FOUR little FULTONS: something hard to admit...

Friday, September 26, 2008

something hard to admit...

As I am sitting here listening to the Sprout channel on in the other room I reflect on my past ideas regarding Barney. I NEVER liked him! But our children have a different opinion on this purple fellow, they LOVE him! BEFORE kids I would speak ill of this creature. Basically just that I never "got" him. What is it with a humongous PURPLE dinosaur that gets kids all excited!? I just could not figure it out. WELL, fast forward my life several years to where I sort of "get" it. He is a fixture in our home just like Sesame Street. Again I never saw it coming! It is SO hard to admit that we watch this show, even sing his songs to the babies. My hubby on the other hand sings his own "version's", we won't go there! LOL! . I guess the truth is the truth! Our children just LOVE him! They will stop practically anything when they hear the intro to Barney and come running. I know, I know, Barney is a BIG, PURPLE Dinosaur brought to life from your imagination. I guess that is what makes him so special, that they use their imagination. I think the other reason he is so popular is due to the music. Children love to sing & dance! The creators of Barney knew what they were doing many, many years ago! LOL! It is AMAZING that when there is chaos in our house watching Barney will calm them down. They LOVE him, who am I to argue! I still can only take him in SMALL doses. I am not one of these parents that will buy everything with his image on it either & I will not be buying them Barney stuffed animals! I must admit that we inherited a SUPER LARGE Barney stuffed animal. It was a hand me down from my cousin. They climb all over him & again I did not have to buy it! (When you have 4 to buy for this is very good rationale!) The last thing that I should probably admit is that I sometimes even break out in song while I am at work. ANY song! ha! My ONLY defense is that I have quads & it's the only thing that keeps me sane!.. (good theory huh!? ha) So after 20 short months of being a parent I cannot get over the fact that we watch Barney! It is...

something hard to admit....

Our Story...

Ok I am now over 8 years into this "job" of mine, being a mommy to multiples, high order multiples to boot! They say that if you try to conceive without protection for one year with no success then you are infertile. Those words were a lot to take in. I sought answers from everyone. We started out with our 1st OB/GYN Dr William Casale doing the normal testing that they were equipped to do. We did it all, IUI's, spermwashing, etc. I then contacted RESOLVE, a wonderful organization for people like me (could not get pregnant). I started making mental notes of what I needed to achieve my dream, to be a mom! The next step was to go see a Fertility Doctor. We chose to see Dr Mark Denker. After checking me out he then referred Michael to see a Urologist who ended up putting him on clomid. Yes, men can take this RX too! It helps make more sperm just like it helps a woman create more follicles. It is AMAZING the things you learn when you are trying to conceive! After further testing we were both told we had fertility issues, I had fewer eggs than a woman my age & they were "tough", Michael had double vericasils so that in order for us to have the "best odds" we needed to go the IVF route. I had this feeling that it was not going to work right away, call it my intuition. So we bought a package, can you even believe that they sell "packages" like a travel agency? Our "package" included 3 rounds of IVF with ICSI, minus all the meds I would need. The drugs are an expense we did not even think of but had to purchase for this entire thing to work. Well, it ended up taking all 3 rounds of IVF & accupuncture courtesy of Dr Susan Schiff for me to get pregnant & boy did I get pregnant! (Trust your intuition!) We started out with very few follicles, only 3 fertilized into embryo's and all three took. I was finally pregnant! 8 weeks into my pregnancy one of the embryo's split & became identical. Can you believe that!? What are the odds? No one told me that could happen! AMAZING! We had a lot of decisions to make. No one thought that we should keep all four. In the medical world it is called a "selective reduction". Only a few doctors even do this procedure. We did not know what our future would hold just that we could not reduce anything! In the beginning we had a hard time finding a doctor that felt like we did & wanted our four babies to thrive! We finally found Dr Moises Virelles, a fellow Christian & my now OB/GYN. He then referred us to an AWESOME Perinatologist, Dr Gary Cohen. Having the two of them on our side we knew ANYTHING was possible! My pregnancy was really uneventful. I was put on "bed rest" at 22 weeks. I later found out my "bed rest" was unlike other women's bed rest. I was just not allowed to work. I continued to do things, just stayed off my feet as much as possible. If I went shopping I would ride a motorized scooter. If I went to a party I sat pretty much the entire time. I had no issues, my cervix was long & rock solid. I really feel that God wanted me to be a mommy! The babies were great! They kicked each other more than they kicked me! People would look at me & could not believe that I had four babies inside me, I tell you I was meant to carry quads! Now don't get me wrong, it was not a joy ride, I was miserable towards the end & felt it very difficult to breathe. I never even went into the hospital prior to January 15th. Even though I asked them to admit me MANY times!! On January 17, 2007 we welcomed our GBGG quads; Camryn, Brendan, Avery & Lindsey into this world. 1 set is fraternal & 1 set is identical. They weighed 4 lb 7 oz, 4 lb 4 oz, 3 lb 6 oz & 3 lb 3 oz. I made it 32 weeks 5 days when I delivered them at St Mary's Medical Center. They were all HEALTHY and they did not need to be intubated! WOO HOO! They were little miracles destined to be here! I had nurses come up to me & tell me how wonderful it was that I carried them so long, that it was a better gift holding onto them as long as I did than a Harvard education! WOW! We were SO happy, excited & most of all unprepared for how much our life was about to change. I will say it was a GOOD change! I cannot imagine my life without them! Everyone watches our little ones in amazement & they still do. This is their story....

Blog Archive

These words & pictures are MINE & MINE alone