*Excerpt from 1/30/15*
When I pictured life with Michael, I could not have ever imagined this. I love Michael more than words could ever express and I can't imagine living this life without him. He is the most loving, most patient, most supportive husband. His love and support is unending, and in times like this, that means more than anything else.
I spoke to my gynecologist in Spring 2014. Since we'd been trying to have a baby for over a year, she didn't hesitate. She prescribed Clomid, an ovulation inducing drug. I took Clomid for 3 cycles. We became more discouraged and concerned at the start of each new cycle. When we planned our lives together, we never planned on infertility.
After those 3 months, we decided to schedule a consultation with a fertility specialist that my doctor recommended. That meeting was quite eye-opening for us. We learned that since we had been trying unsuccessfully to conceive for almost 2 years, our chances of conceiving on our own any given cycle was only 1-2%. Wow... pretty bleak.
Dr. Steward ran a few tests and scheduled a hysteroscopy to gather some baseline information. During the hysteroscopy, the doctor ran a camera up through my cervix to examine my uterus and tubes. We found out later that during the hysteroscopy, Dr. Steward removed some abnormal tissue. He described "cotton candy-like" tissue near one of my tubes. A week or two later, we met with Dr. Steward to go over the results and hear his recommendations. He said that, all-in-all, he didn't see any problems and that we fell into the category of "unexplained fertility," meaning there is no clear cause. He recommended that we start with fertility medication and intrauterine insemination, as that's been shown to increase the odds of conceiving in couples with unexplained fertility.
The first cycle was a rollercoaster ride. Once I started the medication, I had to go to the office every other day for bloodwork and ultrasound to monitor the development of my follicles. It was an adventure in itself just figuring out how to balance my many appointments with work. We also discovered it's a tricky thing to decide when to trigger ovulation since follicles don't develop at the same rate. At one point we almost canceled the first IUI because Dr. Steward was concerned about having too many mature follicles. He even encouraged us to consider the possibility of selective reduction if we conceived multiples. Of course, we never considered that, but we decided to leave that possibility in God's hands and proceed with the IUI. This, of course, after hours of worrying and tears. We went on to have the IUI and we were so hopeful it would work, especially since I had 5 mature follicles! Privately, Michael and I talked as if we were already pregnant. We had so much hope. We could hardly stand the 2 week wait. When we got our negative pregnancy result, we were absolutely devastated! We drowned our sorrow in margaritas and planned to try again. Thankfully I had Thanksgiving Break to recover from the disappointment.
The following cycle, we started again. This time I took a combo of pills and belly shots before the IUI. By the time I was scheduled to trigger ovulation, I had 2 mature follicles. We had the IUI, and the waiting began again. This time we would get our results just before Christmas. Though we were hoping and praying for our Christmas miracle, I was convinced that we were not going to conceive that cycle. I just had a feeling. A couple weeks later, we got our negative result. It hit us hard again, but Christmas was a beautiful distraction and it gave us more time to recover.
We decided to give IUI one more chance. Besides being an emotional roller coaster ride, fertility treatment is also extremely expensive. Since IVF was something we were never comfortable with, we knew this would be our last shot. We decided to give it all we've got and do an injection-only cycle, which is a more aggressive treatment. New Years interfered a bit, so I wasn't monitored as closely this cycle, but when the time came, we know I had somewhere between 2 and 4 mature follicles. We triggered on New Year's Eve and had the last IUI on January 2. I was more optimistic this time - maybe because I knew it'd be the last one. During the wait, we celebrated our 4 year anniversary! We got a little nostalgic and decided we'd take an at-home pregnancy test (which is something we were too afraid to do in the previous 2 cycles). We decided to wait until the weekend to reduce the chances of a false result. We drove to Zachary that Friday to come in for Christine's wedding - pregnancy tests in tow. I woke up needing to go to the bathroom early Saturday morning. I took the test. POSITIVE! We were over the moon! But we were also so scared. We spent the next hour or so reading about the likelihood of a false positive. It turns out it's very unlikely. We told our parents that morning, but warned them not to get too excited yet. My blood test wasn't until Tuesday. Of course that didn't stop anyone from getting excited about the possibility! There's just something about being told no over and over again that makes it hard to believe in yes. The next morning, we retested and it was positive again! Monday morning I called my doctor's office. I told them about the positive result and they told me to come in (even though it was a day early).
After 27 months of trying to have a baby, our pregnancy was confirmed on January 19. This news came after 6 months of failed fertility treatments.
Finally, we felt like we could relax a little bit now that our pregnancy was confirmed. We called our parents and siblings. They were all so excited! It felt so good to finally have good news!
I went in for bloodwork on Thursday and my HCG had doubled to 509. We started to talk about the upcoming ultrasound and hearing the heartbeat - that would come when my HCG reached 2000. Since HCG typically doubles every 2-3 days, we hoped it would be early the next week.
I went back for bloodwork the following Tuesday, hopeful for that 2000! By the end of the school day, I had a message from Dr. Steward to call him back. My first reaction was panic. Dr. Steward was not typically the one to call with results. I left school immediately and called Michael in tears. He calmed me down and, thankfully, was on his way home too. When we got home, I asked Michael just to hold me. It felt like something big was coming. We sat on the back porch, soaking in the beautiful weather, as we waited for Dr. Steward to call us back. Finally, after about an hour, the phone rang. Dr. Steward said he didn't have good news; my HCG had dropped to 410, when we expected it to be over 2000. He said it was not a healthy pregnancy. He said my body would take over. We were going to lose the baby. Our baby, the one we've been praying for for years, our little miracle, all of our hopes, would be lost. I can't describe the heartbreak - not just for myself, but for Michael, for our families, for our future, for our hopes and our dreams...
So much pain. So many tears. So many questions and fears. So much loss. It feels like we've lost everything. We've lost hope. But, by the grace of God, we have eachother to lean on. We're just clinging to eachother... to our love.
