Reality Sucks

I thought infertility was going to be the hardest thing I would deal with. Once I got pregnant that I would carry my baby with no problems, just like I did with Delainee. 3 times my body has proven me wrong. 3 times! We did everything right. After our second loss I had panels run to check for blood clotting disorders. We did testing on our chromosomes and we did testing on embryos. Even still I became pregnant after we transferred 2 perfect embryos. One implanted and at 6 weeks had a heartbeat. The anxiety was always there. What if's. We went for our 8 week ultrasound and I knew before being told there was no heartbeat. And just like with William it just had happened. The baby measures perfect just no heartbeat. How does this keep happening to us? Why does it? We will likely never know those answers. It is amazing that Delainee is here. It is amazing my body didn't let her down. I don't know how to wrap my head around everything that has happened in the last year. I am just tired, so tired. And I have to learn to live for David and Delainee and stop living on the hope of giving them a son/daughter or brother/sister. Reality sucks and I hate it. I want my babies back. I want to be able to protect them, that is my job.

When enough is enough.

When do you call it quits? How do you decide you have tried as much as you possibly can? I knew I would know if we reached that point and here we are. We have gotten to the end of the road. To the right we have the option to continue. Continue trying to make Delainee a sister to a baby she can hold. Continue trying for another baby we can bring home with us. Continue pouring all of the money we have into fertility treatments. Continue having broken hearts when once again a cycle isn't successful or we hear the words I don't see a heartbeat. Continue having shots every night and 10 plus pills just to find out again they didn't work. Or on the other side we grieve and learn to live without the other way. We can focus on us and our family of 3 on this earth. Will that longing ever be gone? Probably not completely. But eventually you just know when enough is enough. And it doesn't have to be when you run out of embryos again. It can simply be because you miscarry again and your heart can't take another loss. It is when the fears again outweigh the wants, and for good reason. When financially and physically you just can't take enough. Over $40,000 is gone and until heaven we don't have our babies to hold. It is time to be our family of 3 and focus on Delainee. She wants to be a sister more than anything so now we have to make her, a 6 year old, understand that that isn't going to happen. It isn't going to be easy but it will be worth it. It will be worth it to not put all of our energy into building a family that isn't going to be. It will be worth it, it has to be worth it.

Edited May 27, 2015 I originally wrote this post 2 weeks ago when I started bleeding and thought yet again I was miscarrying. I went in the next day and we had a baby and a heartbeat. I could breath a little easy but still not as easy as the girl that was pregnant almost 7 years ago. Today we went for our 8 week check up and we found out our baby just passed. Sounds all too familiar. The your baby measures perfect there is just no heartbeat. We gained another angel in our welcome group in heaven. I often wonder will it only be our babies that passed after implanting or will it be all the embryos we transferred. I guess one day I will know that answer but it isn't today. Today my heart breaks for the baby inside of me that no longer has a beating heart. The baby that I wanted to protect and once again I wasn't able to. My heart breaks knowing that my big girl won't be a sister. Don't take one day for granted having the children your heart longs for. Your kids may fight and drive you crazy but someone else is wishing they had that chance. 

National Infertility Awareness Week

National Infertility Week is this week. I wouldn't have even known that 5 years ago. That is when this crazy journey began. May 1, 2010 to be exact. 

Infertility is defined as trying and not getting pregnant despite having carefully timed, unprotected sex for one year. It also is getting pregnant but not being able to carry a baby to term. Secondary infertility is defined as the inability to become pregnant, or to carry a pregnancy to term, following the birth of one or more biological children. The birth of the first child does not involve any assisted reproductive technologies or fertility medications. 

