An Update After Our IVF Transfer

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This is going to be one of the hardest posts I have ever written.  IVF and infertility has its many roller coasters and our story is no different.  I left off in this post here about our transfer day, which was back in May and everything went just as planned.  After the procedure the waiting game really began.

A couple of weeks later we would finally know if the transfer had worked or not.  I woke up super early to go into the office to have my blood drawn.  I had taken the day off of work and Kurt worked from home.  This was advised to us since it would likely be an emotional day either way.  A lot of women take home pregnancy tests, but I didn’t cheat once!  I was just too nervous.  What if it was negative and we ended up actually being pregnant?  I didn’t want to go thru that disappointment.  Or what if the tests at home said positive, but we weren’t pregnant.  I needed concrete answers!  And the only way to get those concrete answers were from the doctor.

So around 11am you can imagine our excitement/fear/anxiety when my phone rang.  It was our nurse telling us she had wonderful news to share- we were pregnant!  When she said those words, tears immediately flooded my face and I began shaking so badly I had to set the phone down.  Tears of joy!  We were ecstatic that it had worked!

I was so excited that this was finally going to be our happy ending.  But at the same time I knew we still had a lot to get thru.  The fear of miscarriage was high for me.  So many women go thru it and I was terrified of getting too attached.  And every new ache or pain brought on a new form of anxiety.  But as the weeks went on, all was looking perfectly normal and on track.  We even finally graduated back to our OB which is huge for anyone going thru IVF.  We were elated!

At our first meeting with the OB, she talked to us about all of the early testing.  She was a big advocate for it.  Her take was the delivery room is not the day or time for surprises.  And I was so happy she was on board with this because I really wanted to have it done.  It was a sense of calm for me to know that everything was ok.  And you get to find out the gender earlier than normal!

A couple of weeks later I went in for our 12 week ultrasound.  This was one of the coolest ultrasounds ever because at this point, the fetus actually looked like a baby.  I could see it sucking and opening and closing their mouth.  And you could see the baby doing flips and moving a ton.  We had other ultrasounds in the past, but the fetus just looked like a blob on the screen.  This was much different.

I was on a high!  Kurt wasn’t able to make the appointment with me, so I texted him a picture and for him that’s when it all sank in.  It was actually a baby in there!

Later that afternoon I had another appointment to meet with the genetics counselor.  This was for all of the early testing they did and to go over anything abnormal on the ultrasound.  I sat in the waiting room for two hours, I kid you not.  And I was so annoyed!

Finally they called me back to speak to me.  It never even occurred to me that anything could have possibly been wrong at this point- I was still on a high after seeing a real baby in my belly.  But the genetics counselor had some very unfortunate news to deliver to me. The ultrasound tech noticed something during the scan that looked abnormal and they wanted to watch me a little closer.  The information that was given to me was very vague.  And I’m not going to go into detail about it because truthfully, it’s too painful to relive.

They wanted me to make an appointment in two weeks to have an early 3D ultrasound done to confirm or deny what they thought they had seen.  The baby at this point was still developing, so waiting two more weeks the baby would be a little further along and we could all go from there.

I was devastated.  In my heart, I knew it was all going to be alright, but what if it wasn’t?  I had to go home that evening and explain, thru tears, all of this to Kurt.  That was the first and only appointment after that that he missed!  I was not about to do this stuff alone.

The next day, I was glued to Google trying to find anything I could get my hands on.  But I couldn’t find much.  Which in a way made me feel better.  That night Kurt made me promise him I would stay off Google and to just think positively.  It was very hard to agree to that, but I did.  We would have answers in a couple of short weeks.

In the meantime, since we had done all of the early testing we were able to find out the gender of baby.  I had a cake made and we FaceTimed our parents one night to do a mini reveal.  We were all Team Girl, but to everyone’s surprise we found out we were having a BOY!  Honestly I wanted a girl very badly, but after everything we had experienced I just wanted a healthy baby at that point and a boy was absolutely perfect for our family.

We basked in the excitement and started sharing all of our good news with extended family and friends.  And kind of forgot about the lingering appointment we had.  We choose to stay positive and think that it would all work out for the best.

