After the life changing moment...

After that life changing moment I went into a cloud of sorts. The wake and funeral I felt has if I was comforting everyone else. Someone would introduce themselves has a friend of my sister and I would say "yes she spoke about you often and how wonderful you were" or I would see an old friend of hers I knew and would say "she enjoyed your friendship very much" and sometimes give a story she had told me. After each time I did this I would think what the hell am I doing? Why am I comforting these people? Why aren't they comforting me? It was a strange thing but person after person I kept it up. I wanted to be the strong one who was able to speak about my sister. Then a person who really meant something to my sister came to me and I would burst out in tears. I remember at the wake her best friend from when she was in middle school came over to me she was one of the first people at the wake and someone who has always meant a lot to my sister and to me. She walked up to me and I burst out in tears and so did she. She was that friend to my sister that no matter how long they hadn't spoken to each other for, they picked up has if no time had passed at all. She was one of her friends I like to call a "soul mate friend". I think most people have that friend or a few of those friends. I know I have a few of those friends.My sisters friend had her busy schedule and life and my sister had her life but when they needed each other one another would stop what they were doing to chat. If her friend was in town visiting her family she always made time for my sister. Although they were different people in many aspect they also shared a lot of the same qualities and likes. Seeing her without my sister was a shock to me. It was one of those moment where it hit me again that my sister was no longer with us.

Then there were the people who said the worst thing possible. I was one of those people before I lost someone. I was the person who would give the generic phrases at a funeral. "I am sorry for your loss", "They are in a better place", "God only takes the good ones", "She is looking down on you and smiling"...and many many more phrases. I know that people were saying those things because really what else would they say. They wouldn't say the obvious like "this fucking sucks" who would say that to someone grieving. Then we had the many people who would say "what happened" like re-hashing it at the wake was really fun a thing to keep doing.I had to keep thinking to myself they are trying to help. To me nothing would help me understand how a 37 year old woman was dead way before her time. 

Now my sister never got to do many things that she wanted to. She never was able to finish college, was never able to have children of her own, and was never able to have a surgery that may have been able to save her life (who knows). After she passed I did a lot of soul searching. I figured out that I was happy in many many parts of my life but was not happy with the way I looked. I had been overweight for my whole life. I never remember being thin. Even has a child I never remember that. I look at pictures from when I was a child and think I wasn't that overweight here but then has time went on I packed on the pounds. My all time high was when I was pregnant, yes I know being pregnant adds pounds but what that scale said was scary. I remember being at my doctors office and getting a glimpse of my chart and it said "Morbidly Obese" I almost started to cry. Why would they even put that in there? I will never know but I saw it and wow that was heartbreaking to read. I never felt that big but the scale said I was. 

After I had the twins I knew I should lose weight for them but between sleepless nights and taking care of two babies during the day I was eating bad food and had no time to exercise. Then my sister died. I knew I had to do something to change my life. I had so much to live for and wanted to do it happily. I had tried every fad diet, even tried work out videos, and the weight would come off but not enough and then if I stopped a diet well the weight piled back on and sometimes even more then what I had lost. It was a bad cycle. One day a co-worker came to me and said she was thinking about having a weight loss surgery. I thought good for her for taking over her life. I could not get that conversation out of my head. I started researching surgeries first. Then I researched doctors who took my insurance. Then I made the call for an appointment. I was very nervous to meet with the doctor. Although she meets with overweight people daily I didn't want to be judged by another person. The day I had my first appointment I already knew the ins and outs of every surgery. I did extensive research and already had my mind set on which surgery I wanted to do. I had my insurance information ready and knew what I needed to do in order to get it approved. Even the doctor was surprised at how informed I had already been. She said most patients come in and had no information on any surgery but here I was no questions to ask except for "when can I do this". I wanted a date, needed a date. I wanted to know when my life would change. I had been told over the years by many doctors that I needed to lose weight, but until my sister died I really thought I could do it myself. I needed this surgery to happen ASAP, I needed to start my life again. A few weeks after that initial consultation and then many other appointments to make sure I was healthy enough to have this surgery both physically and mentally I received a date. I was told because of how high my body mass index (BMI) was, I was able to skip some steps and have surgery 3 months after my initial consultation. I was surprised but very happy. From that moment on I was ready, there was no looking back. I knew at that point my life would be changing for the better and that I could be a better me. I could enjoy life a lot more then I ever could before. 

I will write more about that next phase of this surgery in my next post.

Life Changing Moment

I never thought that one day could change the rest of my life. Now yes having kids changed my life for the better but I am not talking about having children. On Christmas day 2012 we were having a great day with the kids. Everyone was laughing, gifts were opened, the kids were happy but little did we know that was about to change with one phone call.

