A New Chapter Begins

Flashback: October 29^th, 2013. I had recently finished another IVF cycle. Our third.

My husband, let’s call him RH, and I were sitting in the office of Dr. Taylor, our fertility doctor. It was a sunny but cool day. It was warm inside Dr. Taylor’s office, though. Too warm. I hadn’t taken my winter jacket off, though I opened the front zipper. The sun was streaming through the glass wall. The warmth reminded me of siesta time when I was a little girl in the Philippines. The warmth felt very familiar and so was the disappointment.

Two weeks before our visit with Dr. Taylor, the verdict was in. The pregnancy test was negative. Again. I should say this was not a surprise. Based on our experience in the first and second IVF cycles, my ovaries were not responding well. A higher dosage was prescribed in the third IVF cycle but the number of ova or egg cells was still quite measly. This confirmed my suspicion that I have very low ovarian reserve. It’s not rocket science really. I was 40 then and I just turned 41 January of this year. What did I expect?

RH and I have always liked Dr. Taylor. An intelligent woman with a gift in making complex concepts easy to understand, she has always been honest and open with us. Whenever we asked a question that she didn’t know the answer to, she told us. Like the other doctors, nurses, and staff in that fertility clinic, Dr. Taylor has shown us great compassion and empathy throughout our whole journey. Most of all she has always been very patient with us. My husband and I are probably some of the geekiest patients Dr. Taylor has ever encountered. We would ask her about the veracity of the information we have researched on our own. We sought her opinion and respected her insights. I think that she might have enjoyed our geekiness a little! She wrote a blog (aptly entitled "Stats 101") that included RH’s probability computation.

Dr. Taylor’s recommendation was for us to seriously consider an egg donor program. Essentially, this means using another woman’s (a younger woman’s) eggs. Using RH’s sperm, an embryo will be later transferred to my uterus. In some circumstances, a family member or a close friend could potentially donate eggs to an infertile woman. R and I don’t know anyone who could do that for us. I mean, I have friends and relatives in the Philippines who would probably offer us their ova. Or at least, consider it. But they are on the other side of the Pacific Ocean. It’s just not logistically possible. Since buying and selling ova is not allowed in Canada, our best option was to go to a fertility clinic in Seattle.

As Dr. Taylor was handing us the brochures of possible clinics in Seattle, I burst into tears! RH held my left hand and squeezed it tight.

“It’s okay,” he assured me. “We’ll try again, Sweetie,” 

“I know,” I replied while wiping my nose. “That’s not why I’m crying.”  

Dr. Taylor and RH looked at me kindly but with perplexed looks on their faces. They probably thought I was devastated by the failure of yet another IVF cycle. I had accepted that fact. I was ready to move on to the next chapter. I was crying because I was going to miss the people at the clinic!

Humor and Infertility

In infertility, negative feelings is often part of the territory. Humor makes difficult feelings easier to deal with. In an older post, I wrote about some things Filipinos say to their Fertility-challenged friends and family to express my anger in a safe way. I don't support violence, if I can help it. ;)

Many well-meaning friends and family members, in an effort to make me feel better, say hurtful and insensitive things that reflect their lack of awareness of infertility. The worse thing is that I was starting to get really angry at myself for not correcting these misconceptions and for not speaking up. I decided to write the post I mentioned above to prepare and empower myself to deal with situations like these.

What started out as an expression of anger turned out to be an enjoyable exercise! I crafted responses that were in turn tongue in cheek, bitchy, and outright silly.

Yesterday, I re-discovered this funny video (below) by fenneladasgupta. I first saw this about a year ago and I fell on my chair laughing!

Nothing beats humor. Enjoy!

 
Full disclosure: I have to say that before I experienced infertility, I probably said (or at least thought) some of these remarks and assumptions.

Happy Un-mother’s Day!

Today is Mother’s Day. 

I think that aside from Christmas, Mother’s Day is the other holiday when it can be difficult for women with fertility issues. It’s best to avoid reading your former high school classmates’ Facebook status updates about their children giving them Mother’s Day cards, flowers or breakfast in bed. It almost seemed like there is a competition for the “aaawww, how sweet” factor. It started getting depressing. For me, yes. Not to them, of course.

