Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Uninterrupted Joy: My journey through infertility, pregnancy and special needs
    Uninterrupted Joy: My journey through infertility, pregnancy and special needs
    Uninterrupted Joy: My journey through infertility, pregnancy and special needs
    Ebook134 pages1 hour

    Uninterrupted Joy: My journey through infertility, pregnancy and special needs

    By Christi Caldwell

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The following journey was never intended for publication. It was written from a mother, to her unborn child. The words detailed her struggle through infertility and the joy of finally being pregnant. A stunning revelation at her son's birth opened a world of both fear and discovery. This is the story of one mother's love and hope and... her quest for uninterrupted joy.

    Dr. Brian Skotko, Co-Director, Down Syndrome Program, Massachusetts General Hospital says:
    "On an exasperating quest to have a child, one mother finds perfection where she least expects it. This book is an emotional companion for any couple feeling alone, with their faith shaken, after receiving a postnatal diagnosis of Down syndrome for their child."

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherChristi Caldwell
    Release dateJan 5, 2014
    ISBN9781310255847
    Uninterrupted Joy: My journey through infertility, pregnancy and special needs
    Author

    Christi Caldwell

    USA Today bestselling, RITA-nominated author Christi Caldwell believes the most perfect heroes and heroines have imperfections, and she rather enjoys torturing them before crafting them a well-deserved happily ever after! 

    Read more from Christi Caldwell

    Related to Uninterrupted Joy

    Related ebooks

    Wellness For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      I Made One. The Other Made Me

      Mar 7, 2022

      I Made One. The Other Made Me
      6 min read

    • Article

      Mum Is Mum

      Sep 2, 2020

      Mum Is Mum
      6 min read

    • Article

      Housefull!

      Nov 6, 2019

      Housefull!
      9 min read

    • Article

      Ria’s Baby Joy ‘My Sister’s Selfless Act’

      Aug 4, 2021

      When I sat down with Woman at the end of last year, I was ready to talk about my long battle with infertility. In fact, I was more than ready. After six years of trying for a baby, I still did not have one in my arms, and I wanted to start a conversa

      9 min read

    • Article

      Mighty & Magical!

      Dec 8, 2019

      Mighty & Magical!
      9 min read

    • Article

      Making My Own Rules!

      Jul 7, 2022

      Making My Own Rules!
      7 min read

    • Article

      Mad About Motherhood!

      Aug 5, 2021

      Mad About Motherhood!
      10 min read

    • Article

      Timing Is Everything

      Jul 9, 2020

      Timing Is Everything
      5 min read

    • Article

      Fertile Ground

      Oct 13, 2019

      Fertile Ground
      12 min read

    • Article

      Grief Declarations

      Dec 16, 2020

      Grief Declarations
      4 min read

    • Article

      (not Always) Smooth Sailing!

      Oct 1, 2020

      (not Always) Smooth Sailing!
      9 min read

    • Article

      Infertile & Querying

      Jun 16, 2021

      GROWING up, in the absence of any sort of formalized religion, I used to pray to my dead grandparents. I would ask them for two things, but never both at the same time: to be a mother and to be a writer. The writer part was simple. I always wanted to

      9 min read

    • Article

      A First-time Mum At 49

      Jan 18, 2022

      A First-time Mum At 49
      4 min read

    • Article

      #Sharing

      Mar 19, 2020

      Start your pregnancy journey confidently by giving your skin the nourishment it needs to be healthy and resilient. Trusted by mothers, and recommended by gynaecologists and midwives for more than 30 years, Bio-Oil Skincare Oil gives your skin exactly

      3 min read

    • Article

      The New Mum At 46

      Aug 26, 2021

      The New Mum At 46
      4 min read

    • Article

      A Pregnancy From Hell

      Aug 18, 2020

      Ever since I was a little girl, I’d always dreamed of becoming a mother one day. I imagined showing off my blossoming bump, my baby nestled in my arms, watching them grow up into a miniature version of me. But as I grew older myself, I understood the

      4 min read

    • Article

      I’ll Never Be A Mum... BUT THAT’S OK

      Mar 31, 2020

      It might sound silly, but when you decide to have a family, you suddenly notice there are babies everywhere. They’re in the latest social-media snaps posted by people you haven’t spoken to in years, they’re opposite you on the train, being placated b

      4 min read

    • Article

      Cover Mum On The Other Side...

