Diary of a very happy mammy of 3 miracles

[Shamrock.]

Saturday 31st December 2016

P is 3 yrs, 9 mths, 3 wks & 3 days old

The last day of 2016! I wonder what 2017 will bring for our family  I'm on Day 16 of FET meds today for our last ever cycle. I started on prontogest injections last night and embryo transfer is scheduled for next Wednesday 4th Jan  I really do want another baby but I am afraid to hope too much that it will work out for us this time. I am trying to keep calm and level headed. I know this 2ww is going to be especially tortureous when it is the last ever chance. I am not expecting it to work out because the last two FETs didn't but nothing ventured, nothing gained. Deep breaths ....don't panic 

Anyhow I wanted to record here about telling P she is donor conceived. We have told a couple of people about Ps donor origins and we are telling P herself but it's not that easy to do. I absolutely love P and I wouldn't change a thing about her but I wish I didn't have to go through this process of telling her encase it somehow upsets her or skews with her self identity growing up. I'm afraid of her rejecting us or resenting us because we used anonymous donors to conceive her and she has no genetic link to us or R. I'm sure my fears are just the same as anyone else who has used donor to conceive.

A while ago I bought the 'Our story' book from the donor conception network then I made up a book myself based on it personalised with photos of Penny and Serum, photos of me when I was pregnant and photos of P when she was newborn. We used to read it to P fairly often about a year ago but we actually haven't read it in a while so I must dig it back out again and start reading it with her again because she might understand some of it a bit more now.

The other day I was at home on my own with P and the donor issue came into my head so I decided to have an impromptu chat with P about it.....I told her that before she was born mammy and daddy really wanted a little baby but we weren't able to make one. I told her you need an egg from mammy and seed from daddy to make a baby and we went to the clinic to see Dr Penny and she told me my eggs were broken and daddy's seed was broken. Cue big gasps from P who asked "How did your eggs get broken?"  I told her sometimes eggs just get broken for no reason at all. I told her Dr Penny got good eggs and seed for us and put them together and made them into a tiny little baby and then she put the tiny little baby into my tummy and it grew and grew and turned into her and mammy and daddy were very very happy coz then she was born and we had her to love and look after 
P was listening and taking it all in and she asked "How did Penny get the tiny baby into your tummy?" I said she just went "phwemmm" with her fingers up to my tummy and it went in. Then P asked "Did it hurt when the little baby went into your tummy?" I said no it didn't hurt at all it just tickled me  She thought the idea of me being tickled was hilarious  Then she said "You know Ginger's mammy has a baby in her tummy? She went to the clinic and got eggs and seed from Penny and now she has a baby in her tummy" Then she ran off and that was the end of the donor conversation for that day 
I was very impressed with the questions she asked me. I've learned you need to come up with an age appropriate response on the spot coz you just don't know what questions you will be asked by a 3 year old. I'm going to make it one of my New Years resolutions to read Ps Our Story book more with her and to chat to her about it all whenever I get the chance to.

[FertilityFriends]

[Shamrock.]

Wednesday 4th January 2017 - FET embryo transfer day 

I am in Athens at the moment and I had my frozen embryo transfer done earlier today. It went well and my lining was good so now it's in the hands of the Gods as to whether this turns into a successful pregnancy or not but over the last few days I have been trying to mentally prepare myself for it to fail and I have been trying to think about all the positive things I could do to move on from treatment if it does. I just don't want to get my hopes up and have them crushed again 

I came to Athens with DH and our previous nanny E is minding P and R for us. I haven't seen them since Sunday evening so I am really missing them. E has sent us snapchat videos of them and we did try to FaceTime with them but every time we did we either missed them or the wifi connection wasn't strong enough. Anyhow we are flying out of Athens this evening and we should get back to our house at about 1am tomorrow so we will see them tomorrow morning for big hugs and cuddles.

[Shamrock.]

Friday 6th January 2017

P is 3 Yrs, 9 Mths, 4 Wks & 2 Days Old

R is 2 Yrs, 9 Mths, 1 Wk & 3 Days Old

We are home from Athens and P and R got on absolutely fine without us. I was delighted to see them when I got back. P gave me a huge hug and kiss but R didn't want to hug me, he just wanted DH! When I did give him a big hug he said "Stop mammy you are squashing me!" He warmed up to me again after about half an hour and we are back to normal snuggling together now... I suppose it could have been his way of punishing me for going away for a few days 

R seems to have gotten taller in the few days we were away and I noticed his speech has really improved. He is saying proper sentences now. P seems to have matured a lot...she seems so grown up  Thankfully she seems to have grown out of the terrible twos phase lately (except for the odd momentary relapse) and now R has taken over the mantle and in the last week or two he has started to really act up and answer back instead 
I suppose I should be grateful he has lasted until almost 3 yrs old to start his terrible twos phase 

The day before we went to Athens R went on a toddler destruction rampage at home! I had to sort out last minute flight check-ins on several different flights for myself and DH and DH wasn't at home so I asked my mother to watch P and R downstairs while I sorted it out on my iPad upstairs. My mum is 82 and she was in hospital for a few days over Christmas and is on medication that makes her very drozy so I normally wouldn't ask her to watch the kids but I thought if I was just upstairs it would be ok.

