(cycle 35, day 22)
saw my doc for the follow up to the D&C...
1. no real reason other than "it just happened" for the MC. nothing abnormal about the tissues collected. i hate not having reasons for things happening.
2. getting a referral to the gyno (same one who did my D&Cs - i hate that its plural) to get testing done on me to find out if there's something curable with me that's causing us to continually MC. could be something as simple as a clotting disorder which is somewhat easily helped.
3. i'm now considered high risk while pregnant, at least in the first tri since i can't seem to get out of it successfully yet. this means i'll be closely watched, or at least as closely as they can without going as far as doing an US every single week... i'll be put on progesterone ASAP, get an US at 7w again and another US about 3-4 weeks after that one to make sure everything is still going well and hope things don't go wrong in the middle again. i appreciate the extra monitoring, but don't appreciate the label because it just makes me feel less hopeful about any pregnancy. i shouldn't need all this extra stuff. my body should be able to do what its supposed to, end of story, no history of MC.
4. because we've had unprotected sex, my doc wants me to occasionally check for pregnancy starting at 5 weeks post D&C so that if by some greater act of god i get pregnant again that quickly, we can get things rolling right away. though she would prefer i get the testing done first before getting pregnant so that we have whatever info we need to help the next pregnancy succeed, but i'm definitely not expecting it to happen like that since its never worked like that before, so i'm sure there won't be an issue. and because this is the first post MC cycle, there's no telling exactly what my cycle is doing since the norm is anywhere from a 4 to 8 week cycle... that's not to say that its impossible i'll have a completely normal cycle, i have noticed some fertile signs last week that pointed towards O having already happened, but i won't know anything til at least next week since i'm still only 3 weeks into this cycle. so now, instead of being able to just wait for AF to show up, i have to occasionally test for pregnancy because of the circumstances.
5. I guess this officially puts us in the "infertile" category. not something I realized until just now... after one year, I didn't feel "infertile" was the right word for us since we didn't put barely any effort in for the first 3-6 months. after an actual year of TTC, I got pregnant, so still not considered infertile. after the MC, because it was only one, I still didn't feel like we were actually infertile. 18 months after that MC? I still didn't feel like that title fit us since I think we only actually tried for half those cycles, so technically, it took less than a year for us to get pregnant again. but once I MCd a second time, that firmly put us in that category since it had now been 3 years + 2 MCs and have yet to make it into the second trimester.
6. i wish TTC was easier for us... : (
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Thursday, August 22, 2013
3rd Anniversary
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| from my sisters wedding in July |
also realized that as of last week we've owned our house for 4 years already and have had our dog just as long (my first baby is growing up! sniff!!!)
to celebrate, DH got us tickets to the dinner theatre in Edmonton : ) I was surprised he thought of it all on his own since the last 2 years we've celebrated by doing a round of golf and dinner out, which I thought would be our tradition, guess not, lol. I wonder what he's got in store for next year!
2 more years til we head back to San Diego!!!
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
picture dump!
house progress : )
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| tile in the ensuite july long weekend |
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| pop of colour at the front door. trying to get my green thumb on ;) |
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| new garden on july 11th with flowers my dad and step mom helped pick out |
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| new vanity, the only finished thing in the entire house, lol |
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| new sod in the front yard. no more looking out the window and only seeing dirt! still not used to seeing grass |
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| the growing garden on august 20th. I haven't killed anything yet! |
Monday, August 19, 2013
no more AF!
(cycle 35, day 14)
FINALLY! finally stopped spotting after over 2 weeks! thank god! I'd been spotting or bleeding in some form or another (running the gamut from spotting to gushing clots) since the first Friday of the month before finding out that devastating news. I thought it was gonna stop last weekend on the last day at the cabin, but then it started up again and got a bit heavier (almost enough to classify as light bleeding instead of spotting) before stopping altogether this past Saturday. just in time for some BDing ; )
I've turned down some BDing pretty much all of last week because of spotting. I didn't want to do something and then cause the bleeding to pick up more. I also didn't want to risk infection if my cervix was still open from the D&C (something I figured was possible since I was still spotting). I felt terrible, but I just didn't feel comfortable in my skin whatsoever last week. i'm doing better now, thankfully. we also managed to BD again the next day, but it didn't end with the possibility of making a baby, if you know what I mean ; )
FINALLY! finally stopped spotting after over 2 weeks! thank god! I'd been spotting or bleeding in some form or another (running the gamut from spotting to gushing clots) since the first Friday of the month before finding out that devastating news. I thought it was gonna stop last weekend on the last day at the cabin, but then it started up again and got a bit heavier (almost enough to classify as light bleeding instead of spotting) before stopping altogether this past Saturday. just in time for some BDing ; )
I've turned down some BDing pretty much all of last week because of spotting. I didn't want to do something and then cause the bleeding to pick up more. I also didn't want to risk infection if my cervix was still open from the D&C (something I figured was possible since I was still spotting). I felt terrible, but I just didn't feel comfortable in my skin whatsoever last week. i'm doing better now, thankfully. we also managed to BD again the next day, but it didn't end with the possibility of making a baby, if you know what I mean ; )
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
ramblings
1) I was entirely selfish as I saw BFP after BFP roll in after mine. I didn't want anyone else to get one because it felt like it upped my chances that i'd be the one to MC again. the last time I was pregnant, there were 8 BFPs I was aware of and 2 MCd, I was one of them. this time, I think there were about 6 or so BFPs so I felt like I was always kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop. I didn't think of it often, but it was in the back of my mind when all those BFPs rolled in.
