My infertility journey

My name is Heather. And this is my infertility story.

I never in a million years would i have thought that I would struggle with infertility. This is by far one one the hardest things I’ve ever gone through. If you are going through this you are not alone.

I am 26 years old, I met my fiance in high school but it wasn’t until we both have graduated that we started dating. Right from the beging I knew that this was the man I wanted to spend my life with. He was everything I wanted, handsome, smart, hardworking ,and funny. On our one year anniversary he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him, without any hesitation I said yes! We were so happy, soon after we bought our first home and started talking about kids and our future. We decided that I should get off birth control, since I have been on it since I was 12 I figured it would take awhile for me to get pregnant, but when a year passed and I still wasn’t pregnant I started to worry. Was something wrong with me? We decided to make an appointment with my gyno. They did a routine exam and did blood work, they determined that I have PCOS witch is polycystic ovary syndrome which they explained made me not ovulate, They also suggested getting my fiance tested to make sure all his swimmers were okay, since he had cancer at age 10 and went through radiation it was a fear of ours that he may not have any. The test came back that he had a very low count. But since there was any at all it gave us hope. But with both of our fertility issues the doctor said our chances of conceiving on our own was very unlikely, he didn’t want to say impossible but he implied it.

We basically had two options if we wanted to have a baby with both of our DNA. And that was IUI or IVF. For those of you who dont know IUI stands for inter uterine insemination, which is basically the “turkey baster” method. And IVF is when they give me hormones that make me produce more eggs and then retrieve them using a needle and combine my fiance’s seman and my eggs and wait for them to form an embro and then put them directly into the uturus.

After thinking about what was best for us we decided to first try IUI, our doctor advised us to only try this once and not to waste to much time on the method.

I was schedule to do my IUI 3 times and each time the fertility doctor we were working with canceled for unknown reasons. We then got a letter in the mail saying our doctor retired and we were getting referred to another clinic. This was very frustrating .

When we finally got into the new clinic (it took 3 months to get an appointment) we basically had to start from the beging.

When they took my fiances seman analysis they told us he had NO sperm. Our hearts broke, how could this be? The other doctor told us he did. I demanded to get another test, and they set us up with a urologists.

3 months later, we got into the urologists who confirmed they my fiance indeed has a low count and low mobility, but has better days then others witch would explain why the last result was that he had 0. The urologists explained that IUI would not be a good option for us and if we wanted to have a baby together we should do IVF.

Now a year and a half later we are waiting to being our IVF journey.

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I’m pregnant…

I still can’t even believe I am writing this. Let’s start from the beginning.

On Saturday July 19th we had our first FET. Right after I noticed I was extremely tired and I slept the whole hour and a half car ride home, as soon as we got home I crawled right into bed and slept untill 6pm when my fiance woke me up and told me to eat something.

About 4 days after my transfer I started noticing I was crampy, it wasn’t to bad it just felt like I was going to start my period, we had our pregnancy test on day 8, I was so nervous I thought for sure the cramps meant I was going to start my period.

When we received the call with the news I just burst into tears, I couldn’t even believe it. I honestly didn’t listen to anything after the words “your pregnant” I ended up having to call the doctor 3 hours later to ask them what they said, they laughed and said it happens all the time. They told me I am 4 weeks pregnant which I find amazing because I thought I was only 8 days since that was how long ago I had my transfer. Our first ultrasound is on our 6 week mark and we can’t wait ❤️

Transfer update

I’ve been putting this off but it’s been 3 weeks since my transfer, a couple days before I was supposed to go for my pregnancy test I woke up with my period, I called the doctors and they advised me to come in for a pregnancy test, they later called me and gave me the bad news.

Yesterday I just received the call aproving me for our first FET, me and my fiance are in the middle of selling our home and buying a new one and I’m nervous to move forward with this cycle due to the potential stess of selling and buying a home. My doctor informed me that many of their patients bought homes while going through IVF and ended up getting pregnant and it’s all in how I Handle stress.

I also looked into transfering 2 embroys this time to increase our chance of conceiving but apparently my insurance will not allow me to untill our 3rd IVF cycle, that doesn’t mean 3rd transfer it means the entire cycle from the shots to the retrieval and everything.

I’m still trying to stay positive and hoping to avoid as much stress as possible some days are harder than others

Retrieval update!

