I know I've been quiet on the blog for a while now and part of it had to do with wrestling with myself about saying something or not saying it. I've decided to talk about it because it is an important topic to me to discuss and because you guys are kinda my therapist. I throw out my ideas and troubles into the ether and get back some support and advice. If you don't want to read the graphic details here's the disclaimer: The following post is detailed and could be construed as graphic, I'm letting it all hang out. So here it goes...
I was pregnant! But not really. On July 22nd I had my first embryo transfer. I've been struggling with infertility for four years now and it has come down to IVF. Things were looking good! My day 10 HCG was elevated and the second one drawn 3 days later was more than doubled! Everything was looking like it was going swimmingly. I had an appointment on Monday, August 18th, to see the heartbeat. Now remember, I'm only 6 weeks and 6 days pregnant in baby-doctor-math, so the "heartbeat" the doctor was looking for was what she called "a tiny flickering the size of a grain of rice." I was pretty excited. I'd been wandering the baby aisle at Target, adding items to my private Amazon wishlist, starting a hidden Pinterest board, but overall trying to live with a don't-move-too-fast idea about it. I'm well aware that not saying anything until week 12 is almost a cardinal rule, but when you work at the laboratory where they did the HCG how can you not say anything? Everyone at work was excited and supportive and it can't help but make you feel the same way. So back to the ultrasound. The doctor looked, and looked a little bit more, but couldn't find any heartbeat or yolk sac. She said it looked like it was an anembryonic pregnancy. Meaning the placenta was there and growing, but there wasn't any baby. Since the placenta makes the HCG, it would look like I was pregnant. I was more than a little devastated. The doctor said that she'd schedule another ultrasound for the next Monday, since in a week's time the baby can grow quite a bit. It had been a "pokey" embryo from the start. Normally they freeze only Day 6 embryos, but this one had been a Day 7. It was a good quality and since my only other good embryo had been frozen together with a less quality one, I had decided to use the single. That's a whole 'nother story. My embryos. I've only got the two left (frozen together) out of a pool that started at 12. Twelve eggs were harvested, 9 were mature enough, 7 were fertilized and only 3 made it to a blastocyst. Two were "5A" and the lesser one a "2B". I was hoping that I'd get to have two children, one from this embryo and another from the double frozen sample. But it looks as if that's not to be. At the second ultrasound there was definitely nothing but a gestational sac. The doctor looked and looked, but nothing. It's not my fault. It's not my uterus' fault. It's just the fact that that embryo was never going to have the ability to grow into a baby. Then we talked about options. I had three. I could have a D and C, which would remove the gestational sac and result in some bleeding and cramping (but be immediate and the least traumatic); I could take some pills (ahem, vaginally) which would induce labor-like-cramping within a few hours to days and I'd pass the gestational sac and then have bleeding and cramping (which could get REALLY intense and if the sac didn't totally pass I'd still need a D and C): or I could just wait for my body to miscarry it naturally (and could take weeks and again the D and C if it didn't all pass). I had done some research and had already decided to do the D and C. They had an opening the next day, but that meant driving home and then back over to Seattle again the very next day. I took it, looked into options closer to home, but not having any I kept the appointment. After a while I started getting nervous that it would be painful. They usually do some sort of sedation, but the office said that they do the procedure there and only use some medication to "calm me down." So I did the worst thing possible, I Googled. And it freaked me out. They talked about intense pain and syndromes that can leave you completely infertile. I turned into a real water-works-basket-case over it. So then I wanted to back-out and take the pill option. But calling back to the doctor took three hours. Finally they got ahold of my doctor and she talked to me straight. Really the woman deserves an award for the most amazing doctor in healthcare. She told me exactly what I would expect with each option, how they did the D and C's there and that the medicine they give me is stronger than Vicodin and that they'd be completely informed about my septated uterus and be doing it guided by ultrasound to not hurt anything, and totally called me out by asking what I'd read on the internet. She didn't push any one option but did tell me what she would be worried about if I did this or that. And ultimately she got me back to deciding on the D and C. Mom and I drove back over the next day and I was still a bucket of nerves and very teary. All of the doctors that performed it were awesome and understanding and let me cry about it. I'll admit it wasn't pleasant but I am glad I decided to do that and not anything that took time or increased the trauma. So now I'm back at square one...again.
I gonna admit that it's been hard for four years watching other people get pregnant with what seems like simplicity. But that can't really be true. I think everyone goes through some difficulty getting pregnant, it's just that it's not shared on social media. The miscarriages are handled privately and quietly, but that also skews the perception that every pregnancy just works out well. And I understand that many people don't want to go through it publicly. But I'm hear to say that getting pregnant is HARD! I know there will be certain ones of you out there saying, "Well, Carrie, it would be easier if you had a partner." But I'm fairly certain that the infertility problems I've experienced would have been just as likely to happen. My ovulations are long, my eggs seem to have problems, it looks like I probably don't even release an egg every cycle, I have a septated uterus; these are all things that would not have been solved by having a husband. And my problems aren't even the tip of the iceberg with what can go wrong with your fertility. There are incompetent cervixes, horseshoe shaped uterus', endometriosis, the list goes on and on! After a while you look around you and see all these children and wonder at how it could be possible. How could it be that every child on the earth came to be when there seem to be insurmountable obstacles to overcome to achieve that existence? It's a kitchy saying, but a true one, that every child is a miracle. So hug your child today if you have one (or two, or ten) because they are precious and rare. And I'm gonna keep trying until I find my miracle.