I thought it best to be kick-ass about the situation. SO I wrote this as my status update:

I think that as a society we should seriously reconsider our definition of motherhood to include all women who have nurtured us and cared for us. They may not have their own children but they have conceived many ideas and thoughts that made a difference in our lives. They have given birth to beautiful works of art. Their kindness and spirit gave birth to our new and renewed selves. So as I think of my own Nanay (mother), I also think of the many important and childless women in my life, Aunt Anne, Aunt Flor, my cousin Myrna, my former teachers – Ms. Ba-ad, Ms. Abellon, Ms. Esmero, the nuns in my school – Sr. Myrna, Sr. Julia, Sr. Godfreda. I say to you: Happy Mother's Day! You have contributed to the woman I am today.    

Friends and former students sent greetings to me which was reassuring. Just as I was preparing to write this journal, I got a heartwarming message from my 16-year old stepdaughter. 

Just wanted to say happy Mother's Day!  You truly are an inspirational person, with your free spirit, thoughtfulness, warmness and creativity! You don't have to give birth to someone to be a mother for sure because you give me so much guidance and more! And you don't have to fit the role of a stereotypical mother either! Just keep being you and that's enough for me. 

Xoxo 

Well. That wasn’t too bad for my un-Mother’s Day. 

Ovary goes AWOL

“You’re right ovary is hiding from me.”

Dr. K announced as she waved the (ultrasound) wand inside my uterus. Great, I thought. My right ovary had decided to play hide-and-seek! Dr. K was conducting a transvaginal ultrasound so we’ll know how many egg follicles are developing in my ovaries. After a couple of minutes, we knew that my right ovary had about 2 little egg follicles and my left had about 5 good-sized egg follicles. This would have been good news except that my left fallopian tube is blocked. Perfect. Just perfect. Rotten eggs. Rotten, rotten eggs. Rotten luck.

Sometime early this year and together with our fertility doctor (Dr. T), hubby and I have decided on the superovulation/IUI fertility treatment. Five days before the ultrasound, we had started on the superovulation part of the treatment. This meant injecting myself daily (supposedly for about ten days) with a low dose (150 IU) of Puregon to stimulate the growth of egg follicles. Since there is very little or no possibility that the 5 good-sized egg follicles in my left ovary will migrate to my right fallopian tube anytime soon, Dr. K recommended we cancel the cycle at this point and not proceed with the IUI.  

Dr. K and Nurse J were pretty sympathetic. Hubby felt very disappointed but I. was. OKAY. Or seemed to be. “At least, we know how my female plumbing system is doing. We’re learning more and more as we proceed with this,” I said like a peppy leader in an election campaign.

It was a different story when we got home. I crumpled on the couch, feeling very sad and angry with my rotten luck. But mostly I felt sadness, deep sadness that hubby and I are getting farther away from having the child that we wanted.

Great Eggs-pectation

Growing up in the Philippines, I know that the cultural pressure for a woman to marry and have children can be very intense. At 26 years old, I was already called a spinster in my village. I was questioned by family and strangers alike what my problem was. Why can’t I choose someone, anyone? Was I being too choosy? No, I said. I just haven’t met anyone who I think would be a suitable partner for me. Many of my relatives thought this was totally hogwash. I thought they should just leave me alone!

At 32, when I first moved to Canada, I met someone who I knew would be a suitable life partner for me. He thought I was a suitable life partner for him, too. So the Reader’s Digest version of the story is: we married and for a while my family and friends left alone. But not for long. After awhile, they started asking when we’re going to have a baby. All of these questions were honest and innocuous; but it came from a perspective that couples marry for the sole purpose of having children and that any couple can have children if and when they want to.

Reality is not that simple. Some couples (especially from Europe and North America) decide not to have children for practical, ethical or philosophical reasons. Like my hubby and I, some couples do want to have children but have infertility issues that make it harder for them to get pregnant without medical help. Endometriosis, PCOS, varicocele, and hormonal problems are just some of the many common causes of infertility[i].

If you haven’t heard much about infertility and some of its causes before, you’re not alone. Before I knew I had infertility issues, I was totally clueless about these things. I mean, I had life all planned out. I was going to have a baby after I do all the things in my check list. Simple enough. But I soon found out that life doesn’t work that way.

---

[i] http://www.genesis-fertility.com/fertility-information/fertility-information