      Nov 2, 2020

      Cover Mum On The Other Side...
      6 min read

    • Article

      I’M ASEXUAL But I Still Became A Mum

      Mar 19, 2024

      Last weekend, my baby boy Oryn turned one. As I helped him blow out the candle on his first birthday cake, he beamed up at me and I felt a rush of pride and joy. It was followed immediately by the heart-stopping thought, ‘What if I hadn’t been brave

      6 min read

    • Article

      My Baby Bump Was A TUMOUR

      Jan 19, 2022

      Alex Klease, 30, Biloela, Qld Holding a newborn bub at my friend’s wedding, I looked into my husband Dave’s eyes. ‘This could be us soon,’ I said to him. Dave, then 29, and I had recently got married, but we were both ready to be parents. I was a

      3 min read

    • Article

      Taking Control

      Jul 9, 2020

      Staring at the familiar green lettering ahead, I took a deep breath. Sat in my car at my local Asda car park, I clung on to the steering wheel, sweat dripping from my palms. You can do this , I thought, trying to convince myself to get out of the ca

      5 min read

    • Article

      Love Step By Step

      Jan 6, 2023

      Love Step By Step
      6 min read

    • Article

      Everything to Lose

      Sep 10, 2020

      Everything to Lose
      5 min read

    • Article

      Twice The Cuddles!

      Nov 4, 2022

      My husband Abhishek and I met in college, but were completely unaware of each other’s existence. It was only when the two of us went to the US for an exchange program did we meet each other. We connected instantly and began dating soon after. In 2016

      6 min read

    • Article

      Our WOW baby

      Dec 3, 2020

      Our WOW baby
      4 min read

    • Article

      Beating Baby Blues

      Dec 7, 2021

      Beating Baby Blues
      7 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Uninterrupted Joy

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Uninterrupted Joy - Christi Caldwell

      Uninterrupted Joy

      My Journey Through Infertility, Pregnancy, and Special Needs

      Christi Caldwell

      Table of Contents

      Copyright

      Dedication

      Prologue

      Part I: Trying to Conceive

      Part II: Personal Journal Through IVF and Pregnancy

      Part III:

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

      Chapter Fourteen

      Chapter Fifteen

      About the Author

      Other Books by Christi Caldwell

      Uninterrupted Joy

      Copyright © 2013 by Christi Caldwell

      Cover Art by Lily George

      Copy Edits by Lynn Crandall Editing Services

      Formatting by Aileen Fish

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without written permission.

      Smashwords edition License Notes

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it or borrow it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

      For more information about the author:

      christicaldwellauthor@gmail.com

      www.christicaldwellauthor.com

      @ChristiCaldwell

      Dedications

      For Rory: You are everything I ever dreamed of. And more.

      Also, for Doug. You are a remarkable father and husband. You leave me in awe every day.

      Acknowledgements

      This story is dedicated to all the friends and family who sustained me and gave me strength on this great journey of motherhood.

      To the therapists who challenged Rory and believed in him.

      To Dr. Carlson, who saw greatness in my son and restored my faith in the medical community.

      To those of you who have a child with special needs.

      And thank you to each and every one of you who has read about my journey.

      I’m honored and humbled.

      Prologue

      The Arrival

      One night, toward the later end of my pregnancy, my husband Doug and I were lying in bed. He was reading. My hands were in their usual position— atop my stomach. I craved each movement, each flutter, each kick, elbow, and nudge: I didn’t get tired of having my insides pulverized, as most people had warned I would.

      That cool Connecticut night, in September was the first time I actually allowed myself to believe this baby, who I had dreamed my whole adult life of holding, would be mine. The baby had always been intangible. A dream of a baby. A dream of a future I had always yearned for but had never really wrapped my brain around. That night, I said, You know, I have thought so much about how to get this baby here, I’ve never thought about after the baby comes.

      That’s not to say I didn’t think of how much work a child was or all the responsibility that went with having a child, but in a sense, I didn’t think those struggles and joys would be mine. From the moment I began trying to get pregnant, to the moment I learned we wouldn’t naturally conceive, to the moment I began my first round of in vitro fertilization (IVF), to the moment, several rounds of IVF later when I’d finally achieved our pregnancy, the baby was the ultimate end of our struggle.

      I knew a baby would change our lives. But I never quite imagined how in the space of one evening, our lives would be irrevocably changed. The night was beautiful, the day after heartbreaking. The days that followed were painful, and then the beauty, the joy, the splendor all set in and have filled my heart with the greatest, most unimaginable happiness.

      Part I: Trying to Conceive

      July 8, 2007

      My life has become a series of waiting. Waiting for a stick to tell me I’m ovulating. Waiting for my period not to come on its scheduled date. Waiting for some kind of indication, some early sign, a symptom, anything to tell me I’m pregnant.

