when all of my tests were completed, I was able to twist Mr. Lucky Buds arm to go in and get the dreaded semen analysis. A few days later I got the call from my RN. "I think we are on to something." With a low sperm count and even lower morphology, we were told that our only shot was IVF with ICSI. I wasalone in my car when I got the call. I remember pulling over and crying my eyes out on the side of the road. I tried to compose myself to break the news to Mr. Lucky Bud back at home. It was difficult to come to terms with things at first, but we tried to be positive, and new that we would be parents some day.

We decided to move forward considering both IVF and adoption. As we thought and prayed about things, it seemed clear to us that for our first child, adoption was the path we should take. We had our homestudy completed in July 2008, were selected by a birthmother in October, and in April 2009, our first child, Little Lucky Bud #1 was born!

          

In 2010 we started thinking about what route to take for Lucky Baby #2. After a wonderful, but also very stressful, and at times difficult adoption process, we decided to try IVF this time around. We took an IVF vacation to Costa RIca in July 2010. We were actually there at the same time as Chef Bud! Although we were hopeful that IVF would work, I started the homestudy process a couple months before Costa Rica as a backup. When our IVF failed, it was great to be able to jump right into the adoption process.

Our homestudy was finished in September 2010. We were first written by our BM on December, 8 2010, and were holding our wonderful Lucky Baby Bud #2 on Christmas Eve 2010!

           

We heard about embryo adoption 2 years ago, and it sounded perfect for us for Lucky Baby #3. Although Baby Lucky Bud #2 is only 7 months, we are diving in head first and hoping for a transfer date in September this year.

We are currently in the matching process, which has already had it's share of ups and downs. We are very hopeful for a baby in 2012, and excited to share our journey with you! As I said in the beginning, things haven't gone how I had planned. It is true, but things have turned out much better than I could have ever planned for myself. I have an amazing husband and two wonderful children. I truly am lucky, and very, very blessed.