Mirena Monday

Parental Advisory -- if you don't want to know about our contraceptive life, don't read this.

Just had to post it . . . I got an IUD today. That's an Intra-Uterine Device, for those of you who are not in the baby-preventing mindset. It's supposed to last about 5 years, being pretty much maintenance free, and prevent something just short of 100% of pregnancies.

I really cannot believe that I'm even using contraception. It seemed like something that I would never ever consider, once we finally had a baby. Just 4 short years ago, I was lost in the sea of infertility, trying so desperately to get pregnant. Jim and I were beside ourselves . . . wondering if we would ever have a baby of our own. Obviously things worked in our favor at long last, and Meg was born in June 2006. Fast forward to just 2 years ago, and I was desperate once again for a baby because we had miscarried our first pregnancy following Meg. I had no idea of that miscarriage was a sign that Meg was a 'fluke' pregnancy or if it meant we'd be headed back to the RE for another IUI or two. Safe to say, contraception was something I never thought would be needed again.

Hindsight is 20/20, as they say. I can look back now and know that it was a lot of drama all for nothing . . . now that we have 2 beautiful girls. And I'm fairly certain we cured the infertility . . . which my doctor said happens quite often for couples that take a while to conceive baby # 1. We got pregnant with both Baby 2 and Kate on first tries, no help from meds or doctors. I never thought THAT would happen, but it did. So . . . we've run the gamut . . . we've been infertile and super-fertile. And now we had to decide what to do if we did not want to have another baby just yet.

Now that Ms. Mirena is (hopefully) doing her job, we are just holding off that new-found fertility for a while. "Family Planning" is in full swing around here. Yes, we will have another baby. The 'plan' -- and I use that word as loosely as humanly possibly because I know it's impossible to plan -- is to wait until next summer to get pregnant again. That would put Baby 4 being born about the time Meg goes off to Kindergarten. Great timing, we think. We'll see. Time will tell . . . and I'll look back at this post one day with that 20/20 hindsight and a totally new perspective, I'm sure.

Here's to Mirena. May she and I (and Jim, I guess) become true buddies over the next year . . . and may she take her eviction well when the time is right.