Simon and I are overwhelmed with joy, gratitude, and sheer bliss to announce the arrival of our precious Archer Bryce Shingleton. I want to write a detailed birth story for my own memories later, but wanted to put a few thoughts together first.

He was born at 11:51 am on Monday the 19th via c-section and placed immediately in my arms and I cannot begin to express the thrill we both felt when we laid eyes on that little peanut. We are in LOVE!

We’ve spent countless hours now in newborn baby la-la land, lapping up every single beautiful expression and funny face this sweet baby makes. Thursday we came home from the hospital and reunited with Jude and snuggled all together in the big bed that night to resume some normalcy of our prior routine. Jude brought out the book we’ve been reading together (The Boxcar Children) and we read a few chapters and then turned the lights out to sing the bedtime songs we always sing. Except this time we were truly all together. Our entire little family, all together. My heart was so full I swear it nearly burst.

I’m proud of what my body accomplished; we made it to 38 weeks and as a result were blessed with a shockingly different and healthier experience than we had with Jude. Simon and I are still amazed that everything has gone so smoothly; it’s also put sharply into relief just how crazy it all was with Jude’s birth and I don’t think we were even fully aware of how awry things had gone until experiencing how good things can truly go.

And again, it’s in these beautiful perfect moments I’m reminded of every tear I shed over our losses, our grief at infertility, my questioning of my faith as to why these things happen, the progesterone shots in the butt, the worry that my body would never cooperate and I’m here to say it was all worth it. My heart is whole and healed. This baby was worth the long road we traveled to get here and I would do it all over again to have him here. It was worth every My heart is full for my friends out there fighting the infertility battle; keep fighting for your family.