2015 started with lots of hope. Visions of the future. Excitement.
Then as the months drew on, the hope dimmed.
In January, I met with my obgyn to talk about starting a family. Rob and I had been married 2.5 years and we were almost ready to try for a baby. It was an exciting time and being a planner, I wanted to get all my ducks in a row. Genetics, combined with being underweight and active, has made my reproductive health always a bit of a mystery. When I discussed my concerns with my doctor, she warned us that it could take a while to get pregnant. So Rob and I made the decision to begin growing our family a few months sooner than we planned. We figured “if it’s going to take a while, then why not get a head start?” Still, I was excited and hopeful that we would get lucky and by the end of 2015, the newest Dron would be on the way.
Per my doctor’s request, I did some blood tests in February to check my hormones. When everything came back totally normal, I was thrilled! The doctor said I had more eggs than the average 27 year old. I felt like an overachiever! But this was bittersweet news; it meant that I had plenty of eggs left for many years of baby-making, but that was due to the fact that my body was hoarding them. I wasn’t ovulating consistently or at all. And lord knows you need to release eggs in order to get pregnant. Still, I thought for sure it was only a matter of time.
When nothing had happened by May, I contacted my doctor and ask her for the medication she offered. Clomid is a fertility drug that helps induce ovulation, which my body was not doing effectively on its own. It also shortens cycle length, which was a blessing; my cycles went from 45 days to 33 days. Shorter cycles meant more chances at trying for a baby. However, Clomid also has some nasty side effects. Hot flashes, crazy mood swings, headaches, incredible bloating, and eye blurring, to name a few. I dealt with the weird side effects, thinking “This will help me get my baby!” I did a blood test later in my cycle to determine whether the Clomid was working, and the news wasn’t good. “You probably didn’t ovulate” was my doctor’s message. And so we upped the dose.
June and July continued the same. The higher dose seemed to make me ovulate, and most of the side effects lessened. I was still bloated like a whale, but aside from being paranoid about looking 4 months pregnant at my sister-in-law’s wedding, it didn’t matter that my stomach was huge. I felt like I was doing what I needed to do to get my body to cooperate and act like it was supposed to do to make a baby. I continued to feel frustrated that as a woman, I needed drugs to get my body to do what a woman’s body should do. Negative pregnancy tests month after month and the return of my period each time made me feel like a failure. I kept myself busy renovating our house, trying to focus on the things in my life I could control.
By September, I needed a break. The Clomid was making me emotional and crazy, and we decided that everything I was doing could be for naught if Rob’s swimmers weren’t good. So my poor hubby took one for the team and got his little guys checked out. The report couldn’t have been better. He passed with flying colors. I was 95% ecstatic and thrilled that we could keep trying. But the other 5% was a little voice in my head telling me that our subfertility (that’s the name for couples who take longer than 6 months to conceive) was all my fault. And that even with the help of the Clomid over the summer I still wasn’t pregnant, so something must really be wrong.
I needed to throw myself into something I knew I could succeed at. This process of having a baby was the first time I’d ever given so much effort to something with absolutely no results. I joined a gym, and signed up for the Boston Marathon. I figured at least training for Boston was something in my life that I could have some control over. I gave up drinking: partly to get Boston-ready, but honestly mostly because I assumed that I’d be pregnant soon and didn’t want people to suspect if I suddenly stopped drinking.
October was the peak of hope for 2015. If I conceived in October, our baby’s due date would have been my dad’s birthday. I imagined how perfect that would be. I went back on Clomid, for the 4th time, and with Rob’s glowing results, we were so excited. I had a lot of pain when I ovulated, which made me super confident that a nice juicy egg was released. EVERYTHING was perfect. But on Halloween, when all the parents on Facebook and in the world are taking pictures of their adorable babies in their cute costumes, my period came and devastated me. It was then that I deleted the Facebook app; it depressed me too much to see so many fall pregnancy announcements and the start of children-centered holiday traditions.
November and December were somber. I went off Clomid. Do I think it helped me ovulate? Probably. But it wasn’t getting me pregnant. Which means there’s something else going on. Rob and I still tried our hardest to conceive, but I won’t have a baby cooking in my belly by the end of 2015.
Today I went to my obgyn to talk about next steps. She reiterated that all my hormone levels look great and that she thinks there is something happening with my ovulation. She tiptoed around suggesting I get help from a specialist, but she didn’t need to. I booked the appointment with the intention of leaving with the name of a reproductive endocrinologist (RE)- a doctor who is specially trained to help people like us have a baby.
I contacted the fertility clinic for an appointment and hope to hear from them by the end of the week. Rob and I plan to meet with them in January to begin the process of more extensive fertility treatments. We’ll start with a consultation to talk about our history. Then we’ll both have to redo our tests (some painful and invasive ones for me, and some awkward ones for Rob). Once they have all our data, we’ll meet with the doctor again to discuss our plan to make a baby.
For the first time in a few months, I feel excited and optimistic. 2015 isn’t ending the way I envisioned; actually quite the opposite. It’s been a year of hope and heartache. But I have a lot of faith that 2016 will be our year.
-DD
I find the more people I tell, the more I feel like the load I’m carrying is lighter and lighter. As this journey becomes more difficult, I’m sure it will get heavy again, but I know I can reach out and my family and friends will bear some of the weight with me. I feel as though I’m gathering my own personal cheering squad. I imagine them like the graveyard scene at the end of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire; shadowy figures smiling at me and coaching me as I battle infertility (thank goodness infertility isn’t sending an Avada Kedavra curse at me). Everyone who knows about our infertility standing around behind me to make sure I get through this.
Adding Drons 