Don't Count Your Eggs

Things can be different

I've written before about my parents and how our experience on IF Island may have traumatized them a bit.  And my initially tentative P followed by terrifying moments like this hasn't helped any. But I was thinking about them again today, as I inch towards hitting the 32 week mark. I was thinking about what it might be like for them to now finally be expecting not one grandchild, but two. 

Yup. I'm outing my sister.

Over the summer of 2013, my little sis (3 1/2 years younger) generously donated her eggs to us. It was such an incredible gift and was a pretty intense time for my family. My sis did not stimulate well and some red flags were raised about her own fertility. After we transferred three embryos followed by one last frostie, my RE met with my sis to warn her about possible fertility problems. He recommended she do an egg freezing cycle for herself as she was pushing 30 and not yet ready to start a family. It freaked us all out but she didn't really want to talk about it. I thought this was valuable info for her, but she did not agree. It was overwhelming. And a year went by, she got married, and lo and behold she's about six months P. Her due date is exactly two months after mine. 

My parents were shocked. They were nervous for both of us. For me for the obvious reasons (subchorionic hematoma anyone?) and for her, well, just because. It kind of...just happened, even though she was told there was a good chance she'd have some problems. 

Now that we are both far enough along, I think my parents can finally feel a little more confident. Though none of us are going to be able to fully exhale until fingers and toes are counted, things for my family have changed drastically, in ways none of us could have imagined. 

By the summer, my parents will have two grandchildren. A girl and a boy. And my family will be living proof that:

1) Miracles can happen

2) Doctors aren't always right, and

3) Good things sometimes do come to those who wait (and wait and wait)

Nothing stays the same. This time last year none of us knew exactly how Noah and I were going to get out of the IF rabbit hole we had fallen down, and we were all a little worried that my sis might be following in my footsteps. Now, things are very different. 

Sending lots of Friday love to everyone with a reminder that no matter where you are in the fight, things can and will be different. 

The Shift

Though it was a beautiful weekend in La La Land (sorry to everyone on the East Coast or places around the world that are covered in snow), Noah and I spent much of the weekend indoors, watching down the first act of our documentary. 

It's a very rough cut, but it chronologically shares our introduction to the world of ART, and somehow, as raw as everything felt at the time, watching it back felt like it was so long ago. 

I remember when we interviewed various IF Island "survivors," like Kalle and Herbie and the lovely Tammy and Candace and Tommasso, and David and Lisa, and Sarah and Hardy-- they all talked about how infertility will one day be in the past. How things won't feel as intense and desperate. Some of these folks ended up adopting or using donor eggs. Some were told they had 0% chance of getting pregnant and then did, unassisted. Some were successful with IVF. But all of them said similar things about having the memories of the experience living on IF Island, but feeling so different once they had their kids. I think it was my friend Lisa who assured me that once I had my kid I would hardly remember the details. I'm not sure if that's going to be totally true for me, I think I'm more like my friend Candace who said that adoption is not a cure for infertility, but it is a way to create a family, and a way that has worked out amazingly for her, as her baby boy (now walking) is 100% her baby boy. 

But I do agree that there is a shift that happens once you're able to hop aboard the life boat off the Island. Watching myself get excited to start IVF in 2012, thinking that was the cure, the solution to the almost two years of insane charting and obsessing, was...I can't even think of the word. Noah and I were so hopeful. I was planning my twins and we just figured though IVF sucked, this was what we had to do to make a baby. We never factored in the idea that it might not work. Once it didn't, and we started scrambling with IUIs and then moved to my sisters donor eggs, we faced a very different reality, and it was scary. We didn't know if the insanity would ever end.

But it does. It did. And for many of you still out there on the Island, it will. Now, at 31 weeks P with Momo, our donated embryo, I've started to feel the shift. Though I know bad things can happen in the next 9 weeks or so, I'm also pretty confident that this baby girl is meant to be in the world, and I refuse to even consider negative outcomes. The feelings of fear and sadness and all that accompanies IF Island life aren't there anymore. I've officially retired reading my infertility books and am now reading about mindful birthing techniques and trying to figure out what baby gear is essential versus what will just clutter the house.

