Wednesday, December 2, 2009

It's just not fair!!!!

Is it wrong to feel like I want to throw a temper tantrum? not here 
alone in my home like I usually do, but out in public. I want to yell out 
loud how left out and forgotten I feel, abandoned by all my friends, 
stuck in this hell while all my friends run off into happy family land. I 
want to let people to know the actual physical pain of watching everyone 
else easily get what you have been hoping and praying for your whole 
life and may never have. I am happy for all those out there who do easily 
get to raise a family, but why does it have to be ME that has to work 10x 
harder. It was always "me" out of my group of friends that wanted to be 
a mom, it was always "me" who chose jobs that included children, it was 
always "me" who was told "your going to make a wonderful mother 
someday" so why is it that I am the one, still sitting here with no one 
to mother?

I know that whole rant sounds like a 5 year olds cry for a toy all 
the "other" kids have, but I can't help myself. I am tired of the rude 
comments I hear about people working with fertility treatments, the
last one being a sly comment about "natural selection". I swear I 
wanted to knock this guys head off, but I knew it would "give me 
away" if I had. Illness and disease could be thought of as "natural 
selection" as well, but we don't see dr's refusing treatment on this 
basis. I am also tired of stupid advice, I feel resentment to everyone
who told me to "relax" over the last year or so, I heard it so much 
that I actually believed that infertility was all in my head, that my 
inability to relax had caused my husband and I all this heartache. I just 
want all of this to end, I want what all the other kids have and I'm tired 
of waiting. 

I am actually getting somewhere with all this complaining, I swear!
Yesterday I had an appointment with my naturopath, I brought her 
the results of all the tests done at the R.E.'s office (they charged me 
$30 for my own test results!). Anyway, I really felt like I needed a 
second opinion after such a dismal diagnosis, I trust her and her
opinion so I was hoping she would have something nicer to say. 

The appointment went well, was it good news? no, not exactly, but
it was better then what I had previously heard. She seemed very 
suspicious of my R.E.'s intentions. For those of you who are new to this 
blog, my hubby was told his sperm would never be able to fertilize my 
egg and that our only hope would be IVF. He did give us 3 months of 
vitamins to see if we could up the quality of his sperm, but he did not 
give us much hope. My naturopath let me know that even if my hubby 
took the vitamins for three months, the new and improved swimmers 
would not show up for at least 4-6 months from the day he began taking 
the vitamins.

What this means is, if hubby goes in 3 months from now to redo his 
SA there may not be much change at all and the R.E. will chalk it up to 
a genetic disorder and send us for IVF. She has asked that we give the 
vitamins at least 6 months and if nothing has changed by then, see if she 
can change things around with herbs and acupuncture. This way we will 
know for sure we tried everything before moving on to the next step.

So this is our new plan, waiting 8-10 months to see if things change at 
all, THEN talk to the R.E. about the next steps. Part of me is happy to 
know that there is still a possibly of natural conception, but the other 
impatient side of me just wants to speed on through to the IVF. 
Sounds bad doesn't it? I am just so tired of waiting, and in the week 
following the R.E. appointment I had gotten used to the monetary 
sacrifice and even got a little excited to be moving forward. 
Don't get me wrong, I am happy we may be able to turn these little 
swimmers around, but I really don't want to spend the next 10 months 
just waiting around for something that may or may not happen. 

Of course, I understand that IVF is not a guarantee of pregnancy, and 
I know it's not something to be taken lightly. I certainly to not mean to 
belittle the challenges that the IVF bloggers are going though. I am just 
being a little insane, this I know, I had just gotten excited to have a 40% 
chance of conception as early as March, rather then a 0% chance.

One more thing before I log off, my naturopath noticed that my CA125 
was not high at all, it was 20...........a normal number being 0-35. That 
paired with my "open" tubes has given her very little evidence that a 
laparoscopy is necessary. Like I said, I trust her and her opinion, so
for now I think were going to wait the 8-10 months and I will hold
off on the surgery until we see a real reason for it. Tic toc!

10 comments:

  1. Vent away my friend. It's what we are here for. I get where you are coming from. I think most of my IF journey has been waiting for one thing or another. Not actually doing anything. I too feel left behind on a daily basis, which has left me really struggling and turned me into a different person.

    I think your naturopath is right to question your RE. It seems like he's moving you along a little fast and maybe not in the right direction. (BTW, my CA-125 was 29, and normal was supposedly 30 or less, so your 20 sounds ideal to me.) It is so tempting to get caught up in things though. Kind of like dangling a carrot in front of a starving person. Who wouldn't want to bite?

    Take care.

