Life didn't happen to me, It happened for me.
Jamaica - 2016
My first realization of how letting go of expectations can change the outcome in ways I could never dream off.
This post is about inspiration not self pity for myself. I do not at all feel sorry for myself anymore. Yes, I used to feel like a victim and how could this happen to me. The opposite is how feel now. I feel empowered and inspired to face each fear or story I created in my head about my life and crush it in its tracks, so it does not rob me of any more joy. I know now the challenges will keep coming in life it's how I handle them and not let them handle me. I thank each experience good, bad, ugly, horrible all of them for helping me become the woman I am today. I am exactly where I want and choose to be. I want to empower myself and my daughter to wake up each day no matter what the universe serves us to make a choice to be grateful for our life and would love to inspire other women in this journey of life. It is ok to be honest and share if that is what I want to do. It is also ok if I do not want to share. The beauty is we have choices. Every day we have a choice to shape and create our own lives. We are not victims to our circumstances. We have choices though they may appear to be limited, they are only limited as much as we allow them to limit us.
This post has taken me a little time to write because I was letting fear cripple me. I choose to dig deep and allow myself to be vulnerable and honest. I do this for myself and hope maybe another woman can feel inspired. I woke up to being a prisoner to my thoughts and life for far too long. It is never too late to start. Just start whatever it is you want to do or create from where ever you are right now, let nothing stand in your way of achieving what it is you want. I am not saying it is going to be easy. Has anything in life worth having been easy if we are truly honest to ourselves. Nope, not for me, I have worked for everything I have and continue to work for what I want and love. I am grateful for that; it has shown me my strength and kept me alive to be frank. I have wanted to give up, felt like failure, wanted to die, and felt worthless. I know I am not alone in these feelings. I know many women have felt these feelings for many reasons at some point in their lives. The thing is I knew I was stronger and more powerful than these feelings, if I chose to fight back and address them instead of ignoring them and trying to push them back down. That is exactly what I did. It may have taken me days sometimes, weeks, months and even years. I never gave up, deep down I think I always believed in myself even if I didn't think I did, I felt it inside. I am not just here to survive, I am her to thrive. That voice was louder than the victim voice so I chose to fight back and find and create every opportunity for myself to do and be better.
3 Months Pregnant - Bay's 40th Bday
I am not the person I was at the beginning of my fertility journey or even the person I was when I got pregnant doing IVF or once I became a mother. Yes, those experiences are all part of me and helped shape me to be the woman I am today. However, those events do not shape my identity. The beauty of it is we keep evolving if we let ourselves. I got stuck for a while. That happens, it's going to keep happening in different times and ways. The universe perfect, it is us that complicate everything and not make it easy on ourselves. We are meant to be challenged and keep learning how to work and get through the challenges. It's the dance of the universe. Do we want to dance in the universe or sit on the sidelines? I'm a dancer in my heart. Hell yeah, deep in my mind, body and soul I know I am here to dance in this life journey through it all.
For many years I struggled with my identity and mental health. I felt I was living a lie, not living an inspired life to be my true self. This was true. I was living a lie. I was living a life addicted to approval of others needing constant validation crippled by fear of disappointing others or needing everyone’s opinion before I could decide. Yup, shit happens to all of us. It will continue to happen because that is life. It's what we do next and what choice we make to change our reality.
My story about fertility is like many other women's out there but it is mine and I love it and own it. I tried for nearly a decade to get pregnant after getting off the birth control at around 30 but for no clear reasons that the doctors could find I wasn't able to get pregnant. You name it I did it, massages, acupuncture, naturopaths and had many tests done at several fertility clinics. The first clinic ran many tests and told me everything was good with my tests. So I felt lost. I took all my test results and took them to my naturopath she reviewed them and told me my results showed that my hormones were imbalanced and my body was stuck in a state of fight or flight. Producing an excess amount of a hormone called cortisol. This is causes by traumas I had been through my life and a huge amount of stress from my job. She said until I could get this under control my body literally was going to think getting pregnant was a threat and would not allow me to get pregnant. No one, in the fertility clinic that I paid to have multiple tests done told me this. All they said was I was fine and there was not clear reason why I wasn't getting pregnant. I'm grateful I take my health seriously and like to get answers even if I don't like them. What I'm getting at is I had to be my number one believer, advocate for myself and never give up on myself or my health. One of my amazing naturopaths helped me get my cortisol levels under control and understand what was happening in my body. Which is very important to know so I made the appropriate changes and sought the help I needed. It was not a quick fix, I had to invest some time and energy to make changes in my life to reduce stress and heal traumas. I am not upset at the doctors that couldn't find anything or am I talking badly about them. I have my beautiful daughter because of their help. They are all amazing and have helped me in my health journey, they are doctors, still humans that make mistakes and over look things because they are busy. We need to take responsibility for our own health and lives. I went through 2 rounds of IUI's and a 1 round of IVF. I was blessed enough for the IVF to work the first time. The difference between the 2 times the IUI's failed and the time IVF worked for me. Yes, there is a higher success rate of IVF because of the intensity of this process and the science it involves behind it. I know in my mind, body and soul the reason the IVF worked the first time was because I took a year long break after my 2 failed IUI treatments. I worked on my emotional and mental health.
