Pregnancy

My fertility journey continued from my 40’s into my 50’s. I wasn’t giving up.

I remember one specialist asking as he was about to put his probe inside me ‘how old are you now Ali?’. He already knew as he had been seeing me for years and had my date of birth in his records.  What he was really trying to say was isn’t it about time you gave up. The definition of geriatric pregnancy, now defined as advanced maternal age – those who are 35 years or older at their estimated delivery date. 

There are a lot of stigma’s, judgements and negative thinking about women who are trying to have a baby over a certain age. If I hadn’t had been as strong as I was, I may have given up. I remember one women specialist saying to me after she told me I had lovely ovaries, that I had less than 5% chance, and in the same breath handed me a box of tissues.   

I overcome the odds by not buying into fear, staying true to my convictions and most importantly kept showing up.  You can dream and wish all you want, but it must be backed up with inspired action.

My fifth and final trip to San Francisco I decided to go it alone - I was going to do it my way.  Being in my own energy felt good, it felt different, we were changing it up.  We had found the experts that I trusted, and their expertise was on a different level.  

On one occasion prior, after I had a hysteroscopy in New Zealand, I had been given the green light to go only to find that I needed further surgery when I arrived in San Francisco. I remember distinctly as I woke up from surgery on my birthday. During that operation, it was found that I needed to be referred to a specialist in Sydney for a further operation. I needed to go halfway around the world to find this out.  

Before I left for my final trip, Tui (my dog) was pregnant, and I helped her through her pregnancy and the birthing of her puppies. I remember thinking she was showing me the way. I was in a caring, nurturing, mothering mode. As I was busy with two dogs and five puppies, I had no time to stress, I just ticked off all the boxes and got on with it. At that time the dōTERRA Adaptiv range had just been launched.  I did two months of diffusing, applying and taking the capsules…I was in cruise mode.  

It was Christmas time, and I watched all the cheesy Christmas movies in my hotel room. I watched The Christmas Miracle, and on New Years Day 2020 I got my miracle - I was pregnant.  This time I felt convinced this was it, the best news ever to the start the new year and new decade. Mark and I had started our new journey in the new Millenium 2000, so we were following a trend.

When I started bleeding at six weeks I went for a scan and was told sorry you have miscarried. I was in disbelief, I went through 4 days of grief counselling, and I remember getting home and filling a skip we had outside, I was angry. I was sent for another scan to see if I needed a D & C. I wanted to go on my own, saying to Mark, I know how this is going to go, don’t come. Lying on the table as soon as the probe went in, I was crying.  Then I will never forget her words, “do you see that” I said “see what”, she said “a heartbeat”, and there it was my baby’s little heartbeat - I nearly fell off the table.  I rang Mark in the car I was so excited, then Joc, then my sister and mum, I couldn’t contain myself.  I rang my NZ specialist to tell them the good news and to my astonishment they said you’re not out of the woods yet, don’t get your hopes up. That’s all I had, was hope.  Our specialists in San Francisco weren’t surprised, they new what they were doing and were professional right the way through.

I loved being pregnant and I welcomed the morning sickness seeing it as a good sign. I had Ginger, Digestzen and Peppermint Beadlets to see me through. My Gia Wellness tools kept me protected, hydrated and healthy.

After eight weeks we were advised to go under the care of a group of obstetrician specialists.  They were not used to someone who was determined in wanting to do things more naturally. One of the obstetricians who I loved came to see me in hospital after Xavier was born and he said “Ali you look great, whatever you’re doing keep doing it”.