"Count It All Joy:" Part I

Painting by Victor Ehikhamenor

Woody Allen quotes what he believes is an old Yiddish saying, "If you want to make God laugh, tell Him about your plans." I had one plan this year--have a baby. I am pregnant, and it came with more of life happening than I anticipated. As James 1:2 says, in the Bible, I must "count it all joy."

Since 2013, I have had to reduce my sodium intake to avoid a recurrence of the pain associated with my kidney stones. I opted out of the shock wave lithotripsy treatment to resolve my issues. It would affect my plans to have a baby. I didn't want anything messing with any of my organs. With faith and limited odds of getting pregnant, I was able to seek out fertility treatments and things worked out for me.

The process of getting pregnant was the least of my concerns. Each significant step in the process fell on a loved one's birthday. More importantly, I knew before having the blood test done that I was pregnant. The evening of his birthday, my husband put up one of my favorite pieces of art by Nigerian artist Victor Ehikhamenor. It was a fertility piece. Coincidentally, my husband, sister-in-law--K--, and the artist share the same birthday. I bought the painting in 2005 and remember telling Victor that it was going to give me hope of one day becoming a mother. As joy filled in my heart at the mere thought of our lives changing forever, I had to contain myself until I took a blood test.

The very next morning, my mother-in-law's birthday, I took the official pregnancy test at my local Shady Grove Fertility center, Dr. Kipersztock and his staff were my cheering squad since we started in 2011--survived multiple surgeries, repeat blood work, constant monitoring, etc. etc. I knew that I would get a call later in the afternoon to confirm the results. Life seemed to be on the slow motion setting while at work. It was just after lunch while I was grading papers when Nurse Sarah called.

"Hi, Yolonda! It's Sarah." I could hear her smile through the phone. She beamed as my heart celebrated in advance.

"Hi! I was waiting on your call," I said.

"Your test results came back, and you are definitely pregnant!"

The crowd in my head had to be contained because I wanted my husband to be the first to know. I had four hours to hold in the news. I just hoped he would be home and things would go according to plan. Again, God laughed. My husband was not home, so I had to track him down before heading to a book fair to meet my cousins, T and T, who I was anxious to tell.


"Where are you," I asked my husband while masking my excitement. I'm a bad liar, so I had to try really hard.

"Headed to Home Depot," he said.

I stopped in the house to speak to my father-in-law and then proceeded to do something I was often told NOT to do--I chased my man. Time was not on my side. I called my husband back to monitor his movements. I was starting to sound a little suspect when he revealed he was heading to a new location.

Anyone who has ever been in a car with me know that I received my license from Turtle Inc, LLC. On this day, I broke some laws trying to get to my husband. I could not contain the news until I got back from meeting my cousins. My law breaking proved successful as I was able to catch my husband leaving the parking lot of the store.

Beep! Beep! I honked my horn like a goose on a wild chase. He pulled over in the lot across from the store. My husband's expression was less than enthused as he didn't understand why I was the crazy stalker lady coming after him.

After greeting him with a card, I stood and waited with joyful anticipation. It was a congratulations card and revealed that he would be a father. With God on our side, we had beat the odds. We beat them pretty badly, too. With less than 1% chance of getting pregnant with one form of treatment, one fallopian tube, endometriosis, fibroids in my uterus, a bi-lateral ovarian cysectomy, a 16% chance of having any eggs retrieved when trying In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), and a 46% chance of having a live birth after three (3) cycles of IVF, we hit the jackpot on the first go.

Everything went smoothly for nearly a month. By a month, I mean a month minus two days. I barely felt any signs of pregnancy. If I had not seen the baby's heart beat on my grandmother and cousin M's birthday, I would think B.B.--a name my friend, Bronze Diva, and I co-founded for the baby--was a hoax. Sure enough, on March 18, 2015, all joy flew out the window into an abyss of darkness. I was excited to experience morning sickness until it was no longer cute and I made my first of several moments in the hosipital. Thus, the beginning of a condition that would later force all efforts of holding the salt or consuming any food or beverage to come to an halt. Enter stage left: HYPEREMESIS GRAVIDARUM. To be continued...