After The First Appointment // Dealing With Bad Results
Fair warning to anyone else just starting their TTC (trying to conceive) journey, your life will never be the same after that first appointment. As long as you were trying every month to conceive, you had hope, but the second you get those dreaded results, it’s all heartbreak from there. There are many lucky women who get to end their infertility struggle the following month with a 5 day Clomid prescription, but for the rest of us, the journey has just begun.
I’m not going to go into detail about our results, but I will tell you that we’re dealing with unexplained male factor sub-infertility. Contrary to popular belief, 1/3 cases are male factor, 1/3 are female factor, and 1/3 are completely unexplained. I was also diagnosed with borderline hypothyroidism, but thankfully, a daily pill keeps my levels in check.
Because of our MFI (male factor infertility) diagnosis, my husband has been the one in and out of appointments over the past month, doing blood work, a second semen analysis, as well as a full body exam and ultrasound. Waiting for results between tests was especially difficult since each piece of data collected brought us closer and closer to IVF.
To give you some sort of timeline, we started testing in May. It’s currently July and we only got our treatment plan this week. Due to Covid, most of our appointments are via Zoom, for better or worse, but our most recent one was actually via the phone. (Yes, they still cost the same as in-office visits.)
I made it about halfway through the call before having a complete breakdown because for three months, both my husband’s urologist and my reproductive endocrinologist had taken IVF off the table. But as of Monday, July 6th, IVF may be the only way we can start a family.
I’m not sure I could ever explain to you what it was like to have everything I thought my life would be crushed in an instant. We went from dreaming of having four kids to not knowing if we’ll ever be lucky enough to have one. There will never be some cute story of how I surprised my husband. We’ll never know the joy of “deciding” to have a baby. Our path to parenthood, assuming we ever get there, will be filled with physical and emotional pain.
As I continue to document our journey, there’s one message I will continue to share -- There is no guarantee with infertility treatment.
Too many people assume that IVF ends with a baby, which is so far from the truth. The only thing IVF guarantees is 2-3 injections a day, an egg retrieval surgery, and a chance at pregnancy. While there is so much education that needs to happen in regards to infertility, like the fact that it affects 1 in 8 couples, you may wonder why I choose to harp on this specific point. I’ll tell you. I believe a lot of the ignorance and insensitive comments stem from this idea that you can “fix” infertility by “just” doing IVF. There is no “just” in infertility. IVF is a brutal, painful process that costs tens of thousands of dollars, and unfortunately, is not always successful.
The idea of putting my body through something so traumatic without the guarantee of a baby is probably the hardest part of all. This is coming from a girl with severe needle phobia. And do you know what happens when it doesn’t work? You have to start all over, if you can afford it. Even if it does work the first round, imagine knowing this is your future every time you want to give your kid a sibling. There is no “just” in IVF.
I’m devastated, I’m jealous, I’m angry. Infertility stole the light from my life and replaced it with endless appointments and heartache. I’ve already had to say goodbye to my dream of being a mom before 30 and now here I am, saying goodbye to our most naive thought yet, that babies are made in the bedroom.
xx Esther
*These posts do not reflect my current situation as they were written in the moment.
Still waiting on our miracle, but sharing now to help others feel less alone.
For more recent updates, follow me on Instagram: @esthersanter
