Do you have good etiquette? Do you have good infertility etiquette?

I just want to start out by saying I am completely guilty of not having infertility etiquette before we knew we had problems getting pregnant. I would not have thought twice about asking a couple married for a few years if they were planning on having children or asking a newlywed couple when they were going to start trying. Most people are not trying to be hurtful. Most people want to tell you something that they think will make you feel better and we, the infertility world, appreciate those that really do try to help us. However, there are the ones that just don't know any better and may not even know that women suffer from infertility and this is ok. Like I said, I am completely guilty! I feel my job since I have decided to be so open is to also give advice about infertility and educate those who are not aware of what infertility can bring.


This is where infertility etiquette becomes helpful. Here are some 10 do's and don'ts of infertility etiquette :)


10. Don’t Tell Them to Relax-  Ok, this is probably the one we hear the most. It sounds right and makes sense, however, for someone who is struggling with years of infertility we are pretty sure it is not because we are not relaxed.

9. Don’t Minimize the Problem- People have made the comment to me, "well, at least you get to get to do things like travel and take vacations." Really? That does not make me feel better, because going to disney world was fun and all, but I am pretty sure I would rather do those things with my children. Or, "well, just think you get time to yourself whenever you want." Really? this does not make us feel better. 

8. Don’t Say There Are Worse Things That Could Happen- Sure, I could be killed, I could be kidnapped and tortured, but, to me, at this very moment in life, this is the worse thing that could happen. I can't make a baby with my husband without drugs.  I can't do what I was put on this earth to do. That to me is the worse thing.

7. Don’t Say They Aren’t Meant to Be Parents- If you say this you should just be punched in the throat...lol.

6. Don’t Ask Why They Aren’t Trying IVF- IVF is not for everyone. Not everyone has to go right to IVF depending on their diagnosis. It is a very expensive procedure and unless you are willing to help pay for this 15,000-20,000 dollar procedure don't expect it to be on everyone's checklist.

5. Don’t Complain About Your Pregnancy- I understand pregnancy is hard, uncomfortable and can be miserable at times. Just be mindful of who you say this to. Remember, there are people out there that are dying to throw up all day and pee on themselves when they laugh :).

4. Don’t Gossip About Their Infertility- This should be a no brainer!

3. Don’t Push Adoption (Yet)- Adoption is a great thing, but, again, VERY expensive. More expensive than IVF. A lot goes into adoption too. Home studies, evaluations, and a lot of uncertainties. It is very hard for some people to come to terms with never having a child of their own and usually someone's last resort after many years of trying.

2. Let Them Know That You Care- All we want you to say is "I am hear to listen." Ask us questions. We are not expecting anyone to have any words. There aren't any words. If you are religious, pray for us. If you are not, tell us you are thinking of us. You don't need to say anything more. It is very hard for some of us to come out and even talk to our people about it. Infertility is something that we are ashamed of. We can't do what every woman in the world can do. We can't do what a lot of mother's take advantage of. That 3 am wake up call that you dread, we envy. That explosive diaper that you are gagging through changing, we dream of. Watching your husband hold his baby for the first time and never knowing you could love something so much, we would die for.

1. Remember Them on Mother’s Day- Just reach out to someone and say you are thinking of them. That is all.

For those of you who know me know I am not trying to make anyone feel guilty. This is simply for awareness purposes. Just remember next time you talk to someone keep in mind they may be going through something that you may not be aware of. If you don't know what to say ask questions. We want to educate you and we want you to understand what happens in the infertility world.

Thank you for reading :)

Shannon W.

Starting my injections

And here we go...again. I would love to say I am excited to be starting the injections, but sadly I am not. We have done injections three times so far and I have conceived two out of the three times. I know this definitely may work which is great, but I also know how well they work. I am praying to God every day, a few times a day, that we are lucky enough to get just ONE baby this time. As much as I would love twins again I am beyond terrified.
So, as you all can see we did not conceive last month with no drugs. I am really sad because I ovulated on my own which is a really huge deal. Last week (Thur) we drove up to my parents house and low and behold "aunt flo" showed up early. Damn bitch never comes on time let alone early, and of course she came when I was 2 hours away from my fertility doctor. So, I call my BFF Katie at our doctors office and she let me know I needed to have blood work done the next day and an ultrasound on Monday. By the time I called my doctor I had 15 min to find a blood center in PA (before they close and the blood center closed), get my blood work done the following day and then sent right away to the doctors so they can rule out pregnancy (for those who don't know 30% of women bleed through the first trimester so it's protocol to have to rule it out even if you think you had your period).

