Itenarary
It is really going to happen. I just talked to the clinic. It felt a bit like talking to the travel agency.
Buserelin injections start on Friday the 9th of September. R will get an insight in what life with me will be like in 15 years as I'll go through something like menopause.
From wednesday 28 September I'll be on Gonal F. Do you feel a bit better when you start taking that?
From the 4th of October onwards I'll have bloodtests and scans.
Eggcollection is expected to take place in the week of Monday 10 October.
I feel my throat slightly tightening....
3 weeks 17 days left to get accustomed to the idea.
Blood bond - day 2
Our IVF adventures start here. On day
2 of my cycle. Sunday afternoon R and I went to the hospital to get some blood tests done. For him HIV and for me HIV and hormones. I just had a weird thought. Imagine the unthinkable happened and the bloodtests came back positive.... Well, that would definitely change the theme of the blog....
I am looking forward to the whole IVF thing now. The people I have to deal with are friendly and nice. R is very supportive and I feel pretty good myself. There is a change I'll be pregnant end of October. I feel some kind of shivers run over my back when I think about that!
This weekend I read the article in the Herald 'What price pregnancy?'. The article was suggesting that the commercial fertility businesses ease women's minds to have children late in life with the idea ART will get them pregnant if it doesn't work the natural way. Something in the tone of voice of that article that irritated me. As if women wait till they're 37+ on purpose because they honestly believe that doctors will guarantee they'll have a baby at 39.
I have never met a woman, not in the 'real' world or online, that said 'I thought having children could wait because of the new technology'. I do know women, like me, that needed a lot of time to finally find somebody they wanted kids with. Or they are still looking and thinking about freezing their eggs. I wasn't sure I'd make it in time. Now I feel blessed I have found my man,
just in time, and that technology might be advanced enough to get me pregnant. I would have needed the same help 13 years ago, when my tubes got damaged. But thankfully IVF has now much better results compared to when I was 24.
Who the f*** is your Auntie
On the internet so many girls write about their infertility it seems to be an integrated part of being infertile! I even think it's the only fun thing of
IF! I have a *theme*, so I can write a blog :-) IFBlogging comes with a whole new language and a long list of abbreviations. The medical terms like
IUI,
IVF,
HCG,
LMP,
SET,
FET but also the words that are often used and it's too much hassle to type all the letters like
PG,
TTC, HPT, OPK, RE, DPO. Not so good for SEO not to use the whole word...
Then there are abbs that are so stupid. Like
AF and
DH.
But I am not so in the mood to write why I think these words are so stupid. Because I have my period.
I am bleeding. My new cycle has started.
IVF starts here. No more trying for the normal and easy way. No, we're going the hard horrible expensive annoying and humiliating way that makes you feel bad and sick and grumpy.
Did you know how much it costs to fly a 600 kg horse 20,000 kilometers over the panet? I did that last year... Now I need a 10 cm trip for my 0.1 mm egg. A detour for my damaged fallopian tube. I'm happy to tell that it's for only half the price!
Good Omen :: Bad Omen
This morning... again..: NOTHING. Isn't that completely weird!? R told me this morning not to have that twinkle in my eye. He knows how high I can go and how deep I can fall.
No expectations please, mrs D! But he is gone to work now so I can be as expectant as I like :-) Do all the funny stuff girls do when they're in the
don't-know-yet stage, like looking at their tits in the mirror and trying to compare with what they saw just ten minutes ago....
Omen: Last night I received an invite for a bbq from an old collegue. I haven't heard from her since my last ectopic. Both first and second time pregnant (with ectopics) I went to (extremely boring) bbqs at her place just before I found out.
Good omen if this means I am pregnant.
Bad omen if it means I have another ectopic. That would mean my lovely gyn will take both my tubes out straight away. This month was their final chance to do their job properly anyway.
