Odd Life Of Timothy Green and Family Trees

Last weekend, Babe and I watched the movie "The Odd Life of Timothy Green".  Have you seen it? What did you think of it?

The gals from our Patiently Waiting infertility/adoption group watched this together last fall but I was not able to make it.

I heard some mixed reviews about it, some saying it was not realistic.  Keep in mind this is a Disney movie.

I really enjoyed the movie.  It's about a couple who struggles with infertility and have done everything medically to have a child.  It shows how painful it can be for someone to go through the struggles of infertility, but also the joys of what hope can bring.  It is sweet, funny, though not totally realistic, has a decent ending.  It also made me think of what kind of parent I hope to be, and what I don't want to be!

If you have not seen it, go rent it.



My sister started a family tree on Geni.com (similar to Ancestry.com) a few years ago.  I just spent some time updating it.  My mother-in-law just updated it and now we can see our family try that goes out a few generations, back to the mid 1800's.  That's pretty cool.

As I was updating my immediate family tree, I had mixed feelings.  I am excited with the prospect of adding our children to the tree, but at the same time, I feel like do my future adopted kids truly fit in this tree?  I know a family is not all about bloodlines, but isn't it that what a family tree is all about?

Should family trees indicate true blood lines?  Or does it not really matter?

Do my future adopted children truly belong in my family tree?  Or should they be on the family tree of their genetic family?

I know the "correct" answer is, "Of course they belong on MY family tree".

But I can't help but have second thoughts.  Especially when I will have an open relationship with the genetic family.

Anyone have experience with this?  HONEST thoughts?

ODAs Signed & Notarized!

Yesterday, I picked Babe up from work, went out to lunch and then stopped by our bank and had our ODAs signed and notarized.  We then scanned a copy of each ODA and emailed them to Debbie.  I will mail the hard copies of the ODAs to Debbie on Monday.  So that is done!

At my initial appointment in May, I was told I needed to order my meds the first week of August.  But I have not heard from NEDC about my protocol.  Since I now have a date for my September transfer, I emailed, Katie the nurse at NEDC.  She said I could go ahead and order my meds, but I won't get my protocol until after 8/15.  That means I will have to stay on birth control pills for another 3 weeks (I have been on them since 6/25).  I was hoping I would be done sooner, but I guess I'll keep doing what I'm doing.

At least a major part of the process, the ODAs are done!  Yay!

Ok, August will be here next week!

A Transfer Date!

We have a transfer date!

I received an email today from Carol, the embryologist at NEDC that our transfer is scheduled for Sunday, September 22nd.  She reminded me that this is tentative date, and could possibly change based on how my body responds to the medication.

Now, to start looking for airfares, hotels and car rental.  This can get a little tricky if our transfer date changes.  We definitely want to get there one or two days earlier, just in case there is a hiccup with flight or weather.  I did a quick look at Delta's website and found that it would cost TWICE as much to get a flexible/refundable ticket.  It will probably be cheaper to pay a change fee if we had to (probably $200) to change our tickets.

For our last trip, we booked everything via Travelocity (flight, hotel & car rental), and got a pretty good discount.  I think we will have to book everything separately this time around.

Anyone have any suggestions on how to book for this trip?

July 2013 ICLW

Hello ICLWers!

This is another one of those months that I am playing catch up on on ICLW.  It's already halfway through ICLW and I am now finally posting and catching up on reading and commenting.  It has been kind of a crazy month with having a wedding in the family and having extended family stay with us for over a week.  Thanks to those that have already stopped by and commented here.

The other day I was thinking about how long we have really been on this journey to grow our family.  I just checked that at my last ICLW posting in June, I said we had been trying for almost 9 years.  In reality, I realize that it is coming up on almost 10 years.  I remember because we were on a romantic vacation on an island in Thailand in February 2004 when we decided to ditch the birth control pills.  Babe and I have been married for almost 11 years, and  have been trying to have baby for almost 10 years.  A decade.  That's is long time.

Anyway, the short version of our story..... we tried Clo.mid, IUI's a couple of surgeries and 4 rounds of IVFs with no success.  We were initially diagnosed with unexplained infertility but then were told, based on findings during our IVFs, we are not able to conceive due to crappy low quality eggs.  Last year we started our international adoption process but then decided to switch to embryo adoption instead.

We are adopting our embryos through The National Embryo Donation Center (NEDC).  We had our initial appointment with Dr. Keenan, selected 2 donor families (we need to have a minimum of 6 embryos) and were approved by them, and currently have a transfer scheduled for September, though we do not have a definite date yet.  We are currently working on finalizing our Open Donation Agreements with our donor families.  Once that is completed, we should have date for our September transfer.  I can't wait to find out when we will be flying out to TN again for our actual transfer.

Hope you will stick around to find out how things play out.

Waiting

It's already July!

But really, is it ONLY July?

When will September (and transfer) get here?

OK, God.  I get it.

(Please pray for patience for me!)

A Confession

Can you believe it's July 1st already?  Where did half the year go?  And yet it seems like September is so far away!

OK, I have a confession to make.

This weekend, I decided to do some Face.book/online stalking!  I'm not proud of it, but I did it anyways.

The mom of Family B has a fairly unique first name.  I know what state Family B lives in.  So I did a quick search on FB by her first name and state, and right away, a profile with the donor mom popped up.  It was the correct first name and state, and had a profile picture of a lady with two babies that looked like twins.  They looked like the mom and babies from the photos that Family B sent us.  Though the profile is private as I am not her friend, I was able to see that the music she likes matches what was put on her donor profile from NEDC.  I was able to tell with pretty high certainty that this is the donor mom.  From my conversation with Debbie, she told me that the donor mom grew up in the Asian country that was listed on FB her profile as her hometown and country.

So, I was able to find out her last name from FB.  I decided to google the donor dad by his first name, and her last name.  And up popped his name and profile on Linked.In, which also had a photo.  I could tell now that I found the right person based on his photo and his occupation.

So now, I know even more about the donor family - first and last names, city they live in and even what donor dad does for a living.  I probably shouldn't have done this as I am trying not to get too attached to a family that we may or may not have a relationship with in the future, pending how the transfer goes.  I'm not even sure if I am supposed to know this stuff.

But curiosity got the better of me!