MultiCrazy

Our Expansion Story 

Our story includes three main acts, and some considerations for Christians dealing with infertility, all of which you can read on this page… 

Act One:  An Unanswered Prayer  (in which several years pass by waiting for a child, with no real hope of that ever coming to pass) 

Act Two:  An Unexpected Surprise  (in which, from out of nowhere, we find a tiny little unborn girl waving at us on an ultrasound screen) 

Act Three:  An Answered Prayer with an Unexpected Surprise  (in which a fertility technique defies the odds with all three embryos surviving, and an extra one thrown in for good measure) 

Act One:  An Unanswered Prayer 

We began trying to have children in the early part of 2001, two years after we were married.  We read about things like ovulation and temperature charts, and assumed that we would have a child in our arms by the end of the year. 

When that didn’t happen over a period of months, we began to worry, and to wonder what we ought to do next.  Some friends of ours had seen an infertility specialist in our area, who had a strong reputation as both a doctor and a Christian.  By the end of 2001, we began to see him, and he walked us through several possibilities of why we might struggle to have children. 

When tested, it appeared that both of us had some obstacles to overcome, some of them surmountable, and others maybe not.  After first trying medication and then some other procedures, we came to the point of deciding whether to try in vitro fertilization, where the male and female counterparts have an arranged meeting outside of the womb in order to produce fertilized embryos (babies) who will then be placed inside the womb in the hopes that they will make it into the first trimester and beyond.  We sought some counsel from Christians who had dealt with infertility, and prayed about it, and we decided that–with some guidelines of our own based on several considerations that we have as Christians (see bottom of page)–we would try in vitro fertilization.  

Ten embryos were produced outside of the womb in May of 2003, with three of those ten immediately being placed inside Lisa’s womb.  (The remaining seven were frozen, in the hopes that they would survive the freezing/thawing process so that they could be placed inside her womb at a later time.) 

We hoped that at least one of these initial three would make it, and even prayed that all three of them would. 

None of them did.  In June of 2003, we were still not pregnant. 

After thousands of dollars and years of doctor visits and sadness, we decided that we needed a break for a while.  Lisa stopped taking medicine and seeing the doctor.  Lisa had won a cruise at her work, and so in September of 2003 we sailed the western Caribbean, doing some things that Lisa could not safely do if she ever got pregnant–horseback riding, swimming in the ocean, jacuzzi. 

Act Two:  An Unexpected Surprise 

On the Sunday which marked a week after our return from the cruise, Lisa wasn’t feeling so good (a regular occurrence on the cruise, which we had chalked up to mild seasickness).  We laughed about the idea of her being pregnant, “knowing” that it wasn’t even a possibility. 

As a continuation of the joke, just in case, we decided to take a home pregnancy test, since we had a leftover from the two-pack that we had used after the in vitro procedure.  We started watching a movie, forgot about it, and only when we needed a bathroom break did Lisa remember to take the test.  We stood there in the bathroom, just in case, and watched the one line appear that always instantly appears.  And then…a faint pink line started to show up. 

We looked at each other, raised our eyebrows, and grabbed the directions.  Did a faint second line even count?  Slowly, the line got darker, and we read that a false positive reading happens less than 1% of the time.  We looked at each other, not sure whether to believe this or not, and certain that we would be the most likely candidates to fit in the less-than-1%-false-positive category.  We were dumbfounded. 

We stopped and prayed right there in the bathroom, excited, nervous, not sure what to think.  We asked God to be with us, and to guide us if we were in the 99+% group.  After so much planning and careful analysis that had gone into trying to get pregnant, it seemed impossible that–when it did happen–we could be caught so totally off guard.  We watched the rest of the movie, trying not to think about what had just happened. 

An ultrasound two days later showed an eight-week-old baby.  (Little did we know that Lisa was already six weeks pregnant before we even left for our cruise!)  We don’t know what exactly had happened, or why it happened like it did, but God chose to show us His power by giving us a child when we least expected it, and with no costly intervention from the medical world. 

We contained our excitement for five more weeks and told no one but our parents until week 13, when the first trimester was officially over.  The rest of Lisa’s pregnancy was wonderful, and she always seemed about two months less pregnant than she actually was.  Everyone who saw her talked about the glow that she had, and how beautiful she was pregnant!  We were grateful to God…and anxious about everything. 