As most of you know that are reading this we have secondary infertility. We have a beautiful 6 year old daughter that is our world. After 3 years of trying for a sibling we finally went to an Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE). Before for doing to the RE I went to a standard RE and thyroid and PCOS was ruled out. I just knew there was something wrong yet once again nothing was pinpointed. We waited the long 16 weeks to get into the RE and as soon as she came in she said "you have PCOS" FINALLY a diagnosis that I knew all along yet everyone was telling me no. PCOS goes beyond blood tests. There are synptoms and the condition of the ovaries themselves. I had not even had an ultrasound at that point but she knew. Sure enough at my next appointment the ultrasound showed poly cystic ovaries. David was checked and cleared so essentially our infertility tests on my shoulders. No matter how much you shouldn't blame yourself it is hard not to. Infertility can take you to dark places. Since almost 2 years ago our journey has taken many twists and turns. We started with an IUI cycle, it got canceled because of over stimulation. We did 2 more cycles both were what the infertility world calls BFN (big fat negative). Next we moved onto IVF. In February 2014 we did egg retrieval. 5 days later we transferred 2 beautiful beyond. 8 days later we found out once again BFN. This was by far the hardest because my doctor had no reason why this cycle didn't work. Everything was PERFECT. The next month we transferred 2 more embryos. 8 days later once again we waited for the call with our blood results (I didn't test before). They called and BFP! We were pregnant! Finally our dreams are coming true! We went in at 6 weeks and saw 1 heartbeat and one embryo measuring behind. It was 50/50 if there would be a heartbeat next time. We went back one week later and there was a heartbeat on baby A this time but it was slow. Baby B looked right on track. Then 2 more weeks later we found out baby A didn't make it but baby B looked great. Next appointment was great and our next appointment was scheduled for just over 16 weeks with a new doctor. We were hoping to find out what the baby was, I couldn't get the sinking feeling out of my stomach. We went in and the tech asked if we wanted to know if she could tell and we said of course. She was quiet. Kept taking measurements and I kept searching for my babies flicker on that screen. By this point I was good at reading the ultrasound or at least where to see the heart. She stopped the exam, apologized and told us she was not finding the heartbeat. She went and got the doctor and he confirmed our baby passed within 24-48 hours before our appointment. Our biggest fears were now reality. All we could do is sob. The staff was great. The doctor explained our options and we decided to deliver the next day. I won't get into that but it was November before we were able to transfer again. Once again we transferred 2 embryos and once again BFN! We had 3 more embryos left and I told our dr I wanted them all. They thawed all 3 but only 2 woke up. It resulted in a BFP and we were due to go back December 30 for our first ultrasound. On Christmas Day, 6 months exactly since we delivered our sweet boy into Heaven, as we were releasing balloons I started bleeding. I was on bed rest through the weekend and on Monday we found out I was miscarrying. I don't think we have ever been ready to bring in a new year. We decided we will do one more IVF cycle. We had testing done on both of us for genetics and everything came back normal. We still decided to proceed with PGS (pre genetic screening) on our next embryos. We did this in March of this year. I responded much better then I ever had to injections and we decided to only send 13 of our embryos to be tested (it costs a flat fee for up to 8 then so much each embryo after that). Our of the 13 embryos 9 came back normal. This is completely normal. Once again no we don't have genetic markers that make us carriers for anything. Think about it this way. Not everyone gets pregnant every month they try. It is because of so many reasons but sometimes the egg and sperm don't make an embryo that would be compatible with life and it doesn't implant. Our 4 that didn't come back normal were all not compatible with life. None would have made it out of the first trimester. 

So that is where we are right now. That is our story up until this point. I pray one of our embryos will get to go home and make a take home healthy baby. When will we transfer? That is a decision David and I will make and it will be our little secret. We have a 6 year old who misses her brother more then anyone could ever understand. It is my JOB to protect her. If we tell someone we are transferring it would be her. And we aren't telling her because if we miscarry again I want to shield her as much as possible. The longer she knows I am pregnant the harder it is for her about a loss. She didn't know about the last loss until after and it doesn't affect her like losing William. She wants to be a sister to a brother or sister that is alive. And I can tell you she is the best sister to a heavenly brother that anyone could be! We appreciate prayers as we continue our journey and pray one day we will get to share wonderful news with everyone. 

Be kind to everyone, you never know who is struggling with infertility. I also have to remind myself just because someone has been married for years or because they have an older child doesn't mean getting pregnant comes easy to them. 

If you have infertility please don't feel ashamed. You are not alone. Infertility comes in many shapes and sizes but we are all in this group together. The more we speak out the more awareness will be brought to this. And hopefully one day insurance will have to cover infertility just like they do other diseases. 

Finally something goes our way!

