God’s Timing – Not Mine

Tomorrow is my daughter Tori’s 4^th birthday. I can’t believe it has already been that long since she was born, it feels like just yesterday. As we get ready to celebrate her birthday tomorrow, I can’t help but think back to the time before God gave her to us.

October 2004 – Rick and I had only been married for a year and half and we weren’t even planning on having kids until after 3 years – at the very least. Around that time, one of Rick’s coworkers had recently suffered from a brain hemorrhage and died. His name was Dan and he was only in his early 20’s – just like us. Just thinking about how young he was, and the fact he was just recently married made us realize how short life is and we wanted to make the most of it. After a while, we both decided it was time to start a family.

I was SO excited! The only people that we told were Bryan & Shannon (Rick’s brother and his wife) and they lived in Virginia at the time. I assumed that once I got off the pill I would be able to get pregnant right away and by Christmas time we could surprise everyone with our wonderful news. Well, Thanksgiving passed, then Christmas passed, and then New Years, before I knew it we were into February. By then we decided it was time to call the doctor.

The doctor told me that I had high prolactin levels (called hyperprolactinemia) and that was causing me not to get pregnant. This is caused by either a) prolactin producing tumors in the pituitary gland b) pituitary tumors or c) benign tumors in the area around the pituitary gland. My heart sank as she told me the news. I remember my eyes filling up with tears. Not only could I not get pregnant right now but I might have a tumor too?! So, we scheduled an MRI to check things out. By now, we knew we had to tell our family that we were trying to conceive and we needed their prayers for my upcoming MRI. They were all so supportive.

Here is one of my journal entries from that time:

February 21, 2005

“Lord, please give me a peace and calm spirit about Your will for our lives. I want a baby so badly – You know my heart’s desires. I want to be a mother and be able to hold and love my baby. You’ll bless us with a family someday. I can’t wait to look into the eyes of the beautiful baby You will have made for us. Please have Your hand on my body, please protect me from anything that would hinder me from having a child. I pray that You would bring me peace and comfort. I know that Your plans are better than ours, Your timing is perfect.”

A few days after my MRI, the results were in. There was nothing there! Although they still weren’t able to find out what was making my prolactin levels increase. But I didn’t care, I was SO relieved that I didn’t have a tumor – on my brain! Thank you Lord for answered prayers!! So, I was put on medicine (bromocriptine) to lower my prolactin, I had to go have blood drawn every two weeks and I needed to start charting. I did this all spring and all summer. It seemed like everyone – and I mean everyone – was getting pregnant around that time. I think we had a total of atleast 12 people we knew that were expecting, except for me. My levels were going down, but still…no baby.

October 2005 – I was driving to work one day and I had to pull over the car because I felt so sick. I hadn’t been sleeping well lately either. Of course, my first thought was that I maybe I was pregnant. But after so many negative pregnancy tests, it was emotionally draining to even think about having to go through another one. But still, I knew I needed to take one. It was a Friday night and Rick had to work. I figured that if it was negative, then atleast he wouldn’t have to see me be so sad about it. So, after I took the test I waited in my bedroom for well over the time that you are supposed to wait. I sat on my bed, praying so hard for strength if it was negative and begging for it to be positive. The moment of truth arrived, I lifted up the box I had put over it to look at it: there were two lines. “Wait, what does two lines mean?!” was the first thought to go through my head! I grabbed the box and compared the examples to my test…I WAS PREGNANT! I kept comparing them to make sure I hadn’t read it wrong. But I hadn’t, my baby was here. I was jumping around the bathroom, crying tears of joy and thanking my God for giving me this baby.

When Rick got home that night, Nala (our dog) greeted him at the door. On her collar was a tag that read “Hi Daddy! Victoria (our girl’s name) or Josiah (our boy’s name) is here!” He looked up at me, with a huge smile on his face and said “Are you serious?!” I showed him the test and he picked me up and we hugged and thanked God for our miracle.

After 13 weeks of only telling close family, we finally made our news public: We were going to have a baby!! And on January 4, 2006 we found out it was going to be a girl, our Victoria.

Tomorrow I will share with you her one of a kind arrival story.