On May 11, 2004, Lisa delivered beautiful Ashley Gail Roberts, who has been a great source of joy since the day she came into our lives.  Click the thumbnails below to see our little pride and joy (all pictures here prior to her siblings’ arrival)… 

October 26, 2005

September 24, 2005

August 19, 2005 (courtesy of Visual Impact Photography in Savannah, GA)

July 4, 2005

May 14, 2005

December 2004

July 2004

May 11, 2004

Act Three:  An Answered Prayer with an Unexpected Surprise 

We decided that we did not want to wait too long to start giving the seven remaining embryos a chance at life.  We decided that–when Ashley turned one–we would go to the fertility clinic and have them place two or three more embryos inside.  On May 21, we found out that four of the seven embryos had not even survived the freezing and thawing process (leaving us with three), and then we allowed the doctor to place these remaining three embryos inside Lisa’s womb, in the hopes that this time at least one of them might survive. 

We prayed–as we had two years earlier–that all three of them would make it, even while knowing that a triplet pregnancy would be a very big ordeal.  We found out that we were pregnant at the end of May (this time the second line on the pregnancy test showed up immediately!), and our blood test numbers showed Lisa’s hCG levels to be off the chart, indicating that there could very possibly be more than one.  (A little research of my own led me to believe that those kinds of numbers indicated that all three of them had survived.) 

We went to our first ultrasound at six weeks, and as soon as he started the scan our doctor immediately told us that there were three.  After a few moments, he said “Oh my,” to which Lisa said, “What?!?!” and to which he replied, “There may be four.”  Indeed, not only had all three embryos survived, but one of them had split into identical twins, ushering us into a very rare, very scary category of a quadruplet pregnancy. 

For enlargeable ultrasound photos, recent pictures of the babies/kids and for the rest of our story, go to the main posts of this site.    

Christian Considerations for Infertility Treatment 

We began seeing an infertility doctor when we knew very little about the subject.  We were very blessed to see a doctor who approached the issue from a Christian perspective.  Not everyone is so blessed.  Here are some questions that we think you ought to ask… 

1) Are you financially prepared for infertility treatment? 

Most insurance companies do not cover infertility treatment.  It’s possible that your doctors’ visits could be very short-lived before you find yourselves expecting, but it’s also possible to sink a lot of time and money into treatment, none of which is guaranteed to produce results.  If you are already in debt, now is probably not a good time to start infertility treatments. 

2) Are you willing/able to adopt? 

Adoption in today’s world can be even more expensive than infertility treatments, and in many cases more fruitless.  There are no guarantees in either, but there is certainly a need for good adoptive parents for millions of children around the world.  If you know already that you would be more blessed by adopting than by conceiving a child, then go forward with adoption and put all your eggs in that basket.  In some cases, God ends up blessing through both adoption and pregnancy. 

3) Do you not have a personal peace with particular infertility options? 

From latex to the birth control pill to prenatal vitamins, most Christians have utilized medicine and/or scientific knowledge to prevent the conception of a child and/or to assist in the dynamics of pregnancy.  Infertility treatments today are another example of this happening.  At the same time, there may be some treatments that you are personally uncomfortable with.  If that’s the case, here’s a simple piece of advice:  don’t do them.  At the same time, don’t assume that every other other couple should have the exact same location of their own line in the sand. 

4) Would you be willing to have as many children as the number of embryos that you allow to be produced? 

A fertilized embryo is a child.  We decided that–if we were going to utilize in vitro fertilization–we would not produce any fertilized embryos that we did not later attempt to place inside the womb.  In our case, ten embryos were initially produced, and we reconciled ourselves to the fact that if God chose all ten of them to survive–as unlikely as that was–we would gladly accept the gift.  We encourage you not to produce, and then “discard”, a fertilized embryo. 

5) Does your doctor know where you stand on these issues? 

It is your responsibility to educate your doctor concerning what choices you would make in regard to a fertilized embryo, and why.  If you only want to produce a limited number of embryos (for the reason stated above), be sure to tell him/her that, and get it in writing.  If he argues with you based on economics and practicality, stand your ground.  This is your life and your choices and your family and your finances, not your doctor’s. 

Please feel free to contact us about any of these considerations at roberts99@insightbb.com