      I’ve been trying to conceive since November 2006. I’ve heard all different stories on my prospects of pregnancy. For some women it takes two years for the cycles to regulate when coming off birth control pills. For some women, their cycles normalize soon after they stop taking the pill, and they become pregnant within the first three months. My husband had been convinced that as soon as I was off the pill, I would be instantaneously pregnant. After all, I’d been on this hormonal pill to prevent pregnancy for almost ten years. To think that I won’t get pregnant is just contrary to what all girls are told growing up. My sister had been one of those three-months-off-the pill-and-pregnant stories. My cycles were regular the moment I went off the pill. I didn’t miss a period, my cycles weren’t unusually long. I just started a normal cycle.

      The first month we said it was okay. A September baby would be too difficult, as we are both teachers and I don’t yet have the maternity time accrued. The second month the same thing. The third month I was two days late…I was never late…I believed with all my heart, the moment that I was even one day late, I would be pregnant. I called my obstetrician, who in that moment looked at my file and realized he’d not ordered the appropriate prenatal screenings. My period came the next day, and I was then encouraged to abstain until we ascertained if I was a Cystic fibrosis carrier.

      I learned I was a carrier, which postponed our conception attempts for a month while we waited for my husband’s carrier screening. He was not a carrier and we resumed trying. Month four we didn’t talk much about the timing. I think we’d both begun to see that conception isn’t as easy as we’d presumed.

      But month four I silently thought about how nice a December baby would be. I loved the idea of going to cut down the Christmas tree, imagining myself too heavy with child to navigate the steep mountainsides of the idyllic, New England tree farm in Connecticut. I imagined myself standing in some tree farm, on flat land, with my husband doing all the work, and me laughing at the pass I got from helping.

      December slipped past and then I entertained the even better idea of having a New Year’s Eve baby. I even imagined having my baby called ‘Baby New Year.’

      I don’t know what I thought about for the month of February…the sweet ponderings started to come a little less regularly. This month, if I get pregnant, the baby would be born in March. I have done the calculations…I haven’t done that in at least two months. If I conceived this month, I’d miss my dog Sonny’s birthday. We usually throw Sonny a spectacular birthday celebration. It may seem eccentric, crazy, even pathetic to some. At this point, he’s the closest thing I have to a child.

      Except…I have this horrible feeling that again March will slip by as the other months and it will be me saying, Oh well, there is always April. Maybe we can share the same birthday. Or May. How perfect for a teacher to have a May baby, because the summer break makes the perfect amount of maternity time. I hear these like a litany, as though my mind already knows what my heart does not…that there is even a greater possibility that I will not conceive.

      It all sounds so clinical. It is not supposed to be like this. I’m not supposed to pee on a stick to determine the best time before my body releases an egg. I’m not supposed to time everything to scientific perfection and yet the baby of my heart remains beyond my reach. I’m sure there is no greater pain for a woman, than to feel this sense of failure in one’s body. I began to look at myself as different from others and I began to hate myself and even others for the ease with which they seemed to conceive.

      For Doug and I, to do everything right; no drinking, no drugs or smoking ever and yet for no apparent reason, we can’t create life—something so natural for the majority of couples.

      So I made a list because I’m a glutton for pain. Exercise—check. Healthy diet—check. Only one sexual partner, in my entire life—check. Prenatal testing and vitamins—check. Regular OB appointments—check. Age: mid-twenties—check. Conception—no check.

      Each month I wait. I wait to ovulate. And then I wait not to get my period. I am due to in three days. At this time I will be on vacation. My doctor has ordered initial blood work to begin considering why, after our scientific approach to conception these nine months, I remain unsuccessful. This blood work is required on the third day of my period, which means I’ll have to go to some out of state clinic, and it really doesn’t matter. I don’t care. All I want now are answers to our problem and a strategy so we can at last have a baby.

      July 9, 2007

      I hate that everyone has begun asking me questions. I always thought family would be the only ones with the boldness to make personal inquiries they felt they were entitled to make by way of the blood connection. What I didn’t expect is friends and colleagues to ask regularly if I’m trying, if I’m pregnant, and then giving me all great stories on their own successes. I’ve heard everything from the always-have-sex-on-day-14 to the going-on-vacation-and-just-relaxing, to the keeping-your-legs-up-in-the–air-after-having-sex. Check, Check, and Check. I’d tried those ideas long before their advice. I didn’t tell them that. I just thank them for the advice.

      If I was pregnant don’t people think I’d want to share this special news?

      Not yet.

      No, we’re thinking about it.

      We’ll see.

      I have a whole arsenal of responses. But I’m tired of the questions.

      July 10, 2007

      I got my period. Sounds like the start of a young female’s adolescent book. It is the day my

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1