2) I hate my body. its not the same. I didn't give birth to a live baby so I feel like I shouldn't have to deal with the same effects, especially with less than 3 months under my belt and not the full 9. its just one more reminder that I did have a baby growing and then I didn't and it got taken away far too early. like a knife to the gut and a big fat F U to my ego. other things than the extra fat around my midsection are also different. I now get gas pains like I just gave birth. I get a sharp cramp that needs to be relieved right away, like an air bubble that's trapped and trying to get out (I guess that's literally what it is anyway...). I can't think of what else is different, but its only been a week, i'm sure i'll notice more.
3) i'll never feel comfortable in the first trimester ever again. maybe after I manage to have a live baby, but for now, it's shattered my confidence that my body can keep a baby safe. I was hoping the first MC was a one off fluke, but I guess it wasn't. I want to know that my body is even capable of this. i'm absolutely terrified to get pregnant again. even if I have a good US, it doesn't mean anything to me anymore. I believed that baby was still growing and thriving for the 3.5 weeks after our first US but they weren't. I find myself wondering if they had a slower HB and was in the process of dying while we were watching them on the screen considering they only measured 6w6d at the US I had at 11w. i'm going to constantly wonder if everything is fine in there next time.
4) I don't know how much extra monitoring i'll get next time. will I get more than I did this time? I don't know how i'll survive the time between USs because i'll be in a constant state of fear that that will be the last time we'll see them alive. will it just be one to confirm a HB around 7w again and then wait another 5 weeks til I get another one at say 12w to make sure everything is okay til a Doppler picks up a HB? will it be once a week? every other week? I just don't know. I also don't know if this has put me in the high risk category for next time. will I have to go to the city for everything now and see a specialist? see the gyno at the hospital instead of my family doc for any pregnancy? I've been left with a lot more questions because 2 MCs don't just happen without a live baby in the mix or some investigating as to why this happened, twice. I want the extra monitoring, but I know it won't help ease my mind because i'll always have this experience to taint any good feelings.
5) at what point will I feel comfortable? we were ONE week away from announcing on FB. ONE WEEK. I have a gut feeling the bleeding didn't start until it did because of the drop in progesterone from having my last dose of prometrium 5 days prior. what if my doc had prescribed it to last until 12 weeks instead of 10? would everything have gone the same way, but we would have announced it publicly only to have to break the news publicly when everything went downhill? I was so confident after that flicker of a HB and the prometrium I was taking. I shouldn't have been so damn confident. but how could I not be? we had already gotten 2-3 weeks further at the US since the last time all that developed was a sac and we got to see a baby and a HB. how were we to know that not even days later that baby would stop growing? at my prenatal apt the Friday everything started going wrong, my doc tried the Doppler. we weren't surprised when she couldn't pick something, but she had a feeling she was almost picking something up. we were so hopeful everything was going fine. i'll never have that feeling again. instead it will be met with skepticism and fear. maybe when we consistently hear a HB at every apt? maybe when I start to feel movement? maybe when I finally give birth? will we even get that lucky to get to that point?
6) I just want answers. I don't want to keep going through this. I don't want time to pass me by. I want a fix to this, and I want that fix quickly and I want to get pregnant again NOW. I don't want to have to wait another year and a half to get pregnant again. I can't do it. I want my time with my babies back. I know DH doesn't want to do testing right now, but I can't wait a year for that to happen. he probably won't have to do any testing since we've now achieved pregnancy twice, the problem is most likely with me. if its a med I have to take in the 2ww to help things along, fine, but I don't want to go through another 18 cycles paying for a med hoping it works just to be crushed by AF month after month. its a waste of money if it takes that long again. what's the point in taking something to help sustain a pregnancy if I won't get pregnant for years from now? this all feels like a crapshoot.
