Of Course My Baby Has Personality!

We were getting our pictures taken for a new church directory. I dressed the three of us in coordinating-but-not-matchy-matchy outfits, and we walked over to the church. My sweet daughter smiled and was friendly to the lady checking us in, and we had a pleasant chat while waiting for the photographer. Then we sat for our pictures, and of course, Little Girl gives the photographer a blank stare, mouth partially open as if to say, "What are you doing?" in all of the pictures. He tried to get her to laugh or smile, but she just looked more confused. We never got a picture with three people smiling. Oh well, no harm done. I wasn't planning on ordering any anyway, and she is adorable no matter what face she's making. 

As we prepared to leave the session the photographer commented, "Don't worry. She'll develop a personality eventually." I'm sure you can imagine my motherly indignation at that comment! 

The Difference a Year Makes

A year ago today I saw my little girl's heartbeat for the first time on an ultrasound. I was 6 weeks 5 days along in my pregnancy, which means Little Girl was not even 5 weeks old. I can't believe the difference a year makes!

I still remember how nervous and excited I was at that ultrasound. I was hoping that I would get to see that little flickering heart beating, but I didn't know for sure. I hadn't had much in the way of symptoms, and I confess I worried a lot. But as soon as there was an image on the screen I saw that heart beating away. It was magical. 

It is so incredible to think that over the past year that little tiny flickering speck inside me has grown into this beautiful 4 month old baby girl with so much personality! What a blessing, and what a testament to God's goodness and design! Every time our daughter does something new and we see how fast she is learning about her world and growing in her abilities it is awe-inspiring to realize that just a short time ago she was still inside me. 

"You Knit Me Together"

"For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb." ~ Psalm 139:13

We had our first ultrasound at 6 weeks, 5 days. We were able to have one so early because our fertility clinic always does an early ultrasound to make sure everything looks good before they refer patients out to an OBGYN. Our baby had only been conceived 4 and a half weeks ago, but already at that ultrasound, we could see a heartbeat. It was a flicker on the screen, but it was clear as day. The doctor didn't even have to point it out to us; we could see it clearly on our own. How amazing that so very early we can already see the baby's heartbeat! It was very special.

Our second ultrasound was almost two weeks ago, at 10 weeks, 6 days (or almost 9 weeks after conception). It was incredible! Baby already looked like a baby, was waving his/her little arms around, kicking and moving around in there, and acting completely adorable. We were told that Baby was measuring 11 weeks, 3 days, and my heart filled with pride to think that my baby was already "four days ahead." Now, I do know that this is really silly... it's perfectly normal for babies to measure a little bigger or smaller and it isn't a problem either way, but I couldn't help it. I would have come away from that ultrasound being proud of Baby for something no matter what. It was just such an amazing experience. After a few attempts (because Baby was so wiggly) the ultrasound tech was able to measure the heart rate - 156 bpm.

Humor me for a minute while I get up on my soapbox...

I can't believe that people can see an early ultrasound like one of these, see a heartbeat, or see an adorable baby kicking and moving all around and somehow think that this baby is not a person. If it isn't a person, what in the world could it be?! I now understand how effective and wonderful it is to be able to show pregnant moms who are not sure if they want to keep their babies ultrasounds so they can see the little person growing inside of them. When I saw my baby, no part of me believed for a second that the baby inside me was part of "my body." That Baby was doing all sorts of adorable things that I had no idea were going on in there. It actually made me feel rather clueless, like, "How can all of that kicking and dancing and wiggling be going on inside me and I have no idea about it?"  It was clearly another, separate, little tiny person living inside me.

I am unashamedly pro-life, as you will probably know if you have read my other posts. Even if I had not been pro-life before, I think struggling with infertility the way I have would have made me realize the value of life and how wanted every baby really is.

I firmly believe that there is no such thing as an "unwanted pregnancy" and absolutely no such thing as an "unwanted baby." Allow me to back that up:

• God wants the baby. This is the obvious one. God created that baby. God knit each and every one of us together in our mother's wombs (Psalm 139:13) and regardless of the circumstances surrounding our conception and birth, God desires for every person He has designed and created to be born and to life a life to His glory, because He loves us all.
• The mother (or parents) wants the baby. Admittedly there are times when this is not true. We all know that, otherwise abortions would hardly ever take place. But I think it is sad that at times our society assumes that if perfect conditions did not surround a child's conception then the mother or parents must not want, be excited about, or love their baby. Even if a baby was unplanned, a complete surprise, or even came about after a "mistake" it is hard to carry a child and not love and want that child. We should never assume that a woman who is pregnant doesn't want her baby just because it appears to outsiders to be an inconvenient time in her life for having children. 
• Even if parents do not want a baby, God still loves that child. And, as I know from experience, there are countless couples who want that baby. After going through infertility and coming very close to turning to adoption, I see clearly that every single baby that is born is wanted. And not only is that baby wanted by God, but that baby is wanted by some person or couple somewhere who would give anything to have a baby. 

There just is no such thing as an unwanted baby, and by extension, no such thing as an unwanted pregnancy. No such thing. 

Getting down off the soapbox... Sorry about that, guys! But those are some of my thoughts since our last ultrasound.

To conclude, that ultrasound a few weeks ago was absolutely life-changing! I cannot believe how blessed we are to have this opportunity to have a baby. Over 12 weeks in and Jonathan and I still look at each other regularly and say, "I can't believe this is actually happening. God is so good!" Baby has only been around for 10 weeks or so, and already all his or her little organs are in place and beginning to function and he or she is wiggling and moving around and looking very, very human and adorable. It's crazy to think about, but God must just be very good at what He does.

