The Process

If you have not already, begin with Part 1: Our Family Plan.

Part 2:

FYI: This may be more details than you want to hear. But infertility is a detailed thing. You have been warned.

In May of 2007, when Lily was 15 months old, we quit preventing pregnancy. Neither one of us enjoy the rigid “trying” for a baby, so we just waited. Many prime times during the first year JD was out of town (camps, mission trips, conferences, etc.), which does not help in getting pregnant, so I wasn’t too stressed when we were not pregnant after the first year. After about 15 months (Summer 2008), I did begin to worry. Ovulation tests were positive and basal temps were being taken without any luck. Lily was now 2 1/2. The first two pregnancies took 3 months each to conceive. What was taking so long? Shortly thereafter, I learned I was pregnant, only to miscarry at 4 weeks. I talked to my OB and he ran some preliminary tests. All were normal. JD was even tested. His tests came back with some slow swimmers. We assumed this was the problem, although they said we could still easily get pregnant.

In January 2010, we decided it was time to check out the infertility doctor. I had fears of them starting me on meds and having 8 babies. It was scary. And I was uneasy about where to draw the line between man-made baby and God given baby. But we decided to go and be examined, tested, poked, prodded and everything in between to see if we could find the answer to “why?”

Right off the bat, the doc wanted to start me on Clomid without knowing what exactly was wrong. The fears of having 11 babies were now knocking at the door. So I told him no. Clomid is to make you ovulate and my at home tests were telling me I already was. Why increase the chances of those 16 babies at once? Instead of meds, we just did lots of lab work and an ultrasound, draining our bank account by about $1,000. He was not thrilled about my choice in the drug matter, but it’s my choice. I wanted answers to try and fix the problem not a guess about what was wrong.

The results are in. JD is a-okay. He is NOT the problem. It is me. My poor ovaries were 40 years old (and I was only 32). The doc tells us if we are going to get pregnant we need to be aggressive with treatment and to do it now. He also tells us about a study their office is doing to test my uterus. We sign on the dotted line (it’s covered by a grant since it is for research-Praise the Lord). That next month I start taking Femera (a drug similar to Clomid, to help make sure I ovulate). Oh my. PMS for the five days I was on it. I was a mess! I then went in for the uterine biopsy. That was a ton of fun. And then I went in a couple of days later for an ultrasound to see how many follicles have been released. Let me back track a bit. The previous month I went for an ultrasound of the day of ovulation. That was on day 11, earlier than the typical day 14 for most women. Therefore after taking the meds in the second month I went in again on day 11 to see about the follicles. You want to guess how many there were? FIVE. What? And since I came in so early (and had not yet tested positive on the ovulation sticks), she really couldn’t tell me how many follicles would mature into eggs and how many would be reabsorbed. Really? My fears of having twins were just increased 2 ½ times!! I was freaking out. Now came the biggest decision, do we have the “timed intercourse” on the positive ovulation day and risk actually conceiving 5 babies, or do we wait? For the next week I was out of control and stressing about it while we were waiting for that positive test. Do we, do we not? JD finally said yes. And after all that stress, God said no.

And because of all that stress, we threw in the towel. I felt like I had wallowed in my own self pity for years now. And I was not being the best mom I could be to Lily. And the past month had been the icing on the cake. Well, that sounds too great. More like the scum on a dirty fish tank. It was the worst month ever. And most importantly, I did not have a peace about continuing with treatment after that negative pregnancy test. Therefore we spoiled Lily rotten; for a few days anyway. If she is our only child, we will enjoy every moment of it and not hold back.