I haven’t been on here in awhile…like almost a year. In my defense, I spent most of that year in
very poor health. I opted to have
gastric bypass surgery in December 2012.
The surgery was successful in that I’ve lost about 115 pounds, but I
lost the weight VERY quickly and had some severe complications after the
surgery. This past July, after months of
being on home IV nutrition and fluids through a PICC line, I had to undergo
another surgery (to remove a large ulcer that had developed that was preventing
me from eating and drinking, and to revise the original surgery) with a
different bariatric surgery program. I
am happy to report that I am feeling MUCH better now with regard to my overall health. Luckily, I have a job that allowed me to work
from home and I had a lot of support from my husband and my friends. I chose to have the gastric bypass surgery so
that I could be the mother that I wanted to be to Ian…not the mother who sat on
the couch and watched him play…or deleted every picture of herself out of
family pictures. I achieved my goal…but
in the process I had to sacrifice, for the last few months at least, being the
mother I wanted to be to him. Luckily, I
was blessed with the happiest, smartest, most easy-going baby/toddler (in my unbiased
opinion) that anyone could have, so Ian has emerged from my health issues
none-the-wiser. I could gush about him
forever, but I’ll save that for another post.
You may wonder why I’m writing now…after almost a year of
internet silence. I’m writing now
because I need to. You see, there are
many side effects of drastic weight loss.
One of which can be increased fertility.
However, when you’ve spent years going through what I went through to
get pregnant with someone else’s eggs, you don’t concern yourself with trivial
matters like “fertility.” When the
bariatric doctors have asked me over the past months what birth control I am
using (as the birth control pill doesn’t absorb properly in gastric bypass
patients, and not everyone knows that), I’ve chuckled and explained that there
is no way I could get pregnant on my own.
Between endometriosis, sucky eggs, only one ovary, periods that only
happen every 2 or 3 months, and infrequent sex with my husband (nothing like an
IV sticking out of your upper arm to put you and your man in the mood), I was
not too worried about getting pregnant. Only…I guess I should have been.
A couple of weeks ago (my first full week back at work
actually), I was sitting at my desk, typing away, when I felt wetness between
my legs. My stomach was having sharp
pains, too, but it had only been 29 days since my last period, so I thought
maybe I was having some random ovulation issue…as my periods have been running
60 to 90 days apart. I ignored my body
for a couple of hours and by the time I got up and went to the bathroom, I had
bled through my jeans…at work…NICE! So,
I went home…and promptly started vomiting.
The cramps got super-intense and I told The Prince that I thought a cyst
must have burst or something, as this was NOT a normal period. On one trip to the bathroom, I noticed my old
boxes of home pregnancy tests next to my pads and tampons. The Prince had recently
re-arranged/toddler-proofed the bathroom and apparently thought those two items
logically went together. I don’t know
what possessed me to pee on a stick. I
wish I hadn’t. I wish I had just left it
alone…but I didn’t. And one positive
pregnancy test turned into two…and then three.
I tested with a digital HPT later that night…still “PREGNANT,” but the
non-digital test’s line seemed a little lighter than it had been earlier. I didn’t say a word to The Prince or anyone
else about what was going on. Instead, I
obsessively counted the days back to my last “encounter” with my husband, and
tried to figure out how this could possibly happen. The timing would be about right if I was “a
fertile,” but I wasn’t…I was very much infertile. I remembered my husband saying to me prior to
the last “encounter,” “Do we need to use precautions?” and me saying “No”…ignoring
the box of condoms I had bought “just in case.”
The next morning, there was still a positive line on the
non-digital HPT, but the digital was reading “NOT PREGNANT.” The bleeding and cramping was still going
strong and I was pretty sure that this is what a “chemical pregnancy” looked
like. I went to work and decided to call
my OBGYN’s office. They were rude,
saying “What exactly do you want us to do for you? We can do a blood test, but it won’t help
anything.” That’s true. Confirmation that I was a little bit pregnant
a few days earlier did not help anything.
I ended-up calling my fertility center for some more compassionate
advice, and the amazing head nurse (who is still an angel) told me to come in
for blood work, as we needed to be sure this was actually not a growing
pregnancy and also not an ectopic pregnancy that would require intervention. It was really odd sitting in the fertility
center waiting room where I had sat a hundred times before. In the past, I was always praying for a
pregnancy…and this time I was praying for a negative beta. I know how awful that sounds. But I also know that if my pregnancy had
started out with that much bleeding…something was wrong with the pregnancy. I know that I am well enough to go to work
and do daily living activities, but I am still struggling to take in 500
calories a day and to not lose weight every single day. I’m not in any position to carry a healthy
pregnancy right now.