The IF Island survivors were right, things do change even though it feels like they never will. I hope that gives hope to those still in it and gratitude to those who can look back in retrospect. 

Happy Monday everyone. Have a beautiful week. 

 

A Better Birthday--Finally.

Wednesday was Noah's birthday. It was just another weekday work day for both of us, but it made me a little emotional. Birthdays on IF Island are often hard. Feeling celebratory is hard. Having extra cash for fun times and cool presents are hard. And for me, another birthday meant another year ticked off living in the insanity of infertility and another year of fertility youth gone. I'm still not down with the term "advanced maternal age" and how quickly my medical charts and my doctors attitudes went from shrugs about being 30 or 31 to concern about being an "elderly primigravida." But enough about me. 

Noah's birthday was simple but felt so different from his other birthdays because I wasn't struggling to wear a smile. We were both at ease and feeling grateful. On his birthday last year I spared him of coming with me to my sonohysterogram. I think that was my gift. You're welcome, Babe. We were preparing physical and emotionally for embryo donation and uneasy about what it all meant. The year before that we went to Vegas.

January 2013 we were really broken after our first unsuccessful IVF cycle. Our IVF disaster ended in late 2012 and my aunt generously sent us some money with the caveat that we had to spend it on something fun-- not medications or bills. So for Noah's birthday we drove to vegas where he quickly lost some money betting on football and then won it all back and then some by putting a chunk of chips down on 21 at the roulette table. 21 is his birthday number and it turned out to be quite lucky. Vegas was a welcomed break from our lives that my aunt knew we desperately needed, but we did have to come back home to figuring out what we were going to do next.

This year there's nothing really to figure out. I got up from the dinner table about four times to pee, and every time I walked back towards Noah, happily eating his steak, he smiled. He smiled at how I needed to squeeze past other tables, and how far I had to pull out my chair to sit back down. My rounding body (which he  sweetly compared to a snowman and one of those kong dog toys-- dog lovers, you know what I'm talking about) is the best birthday present he can have right now.

So we ate our meals and headed home feeling like normal people. A normalcy I never thought I'd feel again after being tossed around IF Island for so many years. 

Wishing everyone a beautiful weekend. 

Super Bowl vs. Birth Class

Soooo--- as some of you might know, Noah is a huge Seahawks fan. He's from Seattle (like Momo) and not only loves the team but loves the support of the fans, the 12th man. Yesterday the Hawks played one of the ugliest games we've ever seen. Noah was silent through 90% of it (we were also watching with a handful of friends who are all Packers fans), but his eyes were glued to the TV. The Hawks were sloppy and messy and blowing opportunities, but the fans held strong through the rain--cheering as their blue and green face paint dribbled down their cheeks. Then in overtime, some how, some way, the Hawks won. They won the NFC Championship and will head back to the Super Bowl in two weeks. 

Noah and I were stunned. How was this possible? Everything was going wrong for the team. Guys were being intercepted, they were losing the ball, they were being clobbered, and yet, in the end, when it counted, they pulled together and pulled through and walked off with a win. 

I don't want to compare this game to our years of infertility treatments, but then again, I kind of do. Only to make the analogy that sometimes the road is ugly and bumpy and anxiety provoking and you can't fathom coming out on top-- but then you do. A win is possible. Even when you think there is absolutely no chance. I have a friend who put in a hail mary embryo-- her last FET--which looked--not so good. She was researching egg donors the day after her transfer, gearing up for what she thought would be her next step, but instead she had an uneventful pregnancy and last week gave birth to a beautiful baby boy. As Noah always says don't stop believing (sometimes, when I'm lucky, he sings it).