The lucky number in this case is
3. This could/would/should be my
3d pregnancy. I *always* get pregnant in the
3d cycle of trying. In the
3d cycle after R & I met (oops), in the
3d cycle after we were allowed trying again after the ectopic. And this cycle was the
3d after my second ectopic.
This month I haven't temped, I haven't used OPT's, so officially I don't really know what day I'm at. On Tuesday two and a half weeks ago I definitely felt my ovulation. I remember exercising my horse on a long reign and all of a sudden I felt
PANGG!! on my right side. It lasted for some minutes. It made me a bit dizzy. I thought: Good! it's a right-side-month! I can expect more from my right than from my left side. On the left my ovary and tube were all entangled in adhesions, and the whole lot was pretty damaged. At the right at least my right overy was completely normal.
I make myself a very nice coffee. If I am pregnant I'll give it up so I'll extra enjoy this one.
And... You're right. Two days late is so much nicer than two days early. I am completely uncapable of doing anything useful, but am enjoying it a lot. I have a pregnancy test upstairs. I don't want to do it just yet, not to spoil the moment. It's almost like a pack of cigarets. It's itching in my brain.
Look here for some nice pictures of
reproductive stuff under the microscope »
Two days late
I am
late. I am never
late.
... Just when I want to get my period so I can call the clinic to tell them I'm going to start my ivf cycle this month. I want to go to the lab on day 3 and get my first bloodtest done. I'm not looking forward to the whole ivf thing, I just want to get it over with. I want to be a
Newbie Barbie.
Theoretically I could be pregnant. I still have tubes although they're in bad shape. We have Welsh sperm, they are very persistant. We did it at the right time. Statistics say I've got a small chance. But shouldn't I have noticed something by now? Or do you notice ectopics much sooner? Don't expect me to do anything useful today. And don't say anything wrong. Cos' pms finally kicked in. Or has it...?
Time is healing
Wow what an intense time since I moved to NZ. Falling in love with R. Getting pregnant. R asking to marry me. Life would have been pretty amazing if these had been the main events last one and a half years. Loosing my pregnancies and finding out about my damaged fertility caused more hurt, grief and sadness I ever felt. I cannot even describe it.
What also makes describing the pain difficult is, like with most pain and hurt and grief, it has faded. Little by little the sharpness of the hurt is getting less. The wounds are starting to heal. The first ivf cycle is coming closer, so there is reason for new hope.
I feel pretty good at the moment. Acupuncture, but also herbs, vitamins and diet advice of
my natural fertility specialist give me support. My depression is gone. I don't cry anymore. I don't even have PMS anymore. How cool (and long ago!) is that! And how nice for everyone :-) Now just a bit more creativity and zest for work and I'm great.
Last weekend I saw the movie
'The Sea Inside', about a man that is paralysed for 28 years and fights for the right to die. It was an incredible movie. I've never seen a movie that touched the issues of life and death so deeply. Inside the man is full of love and life and passion and emotions. His body restricts him to move, love a woman, to have children, to live. The only way he can express himself is in his poetry. For him, that is not enough. If he can't have a life, he wants to die. And in the end of the film he indeed kills himself with the help of people that truly love him.
When I was finding out that having children wouldn't come to easy for me I once said that
'loosing my fertility would be like loosing my legs'. After watching The Sea Inside I realised what I actually meant. Wanting to have children is such an essential way of my being. It is more than an biological urge. I would be cut of from a very important source of information what (my) life is all about. An essential way of expressing myself would be lost. And expressing my love for R. And my love for life.
I'm not saying I want to die if I don't get children. But at the deepest low of my pain and grief there were moments I felt like I wanted to die. Or at least hurt myself. Bang my head against the wall. Don't worry, I never would. I'm just saying what I felt.
Sure I know that having children is not the answer to the question of the meaning of life, and ofcourse kids are not always fun and ofcourse there are things that will get more complicated once they arrive and god knows what people tell me to convince me that it's
NOT ALL THAT NICE to have children. R's teenagers do a great job in emphasising that having kids is not always fun. And als my mum is very good at given hidden messages like that in our phone calls. Ofcourse absolutely not meant to hurt me.
