The same day I buried our April baby, my best friend told me that she thought she was miscarrying as well. She lost her baby, and we were able to be broken-hearted together. When we were ready, we started to try again and we kept each other updated on our cycles. It was a strange gift, and I think we both felt less alone when all of the Fall pregnancy announcements were made.
By February 2017, my best friend had texted me with her happy news! I felt excited, and I had hope that even though it wasn't a successful cycle for us, that we would be pregnant together very soon, just like we'd always dreamed!
Despite all my hope, church started to get really hard. One of my friends who made their pregnancy announcement in the Fall was growing a sweet little bump. As soon as I noticed, I cried (like, embarrassing out loud sobbing that couldn't stop) through an entire service. More and more, the painful reminders of what we had lost were everywhere. It felt like wherever we went, we were the only childless or not pregnant couple in the room.
As 2 more months of unsuccessful trying went by, hope felt a lot less like consistent comfort, perspective, and peace, and felt more like the thing that consistently strung me along and left me to bleed.
Even though at the beginning of each cycle I was convinced I shouldn't get my hopes up, they were back up and soaring by the end of each cycle! I was so sure that each one was "the one".
When my dreams of having our "little turkey" or "little butterball" around Thanksgiving 2017 were gobbled up by reality (See what I did there?), I finally felt desperate enough to call a doctor and get some help. We started seeing a fertility specialist on March 23rd.
Despite knowing that it meant I would have to do some of my least favorite things, (make phone calls, see doctors, get blood work and invasive tests done, etc.) I felt at ease knowing that they would check my hormone and progesterone levels and Rob's swimmers, make sure my uterus was in good shape, find out if I was ovulating properly, and that they would want to know ASAP if I got pregnant so that they could monitor everything! It felt like a big step in the right direction.
That Monday, it was time for the blood work to test my hormone levels. Being someone who HATES giving blood, this was a memorable experience.
Rob, being the sweet husband that he is, drove me to the Quest office. When it was my time, the nurse took me back, saying "We've got a lot to draw, honey!". She started grabbing hand fulls of viles. Right as I thought she HAD to be done, she said she had to get some more from another room! Another nurse walked by, saw all of the viles and gasped.
The nurse came back with the rest of the viles and asked me if I would pass out. Before I could finish the word "Probably!", she got me out of the little desk and asked me to lay down on a bed in the room. She prepped my arm and talked to me through the whole draw. I talked about my fondant job, my husband, my ring, how my bedroom used to be the same lime green color as the interior of the room, and who knows what else! I really ran my mouth, which is not something that I do normally. It wasn't so bad and it seemed to be over relatively quickly. I felt like a rock star when I walked out of there without passing out! They took 15 VILES!
Over the last year, we had lost both of my Mommoms. One of the thoughts that got me through the blood work was wanting to make my Mom into a Mommom, since a life without Mommoms just felt wrong. Our family was way overdue for some good news, and I dreamed of bringing joy to my grieving parents, siblings, and Poppop at the Easter table that year. Success at this cycle meant a December baby, which I joked I would lovingly refer to as "Baby Bertha Jessie Smith" in memory of my Mommoms, who were both born in December!
Despite these joyful thoughts, I felt the weight of all of the sorrow. My life seemed to have turned into a perfect pattern of miscarriage, struggle to conceive, loss in the family, and more struggle to conceive. It was hard not to look around me and compare this season of grief and struggle to the lively and effortlessly happy seasons all of my friends seemed to be in.
Instead of making a pregnancy announcement that Easter, I made appointments for more blood work and another uncomfortable and bloody babyless ultrasound. The specialist talked me through the whole ultrasound and found plentiful eggs! On the day after Easter, Rob made love to a plastic cup and I had dye shot through my uterus.
Egg hunts and uterus dying - A little too hilariously appropriate for Easter.
The HSG test was uncomfortable, but I have to admit it was pretty neat to watch the x-ray screen and watch the golden yellow colored dye flow through my (wonky looking) uterus! I'm guessing that many women don't get to see what their uterus looks like, nor have such an opportunity to go by the name of "the golden uterus".
Take that, fertile Myrtles!
The specialist told us to make sure we definitely try after the HSG test, because it's common to get pregnant after it since it can "clean out" a uterus. I did some premature calculating on the pregnancy app (like I always do!) and discovered that success for that cycle meant that I would not only know I was pregnant by Mother's Day, but I would be due just a few days before my 30th birthday! Hopes and dreams danced in my head!
When the test results came in, everything looked pretty good. Rob's swimmers were healthy, and I had plenty of eggs. The problem? It seems I put the "late" in "ovulate". While my eggs were maturing, they weren't releasing as they should, from what I gathered. The specialist told us that I had a mild case of PCOS and a hypoactive thyroid.
The hypoactive thyroid thing made total sense to me since the thyroid produces the hormones that are needed for ovulation and for supporting a pregnancy. It felt a little sad to know that my body could have been the thing that failed our babies.
I felt at ease as the specialist went through the possible future steps with us. He prescribed Levothyroxine to replace the hormones my thyroid wasn't producing enough of, as well as Clomid to help me ovulate. I started the Levothyroxine right away, and kept the Clomid prescription for a rainy day, knowing that it would mean more frequent visits to the specialist once I started it.
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