Our fertility story

Update- I am still pregnant ;) no new news! This post is about our journey to get to this point. Everything looks great still with the babies and we are on track for making it to the scheduled C section in just a few short (long) weeks!!

 I’ve  wanting to write this post for some time now and decided today, when we are just weeks away- or less!-  from our lives changing completely would be a good time. I want to write this post for a few reasons. One, to reflect back on the last 3.5 years and see how much we’ve grown and changed and two, to maybe encourage someone or the very least let someone know they aren’t alone. I also want to be able to read back on this years down the road. Pregnancy loss  and infertility are one of the most lonely things you can experience in the moment, and if this blog can help at least one person realize they aren’t alone, I would love that. This is going to very long, just to warn you :-)

Tom and I got married in September 2014. It was the perfect day! After that, we got the typical “when will you start a family” questions. We knew we wanted children but had kind of talked about maybe trying after a year of marriage. Fast forward to June 2015. I was at the gym working out and the workout really killed me. I was by no means a fitness junkie but was going to the gym 2-3 times a week and I’d be tired but nothing like this. I remember just feeling “off.” I took a pregnancy test in the middle of the night (what better time to take one, right?! Ha!) and it said positive! Wow, totally unexpected. I woke Tom up, haha who was so confused! We were terrified but excited! About a week later, I started bleeding.. a lot. I laid down on the couch for a bit and when I got up, I felt a lot of blood. I called the nurses line ( I was only 6 weeks along I thought, hadn’t even seen a dr yet to confirm my pregnancy) and they told me to come in the ER right away. We sat in the waiting room for two hours- the longest two hours of my life- while I bled through pads and just knew it was over, almost before it even began. We finally got called back and they confirmed, I had miscarried. There were so many emotions. Just a week ago we barely had pregnancy on our radar, so go to from such a high to such a low was really difficult. I was able to pass the baby naturally, no need for surgery or anything. After that, we decided we were ready to start a family and so we began “trying” anyone who has ever “tried” for a baby knows how stressful and NOT fun it is.

After about a year of trying with no success. we decided to go take a break and go on vacation. April of 2016 we went on a second honeymoon to the Dominican Republic for a week. It was awesome and just what we needed!! After we got back, we started trying again and still, nothing. Fast forward to January 2017, we decided to see a dr to make sure everything was alright. We had our first appointment in Jan and both had some standard tests, where everything came back normal! That was great news but also left us in the same spot, with no real answers as to why. We didn’t love the dr or clinic but decided we’d stick with it. Long story short it didn’t work out at that clinic, so in April  of 2016 we decided to see a fertility specialist who gave us the same diasgnosis, “unexplained infertility.” Meaning no medical reason as to why we weren’t getting pregnant. They recommended IUI, intrauterine insemination, which is where they give the women hormones to stimulate the ovaries, to make more eggs. and then take the males sperm sample, clean it and get any bad swimmers out, and insert it into the women through a catheter. This is a much cheaper, less invasive option than IVF. We signed our lives away at the clinic at at the pharmacy, staying we knew the risks and that we understand we would be at a slightly higher risk for multiples (hahaha, looking back on that!!!)

We started the first round in May of 2017 and were hopeful! I started taking Clomid and had frequent clinic appointments for monitoring my ovaries via ultrasound. Two weeks after the first procedure I had a blood test to test for pregnancy, and it was negative. Ugh. That one hurt. We knew there wasn’t a super high success rate, but even so we were hopeful it would work on our first try. Nope. So, we did another round of the same. More hormones for me, more appointments and more waiting. Our second blood test came back... positive!! I got the call at work on a Friday afternoon and I was so thrilled!! About an hour after I got the call, I started bleeding... heavily. I left work and went home (we were living with my parents at the time in the process of building our home) and laid in bed, crying because I just knew. Second pregnancy, second miscarriage.  By this point, many of my friends were pregnant or on their second child, and it had been two years since our first loss. I was very discouraged. We met with the dr Monday who did a blood test to confirm the loss and started talking about next steps. We loved our fertility clinic and our dr. Anyone reading this going through something similar— make sure you love your dr!! You will spend a ton of time with them and it’s so important to trust them and like them. If you don’t like them, leave. We left our first OB clinic and was so happy with moving on the fertility dr!

Since had now had two pregnancies and two losses, we were diagnosed with “recurrent pregnancy loss” on top of “unexplained infertility” ironic, right?! Can’t get pregnant or stay pregnant. This was a really hard time for us as so many things were in limbo. We were living with my parents (which was amazing actually- they were SO supportive and it helped for me to have my mom to talk to) so we didn’t have a real “home”, Tom was switching jobs and I was especially struggling with the second loss. It felt so unfair, how could my body not do what it was designed to do?! The clinic did more tests with us, blood tests and some internal exams for me, and everything came back “normal.” Again. Which was great but still frustrating.. we did another IUI in August of 2017, negative. Another one in September of 2017, also negative. By this point we were almost ready to move into our new house so we took a much needed break. I was hormonal from being on all the drugs and it was just getting exhausting. We moved in Oct of 2017 and took the rest of 2017 off to enjoy the holidays and our new house. It’s hard to take a break, though. As much as I was relieved to be off the hormones, and have some of my life back, we also weren’t getting any closer to our goal of becoming pregnant, so it was still a really hard time for us.

