Hello, I’m Jessica, Contributing Writer for Lansing Mom!
I was born and raised in Lansing, and, minus the two-ish-year stint I moved to Novi and then Fowlerville, have lived here my whole life. I attended Waverly Community Schools and graduated from CMU (East Lansing) with a degree in teaching. After four years of teaching, I graduated from MSU with a masters degree and then moved the future-hubby and myself to Novi to open a new school and serve as an assistant principal. We got engaged soon after and were married in 2015. Living in Novi was a lot of fun, but we really missed our family and friends, so we decided to build a house in Fowlerville as a middle ground for my job in Livonia and his in Okemos.
Embracing Change
A few months after our wedding, we suffered our first miscarriage which began the longest and hardest journey we would encounter. I had a lot of fertility appointments, was working 50 plus hours a week, and needed a change. My first day of winter break, I applied to a local insurance company and by February 2020, I was a commercial underwriter. It was a terrifying decision, but I knew it would allow me the time to focus on growing my family. Once my job was in Lansing, it made no sense for us to live in Fowlerville, so after eight short months, we sold our house and moved back to our home town. Now we could focus on babies.
Yearning to be a Mama
The journey to motherhood proved to be longer than I had hoped. We ended up with another miscarriage one and a half years after the first and it seemed like being a mom would never happen for me. Then, on the two-year anniversary of our first miscarriage, a girl I went to high school with notified me of her younger cousin who had a six-month-old and was pregnant. She knew she wanted to give the baby to a loving home and the first person her cousin thought of was us. I blogged about our fertility journey and always debated if it was too personal, but had I chosen not to, this never would have happened. Fast forward to June 2018, and we were blessed with our missing piece – the son we were always supposed to have. I’ll never forget the minute he came into the world and we locked eyes. He stopped crying and just stared at me as I held his tiny finger – from that moment on, he’s been my world.
After his first incredible year, we decided to play with fate and give him a sibling. This time around, we opted for IVF using donor embryos. It was important to us that his sibling share a similar birth story and notion that you don’t need the same DNA to be family.
We were fortunate that the first IVF transfer took resulting in a successful pregnancy. I always assumed I would feel confident being pregnant once we had the first heartbeat but was wrong. The feelings from prior losses took a hold and I was terrified of losing our tiny human the entire pregnancy. Finally, after 9 months of fearing the worse, our second miracle was born. To this day, saying I have 2 kids feel surreal and that fact will never be lost on me.
Life and Passions
After our family was complete, it was important to me to give back. Infertility and loss is unbearable and isolating. I wanted to do everything I could to help others, so in 2022 I founded The One Wish Foundation. Our foundation provides grants for those seeking fertility treatments or adoption. We also provide support groups through monthly meet-ups and a private community group on social media. To help raise awareness and help others know they aren’t alone, I published my first book, Waiting for You: My Story of Infertility, Loss, and Survival, detailing my journey to motherhood. All proceeds of that book go to the foundation grant funds.
My life seems crazy busy with being a full-time working mom and business owner on the side, but I love every aspect of it. My husband and I have been married for almost 8 years and together for almost 18. We make sure to do weekly date nights to the movies and love family outings to the many local activities Lansing has to offer. We are very close with our families and try to plan as much time together as possible. When I need my “me” time I love to read, run, and write and am so blessed for the choices I have made to allow me to be here doing what I love– which is surround myself with inspiring women and help build one another up.