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  2. I like your naturopath! And yes, I think you should be suspicious of your RE's motives. One of the biggest reasons why we left our evil fertility clinic was because they were ramming IVF down our throats!

    Don't apologize for venting. That's why we're here!

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  3. We are your virtual sounding board, please bitch away.

    I always see it as odd when docs go right to ivf - like i said before we had a very sad case of severe endo and they didn't want me to do ivf right away we started with iui.... so I find that suspecious as IUI is mostly covered in this fair province and is cheeper - and if the vits help the sperm it maybe an option.

    I used to be bothered alot about the natural selection thing (because I really did wonder if perhaps I should not reproduce). Then I thought, well natural selection is helping me improvise new ways to have a child - so aren't I the more evolved person? Just a different perspective.

    On the hard days, when in montreal, i used to pretend that every single pregnant woman was infertile, and every baby the result of ivf, i know it sounds odd, but after a while it conditioned me to feel better about me...

    ALSO - perhaps a little break from ttc? Seriously, think of it this way, the sperm are not going to get to the destination right now anyway, so for a few months your guys just concentrate on each other and having fun and not making babies.

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  4. Kick and scream all you want, I'm sure we've all been there (or are going there) at least once during this IF journey.

    I'm glad you got a second opinion from you naturopath. If you have a year or so to spare... meaning if you're young enough... trying this natural approach would definitely be worth it. If for nothing else, knowing you've tried everything.

    I'm keeping my fingers crossed those are some kick-ass-vitamins :)

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  5. I just don't think that a lap is a bad idea. I wouldn't let that re touch me with a 10 ft pole though.

    The fertility clinic told us the same thing, with your DH's sperm you will NEVER conceive on your own. ha!

    I would really investigate the suspicions of endo though. Your periods seem "endo painful". Plus it is one of the leading causes of IF in women. It's so hidden and you can't be tested for it. Only a lap will reveal what is really going on in there....

    Just run from that RE. He's a money hungry scum bag who likes to create life that he sustains in test tubes.. :)

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  6. I would think twice about going back to that RE, and definitely not rush into a lap. I agree with Sew - if you have painful endo symptoms, then you may want to look into a lap before too long. I didn't have the chance to take time to think about it unfortunately for surgeries one and two (or I would have found a different doctor), because the pain was so debilitating.
    I think naturopaths are the way to go, and I agree with her opinion on the supplements for your Hubby. My dr. said the same thing - it takes at least 3 months to see results, so if you want to see the full effects of the vitamins, you'd have to wait until 3 months after he took the last day's dose.

    It is so incredibly hard to wait when everyone around you has 1, 2 and 3 kids and it seems effortless. I can't even count how many times my friends told me they always thought I'd be the first married (I was the last of us 3 at the ripe "old" age of 22!), the first one with kids, and the one with the most kids. Well, they have 2 and 3 kids each, so...there goes that.
    Sometimes I feel like I, too, could just run straight to the nearest Shady Grove and just do IVF already. Patience is so much to ask for from an infertile who has been waiting so long already, but it seems that we are being called to wait even longer...who knows why?

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  7. Let it all out! So glad you found my blog. I love natural remedies and we have tried many in this IF journey. Too bad my DH's SA results were WAY below where they need to be to get me pregnant. But he too is taking vitamins to hopefully improve the swimmers so our IVF with ICSI will be a success. We hope that we fall in that 40% that does fall pregnant and stay pregnant.

    Nothing about this journey is easy. I really hope that you can find something that will help you get to the light at the end without IVF. In the mean time, let it out!!

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  8. Hey! Thanks for stopping by my new blog!! I'm still trying to figure out "wordpress" and I haven't yet found how to let people "follow" my blog but there is an email sign-up on my side bar where you can get e-mail notifications of new posts! Hope that helps for now until I can figure this all out!!

    Thanks again for stopping by!!

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  9. Aw, T ... there are so many things I want to say ... with every post I've felt a strange, commisserative empathy and a curious kind of guilt for having "made it out the other end" of this cruel and brutal journey. One week before I got my BFP I created a blog that I ended up never writing in ... I titled it "Joy and Woe" after the poem by Blake ... and nothing -- not the IF, the BFP, the pregnancy, the baby, the devastating flirtation with the edge of PPD -- has been truer. Anyway ... just wanted to let you know that I'm reading and thinking of you. My whole family loves you so much and we can't wait to meet the baby that we know is making its way to you.

    -- Jeni

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  10. Thanks Jeni!!!
    Hope things are well with your family & are enjoying your
    time with the babe (soooo cute) I'm happy you made it to
    the other side....not only do you deserve it, but you give
    me hope!

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