January of 2018 we decided to give IUI #5 a try. By this point, I was over it and we were starting to talk about other options. Adoption, or even IVF. However, because of our insurance coverage through the state where I work, we had excellent coverage on IUIs and nothing covered for IVF. At our clinic it would cost us about $40,000 for IVF. A young couple, married for about three years, who just bought a new house.. we definitely didn’t have that kind of money! So, IUI #5 it was. Honestly I had a negative attitude about it and was not feeling hopefu at all. But, on Toms 31st birthday, I took a test and it was positive!! We were so excited but also scared. Pregnancy loss takes so much of the joy out of pregnancy, it is so unfortunate. Days went by with no bleeding, and each day brought more hope. We made it further than we had before. and were excited. I had two ultrasounds at my fertility clinic and all looked great. Then, I started bleeding. Insert panic!! We went to the ER who told us that my hcg levels were decreasing and I was likely miscarrying. Again. I was devastated, and REALLY mad. That was one of the lowest points for me. I remember just being so angry. I hated it. I continued to bleed. We scheduled an ultrasound with Our fertility clinic the next week, expecting the worst. To our shock, my hcg levels had INCREASED and I was still pregnant..... what?! Talk about an emotional roller coaster. The fertility clinic found what’s called a sub chronic hemorrhage in my uterus which is basically a blood vessel that has popped and can cause bleeding in early pregnancy, but the baby was completely fine and I was still pregnant. We couldn’t believe it. We “graduated” from the fertility clinic and made an OB appointment. We were on cloud 9, this would be our first time getting an ultrasound like a “normal” pregnant couple! We went in and within minutes heard the words “I am not finding a heartbeat.” Wait. What? No! You have to be wrong. But, it was true. We could see on the screen a blob, our third baby, not moving at all. That was one of the worst moments and I’ll never forget hearing those words. The tech left us alone to process and Tom and sat in silence. We couldn’t believe it.

We met with the dr that same afternoon and she gave us two options. One, to let the baby pass naturally, or two schedule a D & C where they would go in surgically and remove the fetus. I was so disgusted with my body and so angry I just wanted the baby OUT. So we scheduled the D & C for the next morning. I was put under and didn’t feel a thing. I remember waking up and just feeling empty. We had the fetus tested for any chromosomal or other abnormalities to see if we could get
any sort of answer as to why this was happening. Again; the results came back normal. Which in the long run is what we wanted to hear but still, so frustrating. We also got the news that the baby was a boy. We had a son. It was so hard to process. To this day I’m not sure I am glad I got that information or not. We named the baby (kept the name just between Tom and I) to get some sort of closure. It was tough. By this time; it was mid March and we were at a complete loss of what to do.

We did some additional testing with the OB just to make sure we had covered all our bases. By this point I just felt like a giant science experiment, with no one really knowing what was going

on. After they did bloodwork, they noticed my clotting time was a little off, so they referred me to a hematologist where I gave more blood. That also came back at the high end of normal. During this time we did two more IUIs (number 6 and 7) with the OB which were both unsuccessful. We decided
to go back to the fertility clinic and were strongly considering IVF. We met with the dr who looked over our charts again and thought we should try one or two more IUIs, but if I got pregnant to add in blood thinning medication in the form of a daily shot. Didn’t sound like fun but at this point we were willing to try anything and we still had the awesome insurance we had, we decided to go for it.

We began the cycle and I took the drugs. Again, I wasn’t very hopeful. The dr wanted to schedule a phone call with us mid cycle and I was so anxious! Turns out, my body had responded SO well to the meds that I created 5 follicles (eggs) that were mature and could possibly become fertilized. This is virtually unheard of, and she wanted to confirm we wanted to go ahead with the insemination. Without a doubt we said yes. I mean we had nothing to lose we thought! :) We went ahead with the cycle.

Two weeks later, I had my blood test. I was so nervous! I was at work when they called and they said congratulations, you are pregnant. I had heard these words before so my first instinct was actually terror- not excitement. She then told me my hcg levels were VERY high and that they wanted to repeat the test in 48 hours. So, I went back and 48 hours later my numbers had doubled  and then some. They wanted to schedule me for an ultrasound as early as possible. On July 16, 2018- my mom and I went to the ultrasound. (Tom had just started a new job so my mom came with me- there was no way I was going alone, and she was so excited to step in. She has been incredible throughout all of this and I am SO thankful for her! She will make the best grandma ever!!) anyways- I’m the waiting room I was in tears, so nervous. It brought back so many feelings and I was still healing from the loss just three months prior. I got called back got settled.... instantly on the screen, 3 little pockets popped up and we knew. (My mom had a “feeling” I was having twins so she had spent time googling ultrasound images before the appointment so she could tell right away what was on the screen, hahaha. Gotta love her!!) TRIPLETS!!! My mom was giddy, laughing smiling and clapping while I was speechless (after one choice word - I think you can all imagine what that was. #keepintreal.)  I was terrified!! Here I am just trying for one baby and now We were thrust into a high risk situation with three?! What would we do? How can we afford this? What was Tom going to say?! (Spoiler alert he also had some choice words ;) )  The nurse and my mom calmed me down enough so they could confirm dates and measure everything.. but it was happening. I was pregnant, with triplets.

This was a lot longer than I intended but I am glad to be able to share our story. It’s been a journey of highs and lows. Many of you have been walking through this path with us and I can’t thank you all enough for your support and encouragement through all of this. I never thought I’d look back and be thankful for every step of this path. I believe it made us a stronger couple. We learned how each other grieves and it’s very different, but have been able to come together and give each other what we need. This took time, at times hurt feelings. and a lot of patience. We are taking our parenting roles head on and are excited to finally have our dreams come true!! We have no other choice as we will quickly be outnumbered! ;)  if you find yourself going through anything similar, please make sure you reach out to someone. My friends, family and therapist were crucial to getting me through this. Lean on your people, one day they will need you. <3