Tag Archives: two week wait

BOO! The Trickiest of Treats Has Arrived!

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halloween reveal #2

JQS-12 weeksI can tell…..you all look like you just saw a ghost right now, don’t you!? ;)) Well, what better time to announce our incredible news than on our favorite holiday, right before our one year wedding anniversary?! Yes, it is true! Chris and I are thrilled to announce I am in my second trimester and our son is due April 20th, 2015!

Seems our little egg is the trickiest of treats and found his way into our Halloween goody-basket unassisted and earlier than we had anticipated. Let’s just say, we already know he has a mind of his own and clearly does things on his own time (which I already predicted.) Unbeknownst to us, little Nugget had already made his way to us as we sat in our fertility specialist’s office on that very first appointment back at the beginning of August. Because it was very early, it wasn’t until a couple of weeks and six pregnancy tests later that we discovered he was on his way. Ironically, the one month we completely ruled out the possibility of conceiving due to poor timing with me in Vegas for work, did not deter this super baby. Apparently one time, 3-4 days before ovulation was all it took. He decided to chill out and just wait. This one is a keeper. He wants to be here.

While we were completely floored and thrilled (and in shock for a good day or two,) this also meant that Nugget clearly wanted to go to Italy with us as well. Not the trip we had anticipated, my little man granted Mommy no appetite all week, nausea, narcolepsy and an embarrassing display of motion sickness over the side of a boat in front of The Blue Grotto in Capri. So, instead of feasting on Limoncello, wine and endless bowls of pasta all week, I opted for ginger ale, bread, gelato and the occasional bowl of pasta when I could keep it down. All well worth it……

In a nutshell, the first trimester was filled with more fear and anxiety than morning sickness. While I do have the acne of a 13 year old boy, the nausea, bloating, gas and exhaustion has subsided and was bearable in hindsight. I really cannot complain as I’m sure others have had far worse first trimesters than I. Besides my food aversions and craving only watermelon, grapes and red apples, the first trimester for me has been more about how to not lose this baby. Though clearly, what will be will be, while I wish I could say I have been enjoying this time, I’ve been more fearful about waking up to cramping and seeing blood on my underwear. A normal reaction for anyone who has miscarried, I honestly just kept waiting for this little one to “disappear.” Every morning I would wake up and think, “I wonder if this is it.” But, at the same time, somewhere deeper, I knew this kid wasn’t going anywhere and I had to quiet the clutter going on in my brain. I had to start enjoying this, or the time was going to pass me by and I would have missed it all.  I’d be lying if I said it was easy and I still don’t fear the worse in the back of my mind, but, I choose to focus on the positive from here on out.

Superstitious to tell people or even dare to look at any nursery items online the first three months, with every sonogram, every blood test it would only just reaffirm him proving me wrong. He was sticking around and making himself comfy in there. I think it really hit me after my Maternit 21 and NT Ultrasound came back negative. It all became real and I’ll never forget that night in the living room, standing there on speaker phone with the doctor as she told us the good news on the test results and watching Chris stumble back into the wall with surprise hearing we were having a boy….It is one of the greatest, happiest moments in my life. I will never forget it.

Now as I ease into my 16th week, I’m starting to enjoy things much more. I’m dealing with the weight gain and all the changes going on in my body and am embracing it all. My belly recently popped and I just love it. So does Chris (as does he love my increased boob size as well.) Most importantly, I am starting to feel more at ease that this time will all be OK. We are over the moon excited, feel extraordinarily blessed to have conceived by “spontaneous conception” after all (as documented by my OB) and are ready, loving and living for this ride we are on.

While this blog started out with the intention of chronicling my fertility journey, I transition now into my pregnancy journey. During these last couple of months, part of me felt as though I lucked out and didn’t endure enough to get to this point. I guess a bit of a guilt -complex set in that I should have struggled more to earn my war badge like so many others must. I do hope however, if in any small way, I will serve as a bit of inspiration and proof to those women still reading that miracles do happen and can and will happen when the timing is right, one way or another……..So please, keep the faith and let’s see where this journey leads all of us!

Until next time…..Happy Halloween & wishing you all 1 Good Egg in your goody bag too! xxx

 

“Lending a Hand”: A Husband’s Perspective

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By Chris…..a.k.a “The Brit”………

When my wife first suggested writing a blog to retain her sanity as we set out on our fertility journey, I couldn’t have been more supportive of the idea. “Great idea!” said I, “Go Balls-out;” not knowing at the time I was going to get drawn into becoming a contributory writer. Then again, I should have known better. Have you met her? Hmmm, of course you have……. so you know what a strong minded woman she is.

