HOPE!

Well I finally had my annual checkup, which I have been waiting for since the beginning of the year to talk with my Dr. about my ongoings and all the recent developments. I found out that everything looks...well...normal! However, my Dr. diagnosed me with Adenomyosis (still having trouble spelling that out). It's basically endometreosis of the uterus. Cure? He told me a hysterectomy. Should it cause my infertility? He says no.

So I decided to research the condition myself and found this out:

1. It does cause infertility
2. There is a form of natural treatment

This is wonderful news. In reading the research on it, it all started to make sense. All these symptoms I have had that we thought weren't related, in fact are! Symptoms of adenomyosis are:

1. Infertility
2. High estrogen
2. Low Progesterone which inhibits ovulation
3. thyroid symptoms like: hair loss, weight gain, difficulty loosing weight, lack of energy (even though the thyroid tests normal!)
4. PAINFUL Cramps all the time
5. Pelvic Discomfort
6. Breast Tenderness
7. LONG menses
8. irregular menses

Many of these symptoms kept making me think I was pregnant every month.

Basically what happens is I develop high amounts of estrogen from xenoestrogens ("foreign" estrogen) in my environment. This causes the progesterone to go down and inhibits the body from ovulating. So no matter how hard we try...no baby :( This also messes with the other hormones and chemicals in the body. Because of all these things my endometrium tissue cells have embedded into the muscle of the uterus and causes severe pain during menses and even throughout the month. I hoping to be able to detox my body of all the excess estrogen and then start using a NATURAL progesterone to get everything where it should be. It is hard to believe that I found all this out in a matter of minutes and my Dr. told me the only treatment was a hysterectomy. Stay tuned to see how it all goes :)

Want a kitty?

Well we are more than ready to find a home for one or two of the kittens we have left. They are both female and we can get them "fixed" and vaccinated for $11 each if you would like. We did manage to find a home for two boy kittens with some dear friends, but unfortunately a mean ole tomcat got a hold of them :( Our friends felt so bad. We would like to find homes that the kittens would be allowed indoors at least overnight, especially since they are still so young and vulnerable.

We have put an official end to the problem of over population (at least at our house)as we "fixed" our two adult cats today. It's so funny to see them so calm and quiet. And boy were they hungry when they came home!

Here are their photo opps:



Kitty #1 has the neatest coloring. Grey back, black face, white paws and whiskers :)
She is very feisty and playful and puts up well with kids.


Kitty#2 is solid grey with medium to long hair. She is very sweet and calm. She will play and get into things, but prefers to be cuddled. She does put up with the boys handling her, but I can tell she doesn't prefer them messing with her.

Coupon Giveaway Over At Rochele's!

Go on over here at check out this great coupon giveaway!

A Hard Week

It has been a rough 7 days for me and I am glad things are getting better. I am still ever struggling (beyond the normal) with my female stuff and got bad enough to call my doc as I was under tremendous pain to the point that it took Lortab and Ibprofen to get it under control. Of course they decided I needed a pregnancy test and to no shock of ours it was negative. After almost two years of this I no longer expect a positive result. I am not sure if that is good or bad, but I guess a part of me has come to terms with the fact that I may never have a little one again. Thankfully my checkup is real soon so I will get to talk some more with the doc about it and hopefully he won't suggest a fertility specialist again, but try to figure it out for himself. On top of all that chaos I had to have my tooth crowned which was basically a lot of grinding, sanding, stabbing, filling my mouth full of caulk-like substances and druelling on myself :( What did I get out of it? A horrible looking temporary crown on my front tooth. Seriously I feel like I have a snaggle tooth! In 2 1/2 weeks I get a lovely looking tooth that I am assured will look even better than my original tooth. Thankfully I have a great dentist who doesn't mind the fact that I am a big baby when it comes to getting shots in my mouth. So that was my seven days. Thankfully I am feeling better and hoping it will stay that way so I can catch up on housework and maybe rip up some carpet while Ryan is at work. There's hardwood under these nasty carpets!

Rosetta Stone Giveaway!

My friend Jennifer is having a giveaway for Rosetta Stone and this is what she has to say:

Rosetta Stone is the fastest way to learn a language and has been the #1 foreign language curriculum among homeschoolers for a while — and you can WIN the *all new* version 3 Rosetta Stone Homeschool LATIN program… FOR FREE! This is the first year you can get Latin in the brand new Version III update.