Through our journey to expand our family nothing has come easy. Insurance doesn't cover any infertility so we are in over $30,000 for that. Then insurance didn't cover the genetic testing on William. They also sent a denial letter when we did a preauthorization for our genetic testing. BUT when we got that letter it states that genetic testing is only covered in fetal tissue. But yet it wasn't when they denied it 6 months prior. Well I contacted the lab first and the lady was super helpful and gave me codes I could include in an appeal and said she thought an appeal would be a good idea because all they could do is tell me no that particular test wasn't covered. She said the test they run on fetal tissue is more complicated then the test they run to see if we are carriers of something genetic and for that reason insurance doesn't usually cover that particular testing. Well I filed the claim and got the decision today. THEY ARE ADJUSTING TO COVER THE TESTING! This was a $2000 charge we had to pay because they didn't. So this amount can now go towards our testing (which for some reason we haven't been billed for yet). I am over the moon excited that something went our way. And thanking The Lord for this! 

IVF #2

In February we went for our preIVF blood work so that we could proceed with our IVF schedule. I took 30 days of birth control pills (ironic isn't it) and then went on March 9th for a baseline ultrasound and bloodwork. All was good so I startedy injections that might. I did 225 of follistim and went back on Monday March 16th. Everything looked great and I was progressing right how they want me to be. I had a much needed mom's day and visited friends and meet the most adorable little baby. Tuesday I continued on the follistim and also added ganerelix to keep my front runners from getting too far advanced. I did this Wednesday and after my checkup on Thursday also did this Thursday. And I triggered Friday. Sunday bright and early we checked in to my RE's office at 7am and I was soon taken to my room where they ask a bunch of questions, hook up the IV and have the anesthesiologist come in to address any concerns I might have. Before I knew it I was back in the surgery suite and I went from breathing oxygen to waking up in recovery. My first question of course was how many eggs. There was another retrieval right after me so they didn't have the report yet. Last time I had 19 to start with so I was afraid of I had less I would be disappointed. Well I certainly didn't have less! One of my nurses popped her head in and told me they retrieved 32 eggs! I was very shocked! My other nurse told me they wrote down my prediction number based on my ultrasounds and it was 18! I nearly doubled that! And I felt good leaving the hospital. We got home and I was tired so I slept in my chair and after I got up I felt so bloated. The bloating has continued since then. I look like I am pregnant and that isn't an exaggeration. So not only did I have to go on birth control before starting IVF but now I get to look pregnant even though I am not! What a cruel process. I am trying to get the fluid level to go down and will be watching it very close the next few days because of I gain too much weight I will likely have to go back to the office to be checked for ohss. We will NOT be doing a fresh transfer. We will have any blastocysts that we have tested at day 5 and freeze all embryos for future use. This is a very personal decision that David and I along with our Dr made. We are strictly checking to make sure we have healthy embryos to transfer. Any embryos that aren't compatible with life would result in another miscarriage and we can't put ourselves through that again. When we decide the time is right we will transfer again. But that will be between David and I. Pregnancy is suppose to be a joyful time. We lost 3 babies last year and I know in my heart I will be over the moon to be pregnant again someday. I will also be scared to death. So please just pray for us. Pray for the next year, heck pray for the next two! If we have news to share it will be in our time and to whom we feel comfortable. I can honestly say at this very moment, and since William died, I have no desire to tell anyone. Not family, not anyone. Please respect our decisions. Everyone grieves differently and also handles loss differently. This is how I am handling it. Another way I am handling it is I have recently signed up with Young Living Essential Oils. My kit came with Stress Away and Joy. I planned to use both of these during my IVF cycle. My wonderful friend Brie and her sister Katie also sent me Peace & Calming and Valor. So those for oils are my everyday oils. I also drink Ningxia Red which is made from wolfberries and very high in antioxidants and nutrients. It is very yummy! I am not sure if those or my weight loss contributed to a higher response this cycle or not but I have felt good so that is all that matters. I like lemon in my water and have used peppermint for headaches. I also use oils on my family but I won't get into all of that. If you do have oily questions send me a message! 

I will update this entry with my fertilization reports.

As of Monday March 23rd we found out 28 of the 32 eggs were mature (holy moly!) and 27 fertilized! Our next report will be on Wednesday to see how many have made it to day 3. 

