On The Off Chance…


On the off chance.  That seven years later anyone reads this still.

 

We moved.  We did IVF twice in our new state.  We had a daughter.  Eight months after, at the age of 38…this (now 42 year old) mama found herself pregnant with a fourth baby. Delivered just after I turned 39.  THIRTY FUCKING NINE. Perfectly healthy.  Perfectly natural.  Perfectly hilarious and weird and amazing…but did it the way Regular People Make Their Babies.  She wasn’t planned or expected or tried for.  We just did what married people do after a few weeks of not having Done That Thing, after a delicious Thanksgiving dinner…and nine months later, this lady who had OLD AS DUST EGGS had a perfect little girl.

 

I am the living breathing example of “having the things I once wished and prayed for.”

Don’t give up.  Never give up.  Keep the hope.  That crazy, awful, insane word.

signed,  The Infertile Mom…OF FOUR



Last Post Ever.


So.  I am coming up on the three year anniversary of my blog…and I’ve decided not to continue paying the oodles necessary to keep the site name, etc.  I’ve simply printed out the pages, and hope to put it all together in a binder for the boys (and me) to read some time down the road…you know, in case they wonder “why is Mommy so crazy?”

 

It was bittersweet to re-read old posts as they came flying out of the printer, recalling the heartache of trying for A, and the subsequent tries for a third (one try wasn’t ever even documented; last September I did a final frozen transfer of four embryos, and did not wind up pregnant).  So that was three decent tries for number three.  And then we moved a few states away, so we’ve stayed busy with all that entails.  I still have baby three on my mind and in my heart…but this past June I turned 36.  Not thinking those eggs I’m still releasing are doing much more than dissolving upon release (ok, who am I kidding, I still kind of think every month may be our “miracle month” that we get pregnant from great sex at the right time.  But I can’t help that).

 

If we do go forward, it will be a return to a new and less amazeballs clinic than the ones I went to back up North, and therefore my hopes aren’t high.  But I do still dream of it.  I dream of giving the boys (P is turning 6 this fall, A turning 3) a sibling…and I know they want one too.  There are pros and not-so-pros to having a third, I know: but right now, I still kind of only see the pros.  Time will only tell.

 

This blog saved my sanity, my heart and my soul so many times, and I am so grateful that T had the foresight to see that years ago.  I am so grateful that I can go back and journey through those years again.  I am so grateful, so blessed and going forward, I am only hoping that the path of our life leads me to true inner peace.



An Open Letter to My Ovaries


Dear Shitty Ovaries,

 

I understand that you did not decide to suck.  I understand that you have no real choice in the matter.  I understand that for some reason I CAN’T know/understand, you don’t do your job well.  But this last time?  After 14 days of Lupron you really thought it was a-ok to have three cysts that resembled Jupiter, Saturn, and Mercury?  And an E2 level over 400?  You do know, right, that I was jabbing a needle (small, I know, but a needle nonetheless) into my stomach for 14 nights, I was having hot flashes, was crazy-ass-off-my-rocker for the first seven days…and you still thought this was ok?

 

This is my LAST TRANSFER WITH MY OWN EMBRYOS.  And quite likely my last transfer ever.  I am kind of itching to get it over with.  I am kind of ready to shut the door (if you could read, Ovaries, I would send you the link to this blog to get you up to date on my last six years).  I was hoping to have this all done before I turned 35.  Do you remember the cake we had three weeks ago?  Yep.  35 came.  I know the fake-pregnancy until week 7 was a bit of a curveball in our plans, and I can’t blame you for that (or can I…you did produce that egg way back in early ’09).  But now that you decided to eff things up a little, I have to wait until I get my August period, and then plan to cycle and do the transfer in mid September.  I had been planning on heading to our summer vacation without needles.  Guess not.  I had been planning to train for the half marathon with vigor–now I get six weeks after a probably bfn to train (contemplating making up a race shirt with some sort of infertility focus…any ideas, Ovaries?)  We are moving a great distance in five to seven months time.  We will have a house to get ready, stage, show, and hopefully sell.  I have a lot in my head right now, and I kind of am so FREAKING PISSED AT YOU.  (Don’t carry this burden alone, I am also pissed off at Dr because he does this stupid block-cycling for his own convenience and clearly not for mine.  And still holding that grudge against Uterus for the 20-something embryos she hasn’t bothered to embrace.  Lots of pissed-off-ness to go around…)

 

I want to cycle.  I want to be pregnant and have one more little baby D.  One more.  Not being greedy, just trying to fill my heart.  So Ovaries, I plead, Get Your Shit Together.  Get rid of your cysts, shut yourselves down, and Be My Friend this next cycle, okay?  I know after that you have no more say in if the cycle works or not…but please.  Do your part. I will write to your bitter and hostile neighbor, Uterus, in a few more weeks, when her job becomes a bit more important.

