This story is one of hope and love. You can also create your own rainbow painted furniture. Learn the story of why I created this dresser.
The Beautiful Story Of The Rainbow Painted Furniture
At the risk of making anyone sad, I promise this is a story of hope and love. Now let’s continue. This really isn’t much of a “how to” but rather a “why did I” blog. Now with that being said I will give you a list of products and I WILL tell you I blended this piece exactly like I did my latest piece. So if you want to create your own rainbow painted dresser or furniture you will use the exact same process as below. 👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻
I am going to give you my supply list, warning: it’s long. But you will have it 🙂 You can paint your own rainbow colored dresser, whether it’s for the reasons I did, or because you just want something beautiful and happy to look at.
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Supply List
Honky Tonk Red
Florida Orange
Flamingo
Daisy
Limeade
Tree Frog Green
Cobalt Blue
Amethyst
Peony
Gold Digger
Synthetic Brushes
Misting Water Bottle
The First Pregnancy
My husband Kris and I dated for three years prior to getting married. Once we got married, we chose to try and have a child pretty soon after. Fast forward nearly a year of trying and we found ourselves sitting in the OBGYN’s office. Everyone always tells you how if you aren’t careful you will get pregnant, getting pregnant is so easy. Well it’s not. As soon we actively tried to figure out “why” we weren’t getting pregnant, we GOT PREGNANT!
Fast forward a week, I was playing in a softball game and I KNEW something was wrong. After I went to the bathroom I saw what every pregnant woman fears, blood. I left in the middle of my softball game, went home and told my husband.
We went to the ER and they said, you are having a miscarriage. Call your OB on Monday (it was a Saturday). I cried but in my heart I was also thankful that I COULD get pregnant, so I was hopeful.
The Whirlwind
Monday I called my OB and they got me in. Sure enough my HCG levels were pretty low and nothing was in my uterus. I was told let’s re-check your blood in 48 hours and go from there. One more blood test, my HCG levels were going up but didn’t double……okay weird…..
Okay another 48 hours and a third blood test. Again, levels went up but didn’t double. Meanwhile I didn’t have any other symptoms beside the constant bleeding.
Finally my OB did ANOTHER ultrasound. An ECTOPIC PREGNANCY. What?? What is that? An ectopic pregnancy is not viable, it is when the baby starts to develop in your Fallopian tube. It is very dangerous. The first thing was to “terminate the pregnancy” the OB’s words not mine. They gave me a dose of methotrexate which is actually a chemo medicine but is also used in ectopic pregnancies as a first step. If it worked the pregnancy would end and everything would essential “flush” out.
Well, it didn’t worked. So here we are almost a month after the initial bleeding, still pregnant. The week after my OB scheduled surgery. I know what you are thinking, why did they wait? Well I had zero pain. I guess no pain equals not an emergency? I would have surgery that following Wednesday.
Surgery
I was back to playing softball during this time. I knew I was going to have surgery but I was hopeful and trusted that everything would be okay.
The day of surgery everything was great, until it wasn’t.
The OB came out to my husband shaking, my tube had ruptured and I had severe internal bleeding. My husband was so angry and mad. I was hours away from dying. All because well I didn’t have pain.
Coming out of surgery I remember crying and asking the Dr to let me not go through this anymore, I had held it together but something about anesthesia is like a truth serum or something.
I survived. It sounds dramatic but it’s true. It’s be almost 9 year to the day that all of this happened.
The Aftermath
After everything was settled and a week or so had passed I went to see the OB again. She gave me the photos from my surgery and there it was, my abdominal cavities full of blood. She said you were born with “clubbed tubes” whatever the hell that meant. Said I am referring you to a Reproductive Specialist (RE) in Kansas City, an hour away and that was that. She left me with these exact words, “You will NEVER be able to have a child unless you have In-vitro fertilization”. That SMACKED me like a ton of bricks.
Never did I have a crazy period, never any issues with scar tissue or many of the other things I have seen so many of my friends deal with. I did everything I was suppose to do, I married this great guy, had a great job, owned a house, (not that I really believe any of that matters) but in my head I was racking my brain of what I did wrong.
The answer was nothing, but I didn’t see it. I am a woman and I should be able to create life for my husband and I. I was literally HALF of the woman I was a month ago in the aspect of reproductive organs. Why would my husband want to be with me? I WAS a failure
The Reproductive Specialist
The first step with any couple who is having a hard time conceiving is to test the male. A man brings ONE thing to the table, that’s it. I know it sound harsh but it’s true. A woman is a complicated machine and so many things could affect her ability to conceive or carry a baby. The male always gets tested. Sure enough Kris was fine and I think the nurse even commented on how fertile he was and how great his sample looked, he STILL talks about it, lol go figure. Men.
