Michelle Britton

It has been a week since we received our disappointing news that our third attempt at IVF failed.  The doctor wanted to see us before the holidays, so he arranged for us to come to his office the day following the pregnancy test. Upon entering his office,  I see my file on his desk. I am amazed at how thick it is, so thick it is now actually two files and both are busting with papers.

He starts by telling us that he has reviewed my file, which probably took him a while. With the excellent quality of embryo’s and all the different protocols they have tried we should have gotten a positive pregnancy test by now. This leads him back to something he told me during my first transfer, my endometrium is too thin.  A woman’s endometrium needs to be in the 8 mm to 14 mm range for a successful implantation. Mine was barely measuring 8mm, and I think he was rounding up. When a women is looking for someone to tell her she is thin, it is not their uterus lining they are hoping they point out. I am shocked, I never thought it would come to this, to the fact it is now my issue holding us back. My head is spinning: Does that mean we give up? Do we try again? What happens now?

He then tells us we still have options;

1. Reverse Dirk’s vasectomy
2. Donor Sperm
3. Find a Surrogate

We have all read about Dirk’s experience with the vasectomy – so that is not an option – even the doctor agrees. Donor Sperm does not appeal to me, that would mean the child was not fully ours, only mine. But wait, did he not just say my endometrium was too thin? When I raised this point he tells me the body reacts differently under natural circumstances and we could get pregnant. Too bad we don’t like these options.

That leaves the last option, finding someone to be a surrogate mother for our child. Dirk and I always talked about adopting if this process did not work for us, and to me this is pretty much the same thing.  Another women would carry a child that would eventually be ours, the only difference is that this child would be biologically ours.

It has been 12 days, 65 pantie liners, 33 Heparin Shots, 136 Vitamins and Supplements, 100 Estrace Pills, 133 Prometrium Pills, and 10 Antibiotics Pills since the embryo transfer.  Today, the  alarm clock rings at 8 am and I hit snooze. I am nervous about going to get my blood test as I have a strong feeling we are going to get another  ’No’.  The lady at the lab wishes me luck and tells me she hopes to see me soon.  This makes me sad – I know in my heart this did not work for us. I feel like crying already.

This is our third attempt, and again it is different from the first two rounds. The first round, I felt completely nothing until the day of the pregnancy test when my boobs started to hurt. The second round, I had many symptoms: sore boobs, nausea, cramping. This round I have only had a lot of cramping, even in the last two days. My period is coming and that is really disappointing.

The morning is spent trying to lose myself in my work, but my mind always comes back to the sad thought of not being pregnant and starting over again. The clock ticks by slowly, it is now the late afternoon.  ’When are they going to phone?’  – keeps going through my head. The phone rings – we both jumped. The news is what we expected. My eyes tear up immediately, they confirmed my suspicions and it hurts.

We are not pregnant.

Our Three Embryo's

The phone rang this morning, it was the clinic to discuss how our thaw went. My heart goes to my throat ‘oh shit none made it’ rushes through my head. They tell me they thawed four and got three good ones. I am shocked and excited at the same time. They finish up by saying one looks like it has never been frozen. I don’t know what that means – but hell, it sounds good to me. They end the call by reminding me to have four glasses of water one hour before we arrive.

We get to the clinic late, or at least we think. We are actually 30 minutes early so we sit in the waiting room watching HGTV and flipping through magazines. Every few minutes I am asked how my bladder is holding up – each time I reply, ‘fine’. They put us in the procedure room where we wait for 30 minutes while they prep.  Holy Shit, I now need to pee, so I send Dirk out to find someone as it is getting tense.

The ultra sound reveals I have too much in my bladder so they hand me a cup and tell me only to let out enough to fill it. These people are nuts – there is no way I can measure my urine output like pouring milk. Once the tap is open, I am not sure I can get it closed in time.

I comment that I hope they are letting me go to the bathroom and not make me do it in the room. After a few laughs I walk down to the washroom – here goes nothing – or in my case one cup of pee. It went okay. I was able to stop the flow with only minimal spillage.  I empty the cup and stand there wondering if they recycle – I mean it is a plastic cup after all. The answer is clearly no, but I make the doctor laugh for asking.

Back in the room they look at my bladder again – shit – still to full. They hand me a dixie cup this time – ‘One and half fills please’ they tell me.  They are killing me – but off I go again. When I return the comment is made that they are impressed with my kegel ability. I did not know I even had it.

Now that I am comfortable and the doctor is satisfied at my bladder size, transfer begins. They display our three embryos on the screen for us to see, it is truly amazing. Once the transfer is complete, they administer another IV of inter-lipid to help with decreasing my immune system.

Three hours after we arrive, we are able to leave, buns in the oven. The twelve day wait begins.

To do a Frozen Embryo Transfer, one first needs to have ideal conditions, that is, the oven has to be completely preheated prior to any baking. For us, the preparation started back on October 15th. This was 21 days after my last period plus after I had ovulated. We started with a single shot a day to suppress any further egg making process.  Then, four days after my period started, I began to take Estrace tablets twice daily for two weeks. This was easy, and as I stated in my prior post, sometimes too easy that we forgot we were doing anything.

Today, I received my next steps for our preparation for transfer on Wednesday. It is insane and I can not remember half the time what the hell I need to do and when. After deciphering the clinical coordinators notes and coming up with the timetable, I read this out to Dirk, he started to glaze over;

My process now starts at 6 am with a shot of Heparin (blood thinner), Estrace tablets (estrogen) and Prometrium tablets (progesterone). This is closely followed by a baby aspirin, prenatal vitamin, antibiotics, Vitamin D (2 tablets), and Calcium (3 tablets). At 2 pm I need to take Estrace and Prometrium. At 6 pm Heparin and Prometrium. At dinner another antibiotic and prenatal vitamin. Finally, at 10 pm my last daily dose of Estrace and Prometrium.

We need to create a daily schedule or we will miss something. Now, we have alarms set and each time it rings we look at the schedule and cross off what drugs we are to administer. I feel like a pill monster.

We are in the midst of our FET protocol and it really does not feel like a real IVF round. I know that sounds lame – but we were going to the clinic almost daily, had a gamut of injections and pills to take, plus a surgical procedure to recover from.

This time we are only doing one shot each evening to suppress ovulation. I have to admit – we keep forgetting about the shot – the other night I was laying in bed – sat up and exclaimed ‘Shit the shot!’

I feel guilty about not being more attentive: is it because I am less stressed – less caring – even expecting it to work. If this is the roller coaster of feelings I am having now, I am afraid for Dirk when I am actually pregnant.