I JUST WANT MY BABY BACK.
2) I hate my body. its not the same. I didn't give birth to a live baby so I feel like I shouldn't have to deal with the same effects, especially with less than 3 months under my belt and not the full 9. its just one more reminder that I did have a baby growing and then I didn't and it got taken away far too early. like a knife to the gut and a big fat F U to my ego. other things than the extra fat around my midsection are also different. I now get gas pains like I just gave birth. I get a sharp cramp that needs to be relieved right away, like an air bubble that's trapped and trying to get out (I guess that's literally what it is anyway...). I can't think of what else is different, but its only been a week, i'm sure i'll notice more.
3) i'll never feel comfortable in the first trimester ever again. maybe after I manage to have a live baby, but for now, it's shattered my confidence that my body can keep a baby safe. I was hoping the first MC was a one off fluke, but I guess it wasn't. I want to know that my body is even capable of this. i'm absolutely terrified to get pregnant again. even if I have a good US, it doesn't mean anything to me anymore. I believed that baby was still growing and thriving for the 3.5 weeks after our first US but they weren't. I find myself wondering if they had a slower HB and was in the process of dying while we were watching them on the screen considering they only measured 6w6d at the US I had at 11w. i'm going to constantly wonder if everything is fine in there next time.
4) I don't know how much extra monitoring i'll get next time. will I get more than I did this time? I don't know how i'll survive the time between USs because i'll be in a constant state of fear that that will be the last time we'll see them alive. will it just be one to confirm a HB around 7w again and then wait another 5 weeks til I get another one at say 12w to make sure everything is okay til a Doppler picks up a HB? will it be once a week? every other week? I just don't know. I also don't know if this has put me in the high risk category for next time. will I have to go to the city for everything now and see a specialist? see the gyno at the hospital instead of my family doc for any pregnancy? I've been left with a lot more questions because 2 MCs don't just happen without a live baby in the mix or some investigating as to why this happened, twice. I want the extra monitoring, but I know it won't help ease my mind because i'll always have this experience to taint any good feelings.
5) at what point will I feel comfortable? we were ONE week away from announcing on FB. ONE WEEK. I have a gut feeling the bleeding didn't start until it did because of the drop in progesterone from having my last dose of prometrium 5 days prior. what if my doc had prescribed it to last until 12 weeks instead of 10? would everything have gone the same way, but we would have announced it publicly only to have to break the news publicly when everything went downhill? I was so confident after that flicker of a HB and the prometrium I was taking. I shouldn't have been so damn confident. but how could I not be? we had already gotten 2-3 weeks further at the US since the last time all that developed was a sac and we got to see a baby and a HB. how were we to know that not even days later that baby would stop growing? at my prenatal apt the Friday everything started going wrong, my doc tried the Doppler. we weren't surprised when she couldn't pick something, but she had a feeling she was almost picking something up. we were so hopeful everything was going fine. i'll never have that feeling again. instead it will be met with skepticism and fear. maybe when we consistently hear a HB at every apt? maybe when I start to feel movement? maybe when I finally give birth? will we even get that lucky to get to that point?
6) I just want answers. I don't want to keep going through this. I don't want time to pass me by. I want a fix to this, and I want that fix quickly and I want to get pregnant again NOW. I don't want to have to wait another year and a half to get pregnant again. I can't do it. I want my time with my babies back. I know DH doesn't want to do testing right now, but I can't wait a year for that to happen. he probably won't have to do any testing since we've now achieved pregnancy twice, the problem is most likely with me. if its a med I have to take in the 2ww to help things along, fine, but I don't want to go through another 18 cycles paying for a med hoping it works just to be crushed by AF month after month. its a waste of money if it takes that long again. what's the point in taking something to help sustain a pregnancy if I won't get pregnant for years from now? this all feels like a crapshoot.
I JUST WANT MY BABY BACK.
Monday, August 12, 2013
Break from Reality
(cycle 35)
boy did I need one. I regret not taking one last time. It did a world of good for me. I wish the timing of everything would have allowed me to have the whole week at my aunt's cabin, but even the weekend was enough of a break from life. I feel a lot better a week from the D&C this time than I did last time.