But what is the alternative? Not having children. What kind of a life is that?
Leaves me wondering: Am I infertile or not? Would I call myself infertile, knowing by now that I cannot get pregnant without ivf?
How do you define being infertile?
a) When you cannot get pregnant the
normal & easy way
b) When there are no more treatment options?
c) When your money has run out?
d) When you have no hope left?
Laparoscopy (May 2005)
Two weeks after my second ectopic pregnancy ended by itself I had my first appointment with my
gynaecologist. She was absolutely lovely and decided after a very quick first meeting she wanted to have a closer look at my tubes. I was booked in for a laparoscopy two weeks later. And even my insurance company decided to cooperate!!
How smooth and nice and quick is that!The hospital was like a 5*hotel. It looked great with designer furniture and everybody was so sweet and nice. (What a difference between public and private healthcare!) The gyn held my hand and I made jokes while the anaesthesia started to work. All fun and games, but an hour later I woke up from the anaesthetic, crying, not knowing if I still had my tubes or not. Still everybody was very very sweet.
The gyn came in saying that what she found was not too good, but that she was very happy she had done the operation. My tubes were damaged, one of my ovaries entangled in adhesions and the fimbria were clubbed. She had removed the adhesions and made new openings in my tubes at the fimbrial ends. She was amazed that I got pregnant twice. She had tested my tubes with dye and initially nothing came through. At the end of the surgery the dye came through ok.
After the surgery three things could happen:
1) I would get pregnant (very small chance)
2) I would get another ectopic (bit more chance)
3) Nothing would happen (fairly big chance)
However chances would be much better with ivf. My gyn is very optimistic about ivf. She said that our eggs and sperm had proven to be a good match with our two technically impossible ectopics.
It might sound strange, but now I look back I am grateful for my two ectopic pregnancies. They have caused me a lot of pain and sadness, but also given a lot of information. A year ago I didn't even know I had problems with fertility. Now, not even a year later I am preparing for my first ivf. If it wasn't for the ectopics by now I might have had my first fertility examinations. And people might still be saying:
Just relax and it will happen... (Every infertile agrees that that is the worst anyone can say - even if it's your mother)
I remember the laparoscopy as a very positive thing. After 4 hours I was home again. I didn't have a lot of pain either. A bit of discomfort from the gas in my belly they use to make a bit of space. Three tiny 5mm scars and an unnoticeable change in my bellybotton are the only reminders.
And you know what caused all this? An IUD. Placed by a gynaecologist 13 years ago. Who 'forgot' to make a swab before placing it. How sick is that? I should look into it to see if I can lodge a complain against that butcher!
Ectopic #2 (April 2005)
The first three months after the chemo I wasn't allowed to get pregnant again. Methotrexate works by destroying the folic acid in your body so fast growing cells have no food anymore. So first the chemicals had to be out of my system and the vitamin levels in my body needed to be back to normal.
The statistics said I had a
20% chance my next pregnancy would turn out to be another ectopic. My doctors said: 'You can start trying again in February'. But I was thinking: There must be a good reason why I had the ectopic. And if there is a good reason, it will happen again.
100% Guaranteed. Medical science can be trial and error.
Somebody said: 'the good news of having an ectopic is that you know you can get pregnant'. But I wasn't too sure. Before I always thought that getting pregnant was a
moment, the moment of the sperm penetrating the egg. But the more I read about it and also the way I experienced it myself made me realise getting pregnant is a
process. The process of the sperm travelling up the tubes to the egg and getting inside of it. Then the fertilized egg moving over the grasslike cilia in the tubes towards the womb, cells steadily dividing. Then the egg hatching - digging itself in the lining of the uterus. Or somewhere else.... :-(
Getting pregnant takes 10 days. Ten long nervewrecking days.I did everything right. No more drinking, healthy eating. Yoga, horseriding, dogwalking, swimming and no stress (quit my job). Started
acupuncture. I bought a document on the internet that gave me more tips. I ate all the recommended vitamins... And ofcourse I had my monthly mental breakdown when my period came.
