A Tale of Two Snowflakes

The end of October 2018 marked the beginning stages of our first ever Frozen Embryo Transfer – IVF cycle (FET for short) in total this would be our 3rd full cycle of IVF, 4th treatment cycle including an earlier abandoned IUI attempt and 7 years of a range of medicated fertility treatments. Additionally, our 2nd IVF cycle earlier in the year ended in an early miscarriage which had naively taken me by complete surprise as I had been so focused and elated at just being able to get pregnant, I hadn’t even stopped to consider that losing the baby would be an option. I think I had some kind of misplaced faith that the universe would feel we had endured enough and bless us with some well deserved good fortune. Coming to terms with the loss has been a major blow for us and in particular me, as once again my body didn’t seem to be able to do what I feel I was made to do, I was made to be a mummy and yet my body seems to be on a different page…..it clearly didn’t get the same memo that my heart and soul did and it sometimes feels all like a very cruel joke. Every stage is like a science experiment, every step is complex and perfectly timed and the whole process is both physically and emotionally exhausting and you have to do all this whilst getting on with normal life and holding down a job and being happy for everyone else’s well deserved happiness as they grow their families and lives and milestones begin to pass you by. This all felt so heavy this year with our loss as I watched other pregnancies blossom and grow perfectly at around the stage I would have been and as the months went by our possible due date, that never came to be, was growing closer and I wasn’t sure how I was going to cope. We had embryos frozen from our last cycle but was I ready to start again? Should I wait and take more time to heal, should I start and bring a little more hope into our lives at a time where we would need it the most as our due date grew closer? What if it goes wrong could I handle two huge traumas in one year…….but wait….., what if it works and I get to end one of the hardest years of my life pregnant….with hope and joy in my belly and the promise of parenthood awaiting for us in 2019 and so we did it…….we took a huge leap of faith and started again!

I didn’t know what to expect with an FET cycle and lots of different clinics do it in different ways. I naively thought I would turn up to an appointment, have my womb lining checked and be booked in to have my embryos transferred. However, the cycle actually took longer than a fresh IVF cycle as they needed to have complete control of hormones and time to prepare the best conditions for the embryos. Unlike a fresh IVF cycle where you need to inject every day in order to grow follicles with an aim to collect eggs for fertilisation, a frozen cycle only consisted of one injection right at the start, the main aim is to down regulate your body – so basically take charge of your bodies hormones so they can control what your body does and then introduce different medications at different stages to keep that going along whilst creating the perfect environment with a few scans thrown in to see how things are progressing.

At our first appointment we were informed we had been coming to the clinic now for so long that our paperwork was now no longer in date or valid and so we had to redo all of that as well as a slight delay for other results but they gave me my first and only injection to take home and administer once I had the call to say we were good to go. After previous cycles of injections I wasn’t too concerned about having to do just one but this was a good sized needle and I felt I would not be able to do this on my own, luckily my sister in law who lives close by is a nurse and was able to do my injection for me…..and so began our first FET.

A Frozen Embryo Transfer cycle to me was very stop start….take this, we will see you back next week…..take these home, take three a day, we will see you back in two weeks and so on and so fourth…..but it was far less stressful on my body than previous cycles and i really felt very positive about how I was feeling and the type of environment my embryos would be going into as opposed to last cycle. Last cycle my recovery from egg collection was really difficult and painful and when my Embryo was being transferred back five days later I really felt my body was still in trauma and wondered how good a chance it would have when I was still in so much discomfort….this time, other than being a little bloated due to the medication, things felt really good! I responded well to all the medication and I felt strong and positive about how this was all feeling. We also made the big decision to have two embryos transferred rather than one for a number of different reasons and there are some statistics that show that by the time women have had 3 cycles of ivf the likelihood of it being successful is much higher and so we had strength, positivity and statistics on our side! Due to our embryos being frozen and it fast approaching December we nicknamed them our two little snowflakes!

I had a couple of shaky days emotionally where I didn’t want my wee button from last cycle to think I was trying to replace it…..which probably sounds crazy but for me that was our baby and I didn’t want it to feel they no longer mattered which ultimately identifies what a grieving process miscarriage really is and although I was trying to be strong and hopeful I was and still am, dealing with that loss. On what would have been our potential due date I had a good cry and thought about how different our lives should have been but prayed our wee button had taught my body how to at least master the “Getting Pregnant” stage!

