Baby!

Hey people!  We have a baby!  And I think he is absolutely the cutest baby around.  Of course, I am his mother so I'm allowed to say that.  :)  So today, I will be sharing the story of his birth.  I'm going to be quite open because I've always felt it was important to share our infertility journey with others.  (And this is a great place for me to record everything for my own history!)  If you don't want to read all about his entrance into the world, this would be a great place to stop reading and just scroll to the pictures.  You've been warned.  Also- this is ridiculously long.  Sorry about that.

Rewind to last Summer.  We had just accepted the job in Qatar, and knew we would be moving at the end of the summer.  We knew we had one month left of treatments before we left- and then we were done.  If this didn't work, we would be taking a break for a while.  So I set up an appointment with my amazing doctor to talk about our options.  I explained that we wanted to do everything we possibly could to put us in the best possible position for a pregnancy.  Because of my history of 3 losses, I was not a candidate for IVF.  But our doctor was willing to try an IUI.  So- I stocked up on all of my medications, continued watching my diet with the help of a friend in the neighborhood, and we moved forward with the IUI.

June 30, 2014.  Steve and I were traveling with the YW in our ward to Wyoming to go river rafting with our bishop as guide.  We got a bit of a late start, because I had to zip down to the clinic to have blood work done.  We caught up to the caravan, and bishop asked Steve and I if we would be in the first raft- the one that was going down the river as soon as we got there.  We agreed, and then continued on our way.  As we came out of the canyon and descended into Afton, I got the phone call.  The one where they give the results of the blood test.  The one that usually left me in tears for a day or two.  This time, I was in tears again, because the result was positive.  The IUI had worked!  Unfortunately, that meant that I didn't do any rafting on that trip after all... but I still had a great time with our cute YW!

My pregnancy was actually pretty uneventful.  It was a pretty easy pregnancy.  I had food aversions, but was never sick.  I was completely exhausted most of the time, but there were no real complications.  At 11.5 weeks, we moved to Qatar.  At 16 weeks, it was confirmed that he was a boy.  (Steve and I would both have been very surprised if we learned we were having a girl!)  I loved my doctor, and had plans to deliver at one of the private hospitals here, but later in the pregnancy I changed my mind.  There were lots of factors at play, but ultimately, Steve and I felt that we should travel across the country (a 40 minute drive!) to the Cuban hospital.  Yes.  A hospital in Qatar, completely staffed by Cuban medical professionals.  Slightly random, but we decided to make the switch and I started seeing my new doctor at about 35 weeks.

Everything was progressing perfectly!  My parents came out to be here for his birth, and they got here the evening of March 5.  I was due on March 8.  I was predicting he would be born on March 10.  Well, March 8 came and went.  I went back to my next doctor appointment and they scheduled an induction for the 16th.  I was bummed.  I really wanted him to come on his own.  March 10 came and went.  But at 1:00am on March 11, things changed!

I woke up at 1:00 to go to the bathroom, and I felt my first contraction.  I had been having Braxton Hicks contractions for a few months, but I could tell that this was definitely something different.  10 minutes later, another.  I woke Steve up.  10 minutes later, another.  Then, they suddenly switched to every 6 minutes.  I woke up my parents and told them that we may be going to the hospital sometime tonight.  I took a shower.  By the time I got out of the shower they were every 5 minutes.  Then every 4 minutes.  For a little bit, they went a bit bonkers and were bouncing around every 2-7 minutes.  But they finally stabilized at 4 minutes apart, I ate a bowl of cereal, and at about 4am, we took off for the hospital!

Once at the hospital, they hooked me up to monitors, and checked me out.  I had 3 contractions in a 10 minute period, and I was dilated to 2cm.  They checked me in and wheeled me up to the Labor rooms.  For the most part, I really appreciated how hands-off the staff of he Cuban hospital was.  I was not hooked up to any IVs or monitors.  I was told to get out of bed and walk around to help with the contractions.  My nurse was incredible.  She checked in on me periodically, and answered all of my questions very honestly.  I loved her!  At about 9:00, they brought the monitor into the room and hooked me up for about 15 minutes.  I did not like having to be back in the bed for those 15 minutes.  The nurse took my information to the doctor, who said that he would like to check me at about 10:30.  I was currently in the Labor/Recovery room.  When I was at about 5cm, they could move me into the delivery room, and that's where all the pain relief was!  I got up and started walking again.