Anyhow while I was upstairs R turned the key on my locked storage press (I normally don't leave the key in the lock) and he pulled out nearly everything in it. He found a bag of sweets and lollipops leftover from Halloween and gorged himself on them. Fulled by the sugar rush he also opened a box of 80 teabags he found in the press and he decided to tear each tea bag open and throw the contents of them all over the sitting room  The black tea-bag dust was EVERYWHERE. He also found my mums hadbag and pulled out all the contents from it. She had a bottle of water in her bag which he somehow opened and threw everywhere too. He pulled cards etc out of her wallet and we still cannot find her pensioner free travel pass or bank card that she knows were definitely in the wallet. God knows where they are gone...they seem to have literally disappeared into thin air! Maybe he ate them LOL 

When I came downstairs after only about 15 minutes I could hear P and R laughing like anything in the sitting room and my mum was still sitting in the kitchen where I left her and not watching them at all    When I saw the mess the kids had made I showed my mum and she said she thought they were just playing....She obviously forgets that you have to keep a very close eye on toddlers 

I also discovered that R had emptied a container of porridge oats behind the couch in the kitchen, in addition to throwing toys everywhere there

I had to get the hoover out immediately to clean up the tea-bag dust mess coz it was getting walked into the ground by P and R trampling on it and while I was hoovering that up R pulled out the water storage drawer from our condenser tumble dryer and threw the water all over the kitchen floor 

I know P probably helped R a bit in the rampage but I think he was the ring leader 

Morale of the story - Do not leave toddlers to their own devices 

[Shamrock.]

Saturday 18th March 2017

P is 4 Yrs, 11 Days Old

R will be 3 Yrs Old in 9 days time

It's ages since I posted here. Last time I posted we had just returned from Athens after doing a frozen transfer our final batch of embryos. Well, I did get pregnant from that cycle but unfortunately I had yet another silent miscarriage diagnosed at the first scan. There were two pregnancy sacs so it was a twin pregnancy I lost 

That was my third miscarriage. I had an ERPC 4 weeks ago. After feeling like crap for a while physically and emotionally I'm doing ok now. We have decided to move on from all treatment and just be grateful for the two beautiful children we are so lucky to have and live the best life possible with them. All the treatment cycles have become too difficult physically, emotionally and financially. I am sad that I was not able to give P the full genetic sibling I so wanted to but we had to stop somewhere 

Anyhow, P turned 4 years old on the 7th March. I can't believe she is 4 already! Time goes by so quickly. It seems like one minute she was a helpless newborn and the next minute she is a sassy beautiful little girl with tons of personality 

This year we decided not to have a big birthday party for her like we have done for the last few years. I find that when you have a big birthday party at home and invite lots of children and adults then you spend the whole time running around stressing trying to make sure all the guests are happy and you don't actually get to spend any quality time with your child yourself. I also find that the child can get overwhelmed with too many people around them vying for their attention.

So this year I decided to make it all about spending some quality one on one time with P and spoiling her. I took a half day from work and collected P after she had finished her morning at pre-school. I brought her to a beauty parlour/ hair salon to get her finger nails painted. She picked out the colour herself- pink sparkly varnish. After that she got her hair curled. The girls at the salon made a big fuss of her and she loved it. Then we went shopping and I brought her to Penneys and let her pick out anything she wanted to buy. She picked out two frozen tops and a skirt and I picked her out two sun dresses for our holiday in June. Next we went to a big toy store and I told her she could pick out anything she wanted there too. She picked a My Little Pony music player, a pair of light up Frozen shoes and a Frozen wig.  She wanted to get something for R so we got him a car race track. After all that excitement she was hungry so I brought her to McDonalds as a treat coz we rarely go there. It was lovely to spend the afternoon alone with her doing fun girl stuff 

I had brought a cake and candles into her pre-school which she had that morning with all her little friends there singing happy birthday to her and that evening when DH got home from work we had another birthday cake ....a Frozen one ... and we invited just 3 little girls who live nearby to come to our house to play and sing happy birthday to her. She had a great time and didn't get overwhelmed at all and both myself and DH enjoyed it too 

I am going to do something similar for Rs birthday on the 27th March but maybe without the nail varnish and hair curling 

[Shamrock.]