Finally Transfer day arrived after what felt like forever, we were up ready and showered waiting for the embryologist to phone and tell us when to come in and we waited nervously to see if our embryos had made it…..all of this could have been for nothing, there is no guarantee the embryos will survive the freezing and thawing stage which doesn’t even bear thinking about. Eventually we got the call in the morning to say both embryos had survived the thawing process and they would see us in just over an hour. We jumped in the car and set off, we were so relieved and I was so proud of my wee snowflakes….so clever…..I like to think they get that from their mummy!

On arrival at the clinic we were informed one Embryo had fully expanded and the other was over 80% expanded and well on its way. Basically, when you freeze embryos they collapse and then as they are thawed they begin to expand to full size and come to life and start developing again which is mind blowing! We got to see see them both on the big screen in the treatment room……my beautiful babies….a perfect grey mass of cells that had already overcome so much!! We looked at them and smiled at eachother, I wondered if they might be a boy or a girl and which one of us they might look like the most, my husband took my hand and they began to prepare for the transfer. Transfer was unexpectedly a little more complicated than it should have been but I cannot fault the clinic or the doctors who were absolutely fantastic and did not want to take any risks with the Transfer until everything was extremely clear on the screen. A twenty minute procedure ended up being an hour and a half in total but after a bit of a difficult time and being a bit bruised and battered, eventually the catheter was in place and we got to see the beautiful shooting star on the screen as the warm water and embryos light up on the ultra sound, the doctor was able to show us our wee snowflakes perfectly situated…..all we needed now was for them to hold on tight! As we left the clinic relieved and hopeful and terrified all rolled into one the practice manager passed us in the hall and said…..”I have a good feeling about this time……I hope you have a very sober Christmas and New year!” I touched my tummy and thought to myself, did you hear that little snowflakes…..I have a good feeling this time too….just hold on!

The wait between Transfer and the test date is unbearable, time seems to slow down to an almost standstill and it sends you into a limbo, googling frenzy. Additionally the time we had to wait to test was longer than it had been during a fresh cycle of IVF – only by a few days, but it felt like forever and this time I had absolutely no idea what to think! Last cycle I had a couple of symptoms that made me think it had worked, this time I had a hundred symptoms but no idea what was the medication and what was my own body and so all we could do was wait! Without good family and friends and an online community of others going through ivf I really don’t know how I would have survived!

Test day came and things had felt much stronger than last cycle and although I was terrified I was extremely hopeful. I woke at 3am bursting for the loo and thought my hubby is going to kill me if I wake him at this time to test…..but I couldn’t wait any longer…..maybe I would just lie and tell him it was later……? But I braved it and woke him and told him it was 3am…..I could tell he wasn’t impressed but I think his own nerves got the better of him and he rolled over and put his lamp on and told me to go take the test. And so I did…..but this time I couldn’t look, he took it from me and turned it only towards himself, we sat beside each other on the bed holding hands, I was shaking with nerves from my feet upwards and went a shade of see-through from sheer panic and he stared at the test as the little egg timer flashed for what seemed like a lifetime……he raised his eyebrows (please don’t say NOT pregnant……please, please little snowflakes, please have held on). He turned it towards me and smiled as he said out the words and my eyes scanned the little digital window – Pregnant! We both smiled at each other…..Yes, thank you, thank you, well done my little snowflakes, you did it!

It was such an overwhelming feeling to be given another chance after what happened earlier in the year and this time I wasn’t having any worrying symptoms and finally, maybe after all of this time it was now our turn to have the family we always longed for…..is there one in there or two….will we be a family of three or a family of four? Try not to get ahead of yourself the other little voice in my head would say!

I called the hospital and they arranged for me to come in for some blood work a couple of days later – we were heading away for Christmas for the first time and I couldn’t wait to sit by the pool in the sunshine and relax and give our snowflakes plenty of time to keep growing and thriving…..this was going to be the best Christmas ever, every time I heard the song, “All I want for Christmas is you” I felt so emotional because the words felt like they were speaking directly to me and our little snowflakes!

