The amazing Amanda Morris and Ryker (2.5).
Amanda married her high school sweetheart in May of 2010. In preparation for wanting to start a family, she set up an appointment with my OB GYN to address her irregular periods. She was put on a combination of medication to attempt to regulate her periods and assist with ovulation. August 29, 2010 the learned they were pregnant and at 5 weeks along they told everyone. Three weeks later they suffered a miscarriage and were heartbroken but assured there should be no reason they couldn't conceive again.
Amanda and her husband spent the next three years trying to get pregnant again when she found electronic acupuncture and the "Creighton Model FertilityCare system using NaPro Technology". After 4 month of charting cervical mucus using this system, the discovered that her luteal phase was not nearly long enough to sustain a pregnancy. Amanda was referred to her local fertility doctor who specializes in NaPro Technology and within minutes of reviewing her chart, she was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS).
Amanda was put on a regimen of medications and progesterone shots and on Mother’s Day 2013, her pregnancy test finally came back positive. They continued progesterone shots for the first trimester and besides some morning (and night) sickness which was only cured by almonds, the pregnancy went fairly smoothly.
On January 16, 2014 at 40 weeks Amanda chose to be induced with cytotec. She dilated to a 2 but after 32 hours of labor with little progress and ultimately decided a cesarean birth would be best while both of their vitals were still good. At 5:30 am we were taken into the operating room and a 6:07am, Ryker was born screaming and perfect.
Breastfeeding and natural birth were both top priorities for Amanda going into motherhood and both proved elusive. They breastfed for 6 weeks before some issues caused her supply to drop. She struggled with feelings of failure there almost as much as she had with her miscarriage. "I felt like I finally had a child and now I wasn’t able to feed him the way I'd always hoped I could." Amanda would like to have one more child and says that knowing what she knows now, maybe she could have VBAC and solid breastfeeding relationship but they don't she knows that she will be okay.