As I was leaving the clinic to wait the couple of hours for
the phone call with my Hcg level results, the head nurse asked me “What are we
hoping for here?” It was all I could do
not to break down right there. How could
I say the words “A negative” inside the hallowed walls of the fertility
center…knowing that every other room was filled with a woman who was me 3 years
ago…a woman who would give anything for a positive? In that moment, I could not have felt any
lower, any more despicable, any more irresponsible. As I walked back through the waiting room, I
saw a room full of husbands, boyfriends, partners, and waiting patients looking
up at me with smiles of hope or nervous looks of anticipation and worry. I thought, if they only knew what was in my
head right now, there would be only looks of contempt.
The call came a couple of hours later. My Hcg was already down to zero. I could only have been the very tiniest bit
pregnant…but the news still hurt emotionally.
Even though I feel it was the best outcome, I still felt a deep sadness
that I still haven’t completely shaken.
The bleeding has FINALLY stopped, but the emotional pain (mainly guilt
and sadness) has not. I eventually (a
couple of days in) told my husband what happened. He said he was sorry I was going through it,
but he was glad I wasn’t pregnant because my body couldn’t handle that right
now. Then he launched into how exciting
it was that I can get pregnant with my own eggs…and I wanted to punch him. I technically got a little bit pregnant with
my own eggs, but it didn’t take…and there’s no way of knowing if the loss was
about my egg quality, my endometriosis, my body attacking an embryo, or just a
comment on my general health. Hell…it
could have just been a fluke as Dr. Google claims that 50-70% of pregnancies
are likely chemical pregnancies that no one knew about. While I suppose it is possible that I have
magically become a fertile, I think it is more likely that this loss was a
reminder that I cannot get pregnant with a child with my own eggs…at least not
for more than a day or two. And I’ve
already mourned the loss of having a child that is biologically mine. I don’t want to reopen that wound and start
the process of hoping that my eggs “work.”
We have eight little frozen embryos, genetic siblings to the perfect
little angel we already have, waiting for us to decide in a year or two if we
want to try to give Ian a sibling before we put the rest up for adoption. I’m okay with that…but apparently my husband
is not on the same page as me. What I
did learn from this experience is that my body is not to be trusted and I can’t
count on my infertility, so I need to use some form of birth control. What a concept after years of failed ART
cycles.
I know this post isn’t going to win me any
friends…especially with those still in the trenches. I’ve been avoiding writing it because: (1)
it’s not exactly how I wanted to make my blogging return; (2) I have friends
who are going through their own infertility/fertility stuff and I’ve been
trying to wait for their stuff to calm down before putting this out there; (3)
I’m worried about getting lectured in the comments about how irresponsible and
deplorable I am for behaving recklessly and then hoping for a negative beta…and
I don’t know if I’m strong enough to fight back because I mostly agree; and (4)
I worry that I’ll regret putting this insanely honest post out there…but it
will be too late to take it back. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter. I know I will put this post out there because
I need to write this post…and get these toxic thoughts and feelings out of my
head and heart. My blog has always been
my place to come and be totally honest about my feelings and experiences with
infertility and along the way it has saved me an occasionally even helped
someone else. I’m really hoping this
post helps me work through the emotions surrounded with this situation, and
doesn’t hurt anyone else in the process…especially those of my infertile
friends working on conceiving siblings for their little angels.
It’s easy to forget what it is like to be sitting in the
waiting room of the fertility center, praying for some good news. You wouldn’t think the intensity of the
feelings would ever fade or leave you.
But before writing this post, I made myself go back and read through my
posts when I was there…just to be sure that the old me would still want me to
post this. I had forgotten how intense
things were…how bad the emotional pain was.
And still, I am writing this post because the old me, sitting in the
waiting room praying for a positive beta or a good follicle scan, would have
wanted me to…because she would want me to NOT forget. Not forget how awful this very early loss feels. Not forget how far I’ve come over the last
six years. Not forget to be grateful
every day for what I have and what the future may hold for me and my
family…whatever that word means down the road.
It’s easy to forget, but not when it is in writing…out there for the
world to see.