Embryos are People Too

This morning as I was reading this month's issue of The Lutheran Witness (a magazine published by the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod) I came across an article called "Shaped by God" by Rev. Dr. Robert Weise. There are some things I really liked about the article, but there were also some things that made me pretty livid. I will delve into some of the issues in this post.  This month is the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, so the entire issue was dedicated to life issues. The article was about a topic very much on my mind lately; it dealt with the question "Are embryos in petri dishes really human?" 

Of course, my answer and the author's answer is a resounding "yes!" An embryo is fully human - it has a complete set of human DNA and will grow into a human being if in a woman's womb. The point of the article was that if life begins at conception, it does not matter where conception takes place. Life is life, human life is human life, and all human life must be treated with the same level of respect. The article is about the bioethical issues that today's assisted reproductive technology creates. 

In a nutshell, the problem with IVF from a pro-life perspective is that in the process a set of embryos are created in a petri dish, they are allowed to develop for a few days, and then if they are determined to be "viable" they are implanted. The concern is that a doctor looking at embryos and making a call about which one is stronger or more able to survive and destroying the rest is essentially abortion.  Now, my doctor did tell me that when they say "viable" they mean alive. Most embryos created during IVF will die naturally before they get to implantation. But a doctor is still using his judgement to discern which ones are dead and which are alive. Now, since technically the embryos die on their own, no one has killed them and it's still okay, right? I have heard and completely agree with the argument that in a sense, IVF just simulates about 10 cycles of a woman's body taking place in one month instead of 10. It is likely that almost all women have chemical pregnancies at some point in their lives and never even know about it, so this is not really any different. If I was okay with this concept, then I suppose ethically it's still fine. But a major problem for me comes with what they do with extra, viable embryos if they have more than two or three survive. I am not okay with freezing embryos at all. The freezing and thawing process is harsh, and most of the embryos probably will not make it. Plus, how can you put a human life on hold for years just because you aren't ready for it? I personally cannot reconcile this with my pro-life beliefs. If an embryo is a living human being, we cannot freeze it and thaw it out at our convenience. 

Because my husband and I feel this way about IVF, I had a conversation with my doctor about if there were any ways we could do IVF taking these considerations into account. There were. We do have the choice to do a lower dose of drugs to produce fewer eggs, and then instead of having 10 embryos at the outset of the process we could start with five or six, or even just three. If we started with just three embryos, my doctor said that they can just implant all of them when the time comes, regardless of whether or not they look viable.  If we went with this route we would eliminate the issue of a person selecting. 

It makes me sad that the religious leaders who teach on IVF do not ever acknowledge that there are couples who do this type of thinking or take this kind of approach. In this article the description of how IVF works made it sound like there was only one way of doing this procedure or like the couple involved has no voice or say in how it is done. This is just not the case. 

Although I loved the fact that an article was written about this topic, and I feel that it is very important to educate about these important issues, I feel that the article was written in a very unfeeling way. The words "fertility" or "infertility" were nowhere in the article and the author continually used the phrase "assisted reproductive technology" to describe the practices he was condemning. That may be a correct phrase, but wouldn't mentioning infertility treatments or at least acknowledging that the people who seek out IVF are usually struggling with infertility have been more sensitive? To rub salt in the wound he used the word "parents" to refer to these couples several times! These people want to be parents so very, very badly. Most of them probably do not have kids, and you're already accusing them of being bad parents for considering IVF?! I really think the author had great intentions, and like I said, I agree with him on the science and ethics of it all, but I think the article was written with little-to-no tact. We really need to have people who have struggled with infertility themselves write these kinds of articles. 

Our Choice

I did want to take the time at some point to explain why we have decided not to pursue IVF. What I have said above does cover much of our reasoning. We are not comfortable with doctors determining which embryos are viable and which are not, and we are not comfortable with freezing. As I indicated, we still have a few options to do some low-stimulation IVF without raising these concerns. I certainly do not think that to do so would be ethically wrong. I see no problem with couples that do choose to do IVF by this route, and I certainly do not pass judgement on couples that do IVF. I understand the motivations and I understand the struggles. 

The main reason why I could not bring myself to do IVF is that I couldn't stand to know, for example, that we had five or so embryos at one point and then we only ended up with one baby. Since I believe so fully that life begins and has value from conception I feel that I would see the four embryos that did not make it as losses. To me it feels like planning to miscarry. Because you know that your doctor will never implant five embryos, so you know that some of them are going to die, and that is the plan. I just can't get around that concept, and neither can Jonathan. I know that many women miscarry that early and never even notice. I know that this happens naturally all the time. But there is a difference between something happening that you never knew about and something happening because you planned and intended for it to happen that way. Again, I certainly do not think that all women who do IVF are planning to miscarry or hoping to miscarry, and I do not judge them for that. I understand the reasoning that it is a natural process and no different than what might happen over the course of several months naturally. It is just that for me, I know I could not live with that knowledge. I do not want to conceive babies with my husband and plan for them to not make it. I can't do it. I would rather adopt. 

So that is why we came to the conclusion that we did. And a great deal of that decision has to do with trusting God as well. I trust God that it will not be necessary for me to resort to IVF to parent a child. I believe that He has plans for me that are good and that He will reveal in his own time. Does this mean I am patient? Not at all. But I try. 

To Readers

If you want to know more about our reasons or reasoning about IVF, please do not hesitate to ask. I am more than willing to talk about it. If you were offended by anything I said, I am really very sorry. Please, please, please let me know so that we can talk about it. I certainly never want to be insensitive. I know many women who have done IVF and I promise I have great respect for them and do not think any less of couples who chose this route. 

Also, incidentally the author of this article is a professor here at the seminary my husband is attending. I think I will probably send him an email at some point, so don't think I am talking about him behind his back! I am sure he is a great guy and does not mean to be insensitive.