LADY TALES
THE FERTILITY JOURNEY
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My Journey
I have always dreamed of having children ever since I can remember. When I was younger, the word fertility was never a future worry or even a part of my vocabulary for that matter. As I got older, there was never a thought that I would have anything other than a large family of my own. This all changed about 4 years ago, I was about 27 at the time, when I experienced my 1st ectopic pregnancy with my fiance. It would not be my last.
I had never been pregnant before, but I knew something was wrong. Immediately after I had a positive pregnancy test, the cramping began. I went to the emergency room where a shot of methotrexate was given as my levels were low enough so they said, and I was sent on my way. About a week later, the pain was worse, and by the time I arrived at the hospital, the left tube had ruptured. As of this day, I would say it was the worse pain I ever felt! They gave me an ultrasound where I saw my baby's heartbeat. This made it all too real and although I was numb with morphine for the pain, it was extremely emotional. They were not able to save the tube and I left that evening knowing I may be part of a group of women with fertility challenges in the future. I was determined after this to beat the odds of achieving pregnancy with 1 tube and we achieved it, twice, within 5 months of each other! Unfortunately, these also ended in ectopic pregnancies, without the loss of my other tube.
We tried to remain positive, telling ourselves how lucky we were to get pregnant so quickly, although they did not turn out well. It was the last pregnancy that my OBGYN mentioned the word IVF. I knew it was costly and at the time, not achievable for us, so I started to research everything I could that pertained to fertility. I wanted to be as educated as possible and know that if down the road IVF was the only choice, I had exhausted all options! I asked my OBGYN about having an HSG done. There was no way I was going to pay $6,000 for IVF not knowing if my tube was officially blocked. She was reluctant, mostly because I feel she was convinced it was blocked, but she agreed.
The day I went in for my HSG, I told my fiance, who waited for me, it was either going to be a fantastic day or a really really horrible day for me. To everyone's surprise, especially my OBGYN, the test showed my tube was clear!! I remember walking to our truck trying to hold in tears of joy and when I got there, bawling my eyes out. It was the best news I had received in a long time. We laughed that to some, it may be strange someone would be crying over their fallopian tube. It would have been strange to me just 4 yrs prior!
I was on a mission to have a baby at this point. We had gone through so much and I felt with the test and the ok from my OBGYN we were going to make that happen. I'm sure many of you have experienced this or are experiencing the addiction of websurfing for anything related to pre-conception, conception, tips on conceiving, charting, and products that assist in all that!! That was me for months! Although I'm sure it was annoying to my fiance, I felt more educated and very comforted by the support and amount of people experiencing similar things.
About 6 months later, we were pregnant again! l felt great and was convinced all was well. Even the blood test confirmed levels were doubling! The very early ultrasound showed a sac, which was very promising. For a moment, I felt the feeling of what it would be like at the beginning of a normal pregnancy. Unfortunately, a week later, when a heartbeat would be seen, only a sac was there, and it was the same size. An ultrasound later confirmed a tubal pregnancy, which had to be removed by surgery. My OBGYN convinced me to let her remove my last tube. For me, I felt I was giving up a part of my womanhood. There was no turning back! It was IVF or adoption, options I had not researched, mostly because I was in denial. She explained the chances of another ectopic would be even greater, and if I had IVF in the future, the remaining tube could create an ectopic with that as well. My fight was over and there was an overwhelming amount of evidence to show it was time to move on. I agreed.
And so here I am, about to start my 1st IVF cycle. What a journey it has been and now another in the making. It is very gratifying for me to share my story so far and my upcoming experiences with IVF. I know how much it meant to me reading stories of others experiencing similar issues and hope I can offer support to others as well!
Thanks for reading!
Jaclyn S.
31 yrs old
jaclyn@ladytales.com
I had never been pregnant before, but I knew something was wrong. Immediately after I had a positive pregnancy test, the cramping began. I went to the emergency room where a shot of methotrexate was given as my levels were low enough so they said, and I was sent on my way. About a week later, the pain was worse, and by the time I arrived at the hospital, the left tube had ruptured. As of this day, I would say it was the worse pain I ever felt! They gave me an ultrasound where I saw my baby's heartbeat. This made it all too real and although I was numb with morphine for the pain, it was extremely emotional. They were not able to save the tube and I left that evening knowing I may be part of a group of women with fertility challenges in the future. I was determined after this to beat the odds of achieving pregnancy with 1 tube and we achieved it, twice, within 5 months of each other! Unfortunately, these also ended in ectopic pregnancies, without the loss of my other tube.
We tried to remain positive, telling ourselves how lucky we were to get pregnant so quickly, although they did not turn out well. It was the last pregnancy that my OBGYN mentioned the word IVF. I knew it was costly and at the time, not achievable for us, so I started to research everything I could that pertained to fertility. I wanted to be as educated as possible and know that if down the road IVF was the only choice, I had exhausted all options! I asked my OBGYN about having an HSG done. There was no way I was going to pay $6,000 for IVF not knowing if my tube was officially blocked. She was reluctant, mostly because I feel she was convinced it was blocked, but she agreed.
The day I went in for my HSG, I told my fiance, who waited for me, it was either going to be a fantastic day or a really really horrible day for me. To everyone's surprise, especially my OBGYN, the test showed my tube was clear!! I remember walking to our truck trying to hold in tears of joy and when I got there, bawling my eyes out. It was the best news I had received in a long time. We laughed that to some, it may be strange someone would be crying over their fallopian tube. It would have been strange to me just 4 yrs prior!
I was on a mission to have a baby at this point. We had gone through so much and I felt with the test and the ok from my OBGYN we were going to make that happen. I'm sure many of you have experienced this or are experiencing the addiction of websurfing for anything related to pre-conception, conception, tips on conceiving, charting, and products that assist in all that!! That was me for months! Although I'm sure it was annoying to my fiance, I felt more educated and very comforted by the support and amount of people experiencing similar things.
About 6 months later, we were pregnant again! l felt great and was convinced all was well. Even the blood test confirmed levels were doubling! The very early ultrasound showed a sac, which was very promising. For a moment, I felt the feeling of what it would be like at the beginning of a normal pregnancy. Unfortunately, a week later, when a heartbeat would be seen, only a sac was there, and it was the same size. An ultrasound later confirmed a tubal pregnancy, which had to be removed by surgery. My OBGYN convinced me to let her remove my last tube. For me, I felt I was giving up a part of my womanhood. There was no turning back! It was IVF or adoption, options I had not researched, mostly because I was in denial. She explained the chances of another ectopic would be even greater, and if I had IVF in the future, the remaining tube could create an ectopic with that as well. My fight was over and there was an overwhelming amount of evidence to show it was time to move on. I agreed.
And so here I am, about to start my 1st IVF cycle. What a journey it has been and now another in the making. It is very gratifying for me to share my story so far and my upcoming experiences with IVF. I know how much it meant to me reading stories of others experiencing similar issues and hope I can offer support to others as well!
Thanks for reading!
Jaclyn S.
31 yrs old
jaclyn@ladytales.com
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