I tested every morning to make sure it was still true and just stared at the test over and over again to try and get my brain to believe it was really happening – I wanted to stop perfect strangers and tell them my secret so it felt like it was more real if I said it out loud!! I attended the hospital a couple of days later for blood work. They called me later that afternoon with the HCG level which was lower than I hoped it would be, I was surprised as everything felt like it was going well and I didn’t have any of the worrying symptoms we had last time, but they reassured me I was just over 5 weeks and the levels can vary massively and I was most definitely pregnant. Typically, I would have had another blood test in a couple of days but as we were going away they advised just to take some home pregnancy tests if I wanted to, to monitor myself and that the rest time would do me good. I was worried though….I was hoping for a better number, I’ve been doing this so long now I know roughly where I would want those numbers to be but I needed to try and stay positive as they didn’t seem too concerned. The next day we flew to Tenerife and as soon as I got off the plane and my hubby was getting our baggage I went to the toilets and tested and a brilliant, bright, red line came up straight away….I’d never had such a bright line and it was a good indication the hcg level was high enough to make the line so bright and clear, so finally I began to breath again and even felt a little excited and hoped maybe it was just a wee slow burner!

So we are in Tenerife and the sun is shining and I think this is the happiest I have ever been, the sun makes me feel warm on the outside and our little secret, that no one else around the pool knows, makes me feel warm on the inside….every now and again I rub my tummy to remind my embies how loved they already are and to cozy in…..and not long after the bleeding begins! The dread comes over me and I know what this is but I’m trying to convince myself that maybe it’s old…maybe it’s implantation from them burrowing in, maybe it’s the medication I’m on. It’s Christmas Eve and I wake up earlier to test to see the line on the test so I can breath again, I test and the line is almost invisible, I know this means the hcg has dropped, our snowflakes are gone and I know it….I phone the clinic, they are careful about what they say but they know and I know it’s over, they know I have been doing this long enough to not buy a hopeful line or a politicians answer…..so they apologise and the nurse sounds genuinely sad for me and she explains I can’t come off the medication till there is absolutely no line left on the test, she knows it feels pointless and prolongs my body thinking it’s still pregnant but it’s protocol. Christmas Day should have been one of my best, but instead I’m empty, my husband gives me a box to open with a pair of earrings in it, they are snowflakes, they are beautiful and I cry – this was meant to be a happy gift, but I still love them as I did our snowflakes…..I’m so glad we are away and I can sit in the sun and pretend to read a book and cry behind my sunglasses. We do not deserve this…….

Two days later and the line is gone…..I come off the medication and on our return from our holiday my body now knows and the full miscarriage commences and it’s bad….I spend the rest of the festive period miscarrying and trying to carry on with a smile on my face. I have quite a few days of pain and discomfort but we have some plans to try and distract me a little. We are so lucky to have family and friends around checking in on us and making sure we are ok.

My body is still recovering and emotionally there is a long journey ahead as this, was most likely, our last treatment…..there comes a time where you need to know when enough is enough and that for us i feel is now and I feel this takes as much, if not more courage to acknowledge than enduring more treatment. We can’t keep doing this, my body can’t take much more and so the grieving process is not only for our two wee snowflakes but for a lifetime of losses that childlessness (not by choice) brings.

2018 brought me our new beautiful baby nephew, who I think kind of looks like me, even though my brother will argue he doesn’t! So I want to thank 2018 for that wonderful, perfect gift (so that makes three perfect nephews to spoil!). Otherwise I am happy to see the back of this year, it has been one of the hardest years of my life and I don’t know how I’m still standing. I don’t know where I would be without such a strong partner who has looked after me so well during this time even though he must be dealing with his own feelings – he is my best friend and for every battle we have fought together I only love him more.

When I started this blog- 2infertility&beyond, I believed the Beyond would be in reference to pregnancy and parenthood but now the ending is different, for some couples the beyond, the end of the journey doesn’t always have the happy ever after you quite expected! It doesn’t mean it won’t be happy….it’s just not the vision you had, the life you planned and with that comes a lifetime of nevers….that will take time to work through and come to terms with so instead we need to rewrite a new kind of future together and build on our plans and memories and love as a family of two…..it’s just a different kind of happily ever after!