I’d put off writing this for some time, why? I have no idea. Perhaps it was the thought of putting my own personal life out there on public display even if it was only to a limited group of family, friends & acquaintances, but deep down I knew that having nodded compliantly some months ago there was no going back. So here it is. The middle aged alpha-male perspective on all this!

I guess, subconsciously I’d never really given much thought to having kids of my own, even as most of my contemporaries were having families, I thought of myself as “Will”, “Cool Uncle Will,” like the character Hugh Grant plays in the film “About a Boy”. I still considered that I had plenty of time for all that sort of thing but the truth of the matter was, that as much as my wife’s body clock was ticking, the realisation set in that mine was too! I finally recognized that I didn’t want to be a geriatric dad, but at the age of 42 maybe that’s exactly what I would be. Granted, my wife & I couldn’t have met & married any earlier & our entire journey has been as fast-tracked as it possibly could have been. So, nonetheless, these were the cards we’d been dealt, but with that, my own fertility was brought starkly into question and that was something I’d never considered before!

So, as my wife & I sat in the reproductive endocrinologist office considering the prospect of IVF treatment, the topic of conversation turned to focus on me.

“And of course, as part of the pre-screening, we’ll ask your husband to provide a sperm sample for all the usual testing. Just make an appointment at the front desk to tender the sample on site”.

Now, I should say at this point, I’m not naively Neanderthal to think I wouldn’t be required to do this, but I suddenly gave thought to how it all works. I envisaged a white padded room, with plastic chair and pornographic literature from the 1960’s. I’d been in pressure situations before but this was something else. How could I be expected to perform under such conditions? I needed mood lighting, scented candles, privacy & a snuggle rug along with my iPhone.

“Alternatively, ask the nurse to provide you with a sterile receptacle on the way out & you can work from home, but remember the sample has to be dropped into our office within 45 minutes.”

Phew, now this was much better. Plus, I had the added benefit of my wife being “on hand” to help out.  Anyway, when the time came, my delivery was modest to say the least and my male ego was sufficiently bruised in front of my ever supportive wife, even though we did laugh about it afterwards! If that wasn’t disconcerting enough though, it was nothing to the embarrassment I experienced upon getting to the clinic in order to make the “drop-off”. Expecting to be first on line as the doors opened at 7.30am, I was greeted by a packed waiting room full of the opposite sex. I nervously fumbled through my work bag for the sample and felt a bead of sweat form on my forehead as I sheepishly told the admin girl, “I….. I know it’s in here somewhere!” Needless to say, I handed it over & completed the receipt forms before sheepishly dashing for the nearest exit.

Now that I’m through with the comedic element of all this, there is a serious point to make here. A couple’s fertility issues are something that need to be managed collectively & sympathetically by both partners. The one thing I’ve learnt on the journey thus far is that it’s vital that both individuals listen to one another every step of the way & really hear what the other is saying, but it’s equally important that you give each other space to rationalize each other’s private thoughts over any given issue. The fertility journey requires us to make huge decisions; often with a sense of urgency about things we never previously considered and these thoughts can weigh heavily, especially when the final outcome can last a lifetime.

I remember one afternoon when my wife & I were looking even further ahead and discussing the possibilities of egg donors, sperm donors, surrogate mothers or even the prospect of adoption. As an engineer I’m conditioned on solving the immediate problem at hand & I never try to get too far ahead but during this particular discussion I began to wonder if that route really was for me. Could I be a good father to a child where only half the gene pool emanated from one side of our marriage? This was huge and I have the utmost respect for those who have the courage to pursue this part of the journey, but the question remained……. was this for me? At the time of writing, I’m still undecided!

The more I debate the issue in my head the more I begin to realize it was my acceptance of an intrusion into our relationship that I was questioning. In my experience, it’s rare to find two people in their late 30’s or early 40’s these days that are getting together and don’t have children from a previous relationship. My wife & I were different here. The fact remained though, instead of creating something new borne out of our relationship, I might be forced to accept that we’d have to open up our lives to something from outside. It wasn’t so much as to whether I could do it as to whether I wanted to. It was somehow an invasion of our intimacy.

The one thing I now know is that I’d need a lot more time to wrap my head around this because the decision isn’t mine alone & whatever I decide affects wifey too. Ultimately, our family unit is the most important thing to me & given that we both have so much to offer as prospective parents, I think I’d eventually be entirely accepting of whatever our journey turns out to be.

Jackpot

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“Papa can you hear meeeeee……..?!”