 

Have a lovely day.



Beta Drops, So Does My Heart…


Dramatic, I know.  But sometimes it hits me like a FRIGGIN TON OF BRICKS that I had an almost-pregnancy, that I have ONE MORE CHANCE TO USE MY OWN GENETIC MATERIAL and possibly only ONE MORE CHANCE TO BE A NEW MOM AGAIN.

 

This weekend it hit me like two friggin tons of bricks.  I had a new nephew born, and while I love love loved seeing all the new baby pictures of my brother’s son, I was saddened somewhere deep inside, knowing I may not ever know that again.  And by may, I mean probably.  I then also was going through things for a garage sale (we may or may not be making a North-to-South move in the next year) and I was crushed by a sea of baby things–things I bought for/registered for when I was pregnant with P, saved through the dark times trying for A…and now I may be getting rid of it all?  Oh sigh.  And cry.  And be so fcuking pissed sometimes that PEOPLE CAN HAVE SEX AND GET PREGNANT.  Okay, I am not pissed they can get pregnant.  Rah rah, happy for ‘em.  But why the FRICK can’t I??  That’s more the thing.  I don’t begrudge those who CAN–I begrudge my own disability to CAN-NOT.

 

Blech…………

 

(BUT, beta was down to 26 last week, so hoping to get a lower number this week, reach zero, get a period in a week or so, and then BAM! bang out my last FET.  Summer fun, let it roll….)

 



So It Has Been a Week…


I guess I have a lot to write.  My beta last Monday was only at 3800, which was just 800 up from the previous Monday–making me annoyed that they didn’t give me another beta in between, just so I could know if that was already heading down, or  if that was as high as it got.  All was moot however when I started bleeding on Thursday.  And man.  It got heavy.  Like, overpower-a-tampon-in-twenty-minutes heavy.  I also saw the sac pass, as well as a lot of other, er, stuff.  I will say that for as emotional as I can get about this whole process, I am pretty proud of how well I handled it all once the bleeding began.  On Friday of last week my beta was drawn and was 1600, and I will go tomorrow again to see how much it fell since then.  I really don’t know how long it will take to get back to zero–I know with my d&c a few years ago, I got a period a month after it happened, and I also think I started an FET soon after that…I know it was done by the end of June of that year, and the miscarriage happened March 20, d&c was March 25, first period was April 26 (crazy how these dates stick in one’s head), and I was on estrace in early June.  I also remember that they effed up my first try at an FET by dosing my lupron wrong, so it could have actually started before that.  Who knows.

 

I am floating somewhere between trying to think about our family being “complete” already, trying to think that maybe an FET with less than stellar embryos could work, the potential for adopting embryos down the line in a year or so…and it’s a strange place to find myself.  Emotionally, I have not been a wreck (Alleluia, alleluia).  I have not spent minutes/hours/days in tears–but I still have it all weighing on my heart and my head.  I am a little tired of “qualifying” things–by saying how blessed I am to have the boys I have, how lucky, how fortunate, how grateful…because OF COURSE I am all of these things.  And I guess I keep saying to convince myself, as well as to let the world know that I KNOW I could be in a much more devastating place right now, if we didn’t have the two boys.  But I cannot yet bring myself to think of getting rid of tiny baby boy clothes, baby toys, and the idea of another one of us in this world.  The regular folks of the reproducing world get decide when they feel their family is complete, and I am still jealous of that.  It amazed me–last night I spoke to my grandmother on her 93rd birthday, and while I don’t really tell her about all we have gone through, she knows some of it.  And who would have thought Nana would get it right–she said to me, “I can say you are so lucky and blessed to have the boys but when your heart wants more that is just how you feel.”  Thumbs up, Nana.  You nailed it–who would have thought?