Now, the Hawks will play in the Super Bowl on the same day (and time) as our first birth class. Whoo hoo! I couldn't think of a better dilemma to have. I told Noah he can skip out on the first class but he wouldn't dare-- not just because he knows I'll give him a hard time about it (jokingly) for years to come, but because he wants to be there to help figure out our exit strategy. We've spent so long focused on getting something (someone) in me, we haven't really given much thought to getting her out. With ten weeks to go (let the count down begin!) we are starting to think about all these things. While some P friends who got to their current disposition easily express feeling overwhelmed by the issues surrounding a new baby-- like what to register for, to save cord blood or not to save cord-blood, choosing the safest car seat-- Noah and I just aren't that stressed out. All that matters is that Momo blasts into this world safely and that we have a way to get her home without being arrested for having a baby on my lap. And maybe a cute outfit. 

Noah and I never stopped believing that one day our lives would shift from measuring out hormones and injecting them into my belly to thinking about car seats and breast pumps. Well, Noah never stopped believing. I had my moments of doubts--- of feeling so buried in the despair of infertility that the light at the end of the tunnel seemed so faint. But the light was still there, my 12th man was still there, and deep in my heart I knew my baby was out there somewhere, I just had to find her.

Sending much luck and love.

Things Do Change

Yesterday I was sitting with my good friend/co-worker in her office, like we've done a million times over the past few years, and she said something about how different it is now. Something about how amazing it is that things have changed so much. I knew exactly what she meant. For years, the edge of the dinky couch in her office, right near the box of tissues, is where I would cry my eyes out between clients. Remembering what it was like to go back to work after an unsuccessful cycle or in the middle of a cycle that wasn't going well was awful. Sitting on that little couch feeling like I've hit rock bottom over and over was torture. This particular girlfriend has really been through it all with me, and the morning after a BFN or something heartbreaking, she'd be there to listen and help me gather myself enough to do my job.

Yesterday, I sat with my round belly, on the edge of that dinky couch, picking through a bag of mixed nuts and feeling happy. It dawned on both of us how different things can be. How things really do change, even though when you're in something terrible, it feels like it's never ending and there is no way out. It's true that nothing stays the same. 

Through the years of IVF and IUIs I couldnl't fathom a moment where I'd be 29 weeks P eating mixed nuts with my homie at work. I couldn't see past the dark cloud and as much as I tried to imagine brighter moments, it was hard. Now I get to live in those moments, as simple as they might be, and relish in the beauty of knowing how lucky I am. Little ol' normal me! 

We on IF Island take nothing for granted. I'm constantly amazed that the heaviness I carried around in my heart for so long is now a heaviness in my belly that has arms and legs and a heartbeat. People ask me if I'm ready for this baby to come. Ummm....never been more ready! We don't have a nursery, I  haven't decided on a baby carrier, we don't have a pediatrician, but we don't care. We are ready. All the things that freak out your average P woman don't really freak me out. None of that stuff feels like it matters all that much just yet. 

All that matters is that what seemed completely impossible for years is now a very real possibility. I hope that's hopeful for others out there. 

Is It True? Am I really "normal"?

On Friday, the high risk doc I saw used a word to describe me that I haven't heard--ever. Normal. 

Normal?

As I waited in the ultrasound room, belly up, I thought about all the possibilities. I knew Momo was in there, because she is learning to break-dance in my stomach currently, so the fears of her not having a heartbeat or something terrible weren't there. But I wondered about my body--the hematoma, the placenta, my cervix--I tried not to think about words like abnormal or incompetent, and just waited for the doc to come in. My story had been prepared. I can get the recap of this pregnancy out of my brain through my mouth in about three minutes, and prepared to do so, but as I started telling the doc about my history he said, "Stop. I don't want to know. I don't read your records. I don't care about what happened in the past. It isn't relevant and I don't want it to skew what I see today."

Ummm. Ok. I looked at him blankly in silence. You don't want my perfectly scripted speech about bleeding and ER visits? You don't want the 90 second version of  years of infertility hell? You don't want to know the few things I know about Momo's genetics? You don't care about the number 23 as a starting beta? I've got some good highlights man! 

He said, "As far as I'm concerned you're a normal pregnant person and I'll tell you exactly what I see."

Fair enough.

He did another anatomy scan measuring Momo's bits, which were all there in perfect order. Head measuring on time, belly a little ahead of schedule, kidneys, hearts, nice long legs (thank you 5'11 egg donor)--- The idea that she came from this...