The contractions were getting much worse.  I asked my nurse if they were really going to get much worse than this.  She assured me that once I dilated further, they would be even worse.  At about 10:00, she came in during a particularly bad contraction.  A few minutes later, she came in during the worst one yet- the first one that had me doubled over and in tears.  She quickly left and came right back with a wheelchair.  She told me that she was going to have the doctor go ahead and check me right now.  So- we went into the "Checking room".  I don't know what it's really called... so that is now it's name!  I hate this room.  Fortunately, the doctor on call was my doctor!  That made me feel a little relief.  Unfortunately, those few minutes were more painful than I could have imagined!  The doctor quickly determined that I was dilated to 8cm.  He broke my water and they wheeled me into the delivery room.  Steve and my nurse were by my side.  I asked if I could have an epidural, and I was told that it was too late- the baby would be here in about an hour.

So- little baby was born at 11:37am.  He is perfect.  I was not prepared to deliver without any pain relief, but it's amazing what you can do in the moment!  I spent a few minutes pushing, and it took 2 big pushes to get him out.  (one for his head and one for everything else!)  The moment he was put in my arms was a moment I will never forget.  He was mine.  And he was alive.  And he made it!  He was so incredibly healthy.  The nurses were amazed with how huge he was!  (As a side note- he was not huge.  He was 8 lbs, 20 inches.  He was exactly in the 50th percentile.  As average as can be.  But apparently they are used to very tiny babies here.)

After a few minutes of snuggling, he was taken off to be weighed, cleaned up a bit, measured, etc.  Steve went with him, and the doctor worked to get me taken care of.  Unfortunately, I had a large tear that had to be sewn up.  It took nearly an hour and a half.  Remember how I didn't have an epidural.  Yeah.  Birthing the baby was so much easier than getting sewn up.  Watching the nurses' faces as they watched the doctor working was very disconcerting.  My nurse kept whispering to me- "It's bad.  Very bad."  Steve and baby came back into the room.  They asked if I wanted to hold the baby.  I had to say no.  I was in so much pain that I was scared of what I may do to the baby on accident.  Finally, the doctor finished up and I was prepared to move back into my recovery room.  My dad snapped this picture of me as we were wheeled back in.  I think it's one of my favorite pictures of that day.  I love that I look so happy (and maybe a bit delerious!).  The pain was awful, but it was absolutely worth it.  I love my little man SO much and I am so grateful to be his mommy.

So world- here is baby. Henry Verdell Corry. Born March 11, 2015 at 11:37 am in Qatar. 8 lbs, 20 in.  I love him.

Kayaking in the Gulf

The staff at our school was given the amazing opportunity to go kayaking with Entalek Ecoadventures a few weeks after we arrived here.  We drove about an hour north of Doha to the city of Al Khor.  From there, we were able to kayak out and around the mangrove forest.  It was really neat to see some of the natural beauty of Qatar and to learn more about the importance of the mangroves in Qatar.  

After paddling around the mangroves, we pulled our boats up on a sandy beach and decided to float around in the gulf for a while.  The water was beautifully warm, and it wasn't nearly as smelly as the Great Salt Lake, so it was much more fun to float there!  We watched the sun go down, listened to the call of prayer from a few surrounding mosques, and then made the drive back to Doha.  

My coworker took these pictures and shared them with us.  Our tour guide from Entalek took some great pictures as well, but I keep forgetting to contact him to get copies.  I'll update this post if I get them.  

Our First Visitor!

Near the end of September, we had our first visitor to Doha!  My cousin Adam was able to schedule his layover in Doha and we spent all day Saturday with him.  It was really fun to see a friendly face and be able to take some time to show off our new home.  Here are a couple of the fun activities you can look forward to when you come visit! :)  

1- The Corniche

After showing off our school, neighborhood, church, etc, we took Adam downtown to see some of the big buildings and to venture into the Persian Gulf.

 2- The Museum of Islamic Art

The outside of the building is designed to resemble a woman in the traditional niqab with the eye slits being at the top.  It's downtown and sitting on the water.  And it looks stunning when it's lit up at night!

There are tons of really neat exhibits inside the museum itself as well.  We stayed several hours and had to skip through some of the exhibits due to time.

The inside architecture of the building is super impressive as well.  Can you spot Steve? 

And the view from the cafe on the main floor was pretty sweet.

3- The Souq Waqif

We stopped by the souq (traditional marketplace area) in the evening.  After a delightful dinner at a Lebanese restaurant, we explored a few of the shops.  The atmosphere was so fun!  Qatar is definitely a night culture, and it was good to be out and about.  

So... the next time you're looking for an awesome vacation place, look no further than Doha!  We're already looking forward to our next visitors, and we've found many more exciting places to show off to our next guests.  :)

And... the random picture to end the post- 

Little House on the Prairie with Arabic subtitles.  