Monday came around and the ultrasound and blood work showed that I was indeed not pregnant and I was told that we are in the clear to start injections. As you can see in the pic below these are about a month or two of my Bravelle injections. I will do a ratio of 3 powders to 1 saline solution starting lastnight (Monday) for 4 days and go in on Friday to see how my body is reacting and if we need to increase or decrease the dosage. The injections usually last about 10 days. Throughout the next week and a half I will go in for monitoring and blood work to make sure my body is reacting to the drugs and producing multiple follicles. Our hopes are the multiple follicles will produce a few eggs and out of that few 1 will take. Sounds so complicated, right?? If you can remember from one of my other posts I have a 75% chance of one egg taking and 25% chance of twins on injections.

I took my first shot last night around 8:30pm and woke up this morning already feeling extremely bloated and irritable. Mike came home and I complained about how bloated I was and the honest man that he is told me he can tell...Oooh Michael Allen you are so lucky I love you and your honesty. He should know better not to mess with an irritable wife who has to deal with sticking herself with drugs for half the month. So, for the next 10 days I will be wearing only sweatpants and not asking my husband if i look bloated.

For those of you who are following along I thank you for sticking with me and I will be sure to update with each visit to the doctor!

Another milestone...

After the boys I expected to have good days and bad days. I still feel that August - January was just a blur, a dream.  When I look at my pregnancy pictures I almost have to remind myself that was real and that was me and we were expecting twin boys. We would have been 40 weeks at the end of this week. My boys would have been here. I would be holding them right now. I hate how some days I am fantastic, positive and excited for the future and other days I want to stay in bed and remember the days where I was happy, pregnant and planning my boys future.

Saturday was a gorgeous day! Probably the nicest day we have had yet this year. I was excited to turn the music up and sit on my porch and just soak in the sun. However, with a beautiful day comes all the families that want to get out with their kids, strollers, walks to the park. I sat on my porch for a few hours watching everyone walk to an event on base for military children. All I could think about was how we should be loading our kids up in their stroller and walking up to the event. I wish I could turn my mind off. I know everyone says this is normal and part of the grieving process and it is still very fresh, but I just want to move on. I don't want to forget my boys, but I just hate hurting. The pain is just so unreal. I have been through emotional pain. Pain of losing a relationship, pain of losing a grandparent, pain of losing a pet, but this pain of losing your children is just unfathomable. It almost makes you question if you ever want to have kids again, because their is always a chance that something bad could happen to them.

We took this month off from treatments and I am praying so hard that with a miracle we somehow get pregnant this month. I mean a girl can dream, right? I still laugh at the thought that people can get pregnant on purpose with one month of trying and no fertility treatments. Please Please Please let that be this month. No more needles, ultrasounds to track follicles and the thought of having a surprise pregnancy test! Oh to dream big, lol.

Ok, so I must get on with life now. Get myself in the shower and pretty for my last week of class. I can't believe my shoot is on Friday and then we get our certificates! I finally accomplished one of my dreams and hoping there are more to come. One thing that has been good in my life recently is meeting all these great people in my class. I do believe God puts certain people in your life. They have definitely made these last 4 weeks very manageable :).


Shannon :)  

And the results are in...

As the saying goes..."better luck next time." It's ok though, I am not horribly upset. Thank goodness I have a busy month ahead of me to keep me from dwelling on it. I knew that this cycle may not have worked. Any treatment less than injections never worked in the past so it was just wishful thinking anyways. The only thing I hate is the estrogen and progesterone mimic pregnancy symptoms and you believe you are pregnant because how can you have so many symptoms and not be. So anyone who may be going through fertility treatments in the future be warned!  When you are on extra hormones they will give you every symptom in the book.

On a better note, I am LOVING my class!! I am learning a lot and it's amazing how much I am not a fan of brooklyn, but love Manhattan :). The people in my class are great and I am really enjoying not dwelling on my "issues" everyday, lol.  I think after this class is over I am going to apply at MAC somewhere in lower Manhattan (Oh the possibilities).

Anyways, not much more to report. Thanks for reading!

Shannon :)

Busy week!