...still completely boggles my mind. 

He measured the amniotic fluid and my cervix and said that everything looked great and that I can consider myself a normal pregnant person. No hematoma in sight. No need for any kind of bed rest (unless it's self imposed). My eyes started to water. Normal. I couldn't think of anything else I'd rather be called.

Noah still wants me to be careful until 32 weeks. I'm super clumsy and awkward so I doubt I'll be doing too much for the next few months, but I don't have to be scared anymore. Well, obviously I'll still be a little scared, but I can be less scared, and I can really let go of my story-- my beautifully abridged traumatic recap of the pat seven months. I can close that chapter.

Many of us on IF Island carry our stories close to our hearts. We don't know any other way. But perhaps what is most important is to look at ourselves and our bodies in the now. I'm excited that a handful of people have commented about being in the very early stages of a P after years of infertility--that's an anxiety provoking time, but remember to be in the moment with it. Prior losses and bad situations don't determine current outcome. Many people are gearing up for another cycle, or trying to figure out what to do next-- also extremely anxiety provoking, but remember that each new cycle is a new opportunity, and the past cycles don't dictate the present. 

Sending luck and love to everyone out there, wherever you are in your journey.

 

Not Exactly What We Imagined

We all have fantasies about how things in our lives are "supposed" to go. Or how we want them to go. Or how we wish them to go. For many of us who are lucky, some of those things actually happen. For the majority of us, there are also things that come up that we never expected, never fathomed, never could have dreamed. They're life's curve balls. Some of those curve balls lead to pain and sadness, others lead to excitement and happiness, and then there's everything in between. 

I was thinking about this when reading one of the comments from an fellow IF Islander on a previous post who said she had a really high first beta and recently found out she's having twins. HOW EXCITING! For many reasons-- to finally get a BFP or a double BFP I should say. To get not only one baby but two! I really wanted twins for a while. When we transferred three embryos from my sister's donated cycle, I was preparing and getting myself excited for twins, knowing it might be a little rough but then you have an instant family of four and don't have to think about where to get a sibling. But I also know that twins were never what I imagined for myself, and this women who is now expecting twins might not have expected it either. We on IF Island are so grateful for any good news, but sometimes the news might take some adjusting to.

Many of us on IF Island have been thrown a major curve ball, and while we are excited when solutions or opportunities start to come together, there may also be some mixed feelings. Some of us may be having our babies after years of treatments via surrogacy or adoption. Some of us may be giving birth to babies not genetically related to us. Some of us will have multiples and struggle with the absolute blessing that is mixed with the anxiety of a higher risk situation and the physical/emotional/financial aspects of having two or three or more babies at once. Some of us will need to plan our family expansion differently and might have kids closer together than what we might have hoped for. There are so many possibilities of things working out...differently than expected.

Different can take some time to adjust to. Different can mean a mixture of happy and sad and coming to terms with certain feelings. Different can mean beautiful opportunities. Different can be ok if we let it be. 

The bottom line is few of us live out the fantasies we created back in childhood or high school, so that means periods of adjustments and acceptance. Accepting then embracing our journey to parenthood is the only way we can continue to move forward.

Happy Friday everyone! I'm heading to the perinatologist with my Mother-in-Law who is in town and will hopefully have a good Momo update soon. 

Back To Reality

I saw a new OB today. Not exactly by choice, but because my insurance changed in the New Year, and while the "old me" would have freaked out about having to change doctors 28 weeks into a fairly stressful pregnancy, the "new me" tried to just go with the flow. I really liked the doc and am happy with the new hospital we will deliver at. So all is fine. Sometime there are external situations that just are, but how we perceive them and deal with them is what makes or breaks our attitude and feelings. 

It was interesting to try and give the Cliff-notes version of our pregnancy story. I printed out some of our medical records (there were over 300 pages so I chose the juicy parts and then highlighted and color coded for the doc, even though I know that gives away information that I am type A and anxious and slightly nuts).