 Around 2:30 pm we received the call that would forever change my families life. I will never forget this moment because honestly I have replayed it in my head many many times. My mom answered the phone and everyone was still loud and kids were playing with new toys. I heard my moms voice change and everyone instantly shut up. I looked at my mom and she had the look of worry and fear. I took over the phone because she couldn't talk but for whatever reason I was calm. On the other end of the phone was my older sisters friend. She was telling me that my sister who did not come to my parents house for Christmas because she had been sick and didn't want to get the kids sick, had collapsed. She had the paramedics working on her but she was not breathing. First thing I thought of was my husband needed to get the girls and go home so I could meet the ambulance at the hospital with my family. I was in action mode and my mind was going very quickly. I couldn't bear to think the worst. 

We arrived at the hospital and we were put into a tiny room that I think was also storage at times. My dad kept going in the hallway to talk to the nurses and to get updates. Then while my dad was in the hall way with my brother a doctor came in to speak with us. I knew it was bad. I know it is crazy but I remember looking at this doctor thinking how does she work in those heels. I can remember she was wearing a skirt, a top and beautiful heels. I told you before my memory is insane. She was talking and talking, finally I looked at her and said what is going on here because you keep talking around something. Then she said it, she said the words that they say on every TV show based in a hospital. "We did everything we could but she did not make it". I felt instant tears and shock. I looked at my mom and I can tell she was feeling the same thing. My dad  and brother came back in the room where I was with my mom and sister in law and we all hugged and cried. My twin sister had already went to her in-laws house at this point to spend the rest of Christmas with them but she arrived at the hospital minutes after we received the bad news. The look of sadness in my mothers eyes that day is something I will never forget. A mother shouldn't lose her child. Her first born child was gone. I have thought many times since that I cannot even bear to think what if that ever happened to me.

We spoke to my sister at 11:00 AM that morning. She called Christmas morning to say Merry Christmas. She told me she felt better but I knew my sister very well and knew she was not feeling well. I knew she sounded worse and she sounded sad because there was nothing she loved more then her nephew and two nieces. They were her heart and soul. Those children did no wrong to her and were the light of her life. It was upsetting her very much that she did not see them Christmas morning to see them open the gifts she carefully picked for them. My sister was the type of person who bought a gift and while opening it would explain exactly why she bought it for you. I always thought that was annoying but now I miss that a lot. I miss hearing the reasoning to something has simple as a wallet or shirt. She put much thought into each gift she ever bought anyone. 

Believe it or not December 23rd is actually a harder day for me. That is the day I last saw her in person. I dropped off some stuff she wanted. She had asked me to pick up gifts for some special animals, yes animals. She made sure she got her beloved dog and cat gifts, my animals gifts, my twin sisters cats a gift, and my brothers dog a gift. She wasn't feeling well and wasn't able to get to the store so I went for her. I had brought one of the girls in with me because I was just planning on running in and because she was sick I wanted to cheer her up and for her to see one of the girls. She was so happy I did that. I remember exactly in her house where she was sitting, what she was wearing and how her hair was (always in a scrunchie). I still do not remember if I said "I love you" when I left that night. I would like to believe I did and some how really think I did but I can not remember that moment. It was such a brief visit but one I will treasure for all of my life. December 23rd is the last day I ever hugged my sister, spoke to her in person, that my daughter got to see her aunt and that I got to see my sister. My older sister. The person I looked up to growing up, the person who I leaned on during hard times, the one person at the time who understand my fertility issues. She got me like no one else did. 

After she died I cried and cried. Then I was mad. I went through all the stages of grief. Some days I feel like I am still going through it all. I have my days where I can talk about her and laugh and think about how crazy she was. Then I have these days that I have this sudden pain and want to talk to her. I always think what would I say if I could talk to her one last time. Anyone who knew my sister knew she was a talker. I always think of how she always answered the phone "hey, what's going on" or how she called you a "jerk" if you were being funny or a pain in the ass. Most days I would give anything to hear a "hey, what''s going on. 

I have had many many days of needing her, feeling abandoned and mad at her. For anyone who hasn't gone through losing someone I have read it is normal to be mad at the person who died. I went through a period where I would wake up and forget and then it would hit me after a second and the pain came rushing back.I have had dreams of my sister and those dreams she is healthy and happy. One dream recently her life dream was coming true. I wake up happy because I was able to see my sister but after a little bit it becomes bittersweet.