 

The emotional aspect of potentially being done hasn’t completely hit me yet, but every time I see a pregnant person with two children, I do still feel that stirring inside, that sting.  It is nothing like it was when I was trying for P, and then the even harder journey of trying for A—but it’s still there.  When I told P that it seemed the doctors hadn’t been able to fix “Mommy’s broken belly” he told me, “Oh Mom, that’s alright.  There are like ninety years to life, you still have plenty of time to get someone to fix it.”  I loved his simple view–being four and a half makes him almost as wise as Nana at 93–but sadly, I don’t have plenty of time.  I have one more shot–one more partial-shot.  And that fresh cycle didn’t give me a baby–so why will the frozen one? (I am going to try to ask my Dr if I can cycle using Ganirelix instead of Lupron through–it will decrease the whole cycle time by at least two or three weeks, and I am a DISASTER on Lupron. Dis.As.Ter.)   Of course, I can’t help but HOPEHOPEHOPE that maybe God is guiding us to this last option, to show us that the reason all the recent cycles have failed (so, two FETs and one fresh in attempt for #3) is because our little one is waiting for us already somewhere in a freezer in Greenwich, and that HE is the baby that we are waiting for.  But I know that isn’t how God works–mainly from experience.  I love being a mom more than anything I have ever done, and likely anything I ever will do.  It fills my heart so completely, and I will surely struggle as I come to grips with knowing I won’t be journeying through new motherhood ever again…



Lost the coin toss


Today I went in and “forced” an ultrasound.  They just wanted to check my levels, but I KNEW I just KNEW that things had gone south.  My body was battling two conflicting issues–morning sickness and the ever-telling pull of my uterus wanting to shed a nice built up lining.  I knew this as of Saturday…and then I just prayedprayedprayed that the period-cramps and other happenings held out til Mother’s Day was over.  It is by far, for obvious reasons, my favoritest holiday in the whole world.  Favoritest.  Has surpassed my old favest, the birthday, and is now in close running with Christmas–not Christmas for me, Christmas for the little ones.  Anyway.  My prayers were answered until yesterday evening, miraculously.  There was no telltale signs of Things Gone Wrong until about 5 pm last night.

 

This morning I got a sitter for the boys, and got to the office with enough time to play some IPad solitaire to numb my mind.  When I went in for the blood with my favorite nurse, I told her I needed an ultrasound.  She is the BEST I tell you, the BEST.  After she said “Shit, what happened, I was out Friday!” and I told her nothing that the office knew of–just that I knew.  She put me in a room right away, and the other doctor (whom I now favor to mine–why, you ask?  Because she has something called COMPASSION.  and BEDSIDE MANNER.  And…WORDS.)  I saw the sac, saw it was still small, and was so damn glad to know I had been right, and this wasn’t going to give me some awesome, surprise, meant-to-be baby.  She was great.  And I was great, let me tell you.  No real breaking down, no sobbing mess, just asking all the right questions about What Happens When You MIscarry (I’ve only had that one with the twin pregnancy–and it was a missed one–and they did a d&c for that whatwith all the copious tissue….).  She told me we might try to give it a week, but schedule a surgery for early next week, so I am not waitingwaitingwaiting for this to happen, and can move on.  I guess there is a chance once I tear off the 4 estrogen patches and stop injecting 1.5 cc of progesterone in my ass, it happens naturally.

 

I definitely cried on the way home.  T is away on business and was therefore unreachable after I left (I swear, he’s not a douche–he was on an airplane.  So seriously unreachable).  I called my SIL/best friend/otherhalf and she cried with me.  But I am going to be okay from this, I just know it.  I guess it was always seeming to good to be true–or even, too bad to be true.  Sometimes I wish I never saw those damn TWO PINK LINES…because two pink lines infer a baby, but sadly, not this time.  We have some amazing things around the corner for our family of four–and I am trying to focus on the belief that perchance, somewhere down the road, I will understand why I was only given two children.  We do of course still have some frozen enbryos with this current clinic (of mediocre-to-poor quality), so the expectation will be low.  It was our plan to be “done” by my 35th birthday which is right around the corner at the end of June–and that is out of the question now.  I know how long it takes for numbers to fall after a loss.  I also know there are embryos out there somewhere, waiting to be “adopted”–and since we likely won’t risk crazy amounts of cash for another cycle with my sucktastic eggs, I know T would be willing to adopt some frozen embryos down the line if we decide to do so.  Part of me is like, “I’m ONLY going to be 35…” and the other part is like, “Shit, I am going to be 35.”

 

I am just going to continue to pray for peace, pray for an “easy miscarriage” (whatever the hell that means–because that sure sounds like an oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one), and I am going to be so damn grateful for the two miracles I was somehow blessed with.  I know I have so many amazing and wonderful gifts in my life–I know that it is now the time to focus on that, and move forward.  Thanks for your support—kind words, reassurances, understanding, and just…reading.

