Ok, I've alluded to this a few times now, so I'm finally taking the time to open up and share what happened in September.
My first cycle after my trip to Finland & Russia in August was totally normal. Before that, in Finland, I was about 12 hours or so late, but that's actually about right because it was a 9 hour time difference. My period also lasted a day or two longer, but that's pretty normal too since I'd been travelling.
Anyway, the next cycle all seemed normal through the rest of August and into September... except my period didn't come when it was supposed to in September. When I was just a day or two late, I didn't think much of it since I had been travelling during the previous month and that might have messed up my internal clock a little.
When I was 3 days late I took an early pregnancy test, just to see if I should be going to the beer garden that night after work or not. It was negative, but was started raining later that afternoon so I didn't go out anyway. Probably for the best I figured, just in case.
Two days later I was five days late and was really starting to wonder. I tested again and was still negative, so I started googling about when those tests were supposed to be most accurate. Everything said that while they can detect on the first day of your missed period, they are more accurate about a week later.
So I decided to make an appointment with my gyno for a blood test. The next morning, day 6 of being late, I went in for a blood draw. B & I were both so convinced at this point that this must finally be "our time" that I didn't even bother calling the RE doctors. I didn't want to go in to work that day after the appointment, as I wanted to be home where I had cell reception when I got the call with the news.
When they called late that afternoon, I was shocked to hear the test was negative. They had done a quantitative test, not qualitative like I'd asked for though, so I was frustrated and asked for some answers. The nurse who'd called me said that sometimes women can just have an "off" cycle. That's when I thought I should schedule a check up with the gyno since it had been a couple years. Time to make sure nothing has changed on my end of things while we've been working on B this whole time. She couldn't fit me in for weeks though, which is why I didn't go until the morning I flew out for India.
I was still pretty frustrated though, and called Robbie to get a blood draw from them too. He agreed that we should do a qualitative one to see if we could get any answers. The next day, day 7 of being late, I went in. Later that day, those results came back as 0, completely negative. I was not pregnant.
I wanted to make an appointment to have another consultation with Robbie and start completely over on all my testing, in case something had happened in the last two years since I'd first had all my stuff done. Maybe I've developed PCOS, maybe I have endo now, maybe I'm not ovulating anymore & need clomid, maybe my tube is blocked again and they needed to open it up again. SOMETHING!
He couldn't get me in for a week, but I was going to be out of town presenting at a conference, so I had to schedule the appointment for two weeks out. This was so ridiculous, how could they learn anything about what was going on with my body that would cause me to be a week late if they didn't look at me for two weeks?!?!? I was beyond frustrated. I was devastated and crushed and angry. I wanted some answers about what was going on.
I didn't believe it could be true that I was not pregnant and nothing abnormal was going on with me. I did a ton of googling. There are women who don't produce the HSG hormone & never get a positive pregnancy test result. Also, if it was a chemical pregnancy, that might not produce the hormone either but would cause me to be late. Also, if I was pregnant but about to miscarry, it's possible that I hadn't been far enough along to detect the hormone and then lost it before I could get the positive result. Clearly, I was in denial and couldn't believe that I wasn't pregnant. I was grasping for anything to hold on to that could help me make sense of everything going on around me.
But honestly, I've never been anything but like clockwork. I always get my period right on target, maybe a day or two off, but never a week! I always ovulated between days 14-16, like clockwork! I'm so regular it's almost laughable in the face of our infertility, and here I was A WEEK LATE and the doctors were all just trying to tell me that sometimes women have an "off month" and I shouldn't be concerned unless this becomes a pattern?!?!?!? I was so mad! I want to be on the fast track to fertility, so if something major like this occurs, I want my team of doctors to start running tests and getting to the bottom of what caused this change! Grrrrrr.....
The next day I started spotting and then got my period. I fell into such dispair. I finally started believing that it was true that I was either never pregnant at all, or had been and was miscarrying, or had had a chemical pregnancy. Either way, it felt like a huge loss.
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| Do you see the hidden baby in this image? This was totally B & I making plans for our future with our baby when we thought we were pregnant. |
Even B seemed to be affected by it. We'd started making plans, even discussing whether I should cancel this trip to India that was coming up, and debating whether we'd be trying to do his big 4-0 birthday trip next summer, since I'd probably be on maternity leave. We were making plans about decorating the spare bedrooms in our new house and buying a bigger car when we could afford it. We were blissfully happy hoping that our time had finally come, and we'd gotten there naturally, without having to spend $20k + to get there.