I had an HSG which is a procedure where they dilate your cervic and shoot dye into you. This checks for blockage or dilation both are bad. Let me tell you something, I have a really high tolerance for pain, I don’t know if it was that recent scar tissue or what but that was the WORST pain I have ever felt. I stopped breathing and tears just rolled down my face.
The Results
Thank God for specialists. When one doctor makes your whole world come crashing down, another is “hopefully” there to give you hope. Now I don’t remember the names of literally any of my doctors, not the ones who delivered my children, not the one who took my kidney, but I remember her. Dr. Sacha Krieg. She said, you CAN have a child you will just need a little help. Thank you sweet baby Jesus.
The Journey
My journey was far from over. First was the Clomid, which turned me into a raging bitch. I hated it. Didn’t work. Then came the shots in my stomach and monitoring. Didn’t work.
Every month when I should be ovulating and after I had ovulate I would drive to KC, get checked and blood drawn, nothing. That hour drive was filled with tears. Eventually I had to ask my husband not to come because he is a fixer and all I wanted to do was cry. Every month when we weren’t pregnant was like a knife in my heart. My mind was in a whirlwind, I switched jobs, just for us to get orders to move to Italy, we had to sell our house and move to another country.
Do I continue to do this? Dr. Krieg said look, you are better to move to Intrauterine Insemination (IUI). That was November. We had to pay for everything out of pocket. The military would NOT pay for our infertility treatments. Do we do this? How do you put a price on having a child?
Intrauterine Insemination
According to AmericanPregnancy.Org, Intrauterine Insemination (IUI)- is a fertility treatment that involves placing sperm inside a woman’s uterus to facilitate fertilization. The goal of IUI is to increase the number of sperm that reach the fallopian tubes and subsequently increase the chance of fertilization. We did our first round in November. Again ANOTHER month of failure. If my heart wasn’t already broken after all of this, it was ripping to shreds. We were set to leave in Feb to move to Italy. My husband and I decided lets do this ONE more time, if it doesn’t work, we move to Italy and just deal with this later.
December 16th, 2011
This date is not only my husbands birthday but the day we did our very LAST round of IUI. This is the day we conceived my daughter. Roxlyn. Finally after all the tears and emotions. FINALLY on my husband’s birthday December 16, 2011, we conceived our rainbow baby. Of course the fear comes after the joy, every cramp, every bathroom trip. The first ultrasound. Please don’t lose this baby. Fast forward to September 11th, 2012, our baby girl was born. That birth story was crazy in itself. Roxlyn ended up in the NICU. After 12 hours of un-medicated labor Roxlyn was born in the OP position. She had respiratory distress and I literally pushed her out and they took her. I saw her the next day. I finally had my rainbow baby and she was taken.
Thank god everything worked out and everything in between that and me holding her for the first time doesn’t matter anymore. So Roxlyn is my rainbow baby and wouldn’t you know she is a lover of unicorns and rainbows and pretty much a miniature version of myself.
This dresser may not mean a lot to other people but it’s mothers day 2020 and I have NEVER written out my story. I wanted to create this beautiful piece as tribute to my angel baby, my rainbow baby, and to all the women who ARE mothers whether they have been able to conceive or are still struggling.
The Surprise
Now if you know me you know I have 2 children. Roxlyn and Lane. I had zero interest in having more kids, my husband wanted another baby, heck even Rox was asking. I just couldn’t after everything from the ectopic to the birth of Roxlyn. Remember how I told you Roxlyn was conceived in December 2011? Well my sweet little surprise Lane was conceived in December 2015. My children are EXACTLY 4 years apart, one September 11th, 2012, the other September 9th, 2016. Now if these two aren’t amazing miracles then I don’t know what is.
Rainbow Painted Furniture 🌈
Here’s Roxlyn’s dresser. It encompasses everything I love about her and what she means to me. My rainbow baby.
Rainbow Baby: A rainbow baby is a baby born after a miscarriage, stillborn, or neonatal death. These rainbow babies get their name because they are like a rainbow after a storm: something beautiful after something scary and dark.
If you are still reading, thank you. If you are a mother of a rainbow baby, hug that miracle hard today. If you are still struggling, I hope you find peace and hope. To all mothers out there, Happy Mothers Day 2020.
I paint furniture not only because I love it, but it allows me to express my soul and pay homage to the things that are a part of who I am. My hope is that you do the same.
XOXOXO