On the day of the retrieval I was anxious and alittle nervous only because I have never been under anesthesia, but the doctor informed me it is a very mild anesthesia, the nurses were so nice and made me feel very comfortable and calmed my nerves. The procedure only took about 15 minutes and when I woke up for some reason I couldn’t stop smiling, idk why maybe it was because I was relieved it was over, or maybe because I just took the best nap I’ve ever had 😂, but probably because I was feeling good from the anesthesia. After the procedure I didn’t feel any dicomfort or cramping untill about 20 minutes later when I stood to change out of the hospital gown into my own clothes. The cramping wasn’t bad at all if anything I would explain it more as a weird empty feeling, definitely barrable. Within 10 minutes after my procedure the nurse came in to let me know they retrieved 15 🥚s! I was so happy with this news 😊 2 days later the clinic called me to let me know more great news, out of those 15 eggs they made 9 embryos! I’m so happy with the results! My transfer day is on Saturday 🤞 please send prayers my way! And lots of baby dust ❤️

Egg retrieval!

We did lupron injections for the last couple weeks then started the gonal f injections untill yesterday we got the call to stop them both and do our trigger shot!

I’ve been very crampy for the last week, the doctor said I have what they call “kissing ovaries” whitch means they are so big they are touching eachother whitch explains alot since I’ve also had back pain, hopefully it means I I have a lot of eggs 🤞🤞

We have egg retrieval tomorrow and I am so excited and anxious at the same time! But mostly I am just relieved to have a break from all the shots my belly is so bruised I look like a pin cushion 😝 hopefully this will be all worth it ❤️

Peices falling into place

Finally I feel like I have something to look forward to, after over a year of test we are starting our IVF journey!

I am on the first step which means I just started taking birth control, I am on the 5 day and need to take it for a total of 22 days. On April 16th I am starting my lupron injections, I am very nervous but excited at the same time 😊

My fiance already gave a back up specimen that we decided to freeze just incase on the retrieval day his specimen are not good.

We also had great news that he is not a carrier of cystic fibrosis, this is a relief since apparently I am a carrier.

And on the 25th I have an appointment for an ultrasound, if everything looks good we will be on the the next step.

Results

So we got our results back from the seman analysis where they used dye to check if the seman were alive, and it turns out 55% are alive! This is great news and we are so happy, this means we can move forward with IVF!

However the urologists we are working with advised us to freeze a couple samples before our egg retrieval just incase the day off his sample isn’t good since it varies so much.

Set backs

So today I got a call from our urologists saying that we need to get my fiance’s seman tested again because she is afraid that the seman he is producing may not be alive since he has such low mobility. If his seman are not alive then it means we can not move forward with IVF.

This is so frustrating it just feels like it’s one thing after another, everytime I think we are getting closer to starting our IVF journey the doctor calls with bad news.

First they say he has 0 sperm, then at last appointment they said that he had 200,000 sperm and that its low number but good news because it only takes one, now a month later (without even giving another sample) they say they think that those 200,000 “might” be all dead? Why give us hope in the first place to just take it away.

Now next step is to set up another seman analysis were they dye test the sample to see if it’s alive, fingers crossed that everything goes good 🤞🙏

Struck a nerve

I need to vent for a second..

So me and my fiance are they type of people who usually keep our personal life private, only a handful of people know what we are going through, I’ve mentioned to him before about telling our families because I feel that extra support cant hurt and some days when you just want to give up it’s nice to have a support system.

Each time he said he didn’t want them to know. The only reason I could think of for him not wanting them to know was because he’s ashamed. This breaks my heart, for anyone going through this just remember you not alone and there is nothing to be ashamed of, you are a warrior you you got this! I got to the point that I didn’t want to upset him anymore so I stopped asking to tell our families.

Well since we have not tied the knot yet (we have been engaged for 4 years and haven’t picked a date yet) he is still on his mom’s insurance. We get all the medical bills to our house but apparently one got sent to hers and she took it upon herself to open it.

Now this is where I get mad, instead of texting or calling her son and telling him she is here for him she instead decides to tell him “don’t rush things, everything happens for a reason and it will happen naturally.” This just hit me deep and I could see how upset it made him, now I know why he didn’t want anyone to know.

It took everything I had not to take his phone and tell her off, to explain what we have been going through and the toll it has taken on him and that this isn’t helping and if shes not going to be supportive than just mind her own business. I just reminded my self to stay calm and not let it bother me. But all the advise I get from other woman going through this is to eliminate toxic people from your life, but what if it’s your future mother in law..

Waiting game

One thing that I’ve noticed while going through this infertility journey is that everything feels like a waiting game.

Wether it’s waiting for blood work to come back , waiting to start your period so you can get more tests or even just waiting for your next appointment.

So far this is what I hate the most, I’m the kind of person who needs a plan, without one my mind just spins.

This consumes my life, it’s all I ever think about. But I keep telling myself in the end it will all be worth it. Because I WILL be a mom. All we can do right now is wait, and have faith.