Those are the words that replayed through my head as we sat in the waiting room during our first specialist meeting. My heart was racing. My palms were sweating. It took everything in my power not to squeeze the last ounce of blood out of Chris’ hand as he signed every last bit of paperwork;  which made me fear we might actually be so poor after this venture that we’ll have to sign away the rights to that very child we are trying to have.

Just as I was about to get up to pee for the 2nd time in ten minutes or have a coronary from nerves, whichever came first……there he emerged. It was like something biblical; a religious moment. He parted the partition doors the way Moses parted the Red Sea. People weep when they see the holy land, I wept when I laid eyes on him. I immediately saw his welcoming smile as I heard him call my name, but all I saw were heavenly white lights that surrounded him as if he was going to lead us to that very promised land……..I then was able to draw my first breath that morning.

We had hit the mother-load. There he was, in all his fertility specialist glory. An adorable, young, Jewish, yamaka wearing, Harvard educated miracle worker leading US into his 27th floor, all-city view office ready to check my eggs. MY eggs!! I was honored. I felt prouder than his Jewish mother probably did the day he told her he was becoming a doctor. More thoughts raced through my head from the short walk to his office than the 45 minutes it took me that morning to decide what to wear and how to do my hair so I might appear younger; hoping it would therefore lead him to give me better news about my eggs due to my youthful appearance. All I kept thinking was, “If this guy can’t get me pregnant. Nobody’s going to.” I will go so far as to say I was ready to break out into a rendition of “The Bottle Dance” from Fiddler to entertain him or bring  him a beautiful brisket next time if it meant he was going to make this happen for us. Yes, I am not above bribery at this point. If I’m going to go down, I will go down swinging.

Within the first five minutes, I was in love. Within the first ten minutes, I think the blood returned to my body. Within the first fifteen minutes, I felt more reassured than I have in months and he hadn’t really said anything of consequence yet. An hour and a half in his office, he spoke to us like human beings. He was kind and thorough and funny and never once spoke down to us. He explained things in laymen’s terms so we understood everything and was honest about where we were at. He was confident and hopeful and his positive outlook……well, his positive outlook made us feel we could have a positive outlook too.

He stressed how he was not too concerned with my pesky FSH level of 12 and because my AMH was above the median for my age meant that there was a reserve there. Now, we don’t know what the viability of that egg reserve is yet, but he did stress nobody’s eggs are ever all bad, even women in their 40’s. As I’ve come to understand from my new best friend, in the last few years, a lot of doctors are now turning to the AMH level more than the FSH level because there is a chance for moderate fluctuation from cycle to cycle. The AMH is more constant and doesn’t really vary. That number is what it is. He was confident that if he repeated the blood work it might have even gone down to an 8 next time. So there we were……..OK….*“insert even bigger exhale.”

As he continued and told us he didn’t really expect too many surprises to surface from my impending HSG (aka tube & uterus check test) or Chris’ semen analysis (oh yes, get ready for that blog entry coming up soon……that will be a good one,) he confessed that with our history, the way things are looking on my lab report and the biggest prognostic factor being that I was just pregnant, he wouldn’t be surprised if we wound up doing this on our own if we gave it a few more months.

But…..first….the dreaded internal sonogram. Good times.

My poor husband should receive a medal for his bravery that day. As he anxiously watched me undress to get examined, he was like a helpless child trying to do something to help me, standing there, waiting to take my pants and underwear to lie neatly on the chair. (This really is no different when he wants to get lucky, though he is not as anal about folding them and laying them on a chair.)

Cut to the chase…..Dr. Mazel Tov showed us everything and in fact I not only had 1 or 2 follicles, I had 6 on the right and 5 on the left! Just one short of a dozen!! Go me!

But of course, because it’s me, I couldn’t just be left to bask in my follicle joyfulness as I stared and recounted each dark circle on the sono. That would not make for interesting reading folks. Of course there has to be a small, potential red-flag. Although preliminary, it is appearing that my uterus might be slightly misshapen. Not to be confused with a tipped uterus. This is different. Mine is appearing as a “partial bicornuate.” In other words, what is also called a “heart shaped uterus.” My uterus looks a bit like two devil horns coming out from either side. –(I could go to so many places with the devil horn thing right now, but I’ll leave it alone. I think those of you that know me are probably already chuckling at this.) So, while he appeared to not be overly concerned by it, my HSG will tell us more as to whether it is insignificant enough to just be left alone or whether I will need a surgical procedure to correct it. Either way, the doc said it is not something to stress over. (Yeah right……surgery on my uterus, sounds awesome. Sign me up.)

