Thursday, September 27, 2012

Dear Babies



I find it hard to believe that I sit here a mother to 6 perfect babies, but I remain childless.  How I miss each and every one of you.  I wish I could have met you.  I wish I could have held you in my arm, but I keep you in my heart forever.  I hate that you never got to experience this world.  Which one of you would have followed in daddy's footsteps and become a computer genius?  Would one of you be a musician or a photographer like me?

My own dear mother was taken away from me far too early.  When I would think of my future I was always sad that my mother would never get to meet her grandchildren.  I guess God took you all home for her.  Now she gets to spend her time with you.

My dear sweet children I love you all so much. No day will ever pass without thoughts of you.  I know in time the pain and aching in my heart will get better, but you will always be remembered and cherished.  One day we all will meet again.

I love you all.

I know you each by name now.  You are my children and will be forever loved,.  

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

2 Babies and 1 Tube Gone

Wow, since my last post my world has completely changed. I feel as though it's shattered and honestly I'm not really sure why.

Early Friday morning I woke up with my left side on fire.  I was in so much pain I couldn't walk.  I was sick and would have rather died then endure that pain again.  I was rushed to ER and called my dr.  Our assumption was that once again the rise in my HCG had agitated my endo.  We were in for a big a surprise.  The ultrasound showed a huge pool of blood hanging around my ovaries, filling my uterus and just all around.  We are not exactly sure what was going on but it was necessary to get in there and find out.

I was rushed off to surgery after a quick call to my husband who was thankfully coming home from an out of town business trip.  Once inside they discovered that I had two sacs.  One baby had made it to my uterus, but it quickly died and not much growth had happened.  The other stayed in my left tube, but was thriving.  Everything was removed along with my tube because it was too damaged.

My doctor felt horrible and has been apologizing to me non stop it seems.  My beta was so low that we never suspected any problems.  He believes that I've got some sort of blood concentration issue that is not giving us proper readings.  He said he has suspected this in my last couple of pregnancies.  He feels like it is his fault this happened.  I don't believe that, I just believe that it's our destiny.

I have been struggling with this who process.  I somehow feel this is all my fault.  I know I shouldn't, but I do.  I pushed my desire for children.  We did the last cycle knowing that our odds were no better.  I just wasn't willing to give up the dream.  I caused this.  It's my fault.

In a few weeks I've got to begin more testing.  My doctor wants to find out what is going on and why my numbers were off.  As far as trying to conceive goes it will change nothing, we are just doing this to make sure there is no bigger issue that we need to take care of.  I'm a little nervous about that.  My doctor never really shows fear, but he seemed a bit worried about my messed up levels.  I'm hoping it's just because he feels bad for missing it and giving us this unexpected situation.

I'm not feeling well at all.  I lost a lot of blood and it's taking time to replenish.  I've felt this huge weight that I just can't seem to get rid of.  I know I've got to soon face the reality of losing two more children and I've got to accept the reality that we will never have our biological children, and very possibly never have any. 

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Secret Cycle + Pregnancy = Our New Future


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.