This is a $259 program (and believe me it’s worth every penny!)
This is a computer based curriculum and Rosetta Stone will also include a headset with microphone, and a supplementary “Audio Companion” CD so you can practice lessons in the car, on the go, or where-ever! Students participate in life-like conversations and actually produce language to advance through the program. Rosetta Stone incorporates listening, reading, grammar, vocabulary and writing along with speaking and pronunciation lessons. For parents, the new Parent Administrative Tools are integrated into the program to allow parents to easily enroll up to ten students in any of 12 predetermined lesson plans, monitor student progress, grade completed work (the program grades the work automatically as the students progress- I love that!), and you can view and print reports for transcripts. Homeschooling a lot of kids at your house? This program is designed to enroll and track up to ten students (five users on two computers) and will work for nearly all ages — from beginning readers up to college students.

To win this most excellent Latin program copy these paragraphs and post them in (or as) your next blog post, and/OR link to the contest from your facebook page and/OR email the information to your homeschool support group – Then go to the original page http://Jeneralities.com and leave a comment saying that you’ve posted about, or have linked to, the contest. Please make sure the link works to get back to the original contest page when you post.

Sounds great huh?!

A Mom's Week

We had a busy weekend. Friday just happened to be my grocery day and we tried to fit in as much as we could into my day with the van. We decided it is time to give two of the kittens to some friends of ours, as they are now into EVERYTHING! So I loaded them up on our way to drop off Ryan. We stopped on by our friends, Gabe and Brandy for what was suppose to be a quick lunch and donating the kitties to them. Well you now how it goes when you have good friends, a shot time turns into several hours of fellowshipping and eating good homemade food. And when I say homemade I mean they even raise their own eggs and grind their own wheat! After leaving there I got a portion of my shopping done and then it was already time to pick up Ryan from work. While in Knoxville, we decided to stop by and get my craigslist mother's day gift that Ryan and the boys wanted to get me. I got a huge creative memories tote bag FULL of albums, cutters, papers, pens and more from a lady who didn't want them anymore. I talked her down to $50 from $100 which in my opinion is a steal for everything I got. Not to mention there were a few items I will sell on EBay and possibly make back the full price! Ryan laughed when I told him that and said, "you are definitely not like the normal woman who would request jewelry and such."

As for Saturday, Ryan's Co. Picnic was at Dollywood and I managed to talk him in to getting season passes at a huge discount since our tickets were free and then we just pay the remainder to upgrade them. He's so great to put up with me! I am excited to get to go more since we will not have any type of vacation this year. I forgot to take my camera, so sorry no pics of our fun there. But, I am so proud of Joseph who rode the carousel, flying bees, pigs and ducks! He is getting much more brave. The highlight as usual was the ride on the read coal train through the smokies. I promise it is a real, full size train! Rider beware though. You get a light sprinkling of coal dust all over you.

Sunday we enjoyed the day over at Mom and Dad's after we got out of church. Just a relaxing, non-rainy day.

Prayer Need

UPDATE: Thank you for you thoughts and prayers in these times for my Mom. After a much longer wait than expected, we got the news that the test was clear. NO CANCER! Praise be to God. What a huge weight that was lifted.

My dear mother, who is near and dear to me has had a lot of health dealings the last several years. After many years of dealing with fibroid tumors in her uterus, her Dr. has decided they need to go. She is scheduled for a full hysterectomy this summer. As the weeks pass by she has noticed more problems arising and her Dr. decided to test her for uterine cancer. We are all staying positive about it and patiently (as we can) waiting for the results of the biopsy. I request prayers for:

-her, that the test would come back clear (Lord willing) and she we stay on schedule for her previous plans for surgery.
-that the Lord would continue to help her as she has recently quit smoking and it would help to improve her health
-for the family that we could be an encouragement and help to her in her time of need.
-that the Lord would give us all peace in His will

Thank you!

Thanks Rochelle!

I have been wanting to have a spiffy template for my blog for some time now and thanks to Rochelle who pointed out where I could get a FREE one, I now am the proud owner of one :)