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boy did I need one. I regret not taking one last time. It did a world of good for me. I wish the timing of everything would have allowed me to have the whole week at my aunt's cabin, but even the weekend was enough of a break from life. I feel a lot better a week from the D&C this time than I did last time.
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Friday, August 9, 2013
Remnants
I'm doing a little better than last time, but there are certain things that just tear me apart. Physical things at the moment, like my boobs barely fitting into my bras or my stomach still looking nearly 3 months pregnant. I put on a pair of pre-pregnancy jeans yesterday and wondered why it felt like they were constantly falling down. It wasn't until I changed into yoga pants and got a look of myself in the mirror and realized how big I still was. Did that ever hurt. Back to my WW diet after this weekend to get back my body.
Things like that are a knife to the gut. If I had just had a baby, fine, I'd be okay with it. But I didn't. So it makes the hurt so much worse and gives me a daily reminder of what we lost. I don't want to be wearing my pregnancy clothes but a lot of my pre-pregnancy stuff still doesn't fit.
I just want to get back to 'me'. l also want my baby, but that feels like a pipe dream now : (
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
heartbroken
Not wanting to write this out for a second time, but I unfortunately don't have good news :'(
Everything was going well. Went for the routine first OB appt Friday morning, tried to hear the HB on the doppler but knowing I was on the cusp of hearing it we weren't too concerned when nothing was heard. Still felt pregnant at that point.
Then things started to go wrong.
I hadn't had any spotting at all this pregnancy. Friday afternoon our sod for the front yard got delivered. I went to the bathroom and noticed some spotting with some fleshy looking bits. Not overly concerned yet, I went about laying sod since it wasn't that heavy, lighter than a lot of other things I lift on a daily basis. Went to the bathroom again to check on the spotting and it was still there and still fleshy looking. I put in a call to my doc to find out what I should do, to the ER it was
I went in at 3:30 and finally got seen around 5pm. He ran some blood tests and a urine test to rule out infection. Was hoping he would do the US they have in the ER, but was informed by a nurse after I asked that they don't like to do them in early pregnancy because its not as detailed and a radiologist doesn't look at the results. Got my blood taken around 5:30 and then had to sit and wait for the results to come in. Nothing out of the ordinary, was sent home with an order to call into US Tuesday morning to get in as soon as I could. The spotting continued til Saturday night...
Sunday morning all hell broke loose.
The cramping started the night before but wasn't significant so I didn't let it get to me. I woke up that morning to severe cramping. They came and went like clockwork so I can only assume it was the equivalent to labor. By 6am, I got up to go the bathroom and there was blood. A lot. I was terrified. I felt a couple clots slip out. I just started crying. DH woke up and came to check on me. I was a mess. He got me fixed up and back in bed while he checked the clots. The cramping continued for the next 6 hours : ( every 5 mins. It was excruciating. We opted against going back to the hospital knowing they would run blood tests and just tell me to come back Tuesday. I didn't want to be sitting there all day, so we rode the weekend out. Had DH check a few more clots over those hours, I seriously love that man. A man who will check his wife's clots is a keeper.
The bleeding steadied so our hopes were that it was subchorionic hemorrhage, which isn't great either, but if it meant there was still a baby in there with a heart beating away, I'd deal with the inevitable bed rest that would accompany it. I just wanted the baby to be okay. The bleeding continued through the weekend but we were holding out hope.
We made it to Tuesday morning, finally. But that's where the optimism ended (not that I had much anyway since when its your body that starts bleeding, you pretty well assume its over, even if there's some encouraging stories from friends that went through similar ordeals). I passed a particularly large clot after DH left for work. I couldn't bring myself to fully check it out further than holding it in my hand hoping it wasn't the baby sitting there in my palm. I got DH to check it when he came to pick me up for the US, he just said there were 2 small clots, but I think he was protecting,me from something worse because I know there was something bigger in there.
Made it to the US, they got me in right away. No good news. The tech just told me to go to the ER without any further info as to whether there was even a HB, so I asked her before heading over there. No heartbeat. Fuck. I just started bawling and DH did his best to comfort me.
Got into a room and the doc came in about 20 minutes later (seemed longer though) followed by the surgeon not long after. At least the surgeon had some answers. He told us the baby had actually stopped growing very shortly after our first US. Heartbreaking news since we were starting to get confident that this would be iur THB.
Got into a private room around 1:30. My mom was with me this time since DH couldn't be away from work for very long cuz they were short staffed. Went back for the D&C around 3:30 and was back in a room around 5:15. I was given some water and something to eat. The nurse took out my IV and I got into my clothes. DH came to pick me up just before 6 and he took me home. I was so glad be home. Went right to bed because I was so tired from the emotional roller coaster over the weekend.
