Ready, set... hang on a minute

Sometimes it’s easier when tricky decisions, the ones where you really don’t know which way would be best, are taken out of your hands. I was in a dilemma a few weeks ago about whether to push to start our IVF this month, which the Dr thought might just be possible, or wait for my next cycle.  However the nurse he spoke to about fitting me in this month was off sick for a few days meaning this decision was taken out of my hands and I’m now definitely going to start next month, in approximately 28 days’ time.  It’s hard to have the prospect of another 4 weeks waiting in front of me, I know 4 weeks should seem insignificant in relation to how long we’ve waited so far but it’s just so torturous, trying not to get your hopes up, knowing that all this anticipation may be for nothing at all except disappointment and tears.

How do you answer the question “How do you feel when you’ve forgotten what normal feels like.”

I feel sometimes that these as these last 3 years have passed me by I’ve forgotten what feeling normal is.  They certainly haven’t been 3 entirely unhappy years, I’ve managed to hold myself together reasonably well and make the most of my childless life to a reasonable extent but there’s always this cloud hanging over me. There's a darkness lurking somewhere down in the pit of my stomach, usually tucked away, but ready to strike with a moment’s notice when something catches me off guard. 

I was doing one of those silly Facebook quizzes the other day that asks “Which Winnie the Pooh character are you,” but it crashed before I finished so I said to Matt in jest “I’ll never know what character I am now!” and he told me, not in an unkind way, that I was a Eeyore.  I was actually somewhat mortified at the time and out of interest watched a couple of videos on YouTube of Eeyore quote before I realised he’s right!  This video kind of sums it up…

Even when somebody tries to say something positive and encouraging, like perhaps about the possibility of the IVF working all I can think in the Eeyore voice in my head is “it probably won't work anyway.”  The thing is I’m sure I didn’t always used to be Eeyore, I’m sure I used to be much more happy and bubbly and care free, perhaps not a Tigger but at least a Christopher Robin or a Pooh Bear!  It just seems that this infertility problem has clawed away at me, dragged me down and down until I don’t really remember who I used to be.   Even cooking lasagne this evening I was making it and wondering what it would be like to make it for my children and feeling sad about it, this sadness invades everything.

Before you say, “You should be thankful for what you have,” please believe me that I am thankful every day.  I work on an Intensive care unit and  constantly see a stream of people facing tragic circumstances, believe me I know how to be grateful for what I have and I thank God daily for the amazing husband and home that I have but the relative difficulty of others situations doesn’t make my own pain go away.

I know I will feel better some time,  I just keep trying and trying to find a way of making that time now so that I don’t throw my life away in the meantime. 

But there is light

Last week I saw 2 of my cousins who I don’t see very often  both at the same time.  Unfortunately the reason I saw then was the tragic death, at just 52, of a very dear Uncle and we met at his funeral so I feel rather guilty reflecting on how helpful it was for me to see then, of course if I had the choice I wouldn’t have but as it happens I did and seeing them did help me. I’ve come very close to emailing one or other or both of them over the past 3 years  because I knew they’ve both had fertility problems.  There’s no particular reason that I never did but I found it comforting to know that they’d be there if I needed them.  They’ve both struggled with fertility problems and found their way out of them in different ways, one through a complex series of IVF and the other through adoption.  They are through the other side and both have beautiful, thriving little boys who are full of energy and life and for me seeing them and knowing that helped to give me some sense of peace.  Matt and I know that we’ll take our 2 cycles of NHS funded IVF and any frozen cycles that may be possible and if that doesn’t work we’ll adopt. So seeing 2 people who’ve both found different answers helped me to reflect that whatever may come there will be a light at the end of the tunnel even if the tunnel is too bendy or has too many crossroads to see it yet.

Waiting

So for now it's just a few more weeks of waiting, our next appointment is 17th March where we should get our plan and drugs... Sigh, more waiting, I wish I could say I was getting good at it but that would be a lie!  

Crying and Cake

We had our first individual appointment (after the group seminar – see the ‘Sad Club’ entry) on Friday. It was about 45minutes long, the consultant went through our medical history, what tests we’d had, their results etc, it was pretty straightforward.  I’d asked at our group seminar  that if by this appointment I was on day 10 of my cycle whether I’d still be able to start my treatment this cycle – treatment usually starts on day 21 so I knew it would be pushing it but on that occasion the Dr didn’t seem to think it would be a problem.    When I asked on Friday it was a different Dr who said this was very unlikely, it made me feel both a bit silly for hoping and desperately disappointed at the prospect of another months wait.  I know you’d think that when you’ve waited over 3 years one more month shouldn’t be significant but somehow it  seemed a devastatingly long time.  The consultant could see I was upset and stressed and had a chat with one of the nurses to see if it would be possible to start this cycle and with a bit of tweaking to drugs he said it could be done and a nurse would call me this week to discuss it.  Having said that I’m now not sure what to do, starting this cycle involves more drugs and feels rushed.  Also, though one of the reasons I gave for wanting to start this month was that I’ve planned my shifts for starting sooner (because I waited longer than expected for the referral to be sent from the hospital), I haven’t been able to plan things as well as I would have liked in terms of getting time off at the crucial stages.   So the logical, sensible part or my brain is telling me to wait another month but the emotional, desperate part of my heart  is telling me to start sooner. 
 