Saturday 25th March 2017

P is 4 years, 2 Wks old
R will be 3 yrs old in 2 days time

Tomorrow is Mothers Day here in Ireland. When I came home from work yesterday evening I was nearly knocked over by two very excited little people jumping on me shouting "Happy Mothers Day Mammy" 

They had both made cards for me with our childminder T and they were very excited to give them to me. T had printed out photos of the children and stuck them onto card and P and R had coloured them and stuck stickers and feathers on them...gorgeous 

P told me to close my eyes because she had another surprise for me so I did as she asked and when she said it was ok to open my eyes I was presented with a small bunch of withered dandelions (weeds). She was very proud of herself for picking me a bunch of flowers so I told her they were the nicest bunch of flowers I have ever received  R saw the fuss I was making about the flowers so he told me to close my eyes and when I opened them he gave me a little pink torch belonging to P and he said that's for Mother's Day  I told him it was the best present I ever got 

I'm very very lucky to have two beautiful healthy children to give me cards and gifts for Mother's Day. I will treasure those cards for ever 

When P was born 4 years ago she was born on a Thursday and I was still in hospital on the Sunday which was Mothers Day and then when R was born the following year he was also born on a Thursday and that Sunday was Mothers Day and I was also still in hospital for that so I spent two years in a row in a maternity hospital on Mothers Day having just given birth. Yes, I am the luckiest woman in the world....well I feel like I am anyway

[Shamrock.]

Monday 10th April 2017

P is 4 years, 1 month old
R is 3 years, 2 weeks old

I've just been looking out my kitchen window at P and R playing very happily together in our back garden. They have been outside together for about two hours now playing in their sandpit and their wooden playhouse. They came in for lunch at 1pm and went back out again immediately after they had finished eating. I can see them from the kitchen so I am able to get some housework done and have a leisurely lunch while they are outside.....ahhhh bliss! There was a time, which doesn't seem so long ago, when I couldn't leave the room without one or both of them bawling for me ...now they like when I leave them alone to get on with their games. They both have great imaginations...when I checked on them a few mins ago they were playing mammies and daddies...R was the daddy and P was a baby and he was making her dinner and looking after her

Seeing them playing together and getting on so well together just melts my heart. I feel so lucky to have both of them. I love them so much 

[Shamrock.]

Saturday 24th June 2017

P is 4 years, 3 1/2 months old
R is 3 years, 3 months old

We are just back from our first foreign holiday as a family of 4. We were in Portugal for 2 weeks and we had a brilliant time. P and R loved the freedom of being able to play outside in the sunshine all day every day. DH and I loved being able to spend every day with them with no work to go to and none of the other usual pressures of life.

We spent many happy days playing at the kids pool in our complex and also went to the local beach a couple of times where R was obsessed with collecting as many shells and stones as possible and P loved just standing on the beach watching the sea, holding either my or DHs hand waiting for the waves to come up to her feet.

We went to a big water park called "Slide and Splash" two different days. The first day P wouldn't go on any of the slides at all and it took R a little while to get going but when he did there was no stopping him and he had a brilliant time. The second day we went both P and R got straight onto as many slides as possible getting more adventurous and brave with each one  I remember at one stage watching both of them sliding down a water slide together whopping with excitement and I thought to myself how incredibly lucky I am to have two beautiful, healthy, happy children 

We also went to a brilliant theme park called ZooMarine two different days. P and R loved the different shows. There was a dolphin show, a pirate acrobatic show and a seal-lion show. They also loved the 4d cinema, the big ferris wheel, the carasouel and the little train but their favourite amusement was the roller coaster so we must have all gone on that at least 10 times 

The first day we went to ZooMarine  P really loved watching the dolphins in the dolphin show and she was saying she wants to be a dolphin trainer when she grows up  During the dolphin show they had a little boat that two little kids got into and one of the dolphins pulled the boat around the huge tank with his nose (all very tastefully done without any harm to the dolphins  ) Afterwards I was talking to the receptionist at our hotel about it and she told me that if I asked at the office at the entrance to ZooMarine I might be lucky enough to get our kids onto the boat and to interact with the dolphins so the second day we were there I asked about it and very luckily there was one space available and I was able to put Ps name down for it! So when the time for the show came she was put in a life jacket and in front of at least 1,000 spectators she very bravely and excitedly rode around in a little boat pulled by a dolphin and then got to touch and kiss the dolphin. It was a magical moment and we were able to get professional photos to take home  I was very very proud of how well behaved and brave P was in front of so many people cheering 

Another great simple memory I will treasure from this holiday is of R gathering every stone, leaf, flower and snail shell he could find from the gardens surrounding the restaurant we had our dinner in every evening and of him falling into bushes etc and getting straight back up and saying "my ok mammy" 

Now we are home we are getting stuck into toilet training R in earnest. I have tried to train him a few times already and failed miserably and left it be but this time I am going to stick with it no matter how many poopey pants I have to change. He is starting preschool on 31st August and he has to be fully trained by then 

[Shamrock.]