Finally the day of our ultrasound appointment arrived and our worse fears were confirmed.  We had lost the baby.

During an ultrasound, the tech doesn’t say much so we weren’t sure what to expect.  But I knew something wasn’t right.  They scanned the baby with this machine and then a more senior tech came in to take more scans and then they wanted scans with a vaginal ultrasound.  I knew it wasn’t looking good.  Eventually the doctor came in to speak to us and confirmed our worst fears.

Kurt and I were both in a complete fog.  It’s just something that no one ever thinks they will have to go thru.  Especially the journey that we had to even get pregnant.  I thought that was going to be hard and difficult time and I truly never expected this. We had hit all the milestones- getting thru the risk of miscarriage, stopping all of the shots (with IVF I had to take a shot of progesterone every day until I was 9 weeks), graduating back to the OB meaning we had a normal pregnancy at that point.  I was finally starting to feel joy and really believing that this was our baby.  And it was all ripped away.

Our entire family felt this pain, including Addie.  That night and the next few days after, she had the worst diarrhea I’ve ever seen.  I didn’t sleep a wink that first night mainly because I was so upset, but also because Addie was waking me up every few hours to go outside.  Her tummy did not feel well.  We eventually took her to the vet a few days later and she didn’t have any infections or parasites- she was perfectly healthy.  The vet mentioned that sometimes they feed off our stress levels and he said that without me even mentioning what we were going thru.  Addie felt this loss too.

The next day, I had to call the hospital and set up appointments to have the D&C performed.  Do you know how hard it is to put on a brave face over the phone and tell someone who you have never met that you just lost your baby?  It’s hard let me tell you.

These procedures are not taken lightly and they are only performed on certain days of the week, at certain times, etc.  We had to wait a week and a half until it could be done.  That week and a half was pure torture for me.  Pure torture.  I had to walk around pregnant yet knowing I did not have a healthy baby in there.  And you still have all of the pregnancy symptoms, cravings, etc.  Luckily, throughout the whole pregnancy I had it pretty easy, so I was feeling almost back to my old self.  But it was so tough.  The best way I can describe it is that I felt disconnected from my body.  I didn’t want to touch or feel my growing belly and I just wanted it to be all over with so I could heal physically and emotionally.

The day before the procedure you have to go in so the doctor can dilate your cervix.  I’ve been thru plenty of producers having gone thru IVF so I thought this one would be a breeze too.  But I was so wrong.  They stick these tiny sticks of seaweed into your cervix.  It sounds weird but somewhere along the way they realized that seaweed helps to dilate the cervix.  And every time they shoved one of those sticks into your cervix it is immediate pain, bloating and extreme cramping.  They did about six of these on me.  Kurt had so nicely reached out his hand to me to let me squeeze it and I gladly took it.  After it was all done, he said he felt like his hand was about to fall off- that’s how hard I was squeezing.  The pain was immense.

The next day was the actual procedure and at 16 weeks we officially said goodbye baby Faber.

I wish I could say the recovery process was easy, but it has been one of the most difficult things I’ve ever gone thru.  Physically my body recovered quickly and I felt like my old self almost immediately.  I was shocked at how fine I felt after what I had just gone thru at least on the physical level.  Now the emotional side of things was a whole other story.

I felt sad.  I’ve never felt so much sadness.  I was just finally accepting the pregnancy which can sound awful.  But when you have tried and tried for so long and also going thru IVF, you are always in the mindset- be positive but prepare for the worst.  You get use to delays, more tests that need to be done and there always being another hurdle you have to jump thru.  The only way I can explain it better is I felt like once we found out we were pregnant, I felt like I was holding my breath.  And after every appointment thereafter I was able to release my breath just a little bit as all the tests and ultrasounds were right on schedule.  And finding out we had lost the baby was a huge blow.  By then I was excited for it all.  We were just about to announce it to social media and we were about to order baby furniture, all of our close friends and family knew.  And then it was just all gone.  No more excitement, no more planning.  It was just gone.