 



It Happened/May Not Happen


I have not blogged about this at all–but we did an FET in April.  It was fairly uneventful, and based on my 0-for-3 FET history, as well as my notsogreat fresh history, we had little faith.  I tested negative the morning of 6dp5dt…but a light positive that evening.  Squinter light.  It got gradually less-squinty until the beta at 14dpo (a wednesday) came in at an underwhelming 32.  Nothing to get excited about, but not low enough to figure it is completely a chemical.  Slow-forward two days, next bext beta comes in at 85.  Slow-forward three days, beta #3 comes in at 297.  Slow forward three more days, beta comes in at 975.   And four days after that….2999.  Clearly doubling.  Clearly doubling within the window of double-time.  But clearly, low.  Pretty low.  Not hopeless low, just low enough to have limited hope, and I am afraid, to get smashed down.  The following day after beta #4 (so this would be 27 dpo), doctor wanted me in for an ultrasound.  I saw the gest sac.  I BARELYBARELYBARELY saw the yolk sac. Dr saw it.   We did not see a fetal pole (I was technically 5w6d at the appt).  After forcing my doctor to share some information with me (he was satisfied with “see you in two weeks” and I was NOOOOOTTTT), he did give me 50/50 odds that this turns into a viable, healthy pregnancy. I also forced him into telling me what I was measuring (“about 5 weeks”). Yuck.  No one wants a flip of a coin determining their ultimate future.  I tried to be all positive and say, “well, there is as much of a chance it works as there is that it doesn’t!” until my usually optimistic husband introduced the coin-toss analogy and I lost all positivity.

 

I have heard that FETs take longer to build steam.  I have read stories of people who didn’t see fetal poles at 5w6d and saw one at their next ultrasound.  And I have read many many stories of people who have miscarried after an experience like mine.  Fifty-fifty, not the greatest.  It is going to be a long trip from today (Wedneday, one day past ultrasound) until next Friday, ultrasound number two.  It is the earliest he would do it.  It will also put me at 7w2d.

 

I am having a hard time understanding why this would happen at the end of the journey–why didn’t the powers that be let me go out with a fizzle, rather than a Bang! No! Wait! No! Not a bang! Just a…….?  So I just wait it out until next Friday.  Not much more to do…but wait and hope.  It’s not in my hands.

 



Sad. Mad. Bitter Childish Ramblings.


Just plain pissed.  And a lot o bit sad.  Tears come at strange and completely unexpected times.  I HATE the fcuking finality of this all.  Hate it.  I hate that other people, fertile people, don’t have to have this decision made for them by their body.  I hate that I would do it again, even though it drove me and my family completely upside-down crazy for a three week stretch.  IVF in the suburbs-to-the-city, with no family, a 13-hour a day working husband, and small children is not for the weak.  And I hate that I can’t do it again, at least, not anytime soon, as I made a promise that is SO DAMN HARD TO KEEP.  I promised my husband I would leave the crazy behind and move forward.  I am currently wondering if I will need any type of therapy to help me do so–and I’m also DAMN MAD that I might need therapy to help me keep a FCUKING PROMISE.  Who does that?  I am mad and sad that the existence of my two amazing little boys isn’t enough to quiet this voice in my heart.  Why can’t I just embrace the blessings of the past and the present and just LET GO of this one last dream?  I feel so utterly selfish and ridiculous.

 

I am MAD that I am going to no doubt put some hope in the embryos I have left (five, I think?  Two from the miscarriage cycle of ’09 and three from a failed Dec’09.  And those last puppies are NOT.GOOD.EMBRYOS.  Pretty sure they froze a PQ or a YZ or something.  Extra room in their freezer at the time?  Who knows).  I am sad and mad that I will have to get some hope built up for those cycles, and they might not happen, they might not thaw, and then they likely will not work.  Or I can think they will, and get my heart crushed further.  I am mad and sad that I will think I might be one of those people to get pregnant on her own even though she has shittastic eggs and a HOSTILE AS SHIT UTERUS…23decent embryos?  2 children?  Seriously???????????  I am mad and sad that I will likely drink wheatgrass and pump my body full of alleged fertility aids, and use OPKs and have timed relations… I am sad and mad that I might hold out hope that it could work (clearly, I am dumber than dirt, as 23 embryos and 2 children…why doesn’t it sink in to my head?)

 

I am mad and sad that T thinks we can “try again” in ”a few years” if we “decide we want to.” Or that he “isn’t convinced it won’t ever happen.”  I will have approximately one egg left then.  And I know that I will jump at that chance and do it and work that one little egger to the ground.  Because I am like that.  Persistent.  Head.  Wall.  Bang.  Repeat.