Then on Day 8 I got my period and it all came crashing down around us. B was sensitive the first day and then seemed to move on. Not me. I was sad and angry. I tried to focus on figuring out what had happened. I wanted answers. Oh, and get this, my period only lasted 2 days! WTF?!?
When I finally got to go in to see Robbie, he seemed to think that trying on our own is futile now and we should move on to IUI's. I told him that we want to skip that or maybe just do one, before moving on to IVF in early 2014. He seemed to kind of write me off then. If I wasn't going to do ART now, he didn't seem interested in exploring other less invasive ways to help us in the meantime. He told me work on losing weight, and if my next few cycles were like this, then maybe we could talk about clomid, but if I get right back on track again, then he said no way to the clomid.
Then we argued about math which really pissed me off. I came home and told B about how Robbie was trying to tell me that each IUI has a cumulative effect, which is such bullsh*t. Dr. J had previously explained it to us the exact opposite way. Yeah sure, each IUI has a 20% chance of working, but that doesn't add up to getting 100% odds after five IUI's. No, the fifth one still just has a 20% chance of working, just like the first one!
God Robbie pissed me off! He tried to make the analogy that if I flipped a coin twenty times, my odds of getting heads at least once would be much higher than if I just flipped it once. Yes, fine. But I'm not doing 20 IUI's! And besides, every individual time you flip that coin, it's always going to have a 50/50 chance of being heads.
Gawwwwwwd he pissed me off! And flipping a coing doesn't cost you $1300 out of pocket each time like an IUI does. We'd rather put that toward the $13-20K + that we'll need for IVF soon anyway. Which by the way, only has a 50% percent chance of working. Geesh, with Robbie's reasoning, we should just spend all our money playing the lottery, and then then when we win after playing for a while (which according to him we'd have good chances of doing after playing more often), we could just pay for IVF right away!
Seriously, what kind of a doctor argues this way? This is why I talked afterward with my gyno about how I don't "click" with Robbie. I'm so glad she encouraged me to feel comfortable switching to Dr. Strawn. I really feel like that guy respects me as an individual, not just another patient with the same old textbook problems & routine solutions. Strawn's the one who said B & I have been infertile for over 4 years, since we went off contraception, not just the 2.5 years that we think we've been "actively trying." I really respect this guy & feel validated by him, not belittled.
So that's the story. For the first time in my life I actually felt the thrill that I always imagined I would once I finally got pregnant. And then it was ripped away. I'm kind of in the place where I was after we decided not to do the IVF in January 2012 again. It's not a good place and I'm just trying to process everything.
Blogging is helping of couse. Sometimes blogging too much kind of keeps me stuck in this world where it's all I think about so I stop for a while for my mental well being & balance. Then something happens and it helps me to process it by writing it down again, and if I get positive feedback from those who love me or have been there too then it helps me a little more. And if I can help someone else going through this too, then that helps even more still.
Travelling has been helping as well. It keeps me busy so I don't have time to think about our struggle so much. And it puts things in perspective by reminding me of all the wonderful opportunities that I'm able to take advantage of right now, which I probably couldn't do if I was pregnant or had kids. India in particular has also reminded me that things could be a lot worse for us. Many other people in the world don't have clean drinking water, a sanitary place to go to the bathroom, or have access to proper food or shelter.
On the other hand, travelling also gives me something positive to focus on like having new experiences and making new memories, especially as a couple with B this time! Of course, like I've said in the last several posts, it's always in the back of my mind and I have guilty-little-pleasure thoughts about making a baby with B in India and naming it Asha or Indie or something. But seriously, without some kind of hope, where would we all be?
I was watching a movie on the way to India and one quote really stood out to me. In the movie, the character was explaining that they have a quote here in India that goes something like this,
"Everything works out in the end, and if it's not working out, then it must not be the end."I love this. Whenever I start to get sad about our baby woes, I need to remember this quote. It really gives me renewed hope for our future and this crazy journey we are on. It also stands as a testament to my stubborn personality and perseverance. I will never give up on the dream of my child. I just can't do it. Motherhood is something I was born for. It's all I've ever envisioned for myself. It's all I've every truly wanted.
And B is going to make such a good daddy. His capacity for love, nurturing, and protection has always been one of my favorite traits of his. He's going to be an amazing father and I just want to finally give him the opportunity to realize that potential. I just want to have that man's babies.
Well anyway, he's joining me here in India for some touring after I finished my work here, so either way we'll have some amazing experiences and take with us some amazing memories to share for a lifetime together!