Then I told him our story-- trying since 2010. Questionable tubes from an HSG and a questionable laparoscopy that was disproved by a second HSG. DOR. Started IVF in 2012. One unsuccessful cycle. Poor responder to meds. Started 2013 injecting the maximum amount of meds during IUIs. No go. Sister donated eggs summer 2013. Transferred 3 embryos. BFN. One frozen transfer at the end of 2013. Zilch. Transfer of donated embryo July 2014. Very low starting beta. Subchorionic hematoma= bed rest. It resolved. Then had a scary ER visit with a bleeding previa = round 2 of bed rest. Then had another hematoma = round 3 of modified bed rest. Now I've been doing well and am planning on going back to work tomorrow! I'm on a part-time schedule and feel like I'll be fine. I was hoping/expecting (not sure why) for this doc to tell me I was all good and a "normal" P person, but he wants me to see a high risk doc on Friday. That's fine. Better to be cautious. 

After I rambled through our story, the doc looked at me and said, "So this is a true miracle baby," to which I replied, "Yes. Yes she is." 

And things will kind of go back to normal, hopefully, for a few months. Both big bleeding situations have happened while I was at work, so I am working on letting go of the fear and sense memory of those incidents so that I can just go back, go slow, and be fine. It's funny how the body and mind really hold onto fear and memories of fear. I keep telling myself fear is about the future, and I don't know the future. I just know what's happening right now. In this moment. In this breath. 

Sending lots of love to anyone who went back to work this week after a little time off. 

2015! It's Official!

2015. 

Wow. 

Why does the year sound so futuristic? 

I kind of have the urge to write a similar post to the one I wrote at this time last year-- about letting the past year go and starting with a clean slate. 2012 and 2013 really sucked for Noah and I. Plain and simple. The years just sucked. When you have years of your life that feel overwhelmingly terrible, it's sometimes hard to imagine that the next year can be different. But it can and it will, and for us, 2014 (though much of it was spent in bed for me) was much better. 

In 2013, I went through a yoga teacher training around the time my sister donated her eggs to us. It kind of saved my life and helped me find a physical, emotional and mental strength that I felt I had lost over the years on IF Island. Having not done any of the physical practice of yoga since June 2014 because of all the P complications, all I really have had is the mental practice, which emphasizes being present and mindful.

Living on IF Island, my brain often turned into a cyclone of repetitive obsessive thoughts that just circled my mind. It was a constant rotation of fearful thoughts, to-do lists, wondering if the next procedure would work, worrying about the cost--round and round it went. The best I could do was find moments of being present, of being in my body, of being calm. But often they were just moments of relief because feelings and unknowns on IF Island are so intense, it can be really hard to just be. My yoga practice really helped me cultivate the calm and learn to sit with and be with whatever was happening, and over time I've gotten better at it.

Now, at almost 28 weeks P (OMG, seriously?!) I find myself in moments of overwhelm about birth and baby stuff. I'm happy to be overwhelmed by these things but at the same time, it can make your head spin. But if there are a few things I've learned over the past few years, it's that some how, some way, everything is going to be ok. It is. I've learned to pause. And to breathe. And to appreciate what I have. I've learned to let go of sadness and to imagine my heart healing so that I can love myself and my life and my baby-to-be fully. I've learned to be open and to embrace whatever lies ahead because I know it will only make me a stronger, kinder person. 

I don't know if I would have learned these lessons had we not gone through all we've gone through. If I got knocked up one night, there's no way I would have grown in the way that I have. While I wouldn't wish infertility on anybody, I do know for certain that when you're finally spit out the other side you have a personal growth that would be really hard to acquire in any other way. You have skills to tackle the difficult decisions in life and confidence that you can conquer your own fears. 

So let's be fearless in 2015! Wherever you are in your journey to parenthood--coming off an unsuccessful cycle, gearing up for your first IUI, coming to terms with third party reproduction, in the middle of hormone induced madness, or newly P after ART, let's all make our new years resolution be to embrace where we are. To experience it all fully and mindfully. To breathe and be present. And to let go of the fear and the what-ifs. 

Rock on 2015! Bring it!