Now almost two years later the crying is not too bad. I have my days. I no longer have that mad feeling. I have the I miss my sister very much feeling. Mostly when I watch the kids do something funny or when one of my daughters does something that reminds me of my sister. One of my daughters looks at pictures and points out my sister. She was only 1 when my sister passed away but ever since I show my girls pictures so they will not forget her. My uncle had passed away the same way my sister did. I do not have memories of him but know so many stories and have seen pictures that I feel like I knew him. I want my girls to feel that way to. 

This entry is to my sister Liz. She was a pain in the ass at times but had a heart of gold. My life changed that day and I made a huge decision after she died. More about that change another day. For now I will say treasure your loved ones because in a moments notice you could lose them and never be the same again.

How it all started.....

I will start this thing off with a little intro about me. My name is Danielle, I am 29 years old (almost 30!) . I live on Long Island with my husband and my twin daughters who are almost 3 years old. I myself am a twin, my sister and I are best friends. I am also very close to my parents, brother, sister in law and brother in law. I have an amazing niece and nephew (my twin sisters kids). I have a handful of great friends that mean a lot to me. My older sister passed away in 2012, we were very close and I think of her each and every day. She was only 37 years old and died suddenly. I am trying to do things in life that I know would make her proud. That is one reason I am writing this. I have always wanted to write and I am trying to follow dreams that she was never able to do. This blog will be about my life being a twin mommy and other antics that go on. 

Well lets get started.....

I always knew I wanted to be a mother. Ever since I could remember my friends always said I am the "mother" of the group. I was always worried about everyone and everything. I was always the sober driver, always the one giving advice, and always the shoulder to cry on. I am a very passionate person with strong values. I am also a very giving person. But if you cross me in any way I will hold a grudge forever. I have a great memory and never forget even the smallest detail or many conversations and activities that have happened. 

On our wedding day I remember my new father in law saying he will see us again (lives in Greece) when we christen our first child. I really thought that would be about a year or two after we were married. I knew I wanted a baby pretty quickly. For anyone that really knows me, knows that when I get something in my head I have the achieve it the quickest way possible. I want something and must have it.

Well like many things in life it just did not have happen quickly or the way I planned it. After being married for 6 months we were ready. We wanted a baby and had bought a condo to have more room for this baby that was going to make our dreams come true. I was that crazy person buying fertility tests, counting days, going crazy writing things down and eating food that could help. I wanted this baby and would do anything to have it. After only 6 months months of trying and not being pregnant I knew that something was wrong. Many people said wait 6 more months you are young, stop stressing. I swear if one more person told to stop stressing I was going to go nuts. I of course did not listen to them I went to a Reproductive Endocrinologist. My husband and I went through many tests and procedures to see what the issue was. The day I received a call from my doctor informing me what the problem was is a day I will never forget. I was in my office at work and I answered the call all happy because I honestly thought nothing is wrong. Every test I had was normal and I was fertile has them come. She told me my husbands results came back and his counts were low and it was not good. She said I had 1% (YES 1%) chance of getting pregnant on my own. She said it happens sometimes. She referred my husband to a urologist to get tested some more. He was not too happy about this but he did it for me. He was tested and tested and tested some more. The results for his low counts were "Unexplained Male Factor Infertility". WHAT! How can it be unexplained! He did things to try and change this. He tried different vitamins, went on medication but NOTHING helped. 

Being who I am and a little pushy I said ok enough tests, what now? They said I could get pregnant but lets start with something called and Intrauterine Insemination (IUI). Now we were getting somewhere right? Well WRONG. After the first unsuccessful IUI and many negative pregnancy tests we had another consultation. The doctor said OK lets do another one. We go in to do this and unfortunately the count for the day was 0 and we were unable to do this. I was crushed, devastated and then that turned into anger. My husband spoke to his urologist who said skip IUI's the chance was so low of getting pregnant and we were wasting our time. Finally someone gave us the truth. I called my doctor and decided to switch to another doctor in the practice. I felt this doctor was wanting us to keep doing IUI's because well the insurance would keep paying for them. I then called my insurance and asked what we needed to do to start In-vitro fertilization (IVF). Has soon as I said it was Male Factor Infertility the represtative said on the phone we can move right on to IVF no problem. Some companies make couples go through rounds and rounds of IUI's to even qualify for IVF. But luckily (well not really) for us we did not have to go through all of that and we can move on to IVF. 