Trip to Jamaica - 2016
My husband and I took a vacation to Jamaica about a year after the failed IUI's. I really had no intention of doing it again. I was ready to start the adoption process. I didn't think I could mentally, emotionally or physically go through the hormones and drug treatments again. So I put it out of my head and just started living life again. It was not the time for me and found peace in this for the moment. I realized I was really unhappy in my career climbing up the corporate ladder wasn't as fulfilling as I thought it would be. I was constantly under deadlines, stress trying to complete this never ending checklist for multiple departments and overseeing so many people and their work. I was in complete burnout but I was addicted to the idea of success and independence. These are not necessarily bad things for some however my definition of success and independence changed. It wasn't something I wanted to do, it was something I felt I needed and had to do. I thought it was the responsible thing that was expected of me. I find it funny saying it was "expected" of me now because I know the only person that put those expectations on me was myself. Most people don't care what others are doing because they're busy living their own lives and mission. Yes, our parents want us to succeed and do well for ourselves. Some cultures put more pressure than others on careers defining success by how much money we make or our titles. Doing well looked different for me than the expectations I put on myself or I thought were put on me. After this realization that my job was causing chaos on my health and life. I gave my notice and quit my job with really nothing lined up. I truly feel and know it was the first step in the right direction to claiming my life back for the first time ever. I did something I wanted to do to make me happy and fulfilled even though it scared the living crap out of me. I reclaimed my life and the next week I had an interview at a restaurant to become a server. I had never been a server before but had always thought it would be fun and I would be good at it. It was something I had wanted to do since I was a teen. It excited me to serve and engage with people. The manager hired me that day and I started the next week. I loved serving, every minute of it. Of course there were hard days no matter what you do. I was good at it, it brought me so much joy and fulfillment just being me. After a short while I was making more money than at my previous job. You see when you do what you love, things fall into place because the energy you put out into the universe aligns with you so much stronger when filled with love and amazing things happen.
My first ultrasound picture of my little peanut - 2016
Waiting for our baby girl to arrive - 2017
The possibilities are endless. I believe nothing is an accident in life. I have always left every job professionally amicably. The job I had quit from, before I left my boss, the owner of the company personally emailed the lead physician at one of the leading fertility clinics in Toronto asking him to help me and take me on as a patient. I was meeting with the doctor within a week. When there was at least a 6 month to a year long wait to get in. I know this was no accident. When you give everything you do 100 percent even if it is not your dream job, regardless you do an excellent job. Everything leads you to align with next choice or step all in the right time. So don't burn any bridges. (Hahahaha) I was scared when I quit my job, oh hell yeah. I felt like maybe I lost my mind giving up a great salary with bonus, benefits and all the perks. I realized during my 2 failed IUI's as long as I was not living my life for me and stressed everyday for 10-12 hours at my job, (plus overtime on the weekends) there was no way my body was going to let me create a home for a baby.
When I took a vacation to Jamaica with my husband after 2 failed IU's I had this feeling come over me on the trip. A feeling of calm and absolute assurance that as long as I keep trusting the process and keep going it will be alright. At the end of our trip, I told my husband I was ready to give it one final try but this time I was going all in and doing IVF. He was like are you sure. I said yeah what is the worst that can happen it doesn't work. That right there was the key to my success and the beginning of taking my life back. I went into it with no expectations and prepared myself there was a 50/50 chance and I had to be ok with it no matter what the outcome. The calmness I felt in my body I can't explain. I can still feel it. It's the same calmness I felt the day my daughter was born into this world. I knew in my mind, body and soul it was going to be ok. Stay tuned for more in the coming weeks on my pregnancy and motherhood journey.
My heart was calm and full -Mila's Birth - 2017