I was angry.  Having an IVF pregnancy is difficult.  Every morning for 10 weeks Kurt had to give me a shot of progesterone.  This is imperative because with IVF your body doesn’t naturally produce this hormone until the placenta forms and takes over.  The shot, at first, wasn’t that big of deal.  It doesn’t hurt going in, but after a few weeks you get huge welts on your butt area.  The progesterone is an oil, so it just sort of sits in the spot you inject it.  And after a few weeks it just hurts and itches and is completely uncomfortable.

I felt sorry for myself.  While I would say I had it pretty easy with the first trimester symptoms, I still had some pretty crummy days where I didn’t feel good.  I had really bad heartburn, a few weeks of bad morning sickness and I was always eating.  One expects to go thru this during the pregnancy, but you do it and in the end you have a baby.  Not to mention the fact that I was always going to the doctor’s.  In IVF you have a few more ultrasounds than a regular pregnancy, but my thyroid also acted up when I found out I was pregnant, so that was being monitored every 1-2 weeks.  And I was keeping up with my weekly acupuncture appointments- which I would never given up because it truly helps me.  But I put in so much work and effort and time to only have to start from square one again.

Thru this entire experience we cannot even begin to explain how thankful we are for our family, friends, doctors, nurses, both of our companies we work for, etc.  Everyone has been truly touching and amazing to all of us.

Every doctor or nurse that we came into contact along this was were all truly amazing and so gentle thru this devastating time.  My OB personally called me the next day after we found out the news while she was on vacation.  You don’t find many doctors like that.

I’m thankful for my boss.  He let me work from home for as long as I needed to and let me take off as much time as I needed for doctor’s appointments, etc.  There was no way I could have worked in the office during those weeks.  The day I returned back to work, I had the most extreme anxiety ever.  Just a few weeks ago, I had shared our joyous news and word was getting around that I was pregnant.  I thought people were going to come up to me and not knowing ask how the baby was or something.  But everyone was kind and just let it be which is exactly what I needed.  Luckily, that morning they announced a huge organizational change and a lot of promotions.  I’ve never been more thankful that day for office gossip!

We are so thankful for our family and friends.  Without your support we would not have gotten thru it- I really mean it.  So many people have reached out.  Our entire counter top was filled with flowers after we shared the unfortunate news.  People still ask how things are going and it truly means the world to us.  And what really tore into my heart was when people would ask if we needed any help with Addie.  Everyone knows how much she means to us and the fact that our friends offered to take her for a walk or to the park really just means the world to us.

And most of all, I am incredibly grateful for my husband.  I pride myself on being independent, but during this time I really needed him. When I wanted to talk, we talked, when I needed to cry, he offered up his shoulder and when I was mad, he let me vent.  I said whatever I needed to say- no judgement at all by him.  It has brought us closer than ever and for that I will be forever thankful for.

Our journey isn’t over yet.  This is not the end.  We still have frozen embabies on ice.  And when we are fully recovered we will be right back in the game!

I’m going to leave you with a text message I received during all of this.  It really hit home to me and came from someone I didn’t expect to hear from.  And after reading it for the first time, I felt more calm because all the points that they had made all rang true.

“I was gonna start this text with “I’m so sorry” but then I thought what would that truly do because I’m sure no amount of “sorry” from even a trillion people would change anything or make you feel any better.  I can’t imagine what you are going through or would I ever wish to know.  Just know it’s okay to not be okay right now.  I wish I could snap my fingers and make this all go away for you.  I wish I could hold you when you feel hopeless and confused, desperate for answers.  Answers that seem impossible to find.  I refuse to say “everything happens for a reason” because I refuse to believe that in this moment.  I refuse to say “everything will get better or be okay” because this is your life, your truth and I refuse to speak for you.  But I will say this you are a strong amazing women!  Even if you don’t think you can find the strength from within to deal with all of this right now, it’s in there!!  Through pain comes strength….and you have to keep reminding yourself none of this is your fault.  As mothers we tend to do that about everything.  My heart weeps unconditionally on an outrageous level for you right now. No women should ever be put through this kind of heartbreak.  I will be praying for not only your beautiful baby and you in this whole process.  I love you.”

xoxox Amanda

Photos by Sarah Chobanian

You may also like Our Infertility Journey or Our Infertility Journey Part 2: IVF