Just today

Prepare yourself for a crazy amount of blog posts.  I can't promise you that they're coming... but they are in the works.  And they will be in no particular order.  Just to make things even more crazy. :)  But for today- I am just going to tell you about today.

Today is Friday.  That means that it is the Sabbath here in our part of the world.  On a typical Friday morning, we wake up about an hour later than usual and head to church.  Our congregation meets at 9:00 in a villa that is surrounded by embassies from all over the world and very near downtown.  We hold services from 9-12.  I then usually stay for choir practice, and Steve stays to help with the finances, and we head home around 1.  Then we relax and spend the afternoon and evening at home.  

Today was not a typical Friday.  And it was kind of neat!  Right before we went to bed last night, (which may have been at 8:30...) I decided to check my email.  There was an email there from the leaders of our congregation, telling us that services in our building were cancelled the following morning due to construction.  Now... we were not entirely surprised.  We were at the church on Tuesday night, and this is what it looked like.

Upstairs meeting area  (Sacrament meeting overflow)

Front of the chapel

Back of the chapel

The construction crew was hard at work, but there was still a lot to be done... and 2.5 days to do it.  So, we made alternate plans for church.  Members were given permission to administer the sacrament in their homes in small groups if they wanted.  We were invited over to a nearby neighbor's house to have our own mini sacrament meeting with their family and another couple from the ward.  It was a great experience.  We used flat bread that was more similar to what Christ would have used in his time, and it was kind of neat to have a service that was so entirely focused on the sacrament.  

Hopefully the interior work on our building will be complete by next week and we can see the primary program that the kiddos have been working so hard on!  By Christmas the construction crew is also hoping to have our new building finished.  They are adding on a building behind our existing villa.  The new building will become the new chapel- and we should all be able to fit in one room!  It will be awesome.  We currently overflow into 2 spaces within the building for our sacrament meeting service.

We had a wonderful morning celebrating the Sabbath with friends, and a wonderful evening celebrating birthdays with friends.  Although, it's kind of hard to feel like the holidays are coming up when you go to an outdoor luau themed barbecue in mid-November... :)

I will leave you with this picture that was taken at our last ultrasound-almost 3 weeks ago.  I was 21 weeks at the time.  I think our little guy has got a pretty cute little smile. :)

One Month In

One month.  We have been in Doha for a whole month!  The transition has had its ups and downs, but we are SO grateful to the staff at Awsaj and everything they've done to help us get settled here in our new home.  So- Here is a brief recap of our first month abroad. :) 

Week 1.  

We were picked up from our homes and taken to the school every morning.  It felt early because we were still recovering from jet-lag, but having somewhere to be turned out to be very beneficial.  In the first few days, we were taken to the mall to do basic shopping at a wal-mart type store and get cell phones, we got our laptops, we opened bank accounts, and the amazing Mohammed started the mammoth task of helping us get our drivers licenses.  We got our eye exam, and took the written portion of the driving test. We were SO blessed to have members of the administration here to help cart us around the city to all the places we needed to go, and to have the amazing HR staff who worked so hard to get us here, and then to instantly begin processing the paperwork for our RPs.  (Residency Permits)  We were also incredibly blessed to have breakfast and lunch provided.  And the lunch was amazing!  By the time we got home, all we wanted for dinner was cold cereal.  And that turned out well for us, because grocery shopping has been very challenging!

Week 2

The second week in Doha we began to start thinking about school stuff.  We got assigned our classrooms, started some technology training, and I started some trainings on the direct instruction programs that are used in this school.  

In the middle of all of our school trainings, we also had our medical test and our driving test.  The medical test consisted of all of the exact same tests we had to complete in the US prior to coming to Qatar.  Go figure.  We had to be screened for TB, HIV, and Hepatitis.  Like almost everything the government does here, the men and women were separated.  We took 2 buses over to the medical clinic.  The men were done and back on the bus in 45 minutes.  The women waited for 45 minutes before they even began calling numbers, and then we ran into some more difficulties.  The women finished about 3 hours later.  It's a good thing the buses had air conditioning!  The driving test was an adventure in and of itself!  Again, men and women were separated.  I went with the women early one morning.  We were picked up at 4:30am so that we could be at the driving school by 5am.  We were ushered into the waiting room where we proceeded to wait until 8am.  Then they started calling women out to the cars to take the driving test.  I was in one of the first cars called.  There was another teacher from my school in the car, as well as the middle school principal's wife.  We left the school and drove a few blocks away to an area with a short straight road, a roundabout at each end, and one roundabout in the middle.  Let me stop here and talk about roundabouts.  They are crazy.  The first day we were here I was sure I was going to die.  3 lanes, cars coming in and out, lots of honking, craziness.  Now that I understand the rules, it makes more sense.  But the first few days of watching cars just hop in and out right in front of other cars was crazy stressful.  Anyway- back to the test.  The road wasn't very busy, but there were lots of construction trucks around.  Our test was just to drive up and down the street 1-2 times and flip around at the roundabouts on the end.  About 1 minute of driving... if that.  I was the last driver.  After I completed the roundabout course, the policewoman began to direct me back to the school.  Okay.  I'm including this weird little diagram to help you truly envision what this crazy policewoman asked me to do next.  

