I’m FINALLY getting to posting pictures of my baby shower, which was a MONTH ago. WOW! Time flies. I’m officially in the “nesting” season but I wanted to be faithful in documenting this miracle’s life.
We decided to have a desert themed baby shower to pay homage to our baby’s name–Phoenix 😉
This day was definitely one I had been dreaming about for a long time.
Actually, I’ve always kinda hated how corny baby showers can be.
But once the desire to have a baby starting growing and then going through a season of infertility, a baby shower become symbolic of a dream becoming a reality.
So life was all about finding cacti for a few months. And I’m STILL subconsciously looking for succulents and cacti without realizing it lol.
We looked for things on amazon, warehouses, Hobby Lobby and Michaels.
We also used a lot of things we already owned and repurposed them.
The books used to add height to decor were library books that we wrapped up with packing paper.
My favorite piece of decor was the cactus we found at Hobby Lobby. It’s the cutest thing ever!
I am incredibly grateful for my family who helped pull this off and made this day extra special.
Special shout out to my sisters and a couple of my closest girlfriends who went the extra mile to celebrate this day!
I’m incredibly grateful for the friends and family in my life who have held me up, encouraged me, and given me so much love in this whole journey.
This baby is loved and cherished so much and that makes this mama beam with joy and pride.
The best part of the entire day was opening gifts with my hubby. He is the best daddy ever already. And I was overjoyed to be experiencing this moment with him. WE ARE GONNA BE PARENTS! HOLY MOLY!
I hope you enjoyed seeing this miracle literally in motion. And I hope this encourages you to see GOD’S faithfulness and to be hopeful in the waiting. And if anything, maybe you found some party decor inspo while you were here 😉
Some funny things that will make us NEVER forget this day: 1. I strolled into the baby shower late without notice, very casually, and so we re-enacted my entrance to be silly. 2. A few of my family members got a stomach bug right after the baby shower and were sick for a couple of days. Surprisingly, I do not get sick. 3. We had tacos for lunch at the baby shower. They were delicious and a major hit!
We all need a little inspiration and a little push to get started with our new goals and plans. These wallpapers are meant to help you remember that you CAN do all things through Him who gives you strength.
They’re simple little reminders in pretty, feminine colors, that are easy to look at. I know every time you see them you’ll be encouraged to take the next best step forward.
To download the wallpapers, long press or right click on the images below.
These wallpapers are for personal use only and copyright Styld by Grace. Any redistribution, commercial use, and sale of these wallpapers is strictly prohibited.
This Thanksgiving why don’t we take time to get back to the true purpose of Thanksgiving? Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE all the food and festivities. But it always feels right to focus on truly being thankful.
A genuine heart of worship and thanks can make all the difference during the next few days that will undoubtedly be busy and chaotic.
There’s also a simple and beautiful Gratitude List that comes with the download. You can pass them out to guests at your Thanksgiving parties or fill it out with your family at the dinner table.
4. Each 8.5×11″ page should generate two separate 8.5×5.5” pages. One page should be a Day X page and the other page should be a Reflection & Prayer page (the last page ends with the Gratitude List).
5. Organize the download by placing the cover page on the front then ordering the rest of the pages from Day 1 to Day 5. Make sure there is a Reflection & Prayer page between each Day. The last page should be the Gratitude List.
Hope this download brings you closer to your family, friends, and Jesus. Happy Thanksgiving!
This freebie is for personal use only and copyright Styld by Grace. Any redistribution, commercial use, and sale of this freebie is strictly prohibited.
This past weekend was pretty emotional! This was the first time real tears of excitement and joy were shed. Post IVF and a positive pregnancy test, you’d think that immediate joy would settle in but to my surprise, it didn’t.
I was still struggling with lots of fear and worry. I was trying to get through a very hard season while finding joy. I felt grateful yet sad. And guilt was really starting to settling in.
There were moments that I asked God why this ongoing feeling of sadness kept lingering. Different things would trigger it. And I found that I’m not the only IVF patient who’s felt the same way as I asked other women who had gone through it too. Up until this point I had to be cautiously optimistic. And it was hard to switch from that to joy in a matter of a day. It’s almost like I had to rewire your brain.
The biggest hurdle after getting a positive pregnancy result was continuing to take injections. I saw other mamas-to-be and inevitably compared my journey with theirs. I was heartbroken that I couldn’t just move on from the medicine and the physical pain.
I told my husband, “I’m so thankful but this is still hard for me to get through. I’m still experiencing the loss of what could’ve been”. That night I prayed and asked God to help my heart find joy. To help my heart and body heal. I knew that he could heal the hurt, the loss, and the physical toll my body had gone through.
In the morning, I woke up and said to myself, “We’re going to have a gender reveal party”. Now, I’ve never liked gender reveal parties. I’ve always thought they were corny and unnecessary. That’s what baby showers are for, right? Well something in me told me that I had to start celebrating even in the midst of feeling blue. I had to receive God’s joy by doing the sacred act of celebrating.
