Love Hope & Happiness – Sara’s Story Part 1
Hey there friends,
How you doing today? Keep that head up, we’re half way through the week!
I’m so excited to re-introduce you to my PIC (partner in crime) of the Fertility Foods Cookbook, Mrs. Sara Haas.
Sara shared her story with us a while back here on Warrior Women Wednesday, but given that this is a ride, not a race, I’ve invited our warrior’s back to share more of their adventures on this bumpy ride here on the community.
So, please join me in welcoming Sara (from 2011) back here on Bumps to Baby!
She’ll be chiming in more these days (thank you for that wisdom my friend) and I hope you’ll join me in welcoming here back!
Love Hope & Happiness, Sara Haas
Back when I started my infertility journey, I didn’t know anyone else going through what I was going through. I felt isolated and totally alone. Knowing that wasn’t a good feeling, and certainly not one that I wanted to cultivate, I decided to channel my thoughts in a positive way. How did I do that? By starting a blog!
And boy was it the key to my sanity. It gave me a place to be sad, be happy, to share my story. It was an outlet that made the journey bearable. And it was a long journey. And I want to share that journey with you now!
So, a big thanks to Liz for letting me share my infertility story here on Bumps To Baby! I hope you’ll find pieces of it helpful, wherever you are in your journey!
April 16, 2011
I love food. I know it’s not a very original way to start a blog, but it’s completely true. I feel like I was put on this earth to celebrate, appreciate and enjoy the amazing gift of food.
I love food so much that after one semester of college studying apparel merchandising (NOT a good fit), my mom kindly suggested perhaps, a different career path. Moms are so smart; mine especially. Ironically, at the time, I not only loved food, but I was also totally in love with nutrition. So, it became very obvious that I should study and become a dietitian. That’s what I did, and it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. Organic chemistry??? Really?
After I graduated and completed my internship (a requirement necessary to sit for the RD exam), I set my sights on Chicago. There were two main reasons for this:
1) Chicago is close to Indianapolis where my family lives. I would be geographically close to family, but not too close. (Keep in mind I was 22 years old at the time)
and…
2) I had a friend here from college who needed a roommate. I feel like this is always a good reason to move somewhere.
I landed my first job as a dietitian at an area hospital. It was awful. Seriously, I was not prepared for the urban hospital setting. Plus, I had the amazing luck (insert sarcasm here) as being the dietitian for the psych floor. Horrible.
Finally, I came to my senses and with much coercion and love from my friends and family, I decided to go to culinary school. It was an amazing experience and a very eye-opening one too. Let’s just say not everyone going to culinary school is the next Rick Bayless. It was a stressful time. I went to school in the morning and then went to work right after. It was a long and grueling day, but totally worth it. I graduated and began working for place that focuses on healthy cooking and it was a nice fit.
These days I wear many hats (as I like to say). I am a chef, a dietitian and a teacher, but these days the role I want most is mom and this is where the story continues…
About two years ago my husband and I decided we wanted to start a little brood. Knowing that we were both super healthy (I think my biggest health catastrophe was a bout of chicken pocks when I was about 6 or 7 years old), we figured that it should happen pretty quickly. No one I knew had any trouble popping out kids…why would I? Oh, but I did. After a year of no luck, we finally turned to some specialists. My first doctor was not exactly helpful and the whole experience was awful. I felt like I wasn’t getting any answers or making any progress. Instead of finding out the cause, they wanted talk about medication, IUI and IVF. Whoah!!!
Needless to say, I didn’t stick with him for too long. I took about a year off of Western medicine after that. I decided to go the route of acupuncture, herbs and yoga. This did amazing things for me and still does. I would certainly recommend giving Eastern Medicine a try. It isn’t as evasive and has a pretty good track record. Although this didn’t result in a baby for us, it gave me a new perspective and I decided to get a second opinion. ALWAYS GET A SECOND OPINION! (FYI- I can’t stand when people bold type stuff, but this is so important.) Never trust one person’s opinion when it comes to your health. Do yourself a favor and get another set of eyes on your problem.
I love my current doctor. The first time we met we talked for one solid hour about what we were going to do. I have never in my life gotten that much attention from a doctor, it was amazing. So, here I am today, still learning and still on my journey of starting a family.
Thanks so much Sara for sharing this with us!