Guest Post: The Other Side Of Fertility Treatments // When Everything Goes Wrong
I’ve been hearing a lot about women who get pregnant on their first round of IVF. I hear these stories and I feel hope, excitement, and a little like I can believe again. But that is not my story, mine is one where all that can go wrong does go wrong, time and time again.
My infertility journey took off two years ago, right before my 28th birthday when I met with the doctor who would guide me through countless appointments, phone calls, the occasional texts, multiple procedures, a hospitalization, and more prescriptions, needles, sharps containers, and alcohol swabs than I can count.
Year 28 was full of IUIs, not because my doctor thought they would work. No, instead I went through three unnecessary procedures because that was what was required by my insurance before they would cover the big stuff, IVF. Not surprisingly, all three IUIs failed. What was surprising though, at least to me, was the pain I felt after each call from my doctor letting me know that I wasn’t pregnant and she still didn’t know why. This is the year I learned that you can mourn something you never had.
Year 29 was a big one. This was when the pandemic hit and shut down all of Manhattan, including all IVF clinics. My cycle was delayed and then delayed again. Finally, in early summer, my doctor called me to say she had been approved to reopen her office. My IVF cycle was back on - and with it came a slew of drugs that I quickly needed to become comfortable jamming into my body. So learn I did, and then I learned about the side effects - which for me meant breaking out like a teenager and a cacophony of emotions ranging from intense sadness to wild anger and back again. It seems the only emotions I didn’t experience were joy and happiness. For weeks, the thought of smiling was always right beyond the horizon. Let me tell you, IVF is hard to go through at all times, but when all of your favorite activities have been removed from your arsenal due to a global pandemic and all the news is doomsday sounding, it’s even harder.
Eventually the day for my egg retrieval arrived and off I went to the clinic where I would be put to sleep for a short procedure which would determine the future of my family. It was my first experience with anesthesia and I was feeling pretty scared, but before I knew it, I was awake again. Then the pain kicked in, a little pain post egg retrieval is to be expected, after all you just had a minor surgery, but this was major pain. After confirming there was nothing wrong and I was just “special,” I was sent home with the wonderful news that we had 16 eggs. The next day that number was down to 14 and by day 5, the blastocyst stage, we were down to 8. Off our little embryos went to genetic testing.
Egg retrievals usually require a few hours in bed post surgery and most women feel ready to walk around by the following day. But not me, no no no. Within 48 hours, I was so sick, so bloated, and so nauseous I couldn’t get out of bed without my husband helping me up. Four days later, I started throwing up and by day five I was admitted to the hospital for a severe case of OHSS, ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. In any IVF process, there is a small 5% risk for the woman to develop OHSS, but the chances of developing severe OHSS is much smaller, only about 1%. This, of course, was my case. I had a large fluid buildup in my abdomen which was putting stress on my organs and making it hard to breathe. I also wasn’t able to eat or drink properly and my blood work showed that I was severely iron deficient, as well as generally malnourished. Thankfully, I only needed to stay in the hospital for 3 days, but it took me another 3-4 weeks before I was able to walk on my own without feeling shortness of breath and before my blood work stabilized.
Shortly after being released from the hospital, my doctor called me with the genetic testing results. Only two of our embryos were viable. This was much fewer than expected and I was crushed. After all of that, the hormones, the shots, the egg retrieval, the OHSS, and the hospitalization, I only had two embryos left. Because most studies say you need three embryos per live birth, it felt like all I had gone through was for nothing. I was also still struggling from the emotional turmoil of the previous few weeks and couldn’t imagine moving forward with the embryo transfer until I had a chance to calm down and process all that had happened in such a short period of time. Let me tell you the truth here, this took a really long time. Every time I thought I was ready to discuss moving forward with the transfer, my anxiety would start to reappear. So much of my process had been harder than expected or harder than anyone else I knew, so I felt that by moving forward, I was opening myself up for more disasters to happen.
After six months, I felt ready to discuss the transfers, so I called my doctor to plan the next steps. We mapped out a plan of attack and back on the hormones I went, injecting myself daily and taking estrogen and progesterone to ready my body for a baby. Throughout this period, I was hesitant to allow myself to become too optimistic, after all only around 50% of embryo transfers result in pregnancy, but I tried to maintain a positive energy as I felt strongly that my emotional and spiritual state would impact this outcome just as much as my physical state. Finally, the day of the transfer arrived. I’ll spare you the details, but when my doctor and the embryologist announced that my embryo, my baby, was being placed in my uterus, the tears started streaming down my face. At that moment, the embryo became a real baby in my mind. I no longer was hesitant to be optimistic, this was as real as could be. And this is how my 29th year ended, waiting to hear if this transfer worked and if I was in fact finally pregnant. This is the year I learned that being patient with myself is always worth it.
Year 30 started with me convinced I was experiencing pregnancy symptoms, even though I was only seven days post transfer and logically knew that it was unlikely to have symptoms that early. I waited anxiously for the Monday that my blood work would confirm that we were among the miracle couples who got pregnant on their first transfer. But Monday morning, I woke up knowing in my heart I was not pregnant. Still, I drove myself to the lab at 8:00 am and waited all day for the results. At 3:23, I got the call. Not pregnant. It’s now Wednesday night as I write this. I cried all of Monday evening, Tuesday I only cried 4 or 5 times, and today I only cried once. I spoke to my therapist yesterday and explained that I didn’t know what category my grief belonged to. Technically, this doesn’t fall into the miscarraige category and my grief pales in comparison to what those who experience that loss feel, but still my grief is real and painful. My grief is for my baby who didn’t even make it to pregnancy. My grief is for my one remaining embryo and the immense pressure for it to grow into a healthy baby. My grief is for my husband who so desperately wants to be a father. And my grief is for me, who once again is faced with something else that went wrong, yet still needs to be strong and move forward. I have only been 30 for five days, but I suppose this is the year that I learned what it is to love like a mother, even if I only experienced it for seven days.
- Anonymous