So having had a straightforward appointment and been offered the choice of when to start my treatment it’s difficult to say why I spent 2 hours crying afterwards.

Somehow that appointment just made everything hit home for me.   It got me thinking about how difficult the next year might be, the appointments, the hormones, the pain, the potential for heart breaking disappointment, the reality that if this doesn’t work I’m going to have to come to terms with never carrying my own children.  The realisation that I might never get to experience  being handed my baby in the hospital for the first time and seeing the look of love in Matt’s eye’s.   I got myself into a really spiral of sadness.  We know that if the 2 cycles of NHS funded IVF don’t work we won’t pay for any more so this year feels like it’s going to be ‘all or bust’, and when finally faced with starting that journey the  weight of it all got the better of  me.  I know there’s  potential for unbelievable joy just as much as for pain, it’s pretty much 50/50, but I know that getting my hopes up could prove a dangerous business.

A few hours, a hot bath, a cupcake and several cups of tea later I managed to pull myself together.  It should be made law that every fertility clinic be near a cake shop, or in our case a Waitrose that provided us with some yummy cupcakes after our appointment on Friday, I sense we may be visiting there a lot over the next few months.  I know  this won’t be the last time I get overwhelmed by it all and there’s going to be a lot more tears but at least for now I’ve lifted myself back onto an even keel, even if my balance is somewhat delicately held.

Sad Club

We’ve now had our first IVF appointment, a group seminar talking us through the process of IVF in general terms.  They do this as a group seminar, presumably because it makes business sense to do this as a group rather than repeat themselves over and over to each couple, they can then use the next appointment to focus on our individualised plan.

Longing to go to a place you never wanted to be  

 

It’s difficult to say exactly how I felt when I arrived at that appointment, we’ve been trying for 3 years and for about 2 years or so, since I began to realise that there was a good chance that getting pregnant naturally may not happen for us, IVF became both a worst case scenario and a light at the end of the tunnel.  We never wanted to end up in this place, but at the same time I’ve been counting down the months to be allowed into the one place that offers some potential escape from the misery of infertility.  So I was a complete mishmash of emotions when I arrived and I felt quite emotional as I walked in, still struggling to believe that this day had arrived, both because I’ve been waiting so long for it and because I never thought I’d end up there. 

Sad Club 

 

When we got the letter through about the seminar Matt immediately labelled the group sad club and that’s what we’ve been calling it since.  I had expected a bigger group, perhaps 10 couples or so but it was actually just 4 couples in a little room.  As everybody arrived and sat in the waiting room in separate couples everybody whispered together in their pairs either trying to make conversation about something else or wondering what was going to happen next.  There was a kind of unspoken shared understanding between everybody and we went and sat together in a little seminar room.  We had to wait for a few minutes for the Dr delivering the seminar to arrive and nobody said a single thing either to their partner or to each other but just sat in complete, miserable, silence. After all what exactly would be your opening line? “So what bit of you doesn’t work properly?” “How much organised sex have you had over the last 3 years?”   

Blood Test - I'd rather have done it the fun way! 

Well it seems that our chances of getting pregnant the fun way have all gone and now starts the series of blood tests, injections, invasive exams and mood altering hormones.  Before the seminar each of the women had to have a blood test.  When I mentioned this in advance to Matt his first response was “I don’t have to have a blood test do I?!” Bless him,  he is terrible with needles, I never realised just how terrible until we both had to go for a blood test at the same time before the IVF referral went through, he went completely grey and clammy and nearly passed out, though it’s a credit to my wifely support that he didn’t actually pass out like he usually does!    You’d think the fact that his main concern was whether he had to have a blood test might bother me but actually it doesn’t at all.   I’m almost as relieved as he is that his main roll in this is a hot date with a cup and looking after me.  I’m more than happy to take all the needles, all the discomfort, the pain, the hormones,  because I know he’ll be looking after me. Also  I know that going for the IVF at all was more something that I wanted to do,  if the choice had been Matt’s we would have moved straight to adoption but I was keen to try the IVF first, I’m only 30, I’m not ready to give up on the possibility of baring my own children just yet without trying this option. 

This blood test was for AMH – Anti-Mullerian Hormone – level.  It helps assesses your Ovarian reserve and gives an idea or the amount and quality of your eggs (ref http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/IVF/Pages/Why-is-it-necessary.aspx), this information can them be used to guide treatment and decide drug doses for certain part of the treatment process. So that’s needle number one over and done with, not sure how many more they’ll be to come but that definitely won’t be the biggest needle, nor the one stuck in the most uncomfortable place!    

So, next appointment is next Friday (it would have been next Monday but we couldn’t make that date), hopefully that will give us some more individualised information on how things will progress from here…