We're driving along that nice straight road on the top going in the direction of the arrow.  We need to go right to get back to the school.  So, she tells me to go right.  However, where the red star is- where you should go- the road was closed.  So I kept driving about 20 feet, When I hit the blue star, traffic from the road I wanted to be on started merging into my lane.  The policeman had me stop, and told me to do a u turn right there.  Into oncoming traffic.  With taxis and buses flying around the corner.  I hesitated... Do you know how illegal and unsafe that is!!  She became very frustrated with me, demanding that I make the turn.  I waited for an extra large bus to pass, and we darted into oncoming traffic.  It was one of the more terrifying moments of my life!  But guess what- we made it unscathed!  I then noticed the speed limit sign (50km) and began driving along the road back to the school.  The officer kept telling me "speed! speed!"  I went a little faster, and then asked her what the speed limit on the road was.  She replied, "I don't know.  Speed!!"  So I ended up cruising down to the driving school at over 100km per hour.  Yeah.  I passed my driving test and left the school at 11:00 with my temporary license in hand!  :)  

Week 3

The rest of the staff showed up and we started working more intensely on getting ready for school to start.

Week 4

First week of school.  More on that later.

I have so many other fun adventures to post in here, as well as stories about our awesome new ward, but they will have to wait until the next blog post.  I'll leave you with a very random picture of Steve walking across the bridge that leads from our housing compound to the clubhouse and grocery store across the street.  I cannot even convey how hot it felt when this picture was taken.  The humidity has gotten better since we first got here, but the first few weeks were miserable!  I'll be back with more soon.  :)

The Big Move

Okay!  We've been in Doha for nearly 2 weeks now.  And I'm finally ready to get this blog rolling.

  First, an important announcement.  We have decided to make our blog private.  But we want all of you to still be able to read it!  So please give me your email address asap.  You can post it in the comments, send it to me on facebook, or email it to me at lindzchica@gmail.com.  However you want, just please get it to me!  

Back to the move.  We left Utah on August 15th.  We packed all of our belongings that would be traveling with us into 4 checked bags and 2 carry-ons.  

I feel like I should add a quick disclaimer here- I am by no means an awesome photographer.  But I will be posting lots of pictures of our adventures.  I apologize in advance. :)

The flight was awesome.  We had an extra leg room seat on our flight from Salt Lake to Chicago.  Our second flight was on Qatar Airways.  They rock.  We were fed 2 wonderful meals, (wonderful by airline food standards...) they came around at one point with cute little individual haagen-daz chocolate ice cream, they had a wonderful selection of movies, and just the best all around service I've ever experienced.  The 13 hour flight didn't feel nearly that long.  

After nearly 24 hours of total travel time, we landed in Doha on Saturday at 6pm.  We waited for our passport and visa to be checked, picked up our luggage, and met up with several other families who will also be working at Awsaj.  (I will share more details in later blogs, but the Awsaj staff has been SO helpful in our transition to life in Doha.)  Here we are waiting in the immigration line...exhausted...

The administrative staff was waiting for us, and they helped us get our luggage loaded onto buses, and we took off for our new home.  We are living in a community called Education City.  I will share more pictures of our house next time, but here's a shot of the front.

Yeah.  It's a duplex villa.  We love it.  

Next time:  Week 1 highlights!  

Remember- PLEASE send me your email address so that you can still see the blog when it goes private. That will be happening sometime in the next few days, probably before the next post.  We love you all!!

Here we come!

With our big move approaching, I am more determined to keep this blog updated.  We are moving to Qatar in August!

While we are in Qatar, we plan to do LOTS of traveling all over the world.  This will hopefully be good enough motivation to keep my blog updated, so I can always remember our experience across the world. :)  Currently, we are working on all the paperwork/legal stuff to get ourselves over there.  We are excited for this new chapter in our lives!