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. 

Sweet Wlliam

Sweet Baby Boy-

I can not believe tomorrow is the day, the day you were due. It has been over 5 months since I felt you move. I miss you every second of every day, we all do. Delainee talks about you all the time. She misses you so much. She is truly the best big sister and you are so lucky to have her. I just wish she could see you like you can see her. I wish she could hold you, feed you and smell that sweet new baby smell you would have. I wish I could see your daddy holding his baby boy. I just know you would look just like him. That cute chin dimple and big blue eyes. We prayed for you, we wanted you and we waited for you. Now we miss you even more! I should be up at night either feeding you or because I am so pregnant my bladder feels full every 20 minutes. I wish I could wake up and you would be here with us. One day we will meet again in Heaven, what a glorious day that will be! One day William I pray that you will be a big brother and watch over your baby brother or sister. It has been a long and hard road and continues to be and it makes me miss you more and more. I will always wonder what happened, why your little heart stopped and why you couldn't live with us on earth. Why after everything you were just gone. We will always remember you! Our lives will never be the same without you but I am so glad we had you, if even for a moment. I pray you are playing in dirt and combining corn in heaven as you would on earth. Watch over us sweet boy. Give your twin a hug for us. We love him/her so much also. I am sure Baby White welcomed you with open arms when you arrived in Heaven. Please be with us this month as we celebrate Christmas with you here.

Love you so much babies!
Mamma

Should be...

Tomorrow I should be 34 weeks pregnant, but today is 4 months without my William. I should be nearly finished Christmas shopping so that I don't have to worry about doing it a newborn. We should have done family pictures of our family of 3 for the last time with me pregnant. Instead Delainee had her pictures taken today and we didn't do family pictures because the thought of it made me sad. In 6 weeks from tomorrow will be William's due date. In 2 months from today we should be celebrating Christmas as a family of 4 or 5 but instead it will be 6 months since William went to heaven. I will get to decorate an angel tree instead of a nursery. My life before William was filled with dreams of our someday baby. Now it is what should have been. I will miss my babies every day. If only I could turn back time and feel William move one more time. Or if I would have recorded his heartbeat I could listen to it now. 

Pictures from Wave of Light. There were many candles lite for our babies and their angel friends and I am so thankful for those people that remembered. 

Our candles for our babies and many of their angel friends. And one for the many more Angels in heaven! 

We also relieved this beautiful rose to let us know they remembered our babies! Thank you Nancy and Kevin!