“Hi, I’m Brown Bear and I have two life stories to share. Firstly I am adopted, and secondly our two lovely girls are with us thanks to IVF.
I am not sure when I was told that I was adopted, or even when I knew what it was, however I must have been young, because I feel I have always known. I remember my parents gave me a book when I was little, titled ‘Why was I Adopted’. I am sure that this helped them explain things to me easily. My adopted parents have never been anything other than my loving parents, and as close as any other kid’s parents. They had a daughter naturally after I was born, which completed our family.
I have never met my birth parents, and know absolutely nothing about them. I am open to meeting them, however am not chasing them down. I am interested in knowing a little bit about who they are, and any health issues I may have forthcoming. I am not interested in why they gave me up for adoption, as that is water under the bridge.
Later in life I met my wife. After we married, we tried for a baby for many years, to no avail. We sought some professional help, which revealed her tubes were blocked, so our only chance to have children was via IVF. We didn’t hesitate to jump into IVF, and before we knew it we were on super healthy diets, my wife was taking a regime of drugs, and we were in the hospital for our first harvest, where we had many eggs, around 30. 21 made it to Day 5 Blastocyst Embryo, which is ideal. So far so good.
At Day 5, the doctors transferred one of the live embryo’s, and the wait started. The remaining Embryo’s were frozen, for us to use in the future.
We were so careful not to do anything wrong. Everything we did was very deliberate, with the new potential baby forefront in our mind. We couldn’t wait until the first scan, where we heard the heart beat for the first time. It was incredible and we were so happy. We waited until 12 weeks to tell everyone to be safe, but we need not have worried. Soon after we welcomed our baby girl.
Two years later, we started trying again for our second baby. This one didn’t come so easily. We spent the next 2 years trying, with many, many miscarriages, around 6 I believe. It was a very hard and trying time for us, emotionally, financially. We had basically given up and felt blessed with the amazing girl we had already, however wanted to have one more go. During this time our doctor had closed up shop, and our eggs were transferred to another clinic, which at the time we were unhappy about. However as it turns out, this new doctor had the magic touch, as we fell pregnant to our second daughter, Miracle #2.
Both girls are growing up beautifully, and we will need to sit them down and explain where they have come from, and how it is different to many other kids. ‘Our Village’ provides a perfect conversation starter!’