I can't believe it's taken me this long to write my first post. I actually created this blog not knowing if I were ever to conceive a baby, but knowing that I at least had to try to be the healthiest possible. This blog was initially meant to follow my journey towards getting healthy enough to get pregnant. A reminder that we are all on God's timeline, I am now happily 16 weeks pregnant and will document everything that led me to getting pregnant in the first place to having a healthy pregnancy.
Now a little about myself. I got married in July 2009 to my best friend, Jared. I was about to enter my last year of school in the Landscape Architecture program at Arizona State University. If anyone knows anything about being in the school of design, it's that we're the only building on campus that has its lights on and full of students 24 hours a day. It's soooo stressful! I knew that there was no way I wanted to get pregnant in such an unhealthy condition. I lived and breathed school. I didn't sleep much and my eating habits were all over the place. For our starting family, it was a conscious decision to wait to have kids till after school. I was on birth control, and had been on them since I was 16. I have always been irregular with my periods. I'm talking about skipping 5-6 months at a time, getting it once or twice and skipping another two months and so on. Doctors always told me that as long as I got it a couple of times a year, I should be fine. I always felt this shouldn't be the case. How can that be normal when a female's body is supposed to menstruate regularly? Anyways, I never received any other explanation except that "it happens" so I just went along with it.
In December of 2009, I was falling apart-literally. I had so much stress that I had the worse stomach and heartburn pain nonstop for weeks. I had so many projects to do at school that I couldn't just relax and sleep. That wasn't an option until final review. Finally, I couldn't stand the pain anymore and ended up going to the E.R. It was during that visit that I had an ultrasound and found that I had fatty liver disease and fibrous cysts in my ovaries. This is where my mixture of doctor visits began. I had my regular family doctor, a gastroenterologist for the fatty liver and acid reflux (heartburn), and eventually a gynecologist for the cysts.
My doctor stopped my birth control just in case that was affecting all of my stomach g.i. issues and I was officially diagnosed with PCOS- Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. I had the worst experience with all of my doctors. Nothing could be done about my liver and I was at risk of eventually getting cirrosis later on in life. Treatment for PCOS is usually metformin (diabetes medicine) but since I had liver problems, I could not take it since Metformin can cause liver problems. Just eat healthy and continue on birth control they said.
I was really tired of everything at that point. Fortunately for me, I met a friend named Leah who is currently studying naturopathic medicine here in Arizona. She introduced me to the Southwest Naturopathic Medical Center and I made my first appointment. If you've never been to see a naturopathic doctor, please go! It is SUCH a DIFFERENCE to regular doctors!! You're seen for 1-2 hours, they ask you about everything and approach your problem not only with medication but they offer suggestions to treat your whole body and get it as healthy as possible. It's a holistic approach and when we live life "going with the flow" so to say, we never realize how much one part of your body affects the other.
It has been almost two years since then, and I have become more aware of my body and more conscious of the way I treat my body and the things I put in my body. My goal was not just simply to get pregnant, but to prepare my body for a healthy pregnancy. It didn't make sense to me to try to carry a little being in a body that was unhealthy and unprepared. Whew! That's a long post. I will be posting soon what my treatment for PCOS was (and still is in a way) so that anyone who has experienced the same can have a different alternative to try. Of course, I am not a doctor and am aware that every situation is different, but if anyone wants to try the natural approach, I am happy to share.
Till next time!
-Aimee
