The former 'Bachelor' star opened up about her pregnancy journey on her blog.
Lauren Bushnell Lane is sharing her pregnancy journey with fans, including the "hard" parts where she wasn't sure she'd be able to conceive. The former Bachelor star -- who announced she was expecting her first child with husband Chris Lane in December -- revealed in a blog post on New Year's Day that she "prayed every day for months" to get pregnant.
Lauren and Chris married in October 2019, and decided to enjoy a few months of marriage together before she went off birth control in March 2020. "My husband is 36 and I’m 30 so I wasn’t necessarily feeling rushed, but it was definitely something that both of us wanted and felt very ready for," she explained.
"Most of my friends who have children seemed to get pregnant the day they stopped taking the pill and without much thought. I spent so much of my life thinking that was the way getting pregnant worked but also simultaneously had this fear that it wouldn’t work that way for me.. does this make any sense? Anxiety is weird haha," Lauren wrote. "After four to five months of trying, worry started to enter my mind, not quite understanding why I wasn’t pregnant. I couldn’t help but compare my situation with those of my friends who it happened very easily for, a lot of the time unplanned. Mentally, this was a really hard part of the journey."
"I’m not sure if other people have experienced this, but as a woman, I assumed there was something wrong with me," she shared. "Chris would see how disappointed and worried I would get and I could tell he felt really bad. And as hard as trying to conceive is on the woman, I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the impact it has on husbands as well. I’m so thankful for Chris. He is such an eternal optimist and I admire his faith so much -- he truly was my rock through the emotional rollercoaster of it all."
In July, Lauren began using ovulation strips and at-home progesterone tests. A few months later, in September, she found out she was pregnant.
"I was shocked but still didn’t want to get my hopes up," she recalled. "After so many let downs, negative tests, and knowing my mom had miscarriages between all 4 children, I couldn’t help but be cautious. I hate that my anxiety robbed the joy of that first positive test, but as time went on, and especially after my first doctor appointment, I was finally able to let go of my anxiety. My joy has only gotten deeper as it becomes more real and as I get further along in the pregnancy I feel more comfortable fully allowing myself to celebrate and connect with this baby boy."
While she's celebrating her pregnancy, Lauren wrote that her journey has also opened her eyes to those experiencing infertility and pregnancy loss.
"It’s an exhausting and emotional journey and a lot of those experiences I’ll never fully understand. Thank you to every single one of you who has bravely shared your story with me on Instagram. Pregnancy truly is a miracle and I’ll never take that for granted," she said. "We prayed every day for months and obviously our prayer was answered, but I know there are a lot of unanswered prayers out there. So many women who are quietly struggling and I’m thinking about every single one of you. I pray for hope and peace for everyone reading this struggling. Miracles happen every single day 💙."
See more on Lauren and Chris in the video below.
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