IVF is no picnic. It was a lot of work and patience. I had to get blood drawn almost daily to check levels, give myself shots, take medications, and have sonograms to make sure things were going has planned. I am very fortunate that the medicine they gave me was working and everything was going better then had planned. I was getting great reports at every appointment. I was told ok we can retrieve your eggs on this date. Because I was overweight they were afraid it would be very hard to get to the eggs and I was reminded of me being overweight at every appointment (like I didn't already know this). The egg retrieval is a scary experience. They have to put you under anesthesia, give you an IV. When I woke up the doctor came to see me and said she did have a difficult time being that I was overweight (again thank you for the reminder). She was able to get 21 eggs though and that was fantastic news. I knew they would get a good number but never expected 21 eggs. The next day I received the call explaining if the eggs fertilized, if so how many and should I expect a 3-day transfer or a 5-day transfer. Well out of 21 eggs 17 fertilized and were doing great. They said I would get a 5-day embryos transfer. They called daily with updates until the transfer. The day of the transfer I decided to only transfer one embryo. They were only able to freeze 4, the other embryos were no longer viable. The transfer was pretty exciting. They let you watch has they transfer your embryo and you watch it go in through a sonogram. It was really something watching that. My husband was able to be with me unlike at the retrieval. Now we wait....and wait...and wait....then do a home test and drive yourself crazy. This wait is called the "two week wait".  At the end of this wait you go to the doctor to do a blood test to see if you are pregnant. Now I am a "Test-a-holic" so before I went into be tested I knew I was not pregnant. Even still I had hope it was a false negative. I prayed and hoped that was the case but it was not. The day they called saying "unfortunately it did not work" was awful. I was at work when I received the call and before I even hung up I was sobbing. Lucky for me the office was empty but I was a wreck. 

After I had a pity party for 1, I started thinking of the positives. I have four beautiful frozen embryos. I would not transfer one again but I would transfer two next time for make the chances even greater. My doctor had me take a month off before preparing for what they call an "Frozen Embryo Transfer (FET)". This was much much easier then IVF. I had to take progesterone and wear a estrogen patch. No shots! I went in again and did my second transfer with two embryos. I thought ok this is it the chances are higher it HAS to work. Well two weeks later and another negative test. Again since I tested the second I knew it would become positive, if I was indeed pregnant I knew I was not pregnant. This time the call from the doctor was not so bad because I was becoming numb to hearing "unfortunately". The doctor said I can go and do another FET right away and not wait a month. Another FET cycle started right away. I was ready knew what to expect and was thinking I was a pro at this point. We had two embryos left and if that did not work I had already said I would take a few months off of this because I was drained emotionally and needed it for me and my husband needed a break from my being pumped with many drugs. I went for my third times a charm transfer. It was easy and after I ate a crepe because well I was emotional and needed fattening delicious food. The two transfer before I went straight home and laid down, did not move. This time I did rest but was not too strict. I really did not expect it to work. Well 7 days past my transfer first thing in the morning (everyone said always test first thing) I tested using a line test and a digital test. Well to my surprise there were two lines on the test and pregnant popped up on the digital. I thought I was seeing things, I thought maybe I am delusional. After now 18 months of trying to get pregnant and never ever seeing a positive test I had to be going crazy right? I started screaming and crying, I was in disbelief for a second then ran to my husband. He saw the lines and the words pregnant. I then could only think of one thing, I had to call my twin she had to know right now, even though it was 7am on a Saturday she had to know right now. I called screaming and she probably thought I was going crazy or something bad. When she finally could understand what I was saying she was crying too. 

From that second on I was a mess. A complete and utter mess. I thought something bad would happen. A few days after that I went for the blood work to test. It came back with great numbers. I repeated the test 2 days later and again it was great. A week later I had my first sonogram. We were told what we would be expected to see in the sonogram. No heartbeat yet but we would see something. Well we saw something and then we saw another something! My husbands grasp on my shoulder when she said ok here is your baby...and oh there is a second baby. My husband said he was hoping she didn't say and here is your third baby. He probably would have fainted. That was the happiest moment I had throughout this entire process. TWO babies! I fell in love with those babies instantly. They were all mine and they were very loved already. 

I had a pretty uneventful pregnancy. I loved my doctor and he never once told me how overweight I was and to be careful. He was amazing. At 36 weeks pregnant (my birthday) I had my weekly visit. They took my blood pressure and the nurse immediately told me go in the room and lay on your side. I knew something had to be wrong she was very stern and seemed scared. The doctor came in calm like always and said OK how does tomorrow sound to have these babies? I said it sounded great. He told me I formed per-ecclampsia and he wanted to deliver that day but he wanted to do it and he was not the on-call doctor at the hospital. The next day I went in for a c-section (one baby was not head down). 

At 11:53 am and 11:54 am my two miracle babies arrived! They were beautiful perfect babies and everything I ever dreamed of and more. 

I think that is enough for now. I did not know which direction I would take with this blog. I am new at this and have always wanted to write. If you stick with me and like crazy mommy stories or just crazy stories in general then you will be pleased. Share with friends and enjoy the ride.