So now I'm here. The day after my second D&C. What a horrible place to be. 0 for 2. At least this time we were able to make an actual baby, but that's little solace when we thought we were 10.5 weeks and everything was going well. Back to cleaning out the closet since I had just put away all my clothes that were too tight and acquired a few maternity items. Time to switch back I guess. Hopefully next time we get it right and I don't have to be back here a third time. Third time's a charm, right? At least so they say...
Everything was going well. Went for the routine first OB appt Friday morning, tried to hear the HB on the doppler but knowing I was on the cusp of hearing it we weren't too concerned when nothing was heard. Still felt pregnant at that point.
Then things started to go wrong.
I hadn't had any spotting at all this pregnancy. Friday afternoon our sod for the front yard got delivered. I went to the bathroom and noticed some spotting with some fleshy looking bits. Not overly concerned yet, I went about laying sod since it wasn't that heavy, lighter than a lot of other things I lift on a daily basis. Went to the bathroom again to check on the spotting and it was still there and still fleshy looking. I put in a call to my doc to find out what I should do, to the ER it was
I went in at 3:30 and finally got seen around 5pm. He ran some blood tests and a urine test to rule out infection. Was hoping he would do the US they have in the ER, but was informed by a nurse after I asked that they don't like to do them in early pregnancy because its not as detailed and a radiologist doesn't look at the results. Got my blood taken around 5:30 and then had to sit and wait for the results to come in. Nothing out of the ordinary, was sent home with an order to call into US Tuesday morning to get in as soon as I could. The spotting continued til Saturday night...
Sunday morning all hell broke loose.
The cramping started the night before but wasn't significant so I didn't let it get to me. I woke up that morning to severe cramping. They came and went like clockwork so I can only assume it was the equivalent to labor. By 6am, I got up to go the bathroom and there was blood. A lot. I was terrified. I felt a couple clots slip out. I just started crying. DH woke up and came to check on me. I was a mess. He got me fixed up and back in bed while he checked the clots. The cramping continued for the next 6 hours : ( every 5 mins. It was excruciating. We opted against going back to the hospital knowing they would run blood tests and just tell me to come back Tuesday. I didn't want to be sitting there all day, so we rode the weekend out. Had DH check a few more clots over those hours, I seriously love that man. A man who will check his wife's clots is a keeper.
The bleeding steadied so our hopes were that it was subchorionic hemorrhage, which isn't great either, but if it meant there was still a baby in there with a heart beating away, I'd deal with the inevitable bed rest that would accompany it. I just wanted the baby to be okay. The bleeding continued through the weekend but we were holding out hope.
We made it to Tuesday morning, finally. But that's where the optimism ended (not that I had much anyway since when its your body that starts bleeding, you pretty well assume its over, even if there's some encouraging stories from friends that went through similar ordeals). I passed a particularly large clot after DH left for work. I couldn't bring myself to fully check it out further than holding it in my hand hoping it wasn't the baby sitting there in my palm. I got DH to check it when he came to pick me up for the US, he just said there were 2 small clots, but I think he was protecting,me from something worse because I know there was something bigger in there.
Made it to the US, they got me in right away. No good news. The tech just told me to go to the ER without any further info as to whether there was even a HB, so I asked her before heading over there. No heartbeat. Fuck. I just started bawling and DH did his best to comfort me.
Got into a room and the doc came in about 20 minutes later (seemed longer though) followed by the surgeon not long after. At least the surgeon had some answers. He told us the baby had actually stopped growing very shortly after our first US. Heartbreaking news since we were starting to get confident that this would be iur THB.
Got into a private room around 1:30. My mom was with me this time since DH couldn't be away from work for very long cuz they were short staffed. Went back for the D&C around 3:30 and was back in a room around 5:15. I was given some water and something to eat. The nurse took out my IV and I got into my clothes. DH came to pick me up just before 6 and he took me home. I was so glad be home. Went right to bed because I was so tired from the emotional roller coaster over the weekend.
So now I'm here. The day after my second D&C. What a horrible place to be. 0 for 2. At least this time we were able to make an actual baby, but that's little solace when we thought we were 10.5 weeks and everything was going well. Back to cleaning out the closet since I had just put away all my clothes that were too tight and acquired a few maternity items. Time to switch back I guess. Hopefully next time we get it right and I don't have to be back here a third time. Third time's a charm, right? At least so they say...
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