As we finished up and spoke about options we might consider after our tests and procedures are completed, he was quick to say that no matter what we choose to do, he would like us to wait until after our upcoming 2nd honeymoon to Italy. Because we “fit the profile” of couples who go through all the preliminary testing and then wind up calling him to say, “Never mind….we’re pregnant,” he is optimistic. But, he also does not want to start any kind of drug protocol until I’m home and can be monitored. Fair enough. Here’s hoping though. He said to go and enjoy vacation and we’ll take it from there upon our return. He said we can even choose to do nothing for a few months. So, who knows, we might be able to make-a-little-meat-a-ball or-a pizza-pie on our own….and if we don’t, we now have a plan to come back to and feel we are in the best, most capable hands. We might end up homeless after our insurance coverage runs out and we start paying out of pocket, but hey, one day at a time for now….it was a good first visit.

And there you have it. Chris and I walked into what we hoped would be a lucky gamble and we walked out hitting the proverbial fertility jackpot of doctors. Lucky 7’s , Triple Cherry’s across the board.

Thank you, Dr. for giving us some tikvah.

Yasher Koach.

 

The Decision to Put Out.

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          Writing this blog has been something I’ve been toying with for the last few weeks. While it’s been frustrating since the miscarriage in January waiting to conceive again (and honestly more like expecting to conceive again since we got pregnant on the first try,) the new-found knowledge that my eggs are in question has made the situation even more pertinent. So, instead of just waiting for the miracle of life to happen naturally, receiving the information that may not happen on its own has put me in a very different head space.
          This journey is extremely personal. It’s a lot of information that a lot of people might question why I’m putting out there. Quite frankly, I questioned writing it myself and spoke with Chris at length about whether I wanted our lives out there and why. The truth? I just hope it helps. I hope it helps me to get my emotions and thoughts out there so I don’t sit around and brew and feel sorry for myself. I hope it inspires others. I hope it teaches people that infertility is prevalent and it’s nobody’s fault. I hope it creates dialogue. I hope it fosters support. I hope it makes relationships stronger. I hope it makes us laugh and show there are funny moments amidst struggle and I hope at the end of this journey, I have these writings to show our “little egg” how much he was wanted and how much we were willing to endure to get him here. 
          As with anything I have done in my life, I either do, or don’t do. I did it in my professional dance career, I did it in grad school and I still do it now when I teach. A good dancer doesn’t mark. Everything is full out. I either will put myself out there 110% or not at all. So here I go. What I will say is as hard as this situation continues to get, I am the luckiest girl to have a partner who listened to my thoughts on starting this blog, sat there at the kitchen table and said I should go and do this “balls out” and write from the heart, uncensored. So I thank “The Brit” for letting me expose him, for being my rock, my biggest supporter and my partner in crime who I take this baby-makin biz with seriously. We are a team. Me and you. You and me. No matter where this roads leads us. I may have been more fertile, with ripe, juicy follicles at 25 where the egg pickin’s were endless, but you were a piece of the puzzle that needed to be filled before this baby was meant to be. I believe that I needed to wait for you. So while all those puzzle pieces align, the timing is optimal now, no matter what those numbers on a lab report say. Everything in our relationship and all that has fallen into place for us has been ruled by the stars and angels above. This will be no different. With this struggle, we will love and appreciate this baby ten-fold when he arrives. Neither of us is afraid of adversity and even in weak moments we will be OK. That much, I know.
          So….that’s why I’m putting out; my writing that is, figuratively speaking. I am scared, excited, hopeful, anxious, ready, filled with dread, doubtful, faithful, fearless, optimistic, pessimistic, trusting and forging ahead. Lately, I have often been caught saying to myself and others,

“I can do this. I know my body can do this at least once. I feel it. There’s no way I can’t conceive and carry at least one healthy child.”

          I have been so tightly wound to control this situation and even though I have never felt so good physically, mentally and spiritually through the practice of mediation, prayer, acupuncture, Chinese Medicine, exercise, rest, summer days at the beach, great sex and de-stressing, the truth is, ultimately this is not in my control. There is a reason having a baby is called a miracle. There is a point where science ends and faith must take over. As my dear friend Simone recently pointed out,

“I hear you keep saying ‘you can do this.’ ‘You know your body can do this at least once.’ Jess, when you realize that it’s not YOU that’s going to make this happen and release it up to God, let him do his thing and trust….that’s when you’re going to get pregnant.”

          This has stuck with me for the past few days. I know it’s completely true and nobody has said it better. Now….here….. is where I try to make a conscious effort to control the things I can control but worry a little less and trust my angels above. Through my writing I hope to find a peaceful place of acceptance and get ready for this baby we can’t wait to meet.