In March I started to temp & chart. And I bought ovulation predictor tests. And I looked at my mucus. We had sex when it was scientifically the right time. Many times :-) And wowee in the third cycle I became pregnant again!! Well, at least that was what my acupuncturist said 8 days after conception
by feeling my pulse. I was very impressed. But I already felt something that clearly reminded me of the first time.
I had felt the embryo hatch. A sharp and scratchy kind of crampy feeling.
I still don't know if you can feel when the embryo hatches in the uterus. I know for sure that you can when it hatches in your tube or fimbria. In my first ectopic pregnancy I had felt it too. I remember saying that it felt as if the embryo cannot find a nice spot. How accurate was that!
If you have felt your baby hatch after about 7 to 10 days after ovulation, let me know!
Ofcourse I was very happy. But the uncertainty took away a lot of the excitement. My first beta came back
118, so at least that was a much better score. Again, I felt the pregnancy wasn't going anywhere. I wasn't feeling more pregnant everyday. I just felt a little pregnant. And after being a week late I felt even a little less pregnant. Bleeding. Loosing the lining. Déjà vu.
It wasn't as bad as the first time. I was better prepared. Getting pregnant was no surprise. Loosing it was no surprise. The doctor sent me for a scan to the hospital. They instantly wanted to put me in bed with a drip and the whole lot. I was so much more assertive all the doctors and nurses were pissed off with me.
I just want a scan! They didn't have time for a scan. So I drove two hours for nothing.
The next day I had a scan and again, there was nothing to see, not in my uterus, or anywhere else. It was so heartbreaking frustrating. Imagine you know you're pregant, but you know you'll never see or hold that baby. It will never have a beating heart. It won't even have a name. Nobody even knows where it is.
Something nice happened. My HCG levels were going down by itself. That meant the embryo wasn't making it, where ever it was. It meant no chemo, no surgery.
This pregnancy gave me something valuable: no trial and error anymore. We were a medical case now. No longer just a statistic. I could continue to the next level: The gyneacologist.
Methotrexate and after
It's a long time ago, ten months! It's not easy to remember it all. It's not easy to recapture the feelings of the total loss and rockbottom depression that I experienced back then. Although I have never seen my baby, although it has never even had a heart beat my body and my soul were completely overwhelmed with love for this little soul in the first weeks of being pregnant.
The chemo was not too bad. I didn't loose my hair, no bad nausea, just total exhaustion. I fell asleep on the doctor's desk when she was gone for a minute. Fell asleep somewhere while walking the dog. And crying. I remember the nurses patching me up with coffee with sugar - it wasn't smart to let me drive. But them being just friendly to me would make me burst out in tears another time.
The hospital kept a close look at my beta numbers. With chemo there is a small chance that some cells survive and continue to divide. The result of that won't be an embryo anymore. Just strange cells, programmed to multiply, holding on to your insides. But lucky me, the numbers went down...
A week after the methotrexate something started nobody had warned me for. I started to bleed A LOT. I got a bit scared I would need the surgery after all, but doctors told me that it was part of the deal. The pain was just excruciating. In my side, my belly, my back, I didn't know pain could be so bad. But after a couple of days I felt something 'POOOFF' - and that was it. The 'thing' let go, I felt better instantly.
A few days later I started to get a pain in my lower back that was sort of pulling my right leg. It became gradually more difficult to turn around in bed, to get out of bed, and in the end I simply couldn't move anymore. More doctors and more chemicals helped me to get on my feet again. It felt like it was strongly related with the ectopic. But ofcourse normal doctors say it isn't and the alternative scene didn't have anything that was strong enough to fix me.
