Author's Note: With my birthday approaching, I've been doing a lot of thinking. Thinking about life, thinking about the birth of our daughter Kayla.

With that of course comes all the thoughts about how Kayla's birth was a long time coming... over six years in fact. And for some time now I've been wanting to write about it.

I'm not sure WHY I want to write about it, just that I want to. I am guessing that before I get to the end of writing these "My Miracle Family" articles I will figure out the "why". In the meantime, I hope you enjoy reading them and learning more about the challenges that couples face when going through fertility issues.

Ten years (and some months) in the future...

On a nice sunny afternoon, a father is sitting on his porch enjoying a drink and reading a book. He is starting to doze off when his lovely ten year old daughter bounds in from playing in the yard and promptly plops down on his lap.

Daughter: "Daddy... "

Daddy: (still half dozing) "Yes honey?"

Daughter: "Where do babies come from?"

Daddy opens his eyes warily. Uh oh. It's THE question. Daddy straightens up and smiles down at his daughter.

Daddy: "Well honey, that's a good question. Let's see... well, first two people fall in love and then decide they want to start a family...."

Daughter: "Like you and mommy! Right?"

Daddy: "Yes honey, your mommy and I love each other very much. Anyhow, so two people decide they want to start a family. They first start trying the 'natural' way...."

Daughter: "What's the 'natural' way?"

Daddy: "Umm.. Never you mind that now, we can talk about that later. Moving on quickly now they then start trying other ways. In this case, with a doctor's guidance, mommy starts taking drugs to stimulate her ovaries and then daddy goes into a special room with a little cup..."

Daughter: "Little cup?"

Daddy: "...and then there's this big turkey-baster looking thing the doctor uses to put into mommy the..ermm..contents of the little cup.."

Daughter: "What's in the little cup?"

Daddy: "Never you mind that now. Okay so then the mommy and daddy start trying even more advanced methods where mommy has to take even more drugs to overstimulate her ovaries followed by mommy having surgery to extract her eggs...daddy then goes again into a special room with a little cup..."

Daughter: "Daddy, this acim now doesn't sound right.."

Daddy: "And then after that, with the mommy and daddy still are wanting to have a baby, the daddy takes a few more tests and from the results they see that a certain surgery may help the situation. So the daddy has the surgery, but they have to wait a year or so before they can try again.."