Advice: never say never. Life changes every minute. We change as people. And what one day we thought we’d never do, maybe that’s the very thing we need to do to move forward. In this case, it was a cheesy gender reveal party.
The best part was sharing this with our family. They have been just as invested in seeing this miracle happen as us. They have prayed, supported, and been there for the hardest days. In the end, we are so happy we did this party with them.
Plus, we got to eat some pretty delicious food and satisfy our sweet tooth with a mini candy bar. Everything was budget friendly yet fun and pretty. Shoutout to Five Below and the Dollar Store 😉
Five months have passed since we found out we were becoming parents. And even though there are still days that I struggle with this infertility journey, I’ve gotta say that God has truly turned my mourning into dancing (as you can see from the pictures). He has taken care of my heart and is healing it more and more each day.
We are ecstatic to be having a baby boy! My father-in-love is the only one of his brothers who had a son. And Edward, my hubby, is the only son who is having a son to carry the Palma name! God is faithful!
To my son, Phoenix Palma, we love you. You already fill our hearts with a joy that’s unexplainable. Your life is marked by godly legacy. And your name expresses exactly who you are: rising from the ashes, renewal of life, and uniquely remarkable. To us and to so many people, you are uniquely remarkable–our first miracle baby. Te amo, mi bebe!
I’ve been keeping this secret for the past couple of months (hardest secret to keep, by the way) and I am so happy and excited to finally let you in on it. FINALLY, I’m pregnant!
In March of this year, we started the process for our first IVF cycle. That decision came after getting a medical diagnosis in 2017 that was very heartbreaking for us. The only way we’d get pregnant was through IVF. And still IVF wasn’t a 100% guarantee.
How did IVF work for us?
Step 1: BCP (Birth Control Pills)
Well a month later in April, I kicked off this IVF cycle with a round of birth control pills. How odd right? Getting on birth control to get pregnant? But this allows the medical team to be in total control of a woman’s menstrual cycle.
Step 2: Ovarian Stimulation
After stopping the BCP, an ultrasound was performed to make sure everything was healthy. Blood work was also done to check hormone levels. Then a few days later, on a date dependent on my cycle, I started injections (a.k.a STIMS) to stimulate my ovaries.
Normally, a woman produces one egg per menstrual cycle. In IVF, the goal is to stimulate your ovaries in order to produce more than one egg.
This was one of the scariest parts for me. I had read horror stories about women getting lots of bruising, being emotionally unstable, and just feeling miserable in general. Thankfully, I have an amazing friend, Audrey, who has done a few cycles of IVF and reassured me that I’d be fine.
These injections were done on my stomach. Twice a day for about two weeks. The bloating and discomfort WAS REAL! I wasn’t fitting into my jeans and it was the biggest oxymoron to me because it felt like I was pregnant without being pregnant. THANKS INFERTILITY FOR THAT CRUEL JOKE!
Step 3: Egg Retrieval
The time leading up to the egg retrieval was filled with medications, monitoring of follicles in the ovaries by the endocrinologist and nurses, and finally a trigger injection to tell my ovaries that it was time to ovulate. This injection had to be taken at a very specific date and time. THAT WAS NERVE WRECKING! Because if we didn’t do it right on time, we could throw off our upcoming egg retrieval.
I was up bright and early for my egg retrieval. I think it was a 5am wake up call in order to get to the clinic by a very specific time. I was wheeled into a operating room and put under anesthesia. And my hubby and mom stayed in the waiting room where they could see a monitor being updated with the amount of eggs they were retrieving.
We were so fortunate to get SIXTEEN eggs retrieved! Sixteen is a great number because not all eggs make it through fertilization. With sixteen eggs available there was a bigger margin for when the eggs got fertilized.
After the eggs were retrieved, my hubby gave a sperm sample. The brilliant embryologist used his sperm sample in order to fertilize the eggs. In our case, a special treatment was used called ICSI, wherein a single sperm is injected directly into an egg.
Step 4: Freezing the embryos
Post operation is a time to relax, recuperate, and wait to get results. There are a couple ways things can unfold post egg retrieval. It’s common practice to transfer back one or two embryos a few days after an egg retrieval. In my case, the doctor recommended for all my embryos to be frozen, wait for my next menstrual cycle, and have a frozen embryo transfer.
I responded a little too well to the STIMS and was on the verge of getting ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, in which the ovaries can become very swollen and fluid can leak into the belly and chest area. I’m thankful our clinic took all the precautions needed in order for me to stay healthy.
The following days after the retrieval, we got a few phone calls from the embryologist letting us know how many embryos had made it. By day 5, which is when they put those babies to freeze, we had 6 embryos. SIX LIVES! SIX POTENTIAL BABIES! We felt so attached already and knew one of them would be transferred in a month. Such a weird, awesome, hopeful, scary feeling.
