IVF From the Male Perspective

This weeks is National Infertility Awareness week and I will be bringing you some special posts in regards to my journey with IVF.  If you aren’t familiar with NIAW, it’s a week focused on raising awareness on this disease and helping couples cope thru these trying times.  Here is an article that explains it a little better.

Anyway, today I wanted Kurt to chime in and talk about IVF from the male perspective.  Often times our spouses are the most forgotten ones in the journey.  We, as women, are the ones who go thru the physical aspects of this with procedures and doctors appointments, taking the medicine, etc.  But our spouses are right there with us.

I recently had a small outpatient surgery and I asked Kurt what he did while he waited.  And he answered that he went down the street to get donuts- his fav by the way haha.  But in all seriousness, he said he needed something to keep him distracted while I was put under.  Before this, I never realized how stressful that could be on my partner.  I mean I knew I was a little nervous going under, isn’t that normal?  But it never occurred to me how he would feel about the situation.

I have been incredibly lucky and Kurt has been there for all of the doctor’s appointments (minus the daily monitoring appointments- those are pretty quick so he doesn’t need to waste his time).  Kurt has given me every single one of my shots.  I don’t have a phobia of needles, but I always look away when he gives them to me. At this point, I know I could do it myself, but I just don’t want to!  And he is always there ready to stab me haha.

And you don’t see those days where my emotions are all over the place.  These hormones are no joke and often times I can go from zero to seeing fire in a matter seconds.  And who do you think is the one taking the heat?  Kurt is.

He is the one who picks up the extra slack around the house when I am physically too exhausted.  There are days where I just want to come home and go straight to bed.  From running to appointments to dealing with insurance, it can get tiring.  And Kurt is there to cook dinner and take care of the animals.

And he’s awlays the cheerleader and the more positive one.  He’s the one who has never lost hope.  I wouldn’t say that I’ve lost hope, but I have my more difficult days when you wonder when is this going to come to an end.  Never Kurt.  He’s always optimistic, persistent, positive and is our biggest cheerleader.

What I’m trying to say is that while I am the one going thru the physical aspects of IVF, Kurt also deals with it in another way.  And I think often times everyone forgets that.  So here is Kurt to tell you a little more about his experiences!

Hi everyone!  This is Kurt and I would like to start off with introducing myself as the magic behind the lens!  I am Amanda’s husband, photographer, furbaby daddy to 3 wonderful little furbabies and Amanda has asked me to share my experience on IVF from a male’s perspective.

I would like to start with this.  If you are someone or know someone that is considering taking this journey, please make sure you do your research on IVF as I truly did not know what to expect myself.  I am going to be honest it has been a difficult, stressful, time-consuming experience and a true test for the both of us.  I have always said that Amanda is the foundation of the Faber 5, but I knew before we began this journey that I would need to be the one to step up to keep our foundation strong and intact no matter what insanely ridiculous curveballs life may throw our way.

About 15 years ago I was in a very dark period in my early, immature life and my own mom had told me that you will be tested again over and over throughout life and right now this is rock bottom for you. I had always somewhat turned a blind-eye to that statement until this past year when I truly understood what she had meant by that statement.  I have never been so aggressively tested physically, mentally and emotionally like I have the last 14 months.  When I said I didn’t know what to expect in the beginning that is an understatement on how unprepared I was for what was to come.

The first moment I realized just how involved I would need to be was one of the many early doctor appts where I was being instructed on how to properly give this shot and that shot and how much each syringe should be filled to and what medications are mixed with what and where to give the injections at is when I realized my wonderful role as Amanda’s husband now included full-time nurse/caregiver which I was ready to take head on.  We would start every morning off with 6 AM shots for about a month just before the egg retrieval followed by months of more shots leading up to the transfer and even more shots post confirmed pregnancy.  My wonderful mom is a nurse, so I grew up getting routine shots so this I knew was a task I was ready for.

By June we were told after the first transfer that we both might want to take the day off from work to brace ourselves of whatever the outcome may be whether good or not so good news, so we did and for me taking off even a half day is extremely difficult.  But then it happened, by the early afternoon we received the call and I didn’t know what to feel except sick to my stomach because if it was great news I knew our whole lives were going to change upside down in the next 9 months but if it was not so good news I would have felt the previous four months was lost in a way so the obvious feeling was SICK TO MY STOMACH!!!  But the call came in and it was the news that everyone going through IVF hopes to hear and we were going to have a baby!