I've always been a healthy person. In this short period of time I had three courses of antibiotics, chemo treatment, painkillers, and anti inflammatories. Yeay! In Janury we had a big detox, super healthy diet, no alcohol, and even a colonic. Let's not go into details!
Treating the ectopic (Nov 2004)
A wicked rollercoaster:First the confusion of being pregnant or maybe not, or little bit. For a few days you think you are
pregnant. Then you loose it. Trying to deal with the pain of the
miscarriage. Finding out that you're still pregnant, or at least sort of. And then all of a sudden your mystery baby turns into something that is like a life treatening
disease...
In the afternoon I was welcomed at the ER in a panicky sort of way and instantly got a IV popped in my arm. 'Just in case you need surgery'. I answered the same questions many many times. 36 years old, 7 weeks pregnant, HCG levels less than 500, no pain, no bleeding, not dizzy, no nausea, no shoulderpain, - I was just wondering what all the fuss was about really. The embryo couldn't be very big if you couldn't see it on a scan I'd say...
The good thing about this part of the world (NZ) is that emergencies and accidents are treated for free, for everybody. The downside of the public health is that you're lucky if your doctor speaks english and that everybody is very very busy.
Two gyns explained to me what a ectopic is and how to get rid of it. And that I had two options: operating and loosing the right tube or chemo therapy.
Methodrexate makes fast growing cells stop multiplying and so my minibaby would die. Ok, I'll have the chemo....
The doctor and I didn't get along very well. I was sad, grumpy, depressed, stressed and in a hurry to get it over with. He was very unpleasant as well. We ended up in an argument that he said he had to examine me and that I said I had enough examinations that day. I just didn't want the grubby guy to touch me.
YUCK!
At 11 pm they were finally ready to give me the injection. The gyn came back, completely dressed in protecting clothing, including some kind of space mask. He was standing there with raised needle, repeating once more I could't have unprotected sex for three months. Ok, just give me the fucking injection will you!
When we left the hospital was asleep. It took a while before we found someone to take the drip out of my arm.
First time pregnant (Sep 2004)
Almost a year ago I became pregnant. It wasn't planned but I was very happy with it. My new partner and I knew each other a rocking
two-and-a-half months. He was more in shock about it than I but said he would support me, no matter what... I was 36 and being pregnant was more then I hoped for.
The pregnancy test showed I was
a little pregnant. (I found julie's blog with Google! - the first blog I read...) So that is actually possible! A faint pink line. I took another test, same result. It was all very surreal. I went to the doctor and had a bloodtest done.
HCG came out an impressive
25. The doctor said that there was NO WAY I could feel pregnant with these numbers, but gosh I really did feel absolutely pregnant. The ladies at the doctor's office congratulated me. But as soon I was behind my computer and started to search for hcg levels I found out something wasn't going well.
When I was a week late I started to bleed. I lost
something, I thought it was a miscarriage. What else could it be? I looked at it closely, wondered how microscopic an embryo was at three weeks because I didn't see anything that looked like an embryo in there and then flushed it through the toilet.
Expecting everything to go back to normal I slowly but gradually started to feel more and more pregnant. But I was also still bleeding and felt very ill, as if I had glass splinters in my veins. I was crying all day. At some stage I was feeling so depressed and strange that it was as if I was walking through a tunnel.
A new bloodtest at week 6 showed the levels gone up to
256. Going up but not enough. The doctor didn't see a reason to do anything and told me to come back a week later. A nurse in the office suggested that I might have lost one of twins and that that was why I was still pregnant. That really cheered me up for a day or two. Then, admitting that this was a very unlikely diagnosis, I decided to go to another doctor.
She instantly guessed right what was going on, told me to get a scan immediately. There was
nothing to be seen in my uterus. And I had pain on my right side. Time to rush to the hospital to get rid of the ectopic. All of a sudden my baby was called 'that lump in the right tube' or 'the results of conception'...
