me and my sis both in the hospital

Thanks to everyone who has commented on my last couple of posts. I appreciate all the well wishes and advice about the laparoscopy. I had my surgery yesterday morning and yes, I do have endometriosis! Based on the pictures the doctor gave to Cameron, it was pretty bad and the surgery took an hour than a half rather than the 1/2 hour they estimated. It took me a long time to recover enough to go home and we ended up being the hospital until 4, which was about 7 hours there. Cameron went with me and was such a trooper sitting and waiting all that time. He was starving by the time we got home and I just plopped down on the couch and promptly fell asleep. My good friend here in Burley brought us dinner, which was just so nice!

The cool thing was that my sister went into the hospital in Rexburg about the same time as me and she had her baby boy around noon yesterday! I was so out of it and did not get the message until last night. She was a week early so I was surprised to hear that. My mom was having an emotional day because both of her girls were in the hospital. I got to talk to Brianna on the phone last night and hear her sweet baby's little noises. His name is Coleston and he has a older sister Cambria, who is 18 months old. I am sure having two kids will be an adjustment for the Mckinnon family.

Not a flattering picture of me, but notice how gray my face is. I had a hard time staying awake after the surgery and was nauseous every time I sat up. We ended up being the last patients to leave for the day!

Coleston Mckinnon--I can't wait to meet him!

Cambria does not know what to think about her little brother.


Two weeks ago, we went to Boise to visit friends and bought some baby furniture off of Craigs List from a family living in meridian. This is the dresser/changing table, and yes it is blue. It also came with a crib and a bookshelf, all matching. We figured it will still work for either gender. We now have all the big stuff for baby-furniture, rocking chair, bedding, pack n play, stroller and car seat and jogging stroller.I have gotten almost everything used and it is really nice stuff. I also have a diaper bag and other misc. things.

I also got this sling and borrowed my friend's baby to take this picture. Yes, that is her spit-up on my shirt. I have a bad back so I will need to use slings or back-packs a lot when I carry my baby.

Prayers are being answered!

God is good and wants to bless us. Sometimes we just do not understand His timing. We have really felt that in the last few months. We feel like a bunch of prayers are being answered and we are feeling grateful, excited, and overwelmed.

Prayer #1: Cameron and I have been talking about Cameron looking for another job for a long time now because he does not like what he does now and it is a dead-end job that does not even require his degree or any degree. We just have not felt right about anything but have been praying that we would know what to do. Well, in Janurary, Cameron decided he was going to go back to school to get a Master's degree in Plant Science. He wants to go to the University of Idaho in Moscow. We will move there in August. This is a huge step for him because he was not keen on going back to school before but has some business ideas that would require expertise that field.

Prayer #2: Shortly after that, I got the strong feeling that I was suppossed to have surgery for my endometriosis. (see previous post) We had never felt right about doing any of that until now, and we know the Lord's timing has something to do with that.

prayer #3: The very end of January, about a week after we actvitated a profile on Parent Profiles, we got an e-mail from a birth mom, and she stated she was drawn to our profile and had a bunch of questions for us. She actually found us NOT on Parent profiles, but on the LDS Family Services website. After we responded to her e-mail, we did not hear anything back, but found out through her case worker that she wants to place her baby with us and she is due in August! She lives in Louisiana. We were so excited and after finding out a little bit more information, we told our case worker we would accept the match and we hope to hear back from her and learn more about her.
Well, just a day after we accepted that match, we got another e-mail from a different birth mother who found us on Parent Profiles. We were just about to deactivate our profile on that web site when that e-mail came through. Too crazy to be a coincidence! She is really young (15) and thinks she wants to keep her baby, but through the e-mails we have gotten from her, she says that if she does decide to place, it will be with us. She is due in July and just told us she had an ultrasound and she is having a boy!
It does not stop there. Exactly a week after that e-mail, we got another e-mail from a different birth mom who found us on Parent Profiles. When the e-mail came through on Cameron's phone, I just started laughing. We have been e-mailing her a lot the last week and a half and have learned that she really wants to place with us and wants to get to know us and meet us before the baby is born. She lives in Illinois and is also due in August. Why on Earth is this happening and why are they all due at the end of the summer? Why can't one be due next month? :) We will be moving far away in August! Talk about interesting timing.

Needless to say, we have a little bit of time but we have some major decisions to make. As we learn more information from the two birth mothers due in August, we have to decide who we want to match with. We cannot match with two birth mothers (Cameron is hoping to adopt both of them, but yeah, that is not happening) using LDS Family Services but we also would like to keep our options open as much as possible. A lot of things can happen in the next five months and one or both of them could change their mind. Who knows? Maybe the 15 year old who is having a baby boy in July will end up placing with us. It is crazy and we are just feeling so grateful that we have even been contacted. We have learned a lot this last month and our attitude towards birth mothers has changed a lot. Before getting to know these girls, we were concerned with making sure the baby met all our criteria before accepting anything. Now, we are really trying to get to know these girls who are in the middle of a huge trial in their lives and trying to help and support them in any way we can. It will be really interesting to know how this all works out. I will try to keep it updated on my blog.

A final thing: Because we are moving this summer, we just decided to put our house on the market now because Cameron wants to sell it on our own and it could take a while with the current housing market. So, our house has had a "For Sale" sign in the front yard since yesterday and we have been deep cleaning and packing up clutter the last few weeks. This a crazy, big decision-making time in our lives right now, and I am just trying to embrace it and hold on!

Going under the knife!

I am bound and determined to update my blog more often. I have so much news to share but today I will just share one thing. I am having surgery for endometriosis this month, called a laparoscopy. I have terrible periods and have trouble with irritable bowel syndrome, which can sometimes be related to endometriosis. The interesting thing is that Cameron and I were never offered this surgery as an intervention for infertility and we never considered it. We were told that the other treatments done would help me conceive even if I had endometriosis. In Janurary, I had a strong feeling that now was the time to look into doing something about my pain. My doctor tried to talk me into doing the drug, Lupron, which would put me into menopause for 6 months and supposedly heal my uterus without surgery. It sounded nice until I heard from several people how awful the side effects were. I do NOT need to feel crazy, gain weight, lose my hair on my head, grow hear on my face, and have mood swings 10 times worse than PMS right now! So I said FORGET IT! I feel good about the surgery and hopefully it will reveal why I hurt so much. If it helps us get pregnant someday tha that would be good too. I know we are supposed to adopt, though, so that is not my main goal.