11 Weeks Expecting + How My World Turned Upside Down

For 11 weeks, I’ve been hiding my pregnancy. If you follow me on IG, you may remember the story of the boys and I going to the OB-gyn to remove my IUD last April. I asked the kids in the IG video why we were at the doctors and Leo (adorably!) noted, "To have a little lady!”

I then spent April through August allowing my body to regulate. It was so thrown off from 5 years of having the local hormones of Mirena flowing through my body that I would spot irregularly, bleed for days, and didn’t re-regulate my period for some time.

In August, on our trip to Israel, Adi and I read the book, The Shettles Method and focused on what life would look like with three of our own.

The Shettles method was recommended by our best friends, Katie and Duncan, who had their little boy using this system. The basic idea is that boy producing sperm is much faster and dies quicker, while girl producing sperm is slower and lasts longer. Therefore, if you want to have a girl, you have sex several days before ovulation and stop having sex two days before.

I really wanted to “spin” to have a little girl. But to be honest, spending thousands of dollars on a less than 100% plan that meant pumping my body with hormones, blood tests, feeling like a crazy person until we got pregnant and THEN still end up with no guarantee of the gender we wanted didn’t sound like my cup of tea. So we tried this.

From August to September, Adi and I weren’t IN IT yet. We were both afraid and getting far too deep in our heads. Mostly, we have been in a really awesome place the past two years, doing pretty much anything we wanted to do when we wanted to do it. We reached a very cool balance of parenting and having an independent life without kids. We have had an amazing flow with babysitters we trusted and the kids are both in school all day (Leo is 5 in tK and Kai is 7 in 1st grade). We take stay-cations at hotels with friends when we feel like it. We head to Ojai or Joshua Tree for an adventure on a whim. We go to concerts, date nights, late dinners or out for drinks whenever we damn well please. If we are tired on a Saturday morning from staying up late the night before, we simply tell the kids to make themselves breakfast and play in the playroom until we wake up. Kai proceeds to make them both gluten-free waffles with a side of berries and they go upstairs and play with their toys and use their imaginations until we wake.

PRETTY DREAMY, HUH? So why fuck it all up?

My relationship with my mother has gone through years of healing. Mostly on my own and including cutting energetic cords, therapy and resolution within my own heart+soul for our relationship. I prayed to have boys because for so long my relationship with my mom was tumultuous at best, and I feared replicating that relationship with my own daughter.

A baby's body is literally made of her mother's juices. If mama’s brain habitually produces stress hormones and she keeps herself in fear+anxiety based thoughts then that is the chemistry the fetus is growing in.

This is why it is so essential to work out all the psychic confusion as early as possible in the process.

If this work is done before conception, it allows the future parents to attract a more evolved soul to partner up with them than if they have ignored the work.

Get to work on yourself now. Whether it's for you or your calm, peaceful, alert+happy baby! You'll forever be thankful.

Now that I’ve healed this maternal tie, I am ready for the next, most challenging journey of my life: raising a daughter.

There’s a part to me that feels incomplete. I dream of this baby girl. I’ve held her in my arms and I’ve seen her as a teenager. I see her connecting with Kai and Leo. I imagine adventures together as a family of five.

Once Adi and I got it together and realized that we can create anything we want in this life, that we already have, and we will only continue this dream…we were ready. The end of September, maybe with the change of seasons, we were finally aligned.

I lead my first IGNTD women retreat with Caley Alyssa in Vail, CO and during that time I called myself out on not fully showing up to this decision. That out of fear, out of wanting things to stay in easy flow, I was denying myself one of the most rewarding pleasures in all of life: raising a little girl.

I spoke my intentions into reality. I created a dream scenario, moving meditation that entailed waking up in my bedroom to the sound of our baby girl's coo from the basket beside the bed and envisioned her with me every step of the day.

That weekend, I believe the baby implanted. That weekend, I believe I manifested, or womb-ifested this dream into a reality.

It’s amazing what happens when you really and truly step into your life, face your fears, process it ALL and show up 100%.

The following week my body already felt different. The skin around my belly felt softer and it felt almost like a different consistency. It felt weird to lay on my stomach (the way I work on my laptop most days).

One week later I bought a 3 pack of 5-day early pregnancy tests. I took a pregnancy test 5 days out from my first missed period and it was negative. I didn’t let it upset me because I knew it was wrong. The next day, I went to NYC for a quickie work trip to promote our Yoga Girls reality show and continued to feel I was holding onto a secret that only my body and I knew. Before a test could even detect. Before it even showed up in my urine. CRAZY! The evening I flew home from NYC (3 days out from the first day of my missed period) and chugged water in my Uber at midnight, ran upstairs to my bathroom and took the test. The entire house was sleeping, all three boys snoring away.

The second line appeared right away!!!! I had to blink my eyes a few times and felt this incredible surge of energy rush through my body. It was 1am on October 11th, Adi and mine’s anniversary. I woke Adi up and he was super disoriented as I was crying happy tears and told him in the dark. He kissed me, said how happy he was and we lie in the bed for hours restlessly thinking about the rest of our lives with another being in it.

That was 6 weeks ago.

The way they calculate pregnancy is quite odd, since they don’t know the exact day of conception they calculate your due date based on the date of your last period. So, I’m 11 weeks pregnant now, but in fact my body has really only been pregnant for 6 weeks. Not sure if that makes sense.

Our little fetus has been developing beautifully, but making me incredibly sick. About a week after I found out I was pregnant the “morning sickness” hit me. It increased as the days went on. I had to cancel multiple events, incredible dinners, birthday parties, panels, so many amazing and fun things in my world because I wasn’t able to keep my food down or go anywhere without feeling disgusted by smells and needing to lie in the fetal position.

I spent a solid month napping the day away and dreaming of the next nap, since I was physically exhausted and sleeping was the only time I didn't feel extremely ill.

This time was a time of complete surrender.

A time to remember my choices, a time to reflect on my desires, to really connect to this reality that THIS IS HAPPENING. That she will turn my life upside down and that nothing is as important as her, her health and my love for her.

We couldn’t be more excited for this baby girl to join our world.

I know with my whole heart and soul that she was destined for me and I for her.

I know deep within my bones that Adi and I can handle anything thrown our way and that we will continue to be successful and full of joy in our love and life.

Thank you all for following on this journey and for your endless love+support.

I’ll keep updating along the way! Feel free to ask questions, we are all in this together and it truly takes a village. Xx

Have anything to share or questions about my conception with our newest Jaffe member? Connect with me on Twitter. Share your own conception story using #PhilosophieLove.