Ok, so we are 8 days post IUI (8dpoIUI)and surprisingly this week went really fast! Less than a week to go until the actual blood test. Am I having any symptoms?? Well, I looked in my old pregnancy organizer from last time and the same symptom I do have was burping, lol. Just so you know I am not a burper! The only time I burp is when I drink soda which is not a lot.  Also, the progesterone the doctor prescribes plays with your mind when it comes to symptoms so I am not getting my hopes up since I know how hard it is to think your pregnant and get the negative, so I am just taking it with a grain of salt. Def better to remain positive though, right? I went yesterday morning for the blood work that is required one week post IUI and my estrogen and progesterone were a little on the low side so the doctor prescribed me supplements to boost my levels. One thing I did forget was how the progesterone when taken orally gives you that "I had a few too many glasses of wine before bed" feeling. Just happy I didn't operate any heavy machinery after taking it :). So, I will be on those pills twice a day until they tell me to stop.

I don't know if it's the sun shining, the birds chirping or the extra hormones but I am doing ok!  I should be really sad though.The boys would have been full term this week :(.  I should be hiding in bed not wanting to face the world but I am ok. One thing I do all the time, and I am curious if anyone else does it, is I always wonder where I would be right now if they were still in utero. When I am walking the dogs I think to myself, "would I be outside right now walking the dogs if I was still pregnant?" "Would I be on bed rest right now?" "would I have been bopping around still shopping or would I have been complaining and begging for them to come out?" lol.  I am also getting passed the bitter phase. I have been able to hear about pregnancies without that sad "why does everyone else to get pregnant but me?" thought pops up in my head. This is a huge step. Maybe it's because I know we started treatment and it's only a matter of time before I will get pregnant again and will be able to look towards the future.

As I was driving home today I heard Kelly Clarkson's "stronger" play on the radio and it has been my anthem for the last 3.5 months. Have you ever heard a tragic story and thought to yourself, "OMG if that ever happened to me I would just die." Or, " I can't even imagine what that person is going through. How are they going to go on?" I am sure you think it all the time. Well, I want you to know that you do go on. You overcome everything. You can choose to let it defeat you and you are allowed to be sad, but you do go on. After the boys, I seriously thought I was going to die. My heart hurt so bad, but the days passed and you find strength.  We have been seeing our CG Chaplin almost weekly since January and the last time we saw him he said something I will truly have to thank him for. He told me how inspiring I was for not giving up and jumping right in and not letting this defeat me; However, he also told me that I need to find something else to focus on that's for me. At first I was mad he said that. How can I focus on something else? I am willing, for as long as it takes to sacrifice my body to treatments until we have that healthy baby. So far I have spent three years as a science experiment. Always taking medication, Always getting blood drawn, my ovaries have been the size of ping pong balls. I have put off my career and traveling because it interferes with treatments. Never able to lose weight because the meds just continue to bloat you up and make it almost impossible to workout without the fear your ovaries might burst from being jumbled around your insides. I am willing to endure it. Wouldn't you do anything for your kids and family? If this is what it takes than I am going to do it. But, I also remembered I am a human and have dreams and desires too. We got home from that appointment and Mike told me to find a school in Manhattan for makeup certification and go. Find one that is only a few months or weeks and go! So, as of Monday of next week I will be a full time student for 4 weeks at Chic Studios NYC. I will finally be a certified Makeup Artist! For those of you that know me really well this has been a passion since middle school. One that I have always been scared to do, but I am focusing on me this time.

So, feel free to leave a comment and let me know what was your major symptom for pregnancy and if you have had multiple pregnancies did it continue to be your main symptom each time!? Looking forward to hearing from you.

Thanks again for reading,

Shannon!

Back in the game! ... of Treatments dun dun dun!

If you have been there you know exactly what I am talking about. Mike and I decided to start the first cycle after the boys with a LESS aggressive fertility treatment. By less aggressive I mean less needles, bloat, and pain. However, you still deal with the hormones which I am sure my wonderful husband can tell you all about. Always crying, bitching, complaining and did I mention crying?  So day 1 is the first day of your cycle (period) and within the first couple days you are prescribed an oral medication (letrozole or Clomid) to take twice a day for five days. On day 10 of my cycle the endless pokes and prods of the treatment begin. I will go in every other day (and for anyone familiar with the Verrazano Bridge, it's a huge toll of 15.00) for about a week to get blood and have a transvaginal ultrasound to track the size and number of follicles that the medicine produced. For all those who are new, a follicle is what releases the egg :). After that week I had one big follicle about 20mm. I was told to take the trigger shot 36 hours before my IUI. The trigger shot will force the follicle to release my pretty little egg and send it on its long journey down my fallopian tube to hopefully meet with one, just one sperm who is fighting his way through the crowd. I always envision the opening credits to the movie "Look Who's Talking," lol.

