Decisions, testing, waiting, and more decisions. I feel that this is all my life has been for the past few weeks. I've been struggling. I have had a hard time knowing what choice to make. I haven't felt at peace about any of our options since my lap. I've had my doctor with all his medical advice, family and friends have had their say, and then that leaves me and my husband. I know our choice and our feelings are what matters. I think for me the most challenging part has been the lack of time we have had to make our choices. I've felt rushed to make a choice and so I've been unable to feel they are the right choice.
My last post we left of not knowing what we were going to do. Well we did make a choice. We decided to try again. We knew before we made anymore choices we needed to do this. We needed to try at least once after my lap. The minute I started taking the medications I felt bad. In the pit of my stomach I didn't have peace. Hope was completely gone, but it was so much worse than that. I wasn't even dreading the worst. I had just given up. I didn't care what happened anymore. If it worked and I got pregnant I wouldn't have been able to find joy. I would be spending each day worried. Each symptom or lack of symptom would always have me on edge wondering if this was the baby to stay. If it didn't work and we didn't end up pregnant then I would be sad and I would fight with feelings of being a failure, even though I know I shouldn't. Can you see my problem, now? I felt screwed either way.
I went in for my last scan, having no symptoms to encourage me that we had any follies or that my ovaries were waking up. One of my incisions had become infected and I just wanted to go home and not bother seeing on that screen how my body cannot do anything right. Yet I pressed on. My scan was a huge surprise. It seemed that our new medication was helping. I had two follies ready for trigger, not just that, but they were the best sizes I've ever had. This could be our cycle. Nothing has ever looked so good.
That night we trigger and began the waiting. We decided it was time to make choices while we were not stuck in the sadness of a BFN or while dealing with the worry a BFP would bring. We decided that since I had enough gonal left for another cycle we would do one more if we got a BFN. Clearly if we got a BFP we wouldn't need to try again (at least not until we wanted child #2). What did we do though if the BFP still didn't bring us home a child? We decided at that point we would stop trying. We would be sad, but have to know that we had tried everything we could.
In this time my husband learned he had to leave for a work trip, the day after we officially know if I was pregnant or not. I lost all hope I had at this point. Every time my husband has left while I was pregnant things have always turned bad. I guess I should say hope was lost, it just changed directions. I was hoping for a BFN. My husband and I decided we were going to track and test a lot this cycle. Just in case we saw red flags about a second cycle. I POAS until my trigger disappeared, then waited a few days. I tested again, and got a faint line. I have to admit, it was early to have any sort of a line, so I was hopeful, yet scared out of my mind. For a couple days that line grew just a bit darker. This was good.
Then the red blood started on Saturday, my official day, which still had a positive. All I could do was wait, but by that evening all bleeding and spotting had stopped. This is a good sign, the previous bleeding could be the normal implantation bleeding that is very common. The next morning my line was lighter, on the same brand test. My spotting increased, but was brown which is the safe color. I dropped my husband off to leave for the week. I could see the worry on his face. He struggled having to leave again, but even if he stayed here nothing would change whatever was happening. To make a long story short, I had a blood test and my beta which should have been at least 50 was 19. From the test I took it was clear it was lowering not rising. I know you are all surprised, huh? Another lost child, I'm sure you're sick of reading about it. I'm tired of writing it.
We are now done. I got to talk to Dr. S today who has actually now told me that he wouldn't suggest IVF for us, but would instead suggest surrogacy. Dr. S saying this just made me know that this was the right choice for us. Our end had come. My emotions have been a bit all over the place. I've been mostly numb to it all, until tonight. I am so grateful for FaceTime, so I could still see my husband when he's gone, but it was so hard seeing the look he got. It's killing him that he's so far away. Now that it time that I should be sleeping it is all hitting me like a ton of bricks. We will never have a biological child. We will never hear a heart beating within my womb. We will never get to marvel at the tiny feet kicking and pushing. It's ended and it's time to move on. I will never have anybody in my family who is actually related to me.
It's time to move on. I'm not sure what that is, but it's what we need to do. I want to say that I'll be a mother some day through adoption, but honestly I don't know what the plan is. At this very moment I know better than to be naive and believe adoption will our future. All I know is that right now we have shut the book, not the chapter, on having a baby and I'm letting the tears fall.
