Infertility Perks

We had the pleasure of attending the Shady Grove Fertility Family Day this past weekend. And it was quite the extravaganza, let me tell you. I thought the NICU reunion was big, but this event was entertaining over 2,500 happy people. Everywhere you turned there were dozens of children, all here with the help of the many doctors and nurses, etc. that helped us all on our journey to having families.  I was a little overwhelmed at first, seeing the hugeness of the crowd (I’m not a crowd-type person), but we soon found our way around. There was even a map to help us navigate. Of course, we didn’t participate in any of the awesome activities for the kids (pony rides, face painting, clowns making balloon animals, petting zoo, bounce houses, dancing, etc.) since them getting lost was a very strong possibility, not to mention the ridiculous lines, but I did fulfill my one goal for the afternoon, which was to make sure to see our doctor. There was an area designated to meeting the docs., and sure enough, we found him right there. We stepped up, and immediately gave each other a huge hug, as if we were family. He was ecstatic to see the kids, and wanted to know how we were dealing with everything. He said there were few cases during his career that kept him up at night, and ours was one of them. He wanted so much for everything to work out, from conceiving, to actually making it to term (or close enough to it), and he was so happy and relieved to see that it has. It was a wonderful time chatting with him, and with no one else in line at the moment, we took our time catching up. It was nice to see him in a more casual setting, where I could really see him as a friend, and not a doctor with another patient in line and paperwork to catch up on (though he never made me feel that way in the office).  It’s always such a great reminder of how we got to where we are today. I need those now and then, when the babies’ difficult behavior causes me to forget on occasion. I Hope we keep this relationship going as long as we can. They will definitely be on my Christmas card list every year.

We hit the barbeque pavilion, gave about 20 people information about our stroller (the man pushing his triplets in a triple-wide stroller was very jealous), and made our way back to the car. They were trying to gather the masses for a ginormous group picture, but we opted out, knowing it would take over an hour to get everyone together, and we just didn’t have that kind of time. The kids were antsy. But we left feeling good and happy and glad we made the 40 minute, each way, drive.