'13 - Lucky for some? (farewell 2012)

I remember this time last year I was thinking how glad I was to see 2011 disappear.  With all it's ups and downs, surely 2012 would be a bigger, brighter, more positive kind of year.  
Well it sure was BIGGER! So I thought I might do a bit of a re-cap on some of the more significant moments of our year...

• JANUARY - My awesome brother married his sweetheart in a beach side wedding, two days after our final attempt at IUI.
• FEBRUARY - I turned 26!
• MARCH - Hubby turned 30!
  
  
• MAY - I began the long list of medications to start our very first round of IVF.
• JUNE - We retrieved a massive 33 eggs during our first IVF egg pickup.  10 of those went on to become DAY 6 blastocysts and were frozen.  Physically I was a mess with a bad case of Ovarian Hyperstim and we weren't able to transfer back for a couple of months.
• JULY - Hubby and I decided it was time to shake things up in our professional lives.  I started a new kind of nursing job, which I love so much.  Hubby went back to university to study business, communication and public relations.
• SEPTEMBER - our first FET following three weeks of medications to build up my uterine lining.  We transferred back two of our embryos, and sadly lost them both.  We also celebrated our Third Wedding Anniversary with a coastal vacation.
• OCTOBER - I  re-started the meds for FET, but unfortunately my body did not respond well and we were forced to cancel our second round of FET.  We took this as a sign that we weren't quite ready to start again with the emotional roller coaster, and decided to take the rest of the year off from baby-making.
• NOVEMBER - We were very happy to learn that we were going to soon have a baby nephew.
• DECEMBER - With a very frantic countdown to the end of the year, Hubby and I made plans to have a very quiet Christmas.  This is starting to become a running joke in the Sunny household, as every time we plan something "quiet" it turns into the exact opposite. 
  Christmas was a lovely day spent with my family.  I don't usually spend a great deal of time with them, mostly out of self-preservation after many years of family disputes.  But we were very nicely surprised by how much we got along with them, and I was sad to drive away from them at the end of the day.
  We also ended up with a house full of Hubby's family, including Ma and Pa,  several sisters, nieces, a brother and some aunts and uncles.

2012 has felt like a monster of a year.  There were a lot of tears, a lot of stress, high anxiety, and heart ache.  But I am grateful for every moment.  It was also a year that brought us the creation of our Boobals (frozen embryos).  A year that brought Hubby and I even closer together; stronger together; cemented us together.  It was a year that we felt overwhelming love and support from our family, friends and all of you who read this blog. 

We decided not to make a New Years resolution list for 2013.  Our only goal is to remain hopeful that soon we will have a baby in our arms, and to stay thankful for each other.  We weathered 2012 together and now we know NOTHING is impossible!

As for the baby-making plans... well we have been ever so pleasantly surprised already.  A recent trip to my doctor proved that my body has enjoyed the time off we gave it, and I have managed to ovulate independently for the first time in over a year.  We are taking advantage of the this new-found hormone surge and will do another frozen embryo transfer (FET) a lot sooner than we expected.  I will endeavour to keep you up to date with all that as it happens.  But, as I'm sure you'd all understand, we have our anxieties about another transfer and so my updates may not always be full of detail.

For all my blogger friends out there I want to say thank you for giving me something to read when I didn't feel up to writing.  You have inspired me to come back to my keyboard again.  Congratulations to the many of you who recently found out you're expecting, or have given birth to your bundles of joy.  I may not always comment on your posts, but I share your happiness with you nonetheless and am cheering you on from afar!

To everyone who reads my blog and has stuck with us since it's inception, I say a BIG, FAT THANK YOU!!  There have been times when I've wondered if anyone really reads this rubbish.  But then I read your awesome comments and see all the 'likes' on the FB page and I can't help but smile a big, goofy smile.  

Whatever your plans for this brand new year, I hope above all else it brings you happiness.  I am rooting for you all!  And I really do love hearing from you, so please drop me an email, post a comment, like me on FB or volunteer to guest post!

Happy 2013!

Good riddance 2011, welcome 2012

Who else is thoroughly relieved that 2011 is FINALLY over?!?  It seems that almost everyone I speak to feels the same way - 2011 will go down in history as one of the hardest, trouble-filled, exhausting years to date!  What was it about that particular year that made it so horrible for everyone?  

For us 2011 started the same way it finished: stressful, chaotic and smothered in bad news.  We thought starting the year with a state-wide, devastating flood would mean that things could only get better as the year went on.  But we were surprised to learn how wrong that thinking was.  We have dealt with Hubby being laid-off, personal financial crisis, deaths in the family, other family tragedy and illness, surgery, failed fertility, and the highest stress levels I think we have ever coped with.  

BUT!  We made it through, relatively unscathed (apart from some psychological damage, but hey, who doesn't have that?), and were able to celebrate a few wins amongst the piles of crap.  We welcomed our new niece JJ, who is adorable beyond words, as well as several other of our friend's new little cuties,  we purchased a second car, we spent some time with long-lost overseas relatives, traveled to parts of Queensland I've never been before, found a lovely new fertility specialist and were able to spend Christmas as husband and wife, alone for the first time ever!  

All in all, I'm pretty darn proud of how we managed our way through the poo pile that was 2011.  There were times I wanted to pack it in, have a tantrum and give up.  Even now, I think back to particular times during the year where I NEVER thought we'd make it through sanely.  And no doubt I'm a little bit more cynical about certain things, careful with others, and so much of a bigger potty mouth than when it all started.  But I'm also hopeful that 2012 brings a fresh start, a chance for a do-over, something positive...maybe even a baby???  

My motto for this year is I AM READY!! 

I am ready for change, I am ready for positivity, I am ready for happiness, I am ready to start our family.  I am ready, are you?

So, cheers to 2012!!  May it be a greater year for everyone!  And good riddance to bad rubbish 2011.  Thank goodness you'll never show your ugly face around here again!