Babies after Ovarian Cancer... Miracles!

so...where was I before my almost month-long blog drought??  heehe.

I had discovered I was pregnant.  I was elated, I was excited, I was SCARED.
Scared that after all the oncology visits/appts I had attened since my diagnosis, everyone had said I would NEVER get pregnant, and IF I did...then it probably wouldn't be pretty....

Warren and I had to delve deep to see how we felt about this baby... were we truly prepared for the "what might be's??" we had so many things we had to consider.  First...did we want to "test" to see if this babe was "normal" and second...what did we want to do in the case that the babe was "malformed" or "not normal"?  I knew where I stood on the topic of "abortion",but ?what about abortion if there was some deformity or life-threatening problem with the baby?  I had not had to consider that before.  The more I thought about it though, the more I knew I had to leave it to my God.  He who had been with me through the Cancer diagnosis, through the treatment, through the recovery, and now got me into remission...He who had blessed me with a wonderful guy, and now He who had blessed me with the desire of my heart.....to carry MY baby inside of me...
I had to leave it to my God. 
Hubby on the other hand though.... I wasn't sure how he would really feel about it all.

When he said to me.... "This is our baby.... We will love him/her regardless of what they do/do not have...."  I fell even more in love with him.  He wanted our baby just as much as I did and was not going to consider termination,.
We decided we weren't even going to test for any problems.  We would wait and see.
I am not even going to try to sum up how much of a pain the whole pregnancy was, but lets just say the fun was taken out of being pregnant by constant follow-up/appointments etc with Midwives, Obstetricians, Oncologists, blood tests, scans (I had a total of 12 scans all up with my first pregnancy),  on top of all the "normal" preggy checks.  All due to my cancer history.  I had at least 2 appointments every single week for the whole of my pregnancy, and boy was that tedious.

Oh, that's right... whenever our hospital had student doctors/nurses in, we'd get them....since our pregnancy was such a "miracle" (thank you Lord).  Often we'd have to repeat my medical and surgical history several times over, and then be asked if we minded this or that student having a look at my scarring, and even a poke and prod around... hhaha.

Anyway as the pregnancy progressed, i got to about 34 weeks when I started getting some excruciating pain, which I can only describe as a "ripping" internally... and it was getting so bad that I could not sleep or sometimes even move without exacerbating it.  This pain turned out to be the internal scars and adhesions from all of the surgeries I had been through, and the growth of bub, and his requiring more space meant stretching of these.  I cannot tell you how painful this was even though my midwife at the time thought it "shouldn't be THAT sore".

When the time came to have our baby..despite my waters breaking, I did not progress into labour at all.
After a day without any niggles or such, they started with the induction.  Over the next couple of days I had a total of 6 tries with prostaglandin gel, all without any effect, and still no onset of labour.  When the Obstetritican came to me and said..."Juanita how do you feel about a Cesarean?"  I said "Bring it on!".

She gave me the option of later that afternoon, or first thing Sunday morning, .... I said "I'll take the morning when you've had a great sleep and are feeling refreshed thanks!!"

Early the next morning, Mum and Dad came up and sat with Warren and I as I was prepped for the surgery.  I was totally excited and not at all scared of the c-section, Warren on the other hand was a little nervous!  Mum was on standby just in case Warren couldn't handle coming in.... ha ha.
We prayed for our baby....and what we were going to be possibly faced with, and we were ready to go.

The prep was fine, and we got in to the theatre, and FINALLY Warren arrived in his white gumboots...heehe.  It was happening. 

I was very lucky that a good friend of mine who I'd done my nursing training with, was in charge of theatre that morning, so she was in there with Warren and I.  She also videoed the entire c-section/birth for us, so that was a bonus.  It was taking a while, and there was no "wahh wahh" from baby...so I asked..."Do we have a baby yet?" and they took down the divider, and held up our baby.... and the doctor said..."Look, he's beautiful isn't he??"  And that's when we first saw our beautiful, PERFECT, gorgeous baby boy.
Asher Gene Bassett, 7lb6oz, all 10 toes and fingers, and the only thing that looked at all "malformed" was his huge testicles!! (which after a few days were NORMAL!) heehee.

The relief we felt at having a baby boy who was just so lovely was really overwhelming.  It was worth all of the annoying lead up throughout the pregnancy.
A few weeks after having Asher, I clearly recalled the prophesy from the visiting preacher guy...when he said he saw a "light" coming from my abdomen...and I truly belive that my becoming pregnant, and having an ovary that 'worked" was what that light signified!

Well, we were very blessed with our little man, our little miracle.  And a "Miracle" is what my doctors always referred to him as.  We were also told that it was probably just luck that we'd had him and that we shouldn't count on being able to have any more.  So, when Asher was 4 and there was still no sign of another child, we would just say "Oh well, thanks Lord, for our boy!" and thought that was it for us. 
When our son kept asking for a brother or a sister, and was more and more persistant, we started talking about possibly adopting... 
That very weekend, I had a gig on up in KeriKeri, and while I was singing, I almost passed out, I felt nauseous, and generally just awful...  I crawled off the stage mid-song, leaving my guitarist to finish singing, and was in a heap on the floor.  "There is something very very wrong with me" I thought....

Long story short, ..... I was pregnant.  Warren was over the moon.  Asher promptly told ALL of playcentre the very morning I took a test and it was positive..... so there was no hiding the fact, or even getting used to it, since everyone knew from day 1!  Asher told everyone that he had been praying for a sister! 

He was right, he got his sister (which i think he sometimes regrets now! haha).  Kendyls pregnancy was even more unenjoyable than Ashers, because we had to add gestational diabetes to the mix, which meant almost living at the hospital!  But we got there...and we got our baby girl. 
I am so thankful to the Lord for giving me the desire of my heart.  I have carried my babies...I have been a Mummy/am a mummy.... all when medical staff told me I would not...  My God is greater.  My God knows best!  Thanks God xx

**Sorry about the lack of pictures, Im on my husbands laptop which doesn't have any!!**