I wanted to take a little bit of time with this first blog to share our natural journey and how we got to where we are now.
Like it says in our "about" section of the website, neither my husband nor I come from a crunchy background. In fact, he was about as far from that title as you can imagine. Even years into our marriage, he was still all about the hot pockets and Pepsi.
And I think about the first few years of our marriage when my husband was an E-1 (Airman) in the Air Force, we thought going out for dinner was a trip to McDonald's. We are still both a work in progress, but WOW have we come a long way! I may have nudged him a little. LOL
The Turning Point
About 6 and a half years into our marriage, we decided it was time to start thinking about starting a family! We spent years trying to NOT get pregnant, so we assumed as soon as we were ready, BAM, it would happen.
Well...turns out that isn't always the case. And over the years I have actually been shocked to find out how common fertility issues actually are! After some testing, we discovered that I dealt with PCOS as well as Endometriosis.
I am sure later I could do a WHOLE blog just about just those issues, but for this one, I will try to keep it brief. My doctor told me that my PCOS was keeping me from ovulating. I was never really given causes for either issue and in hindsight, I was just not totally OK with that answer! But like I said, that is a whole blog unto itself. So I had surgery for my Endometriosis while my husband was deployed in Iraq, and we had decided the best course of treatment was to start with fertility meds to induce ovulation. Again, this was my pre-natural/crunchy-self making decisions. We planned this perfectly for when my husband would be arriving home from a 7-month deployment.
We did the follow-up blood work and were told that my levels were too low and that I probably hadn't ovulated.
We could up the medication and try again next month. But nope, BAM, already pregnant with our little miracle baby! Funny side note: for those who don't know, you start counting the weeks of pregnancy (40 weeks) from the first day of your last period. That was actually 2 weeks before my husband was even back in the country. HAHA So when people would as how far along I was, they would think........hmmmmm........hasn't your husband only been back for x amount of weeks? It was pretty funny. haha.
Becoming a parent, especially for moms as we are growing this child inside of us, something changes.
For me, I transformed in a HUGE way! As we prepared for this perfect little person to be born, I started to think about how I could do everything perfectly for her. (Yeah, right) YES, I had first-time mom syndrome, but it turned out to be an amazing thing for me.
It helped push us into a healthier lifestyle. I started to think about all of the foods that we were eating, all of the cleaning products we had, and all of the chemicals we were using in our home. It ALL had to be changed. I had no idea there was this whole other way of life I was about to collide with.
Our Natural Journey Begins
When our daughter was a few months old, I discovered essential oils! It all happened because a friend of mine was posting on Facebook about these amazing oils that she was using and all of the cool things happening with her kiddos.
She was posting about being able to calm her kiddos and help everyone get more sleep...both things that I desperately needed as a new mom! More sleep? Yes, please! So I messaged her and asked her what these "magic oils" were that she was using.
I had no clue what the heck an essential oil even was. She got me some education, and when I started to hear about all of the potential uses for these things, I knew we needed some in our home.
Do Essential Oils Really Work?
I had just come out of the medical field, so I also had a fair amount of skepticism.
How could all of these amazing benefits come from just a few drops of oil? Was this too good to be true? All of this ran through my head.
But also with this tiny baby in my arms, I knew I wanted to care for her in the best and most natural way. I was willing to give it a shot. Now, my husband must have thought I was crazy, but he was always so supportive of my hair-brained ideas. (I will write a blog later about how he finally jumped into oils) When those oils got into our home, they opened up a whole new world for us. It's funny that we first got into the oils to help give our daughter the best start and care possible, but they ended up changing our lives and health even more. I can't imagine our lives without them now. We truly are BLESSED!
THEY REALLY DO WORK! And if you'd like to learn more about them, check out the essential oil page where I share more about them and the amazing stories from other women and mamas like you!