Infertility

For years, infertility marked my life.

My husband and I were married when he was 24 and I was 22. We didn't want to start having kids right away as we were in school, but we also didn't work hard to prevent pregnancy.

We were eagerly looking forward to having kids, but weren't in any rush. We should have started sooner, is something I often regret.

in the fall of 2006, I thought I had become pregnant and went to check that out with a doctor who did some basic urine tests and basically told me that I was imaging it.  I found another dr who did an ultrasound but by then a month or so had passed and there was nothing to see even if there was a pregnancy.

A couple of months later, we discovered happily that I was pregnant and then lost the baby at 12 weeks.  A year from then, I was again pregnant and then again we lost the baby at 7-8 weeks.

I was so disappointed. It was a hard pill to swallow as we had begun to be foster parents and I was now caring for other people's kids who had not been capable of caring for them.

We were overwhelmed because medically there was a lot of options, but we never really had enough to afford any testing. Our insurance at the time refused to cover anything other then basic blood work.

I knew more about fertility and menstrual cycles and what to expect then most people do in a lifetime. Most of it has faded over time thankfully..

It took another year before we did a very painful test called a Hysterosalpingogram - an injecting of dye into the vagina and then a series of x-rays.  I found out I had a tilted uterus and also that all the my tubes were working properly. One of my biggest fears through all the pregnancies was that I would have an Ectopic pregnancy and die from it.  By God's grace I never had one.

We eventually talked to a fertility specialist at the clinic and were able to begin using Clomedia, a hormone, to stimulate the uterus to begin producing more hormones so that if we were to get pregnant that I would be able to maintain the pregnancy.

I also did some basal thermometer readings, finding out that my ovulation cycle was off by three days. Most women ovulate 14 days after the beginning of a period, I ovulated at 11 days, thus always being off when I was trying to get pregnant.

And I marked the start of my period like a hawk. And watched each sign to see if I was expecting.
Tension at the beginning of every period was intense because I really, really wanted to get pregnant and thought that if I just tried something that it would work.

I think I made myself crazy with all the different steps.

and I know I made my husband crazy.

I was truly thankful that unlike many infertility/infant loss stories, that we didn't end up in divorce. That is actually the case for some that they choose not to be together. And they can't get past the grief.

We did have a successful pregnancy - our first born, Emma Grace in April of 2010. She was a beautiful sweet girl and has been since the first day. Very grateful for her.

Then began the next year and a half of wondering and waiting.  We didn't get anymore testing, but when I finished nursing Emma at 16 months, I did wonder if I would ever get pregnant again. After almost 2 years we did again get pregnant and although I did blood work, etc.. I lost the third miscarriage at 5 weeks.
Another year went by in which we moved away from our drs and I had to find another dr who would understand the massive amount of paperwork I had accumulated by this point. I was given a prescription for more hormones to sustain a pregnancy monthly. I took every couple of months for a year and then became pregnant in 2014 with our first son, Jonathan Darwin. That was during another move to a new area of the US so I was scrambling to find a dr who would understand the situation and know how to help us sustain his life.

Johnny was born in Dec 2, 2014 and I nursed him for about a year and a couple months. 

I became pregnant with our youngest and last rather suddenly only a month after weaning Johnny. I again had a scare with this pregnancy as at about 7 weeks, there was some spotting and they couldn’t find the heartbeat on the ultrasound machines. We had a rather anxious week in which I passed a huge clot of grey matter. We both thought the end had come. But it did not. 

We went back the next week and although the first set of machines again showed no heartbeat, the dr moved us to a newer one which instantly showed a beating heart and movement inside my womb. Our son, Owen Timothy was born several months later on Jan 6, 2017. 

A couple years later, after we had time to process all the things that had happened, my husband and I decided to proceed with stopping our fertility journey. He chose to go under the knife and I was grateful. 

In all, I spent 10+ years of our life pregnant or nursing with all the miscarriages and our sweet kiddos.

Haven’t gotten to the point where I would desire the miscarriage or infertility again but I’m grateful for the blessings of our three children here and the three in heaven. It has been a whirlwind. And I’m glad to be on the other side of that 17 years later.