The wonderful Dalia Jury and Ren (21 months). Dalia had somewhat written off finding that special someone when she met her now husband. Once they decided to finally go on a date they quickly fell in love. Knowing they wanted to start a family eventually and because she was 10 years older than him, they decided to start trying to have a baby right away. Months passed, their wedding came and went and she still wasn't pregnant. There is a month she feels she may of miscarried but they never mourned as they hadn't done anything to confirm the pregnancy.
After a full year of trying, they decided to see a fertility specialist and though her gynecologist had told her she should have no problems conceiving, learned that from a fertility standpoint things weren't looking good. At 38 she was told that she had the body of a 51 year old and the chances of getting pregnant were less than 1%. Her doctor went on to tell her that she had options from IUI to IVF along with the related percentages but that if she had multiples she would need to selectively terminate - as he went on she realized she had just gone from learning she couldn't have children, to the possibility of terminating one of her children in the same conversation. Overwhelmed, they went home to think about their options.
In the interim Dalia began to change her diet and lifestyle a bit and when she went back in to her doctor about 9 months later was told that she was much healthier than before. They decided to give fertility treatments a go, beginning with IUI and working their way up to IVF if needed. Her husband was tested and determined to have slow sperm so they decided to use suppositories to thicken her cervical lining and then 5 days of Clomid prior to their first IUI attempt. Dalia says there was a lot of secrecy surrounding their conception that she wished there hadn't been. She left work for her procedure, lay there for about 10 minutes and then had to go back to work and resume her day as if nothing had happened. 2 weeks later, Dalia learned that she was pregnant with Ren and was thrilled.
The first two trimester's of her pregnancy were wonderful. She never felt sick and didn't become uncomfortable until the last month when she was over being pregnant and just ready to meet her baby. Ren arrived vaginally, 10 days postdates following an induction. Dalia had an epidural and near the end they attempted to use a vacuum to assist her but it kept slipping and she was able to get her baby out on her own. Due to meconium in his fluid, Ren had to be on antibiotics but was otherwise healthy.
While Dalia expected that she would be overcome with love for her son she found that once they got home she really struggled. While she didn't feel like she wanted to harm him or herself in any way she felt detached and worried that she had made the biggest mistake of her life. At one point she even looked up adoption agencies because she was certain she couldn't do it. She couldn't be his mom. At her 6 week check up it was apparent that Dalia had postpartum depression and she was prescribed Zoloft which helped immensely. She began to feel like herself again and is now madly in love with her little boy.
The message that women are whole and beautiful whether they are a mother or not is very important to Dalia. This is a life changing process, she says, and those changes help you remember the miracle of creating life. For Delia however, she has found that she hates her body now. It's not as strong, or slim, as it should be and she doesn't feel like herself. She loves being a mom but wants to have that confidence. She says that confidence is the sexiest thing in the world and she wants to find those moments for herself where she feels like a hero that she's pulled this off.