Step 5: Embryo Transfer
As soon as I got my period, I called my IVF nurse to let her know we wanted to start our Frozen Embryo Transfer. She put me on BCP AGAIN. And a couple weeks later, I got off of the pills and started what was the toughest medicines: estrogen patches and progesterone in oil injections (PIO). The PIO shots are intramuscular injections that have to be injected in your butt/hip muscle. They are painful and uncomfortable. And my muscles are still recuperating from them.
The estrogen made me extremely irritable at first. My emotions were ALL OVER THE PLACE. How can a little patch do alllll that?! It’s crazy how these meds work.
After being on the meds for a week or so, my transfer was scheduled to happen on June 14th. I had to make sure I wasn’t ovulating before the transfer by taking at home ovulation tests.
On the day of the transfer, we arrived at our clinic, feeling very hopeful and of course anxious. Would this work? Would I get pregnant? Before going into the operating room, the embryologist came to see us and gave us a picture of the embryo they were going to transfer.THAT MADE IT SO REAL TO US! It was such an emotional moment.
I walked into the op room super nervous and anxious. This time Edward got to go inside with me. I would not be under anesthesia this time as this would not require my ovaries to be pierced or prodded like the egg retrieval. It was more like a pap smear with extra discomfort.
The endocrinologist got me all set up. My legs were wiiiide open, my you-know-what was also spread wiiiide open, and he positioned the catheter that went through my cervix in the perfect angle and location. When he was sure of everything being right he called the embryologist to bring the embryo.
And there she came with our embaby (as I like to affectionately call the embryo) in a little tube. Edward says he thought to himself, “here comes my baby”. ::cue all the tears::
The doctor then transferred the embryo into my uterus via the catheter. We had a monitor where we could see all of this happening. But the embaby was microscopic so in reality we didn’t see it go in.
Step 6: The Two Week Wait (TWW)
After the transfer, you continue with the PIO shots and estrogen patches. And you wait two weeks to go back to the doctor so they can do blood work to see if you’re pregnant or not.
I have to admit the two week wait is filled with a lot of anxiety. You’re EXTRA careful not to do anything that can jeopardize a potential positive pregnancy test. It is HIGHLY recommended, kind of mandatory, not to take an at home pregnancy test because they can give you false positives or false negatives. I stayed FAR from them and waited anxiously for our next visit to the doctor.
I had a little scare a week before my next doctor’s visit. I was spotting and had a bit of cramps. I cried all night and was sure I wasn’t pregnant. I thought I had gotten my period. At the time I was too paranoid to think straight. But now we know that those symptoms were normal and are considered implantation bleeding.
Our appointment finally came on June 25th. On that day we were flying out to a ceremony Edward was invited to for his work. Either this trip was going to be our celebratory pregnancy trip or a very sad and long stay in San Antonio.
On our layover, we got the call from our clinic. A POSITIVE PREGNANCY TEST. Or as many like to call it, A BFP (BIG FAT POSITIVE)! After our trip we went back to the clinic to make sure my HCG levels were rising and they were so we were officially, officially pregnant.
After IVF and a positive pregnancy test
On July 25th, I graduated from my fertility clinic and was sent off to my OBGYN. It was a huge milestone moment. And also bittersweet as these people played such an important part in our journey. We love them dearly and will continue to have a relationship with them.
I am currently 13 weeks pregnant (YAY!) and I waited this long to announce because I think I needed to feel confident that this was real.
When we found out I was pregnant, we were in shock. After waiting 3+ years to get here it is kind of surreal. And it has taken time for it to sink in. We still had to be on injections and patches until last week. That element kept us cautious and a bit anxious. We knew maintaining a healthy first trimester depended heavily on these hormonal injections and patches.
Therefore, my final injection and the final patch I peeled off my belly, were huge milestone moments. PRAISE BE TO GOD! Science helped put the pieces together but HE MADE LIFE HAPPEN!
AND THAT’S HOW WE GOT PREGNANT! Not the traditional, steamy-love- making, euphoric moment, most people experience. BUT A MIRACLE NONETHELESS.
Final thoughts about IVF and our miracle in motion
When we first got the “IVF ONLY” diagnosis, I could not fathom how something so scientific could be a door God was opening. I thought He had to heal Edward instantaneously. I thought that only if we conceived naturally would it be considered a true miracle.
Today I can confidently say that none of this would’ve been possible without the miracle power of God.
Most IVF patients have to do multiple cycles and multiples transfers to get a positive pregnancy test. In fact, there’s only a 39% chance of it working. BUT GOD! Not sure why God chose for it to happen this way or why now but in His sovereignty, He orchestrated it all for this time in history.
God provided the insurance, the finances, the resources, the clinic, and the support. Ultimately, God orchestrated sixteen eggs to be fertilized, six embryos to reach day 5, and one embaby to be transferred at that very moment in time. Ultimately, He breathed life into our embyro and made life in my womb. I wholeheartedly believe that.
Baby Palma, you are a miracle! Our miracle is in motion! Thank you, Jesus! And thank YOU for your love, prayers, and support.
