My Long Journey To Conception
I started preparing my body for conception six months before we began to try to conceive. I saw an herbalist, was on a number of supplements, received frequent acupuncture, had a daily yoga and spiritual practice, didn’t eat gluten or refined sugar, tracked my cycle, had many tools to monitor and resource my nervous system, and was all around pretty healthy (besides for my perpetually busy schedule). My partner and I were waiting for the moment in my career that I deemed was the perfect time to start trying. As that particular window grew closer, we became giddy with anticipation and excitement. We geeked out on animated Youtube videos about the conception process and started dreaming about what it would be like to be parents. We were as ready as we could be to embark on the “trying to conceive” journey.
The first cycle we tried, I tested WAY too early. Maybe even starting six days after ovulation. I just couldn’t wait. I had been tracking my cycle on an app for a few years and went by the app’s prediction of my fertile window (I had yet to go down the rabbit hole of ovulation predictor kits and taking my daily basal body temperature). I was actually pretty confident that we would get pregnant quickly. I was in my early thirties at the time and both my partner and I were in good health. To my surprise, my period came right on time that first cycle. We both shrugged it off, “of course it doesn’t happen the first time.” Onto the next cycle, which also resulted in my period. The following cycle was March of 2020, when the whole world shut down. And still my period kept coming. Covid-19 brought us into deep isolation and fear. Our work and social lives moved into a strange virtual reality. Covid would be the backdrop throughout the rest of our fertility journey. But we kept on trying to get pregnant, because, when you are ready to have a baby, there is really nothing that will stop you.
It was around our sixth failed attempt at trying to conceive that I started to feel worried. When you are under 35, insurance won’t cover fertility testing until you have been trying to conceive for a whole year. So, we carried on as we were. Each cycle we tried, I either added to or took something away from my process. Coffee was out. Ovulation predictor kits were in. Working in the evenings was out. Taking my temperature every morning was in. Strenuous exercise was out. Restorative yoga was in. Seven months…eight months…nine months…the waiting and disappointment made me incredibly anxious and sad. “Something was wrong with me.” I had many friends and family members get pregnant during this time, which was hard for me. I felt like a terrible person for feeling anything but joy for them. This was when depression and desperation kicked into high gear. I spent far too much time and money on acupuncture, astrology readings, psychics, body workers, chiropractors, herbalists and supplements. We tried legs up the wall after sex. We tried only having sex every other day in the fertile window. We even tried a home IUI kit, because, why not?! You name it, we tried it. Each promised that their method would get me pregnant. My altar was set. Prayers were made every day. Rituals were made before every fertile window. I even took a few cycles to “not try,” meaning: we stopped tracking so closely and just had sex. That also didn’t work.
I cried every day. I started to break down around ovulation because I knew I would have to get through the dreaded “two week wait” and was already anticipating the hollow feeling of disappointment. If I had to see one more negative pregnancy test… I felt alone and isolated. I didn’t know how to ask for support and my partner didn’t know what to do besides hold me when I was in a puddle on the floor. Some friends were awkward about checking in out of fear of being invasive. Or, unhelpful and hurtful comments or projections were made about my process. I withdrew into myself and became a ghost of myself.
At around eleven months of trying, I reached out to my OB and finally got in to see a reproductive endocrinologist. After a slew of standard (and invasive) tests, we were diagnosed with “unexplained infertility.” So, basically: we checked all the boxes and everything looked fine. So, why weren’t we getting pregnant?! We decided to give our natural approach a little bit longer. I started to see an acupuncturist who had a “80% success rate” for getting people pregnant. This sounded promising. After another six months of working with her and not conceiving, I was ready to throw in the towel and move on to a western medical approach. We decided to try a medicated IUI, which was the least invasive and expensive next step. Unfortunately, this did not result in a pregnancy. At this point, the pain and grief I was experiencing was beyond what I felt I could handle while being a functioning adult with responsibilities, but I had to keep moving forward. We decided to skip the suggested two more medicated IUI attempts and move on to IVF.
Then the IVF journey began. First of all, what a privilege to be able to afford IVF! It’s incredibly inaccessible because it’s not covered by insurance. We found a way to make it work through our own savings, some family support and a grant. IVF is complicated and has many parts to it. I found it exhausting to have to explain to friends and family the process step-by-step. What a relief when I would speak to someone who had or was going through it! Surprisingly, I found that being in such an active process around trying to conceive lifted the depressive slump I was in. I was one step closer to *hopefully* getting pregnant.
My IVF journey began with more invasive tests, lots of blood work, transvaginal ultrasounds, and oral hormone prep. And then came all the needles. Injection after injection into the soft tissue of my belly. My partner gave me every single injection as I squeezed onto something and turned my face away. My belly bruised and swelled as my follicles grew. The monitoring of my follicle growth through was intense and felt never-ending. My body truly felt like a science experiment. As egg retrieval day approached, we were lucky to have a good number of fully matured follicles to work with. We retrieved nineteen eggs, sixteen of which were mature (you can just imagine how one’s womb feels after nineteen eggs are retrieved).
Once they were fertilized, six of our embryos made it to day six. Of those six, two were viable after genetic testing. We were hoping for more. Our dream always was to have more than one child. Our doctor told us it was wise to have two embryos per child that you want in case the first embryo transfer doesn’t work. Also, because of our “unexplained infertility” diagnosis, we couldn’t be certain that we could conceive naturally in the future. Plus, the younger you are, the better your results will be. And I wasn’t sure I would be able to go through this again in the future. So, after ALL of that, we decided to do another round of IVF before our first embryo transfer. More time, money, physical discomfort, and emotional turmoil. However, the second round results pleasantly surprised us! Seventeen eggs were retrieved, fifteen were mature, and after fertilization, we ended up with eight day-six embryos. After genetic testing, we had six viable embryos!! We had made eight potential babies in a matter of six months. Seven of which would remain frozen in time. We cried tears of joy as we moved forward towards our first embryo transfer.
We decided to not choose or know the sex of the embryo, even though we had the option to. We had the doctor and embryologist choose the embryo they deemed “had the best chance.” The morning of the embryo transfer we prayed that this would be the day we moved on to the next chapter of our journey of becoming parents. We had truly done all we could do at that point. We watched on a large screen as our chosen embryo was meticulously placed into my uterus. All I could feel was a sense of hope (and a painfully full bladder, which is helpful for them to see the uterine cavity more clearly). Seven days later, I could no longer hold back in anticipation (even though they tell you to not take a home test but wait till the beta blood test two weeks after the transfer). My partner and I watched together as a second line appeared on the pregnancy test. The tears started flowing. All I remember is him saying “wait, wait, wait…” in disbelief. I pulled out a digital “pregnant/not pregnant” test just to confirm. Sure enough, the blinking screen turned into the one word I had waited two years to see: “pregnant.”
—By Anonymous