Wednesday's report is in, at day 3 we have 26 embryos meeting their milestones. 

Friday's report is we are biopsying 13 embryos. We have more that could be tested but every one after 8 is an extra $350 so we had to draw the line somewhere.

As of this morning (Saturday March 28th) our official report for our "extra embryos" is 7 that are frozen without testing. We are so lucky to have so many embryos. This is not typically the way IVF works out. 

What was life like before?

I try to think back to 5 years ago. Delainee was almost 1 and we hadn't yet started "trying" for another baby. What was it like then? We just enjoyed her, us, our family? Honestly we can't even remember our lives before all of the stress, heartache and loss. I am not the mother I should be. I get mad too easily and my fuse is so short. I take it out on Delainee when I shouldn't and it breaks her heart as well as mine. Just relax, don't stress about it, it will happen have faith. No matter how much I try to do these things it doesn't happen. We are gearing up for a fresh IVF cycle and I am just worn down. I am ready to throw in my hat and be done. I don't know how we can possibly go through another loss, in the way of a failure or a miscarriage. I also don't know how we move on if we aren't able to carry another baby to term. Delainee talks daily about wanting to be a sister, a sister to a baby she can see and teach things like writing their name. How could I just give up on her? This isn't about just David and I. We did a lot of bloodwork to try to determine why we haven't been able to stay pregnant or get pregnant and nothing new has arisen. I still have PCOS and that is it. No clotting disorders, no chromosome disorders and we aren't carriers for anything. We will be doing PGS testing on our embryos from our IVF cycle to increase our odds by transferring only normal embryos. We know for sure William was normal but we don't know about the other 2 losses. And since they were early losses likely they weren't normal. We need prayers. Prayers for good results from PGS testing (to be done at the end of March) and prayers for a healthy pregnancy if we do have normal embryos. We don't know when we will transfer and likely won't make this public when we do decide but since we are doing PGS it will be a frozen cycle instead of fresh so we can wait as long as we feel we should. Please also pray that we will find ourselves again. The before stress couple that had high hopes for life. 

Ready for 2015!

I have never been more ready for a year to be over. Sure sometimes we have things to look forward to so we wish time away but I am just done with it. I want a fresh start. Our year has been the worst year of our lives. 

So after we had William I had surgery again for retained placenta. We were hoping to do a FET after that. Well my cycle was messed up so the next month. Then my cycle started too late and my Dr would be gone when we would transfer so another month behind! Finally in November we transferred 2 embryos. And we also learned I wasn't pregnant. How could our luck be stuck on terrible no good news still? We had 3 embryos left after this. I talked with my doctor and she agreed to thaw and transfer all embryos. So I prepared for my last cycle. Transfer day was December 5 and 2 of our 3 embryos survived the thaw and were transferred. On December 13 (12/13/14) we found out that it worked. My numbers were much lower then with the twins but that just meant there was probably one. I went back 2 days later and they like them to double in 48 hours and mine was a doubling time of around 32 hours so all was good! I was so scared when they called that it was bad news but it wasn't. I was due to go back December 29 but we changed it to 30th because of a scheduling conflict. 

Christmas started like any other Christmas with Santa, breakfast and present opening. Delainee also made a bracelet for William for Christmas so we were going to send it up with balloons. It was our first Christmas without our babies and also William's 6 month Angelversary. I felt something was off before we went out to let off the balloons but while we were out there the gush came. I rushed back into the house and there was blood. My heart sank. I had bleeding last time and it was just bleeding buy my heart told me different this time. I laid in bed, called my doctor and the bleeding was letting up. She wasn't real concerned because bleeding is very common in IVF pregnancies. My bleeding got worse through the day and I wasn't able to do anything. We didn't even have our Christmas meal. I called the office Friday and they said they wanted to see me first thing Monday to see what was going on and to rest all weekend. Well Monday brought bad news. No baby and my numbers had decreased. I miscarried. We lost 3 babies this year. 3! It isn't fair. Not one bit! And now we are battling insurance to cover testing to see if there are more underlying conditions. If it isn't one thing it is another! 

So as you can see we welcome 2015! The future is uncertain but for now we will focus on health and continue our journey later. It is time for a break to try to find the people we once were.