Friday 21st July 2017

P is 4 Yrs, 4 1/2 Mths Old
R is 3 Yrs 4 Mths Old

Rs toilet training is going quiet well this time. I think it's finally 'clicked' with him. Most of the time now he will run to the toilet by himself when he needs to go and he is only having about one accident a day now which is amazing compared to what he was like last time I tried to teach him so I am very proud of him. He pees standing up now and always wets the toilet seat but that's just men for you isn't it 

I think part of the reason he is having accidents even though he understands now about the toilet is because he was diagnosed with 'toddler diarrhoea' by a paediatrician a few weeks ago. He said Rs intestines haven't developed fully. It happens in some toddlers and it is something he will grow out of by the time he is 4 or 5 but in the meantime I have to watch his diet and make sure he doesn't get much fibre. So I have to give R white bread and limit his fruit intake etc ...the opposite of what I would consider a healthy diet 

There are two little nuggets the kids said recently that I want to record for posterity:
Last weekend P and R were leaving for a sleepover at Es house and I was saying goodbye to them at the car and R says to me "Don't cry mammy, my will be back tomorrow"  Awhh it just melted my heart.

The other day I was out shopping with P and R and I told them we were going to Mothercare to look at carseats
and P says to me "Why is that shop called Mothercare?, is it not for daddys too not just mammys. Are daddys not supposed to go in there? That wouldn't be fair if it was just for mammys and not daddys because daddys need things for children too!" "Is there another shop called Daddycare?"  I laughed like anything. I have a very clever little 4 year old feminist as a daughter 

[Shamrock.]

Monday 7th August 2017

P is 4 Yrs, 5 Mths Old (today)
R is 3 Yrs, 4 1/2 Mths Old

I've just finished the first week of six weeks unpaid parental leave from work. I'm taking the time out so that I can spend a bit of quality time with P and R before P goes into her second year of pre-school and R starts his first year in pre-school. They are both starting on Thurs 31st August so only 3 1/2 weeks to go to that. I will have a week and half of bringing both of them to and from school myself before I go back to work and our childminder T takes over that duty.

We've done plenty of fun family things in the last few weeks to make the most of the summer...we visited Dublin Zoo, we went on a teddy bear picnic in Rathwood, we played in numerous outdoor playgrounds and indoor play centres (depending on the weather), we had home-made picnics in the park,we went to neighbourhood kids birthday parties, cousin H had a sleep-over and P went to her first ever summer camp..lots of fun!

I am bridesmaid at our friends N & Ds wedding this coming Friday then the following week is DHs 40th birthday and we have a garden party planned for that so lots to keep me busy!

[Shamrock.]

Wednesday 30th August 2017

P is 4 years, 5 1/2 mths old
R is 3 years, 5 mths old

R had his 3 year old checkup today with the public health nurse. He was supposed to have that checkup at 3 yrs old so it's 'only' 5 months late  They are under resourced so they are always late with such things. Anyhow his checkup went great. Thankfully he is doing everything developmentally that he should be doing. It was a different PHN to the one who has done all of Ps checkups to date and she was nicer and much more thorough. She got R to do a lot more things than P had to do for her 3 year old check last year so I am very reassured that he is doing great. She weighed and measured him and he weighs 18.5kgs and is 105cm (3 Ft 5 inches) tall. She said he is in the 91st percentile for both his height and weight!

Rs toilet training is going great...he is fully trained now ...he hasn't had any day time accidents at all for a few weeks now. I am still putting a pull-up on him going to bed at night but for the last 2 weeks it has been clean and dry every morning so I could ditch the pull-ups altogether, I just need to remember to buy a waterproof mattress protector for his bed then I will try pants at night too!  It is some change to a couple of months ago when I was trying to toilet train him and he wasn't grasping it all. I must have thrown out at least 50 pooey pants and I was at the end of my tether but finally when he was physically and mentally ready it just clicked with him and now he is brilliant at it. I'm so proud of him.

Anyhow I better go to bed here. Tomorrow is a big day in the Shamrock household because R is starting preschool and P is going into her 2nd year of preschool. R has been minded at home since he was born so it will be a big change for him going to school for 3 hours a day