For the next couple of days/weeks I didn’t know what to think really.  A lot of confusion I think since I really didn’t know what to expect and what to plan for, so I do what I do best and just told myself I’m going to wing it and we will just figure it out as we go.  Shortly after the news came I remember Amanda and I looking out the window and becoming visually lost in the Chicago skyline where I finally began to open up to her about where I was at mentally the past four months.  I am someone who doesn’t like to show weakness and prefers to keep in my sadness.  I bottle it up until its too much for me to handle keeping it all in.  But I recall opening up about how drained I had felt after taking on a lot more responsibilities including but not limited to taking care of the cats Frank and Charlie, and our diva princess pup Addie full-time so that Amanda didn’t have to overwork herself during these IVF months.

I knew that for the best odds for success you must make sure your wife is extremely comfortable and stress free.  Strenuous and tedious chores around the house was another responsibility I knew I had to take over so that all Amanda could focus on was being healthy physically, mentally and spiritually.  But then the true test had come, and this is something that no one truly can prepare themselves for.  Amanda had gone for her an ultrasound and called me with some troubling news.  Their may be a complication with the baby and that we need to come back in two more weeks for another ultrasound.  My attitude has always been positive regardless of the news or situation because you cannot have two individuals both nosediving emotionally as one needs to be there for the other.  So, for two weeks we had waited, and I already convinced myself that nothing was wrong.  But I was mistaken in the end.

By this time, we had already began spreading the news to family and friends about the pregnancy.  But all the happiness and joy we had been feeling for months had all derailed over the course of one weekday morning.  We had our second ultrasound done however I had to walk next door to have blood drawn while the nurse finished the ultrasound.  Then the call came from Amanda in tears and barely able to breathe asking me to come back as soon as possible as there is seriously something wrong.

The short walk back was not enough time for me to brace myself for what was coming next.  By the time I arrived back I could tell by looking at the sadness in Amanda’s face that it was over.  All the time and the exhaustion from the previous eight months had come to an end.  We had lost our little baby and we didn’t see it coming.  I remember the drive back was quiet and sad.  By the time we arrived home I remember staring into a black hole in my mind with all hope lost.  I had never felt so empty inside and so hopeless that I couldn’t think straight.  I had remained so positive through it all that for the first time I just couldn’t understand why this was taken away from us.  I had asked that question repeatedly for almost two weeks and I felt myself showing resentment towards everyone and everything that the happy go-lucky man I had always known myself to be was shattered into pieces.

But I started to put the pieces back together on the day Amanda needed me the most when she had to come back for the D&C procedure.  I could feel the amount of pain Amanda was in by her grip she had on my hands.  As hard as it was for me to understand why this had happened I finally realized that my positive attitude was desperately needed at that moment because Amanda didn’t deserve this.  She didn’t deserve to be in so much emotional and physical pain that the least I could do was be there to support her and help us both get through this.  By the time it was all over I felt the best way we can bring about any closure to a sad story was to name our unborn son.  Amanda and I were taking a walk a few days before the procedure and we decided a name was a must and she jokingly mentioned wouldn’t it be funny to name him Bruce.  This was the closure we so desperately needed.

The next several months were still extremely difficult for Amanda as everything was a reminder and a trigger for her.  I knew she was still in a lot of emotional pain and it had reminded me of my own dark place 15 years ago that I swore I would never end up again.  As the husband through all of this you must be there for your wife.  You must be the glue that holds together the foundation.  Their will be cracks here and there but that is life and cracks are made to be repaired at some point, but it may take time.  And no matter what just agree with everything she says because in a way it was and still is therapeutic for Amanda to be able to vent her frustrations and emotional pain while I just simply agree and nod my head.  She still to this day asks me how I can remain so positive and as cliché as it sounds my motto is life is to short to be sad and angry all the time when we have so much to be appreciative of and thankful for.   One special moment though happened around our initial due date and that was the birth of our niece, Lily Anne.  I had always believed that Bruce and Lily were supposed to grow up together since my brother and sister in law were taking the same journey with us at the same time.  Now Lily will always make us feel that a part of Bruce is with her.  It’s a special feeling that still gives us hope that our time will come.

In the end everything does happen for a reason.  Our time will in fact come and if you are going through IVF as well remember your time will come to.  Always be there to support each other and pick each other up when one of you may be feeling down.  Bruce is still a part of us and that is something that can never be taken away.  Our IVF story continues on and one day we will finally have our happy ending.

Other IVF posts:

Our Infertility Journey

Our Infertility Journey Part 2: IVF

An Update After Our IVF Transfer

Photos by Sarah Chobanian