Not Easy

There's a certain amount of guilt associated with going through IVF. Especially when it's "your fault". My wife, several years younger than me, had (and still has) a perfect bill of health, while the onus was (and still is as far as I know) on me. In other words, my infertility lead us to IVF, and as a consequence, my wife had to be subjected to several weeks of torture including injections, pills and insertions. My role was to donate on the day of egg retrieval, sit back and do nothing else but support the wife.

She's been a real trooper though. She hated needles a couple of years ago, but since having so many injections and blood tests she's become an authority on pain. After all the that, she'd still have to make the inevitable phone call to the nurse on the day of the pregnancy test, only to find out that once again, we'd failed to conceive. There were times I thought, perhaps we should give up and just be satisfied with a happy marriage. Let's face it, a life without kids is not all bad. There's less responsibility and you get a good night sleep. You get holidays by yourself and you can actually save money. 

But my wife wanted to continue. For all our troubles (particularly my wife) we've had one chemical pregnancy and one early miscarriage. More often than not it was a "not pregnant". But you have to be in it to win it, right? Of course you do.

So we continue to pursue our dream of being parents. My wife puts up with the drugs, injections and emotional strain.

I just be the supportive husband. Of course, I don't show my pain. I don't show my sadness for her. I don't let her know how watching her suffer hurts me. I can't. I'm male.

Coping With Failure

OK, this is the first time I've written about my IVF journey online. My family don't even know that my wife and I are going through this process, possibly until now, and since we're at the most crucial stage in the process, I couldn't help but write down my feelings.

For anyone going through IVF, the process is difficult both emotionally and physically. My wife and I started over a year ago  now, and so far we've had two stimulated cycles for 7 embryos. The first 6 failed. Of those 6, one was a "Chemical Pregnancy", and that was the highest result we'd achieved. Until now. Last Friday we got the results of our 7th embryo when my wife had her blood test. She is in fact pregnant. We were so happy at the time, it was like a giant weight had been lifted. 

We now go through the agonising 3 month wait to make sure it progresses. So that's the reason for this Blog.

I'm going to make an entry every day for the next three months. I've roughly calculated how many days until the three months is up. Let's assume my wife is two and a half weeks pregnant (edit: we've been officially told we're over 4 weeks pregnant). Let's say 91 days for the trimester. Take off 16 days (Edit: 29 days...). Here we go...

Friday 10th May

62 days to go...

We get the news. My wife is pregnant. We made the Nurse say it twice. She was (almost) as happy as we were. My wife has to go back on Friday to get another blood test to make sure it's progressing and the levels are going up. You'll have to forgive me for the lack of technical talk here. I know it's something to do with the hormones.

Told my work friend when I got back to work after lunch and she was absolutely thrilled. Then I told my employer and co-ordinator (a nurse too). They were thrilled too. Unfortunately they were waiting for the news and I couldn't lie to them. They know about the failures I have. Mostly, they know all about the IVF process we're going through because they're the ones who allow me to have the time off work when I need to. It's also nice to have some support. However, I'm also superstitious. I would prefer nobody knew until after the first trimester. A worry.

Saturday 11th May

61 days to go...

Lazy day after a sleepless night. My wife also didn't sleep. I laid awake thinking about all the good things and the bad. The "what-if's". Almost drove myself crazy, but was happy to give up sleep with the knowledge my wife was pregnant.

Sunday 12th May

60 days to go...

My mind went muddled today. Many doubts and negative thoughts. Must stop it.

Monday 13th May

59 days to go...

Happy to go back to work today to keep my mind off the whole thing. Feeling in the need of reassurance, I had my wife call the Nurse to get some clarification. My wife's hormone level was 51 on Friday. It's supposed to double every 72 hours. The next blood test is  Friday. The Nurse is still very enthusiastic about my wife's pregnancy. I thought the two week wait before the first blood test was bad. This is harder. We need to get through the first trimester without any complications. Then we should be home free.

Tuesday 14th May

58 days to go...

Today wasn't too bad. The wife is very confident. I can't display to her how I feel though. There's still that part of me that's negative. 28 days will be on Friday. That's the day of the second blood test to see if the hormone level is going up. She hasn't had any cramps or spots, so it's promising. She  usually gets them for about 5-6 days before Aunty Flow. Looks good.

Wednesday 15th May

57 days to go...

Not a good day today. I made the mistake of consulting Dr. Google for information about miscarriage and early pregnancy. Not to mention HCG levels and the problems and so forth. My wife, as mentioned, gets her second blood test on  Friday and it's essential that her hormone levels double each 72 hours. This means that after a week it should be a high number. Of course, the important thing is it's going up, not down or remaining static. 

I find that I'm at work looking at the clock all day. It's getting hard to make the time go by. However, on the one  hand I like the current feeling "we're pregnant", but on the other hand I don't want a test to tell my wife she is "no longer" pregnant. I can't help it, I've always been a negative person. Anyway, I can't handle being at work, but then again, if I was at home I'd be more of a nervous wreck. I wonder what tomorrow will bring. I just have to remain positive. I know it, but it's not that simple.

Thursday 16th May (5 Weeks Pregnant Today: OFFICIAL).

56 days to go...

Firstly, I had to edit the numbers again (see above). My wife and I were worried about the 28th day being up tomorrow. So far she hadn't had any cramps, spots or otherwise, so we thought she would get to the end of they cycle without a period. Usually however, she get it after 19 days, so 28 days would be a miracle.

So I'm miserable at work this morning. All the what-if's etc. Then when I got back to work it occurred to me: 28 days was a week ago. It's actually 35 days. They calculate a pregnancy from first day of Aunty Flow. That was 35 days ago. So it's been longer than the 28 and heaps longer than the usual 19. Today she still has no signs of spots, bleeding or cramps. We're winning. But I don't want to get too excited, after all there's 56 days to go until we're at the end of the first trimester. Tomorrow she gets the blood test to see if the hormone level is going up. If it's not, we're in trouble.

Friday 17th May

No more days to go...

I started the day at work feeling confident. It'll be OK, I thought. At 8am I broke away from work and did some googling. Mostly what I found was strangely optimistic. All we needed was for the hormone count to go up.  Just so long as it wasn't going backwards or stopped. Following that, work was particularly difficult. Nothing to do with the anticipation of the results, just a hard day.

I got home and my wife was waiting. We made the call to the nurse to get the results. We got the machine. She was busy. We kept trying. Busy. My wife left a message, but unfortunately I had to go back to work. My wife texted me the results. The hormone count had gone down to the startling figure of "1". We lost the baby.

I was OK for a few minutes, then it hit me. Fortunately I have a good employer at work. She knew what I was going through and was also effected by the result. She sent me home to look after my wife. It's over for now. A disappointing conclusion. We have to go a new, full stimulated cycle again. We weren't going to do it straight away, but after a few hours decided it would be the best option. We're so close.

3 Stimulated Cycles: 7 blastocyst embryos: 5 negative results: 1 chemical pregnancy: 1 miscarriage.

We move on.