 

This, my third child, the one I will likely never meet, never know what it is like to have and hold and complete the circle we have started…is the one thing I have pursued with every strength, and it is the one thing I have failed at.  Hard work does not equal success.  Focus, strength, determination, prayer…does not equal success.  Desire, persistence…does not equal success.  Not where infertility is concerned.  Life is not fair–I get it.  I tell my son this all of the time.  And when he whines and says “This is the WORST DAY EVER” I can’t even bring myself to agree with him in a sarcastic jest, because I have known my own sort of “worst day evers”– countless failed cycles, the losses of his two brothers…I can’t.  I know we all have our burdens to bear, and the saying goes, if we saw other people’s dirty laundry, we would always choose to take our own back home.  I’m not so sure of that some days.

 

Tomorrow we’ll drag ourselves into the city.  I’ll see that waiting room for the last time (embryos frozen at previous clinic).  And that will be that.  The door will be closed on this.  If only my heart wasn’t so damn gaping open.



7dp3dt


Ugh, wish my body would freaking metabolize the trigger faster…because there is still a faint line.  I am however glad that I decided to do the “test it out” thing–because it would REALLY HAVE SUCKED if I hadn’t, and then today peed for the first time, and thought that it was a positive test.  They have at least been getting lighter, and I have read that some people take longer than others to metabolize it…so apparently, I can’t even do it in 12 days!

 

Had another good cry/sobbing-babble to my mom this morning, just needed to get it out, and I am sure there will be one or two more sobbing moments, but for now, I feel a bit lighter that it is all off my chest, and I know I will be able to move on from this.  I know that by next week at this time, I will be ok.  And I will be okay because I have two great little miracles that may never have been–and even after this cycle, having done everything the same as with A’s cycle, I realize he is such a little gift.  It wasn’t some magic potion protocol that Dr. D concocted that was the panacea for my issues–it was a good plan with a lucky lucky outcome.  And for that I am so grateful.  I will for certain enjoy my two boys for the rest of my days, knowing there are some who will never even get to say that.  I will probably always be wistful when I hear of others adding to their family (easily or not), but I will have this ugly stage of life behind me, and I will be able to focus on the now, and the future, rather than what Could Have Been.

 

Much thanks to those who still read this, who have always rooted for me, and for all in the infertility-blogging world who have helped me on this long journey.  It’s a crappy little club, but it really means something when you know you’re not alone in it.



5dp3dt


Happy Valentine’s Day!  I have spent a good portion of the morning bursting into tears for no reason.  Ok, lie, there is a reason, obviously.  The period-coming-feeling has only intensified, not subsided like I had hoped it might in order to make way for some cramping.  I don’t cramp before my period, I get a heavy, pulling feeling in my uterus, my body gets kind of weak-feeling, and I get some slight nausea.  Every time I get my period, the above happens.  When I get pregnant, somewhere it turns into a sharper, pinching, tightening localized cramping…that is no where to be found right now…and I even lay perfectly still sometimes to see if that is happening anywhere.  Nope.  It’s not.  Not a twinge, a cramp, nothing.  It is just one of the strongest period-pulls I’ve had in a while. Probably because I had an insanely awesome lining (as usual) that my body can’t wait to shed.

 

Of course, that small part of me that is Eternally Hopeful, has compared notes from March ’10.  I called it as a BFN on 3dp.  I then wrote on 6dp about how devastated I was.  And then somewhere between the night of 6dp and 9dp, something changed, and my body wasn’t feeling the same way anymore.  But of course, I didn’t write down exactly what I was feeling that 6dp, so I can’t remember if I was still having super-intense period feelings, or if they had lessened, or what happened.  I kind of skipped that part.  I have even (embarrassing) gone so far as to make a day by day comparison chart, showing that tomorrow, which would be 6dp, I was then still feeling negative about it.  So I am somewhere in me trying to give my embryos one more day, even though it doesn’t feel possible at all.  Again, The Eternal Hopefulness, just a small small glimmer…

 

I know people are still telling me not to give up hope.  That it is way too early.  That I can’t possibly know.  And for a second I felt bad about coming here to whine about my sadness, my disappointment, my just utter utter…sadness.  But then I remembered that this is my blog, and I wouldn’t be true to myself if I didn’t accurately record how I was feeling and what I was thinking.  So I am whining.  And feeling anger and sadness.  Also acknowledging how damn blessed I am to have T, P and A in my life…but yep, also just being sad about not having another.  Damn you infertility.  Damn you for stopping my family from growing before I am really ready for that.  But we can’t do another cycle without taking something away from our current family unit.  We just can’t.