Ellyse

22 Apr Ellyse

Brian and I got married in May 2003.  I immediately stopped taking birth control as we knew we didn’t want to wait long to start a family.  After a year of being married we had not experienced a pregnancy.  Through discussions with my OBGYN, it was suggested that we start doing some tests to determine why we had not been blessed with a pregnancy.  I had bloodwork done, a test to make sure my tubes were open, etc.  The tests did not show any reason why.   Brian’s sperm was tested and ultimately found to have lower sperm counts.  Both of us were started on a round of Clomid to see if that helped get us to our end goal of starting a family.  We did that for a few months and nothing.  We met with a Fertility Specialist who explained that we had a 5% chance of getting pregnant each month and that IVF was our only recommended course of action.  Needless to say, we left that appointment feeling very defeated and not sure how we were going to come up with the thousands of dollars to pay for IVF.  We decided to then think about it and assess our lives.  We refocused our lives on how to better our financial position as we were still young and in our late twenties.  We stopped all fertility measures as we had hoped that if we stopped focusing on how to get pregnant maybe it would magically happen, as some suggested.

Eight years after we had gotten married we were in different jobs with more money in the bank we met with a Fertility Specialist.  My husband’s new job, offered fertility medical coverage which was great!   Again, IVF was recommended.     We decided to start the process.  With ultrasounds, bloodwork and instructions of when to start a round of birth control to ensure I did not get pregnant before starting the IVF medication we were ready.  The next month, I started the fertility medications.  3 shots each day in my abdomen followed by closely being monitored on many mornings by bloodwork and ultrasounds to monitor the size of my follicles.  Finally, my follicles were the size the Dr’s were waiting on which meant it was egg retrieval day.  We went into the office and I was placed under “twilight” anesthesia while Brian did his thing in another room.    After a quick procedure where they took those plump follicles out we were sent on our way for the Fertility Specialists to fertilize the eggs.  We then waited for the call to come back so that the embryos could be transferred.   Another quick procedure where two embryos were transferred.  Now we were sent home with the hope of finally being pregnant and with this anticipation I was started on another shot.  A shot of Progesterone was started and given to me at the same time every evening and was administered by Brian in the butt.   We waited a week and then came back into the office for bloodwork to see if this long process, which was now eight years after we got married, was finally going to give us the family we had been hoping for.  I got the call later that day that I was pregnant but my number was not very high at 25.  The nurse explained that it was not looking good but the bloodwork two days later would tell us whether I was miscarrying.  My bloodwork doubled, which is what was supposed to do, and continued to climb.  I went it the Fertility Specialists office every two days for bloodwork to check my levels and ultrasounds.  The progesterone was continued during the next nine weeks.   The Fertility Dr was still concerned and hesitant to call this a viable pregnancy because of my low numbers even though they were growing.  He recommended genetic testing.   We did agree to do the testing and received the results that it was a girl and the bloodwork showed there were no genetic issues.  We went on with the pregnancy being excited and started planning the room and a name.  We went to the anatomy scan at 19 weeks.  In this ultrasound everything was measured from the limbs to the head.  The Ultrasound Tech left the room and we were then taken to a room to meet with a Maternal Fetal Medicine Specialist.  The Dr told us that our little girl had some deformities (kidney issues and club feet) and there was not enough amniotic fluid for the pregnancy to continue to be viable.  We were devastated.

I’m not sure I was ready to begin the IVF process again but I knew that it was going to be difficult to continue to mourn the pregnancy that we had waited so long for.  At the suggestion of my husband, I agreed to try again.  We went through the same steps, bloodwork, ultrasounds, shots, egg retrieval, etc.  We kept this to ourselves as our prior experience was not only devastating to us but also to our families.  On transfer day we had only one viable embryo to transfer.  I laid on the table and cried, again feeling defeated.   Days later I got the call that I was pregnant again!  My numbers were still on the lower end.  My pregnancy continued, we passed the anatomy scan.  We shared this happy news with our families.  Nine months later we were blessed with the boy we had always wanted.  Carson will turn 8 this August and I’m so glad we tried again!