The IUI process is not too bad. If you can survive a papsmear you are fine. Your husband goes in an hour or so before the procedure to make his "deposit." After that, it is put through a machine that washes the sperm and removes all of the ejaculate so you are left with a very pure and concentrated "deposit." The funniest part to me is when we go in for the IUI and the doctor puts it on a slide and informs us if they are swimming or dead.  I am sure every man, including my husband holds their breath until the doctor congratulates them with the response of, "well, they are not dead". But, you also don't want to hear that you have some that are swimming in circles either ;) So, after the swimmers pass the microscope test I am set up as if you are getting your yearly exam and instead of being swabbed you have a very long catheter that is put all the way into your uterus. If all goes well this only last about 15 seconds and then told to lay there for 15 min. After that I went home and put my feet up. Not that that is even necessary, but believe me if I have to go home and put my legs up in the hope I am giving those little suckers and advantage I will.

As much as I loathe treatments, I am so excited for them. It is definitely a love/hate relationship. I hate the fact that I even have to do treatments, but I love the day we complete them because that means the next two weeks I rub my belly and pray with everything I have that something is growing in there. Of course the thought of getting that phone call two weeks later that the blood test came back negative is the most painful feeling ever. A whole month of needles, trans-vaginal ultrasounds, bloat, ovary pain, night sweats, crying, bitching, complaining all for a negative. But, we aren't going to focus on the negative, are we? 

So, for the next two weeks I will dwell on every poke and twinge I feel in my belly and compare it to www.twoweekwait.com lol. Maybe I will even do a blog and you all can tell me what your immediate symptoms were when you found out you were pregnant!

Thank you again for accompanying me in this chaotic journey!

Possibly some answers!!

Tonight I met with Dr. Kofinas my new High Risk doctor. This doctor could be my ticket to bringing a healthy full term baby into this world. He is known for studying the placenta and deals greatly with situations such as ours on a daily basis. Here is his website: http://www.kofinasperinatal.org/about-us-/doctors

At our appointment we had a thorough exam and was told everything looks great which was even greater for me since we are going in for our IUI tomorrow evening. My uterine lining was thick and our one follicle was 20mm which is perfect. Now we just need sperm to meet egg...but lets save that for another blog :)

Dr. Kofina's started out needing to know the details of our previous pregnancy. We informed him that we had what we thought was a pretty normal pregnancy with little bumps along the way. He looked at our paperwork from our other doctors and noticed that our last ultrasound before labor with the other high risk doctor showed we had a cervix length over 4 and the following week, two days prior to delivery it was 3.14. This right off the bat alarmed him and said that was our first indication something was not right. This should have been a red flag to our doctor after the nurse called it in, but why would our doctor look at our chart when the hospital calls them..hmmm...sounds shady to me. Then the doctor looked over the placenta pathology report from after our delivery and said that the boys combined placenta weight was less than what one of their placentas should have been. This seems to be what went wrong. He discussed that when something is wrong with the placenta your cervix becomes inflamed and brings on contractions resulting in labor. He said that if he were our doctor from the beginning all of our blood work would have been completed that we had done after the boys and the placenta would have been accurately measured and treated accordingly. Basically, this could have totally been prevented. The blood work from the beginning would have revealed that I have Thrombophila and needed to be on Lovenox and baby aspirin. He said unfortunately this happens all to often because doctors don't check the blood work until a person has had a few losses which is a few too late in his eyes.

We made sure to ask if this was destined to happen again and he said not with the right treatment. These are the situations he sees daily. He mentioned one lady who was there while we were there who was 35 weeks with twins and had come to him at 20 weeks when she was going into pre term labor. He was able to take care of her and get her to this point. We asked if twins would be an option and he responded again, "with the right monitoring and treatment of course." This is what he does. Mike and I are completely relieved. I have faith again. I go back in tomorrow (bc their blood lady was out) for another blood test to test our Natural Killer cells and if we conceive this month I will go back right after to start the lovenox shots. I try to think God has put us in NY for a reason and this may be it. He knew there would be a reason I needed this doctor. I feel so blessed. My heart still aches to think that what happened to my boys could have been prevented. I would have been 34 weeks right now and it hurts so bad. However, I can't bring them back but I know that we are so much closer to bringing a baby home after meeting with Dr. Kofinas. My little angels will help us along the way too. Now just to have good luck with our IUI tomorrow!!

Look for my blog on this IUI cycle either tomorrow or later this week :)