Subchorionic Hemorrhage- Scary Stuff

Two days after our positive pregnancy test we had our first official blood work drawn.  Goodness were they beautiful numbers.  Hcg 876, Progesterone 47, Estrogen 456.  Wowza we were definitely pregnant. They continued me on the progesterone shots and said to come in the following week for our first ultrasound.  After a minor freak out on my behalf trying to figure out if that Hcg was high enough for how far pregnant I thought I was, I calmed myself down and tried to enjoy the thought of this pregnancy lasting.

Later that week while at work I stood up from charting and had a gush of blood.  My heart sank.  I thought for sure along with the moderate cramping I was having I was miscarrying... again.  I was sent home from work and Dr. Friesen's office was able to squeeze me in for a ultrasound, blood work and exam.  After seeing Dr. Friesen and having the ultrasound I felt a little more comfortable and understood that what was happening was a Subchorionic Hemorrhage.  You can read more about a Subchorionic Hemorrhage here : Medscape , in a nutshell this type of bleeding is formed when a collection of blood forms while the placenta is attaching in early pregnancy.  In some women the blood is absorbed and is never noted, on other women they bleed.  It is a fairly normal finding as long as the positioning of baby is okay, and the bleeding slows/stops. 

They sent me home that day and told me to lay on the couch, no lifting Jackson, and drink lots of water.  So I did just that....

That afternoon the nurse called with my Hcg results 3849, Progesterone 47.  Ultrasound showed a Gestational Sac, and a Yolk Sac but no fetal pole yet.  We were still just a little too early at roughly 5 weeks 2 days.  Dr. Maud still wanted me to come to Omaha the following Monday to check in with them, so we took the weekend easy and tried to not get my hopes up of seeing a little baby come the next ultrasound.

Written March 24th, 2017

Gestational sac, yolk sac in the inside

Surprise of a Life Time!!

Sometimes things happen when you least expect them.  For reasons I will never completely understand, we received the surprise and gift of a life time this March...

During our break from IVF we continued to try naturally watching my irregular cycles, attempting to predict when I might ovulate and hoping for the best but expecting the worst.  After my D&C I didn't know what to expect with my cycles, I still continued taking my Metformin and Prenatal vitamin hoping it would get me to be regular.  Fast forward a few weeks and I noticed that my sense of smell was increasing, my breasts were more sensitive and I was having cramping.  I remember being pissed, thinking that my body was giving me all of these signs of pregnancy as a MEAN and CRUEL joke... I couldn't be pregnant, the chances were slim to none, especially after the winter we had.

I kept waiting as the week went on, telling myself I would test by Saturday if still no signs of my period starting.  I snuck into the bathroom before we got up for the day and peed on the dreaded pregnancy test.  Turned my head not wanting to see the stark white of a negative yet again, but then BOOM two pink lines!!! What?! Is this real?! I'm pregnant.....

I came out of the bathroom head spinning, hands shaking and unsure of what todo.. I had never been pregnant naturally.  I went downstairs to call Dr. Maud's office in Omaha to see if they wanted to follow me or Dr. Friesen in Lincoln.  They said with my history that I am of higher risk in the first trimester so they would follow me closely.  They started me on my progesterone shots again, and have me coming in for lab work (HCG, Progesterone, Estrogen levels) in two days.

I am over the moon excited for this blessing.  I cannot believe that we get to have another baby and so unexpectedly.  I am still in shock.  I am nervous for the next few weeks, hoping that my blood work comes back nice and high and that our ultrasounds look normal and beautiful.  Hoping and praying we don't go down the same avenue that we did with our last pregnancy of miscarriage.

I cannot simply come to terms that this is our life.  We have such a blessing that is the size of a poppy seed right now.  Wowza we are lucky and blessed.

Written on : March 18th, 2017

"Thy Will"

A friend recently shared this amazingly beautiful song with me that I had to pass along as I have had it on repeat and probably listened to it a good 20-30 times since last night.  The lead singer of Lady Antebellum Hillary Scott wrote this deeply inspiring song after experiencing a miscarriage of her own.  The words can relate to so many experiences, losses, or unanswered prayers throughout life. 

I hope that you will take time to watch and listen to the beautiful words sang, as I am also trying to really listen.  Really open my heart and soul to God. 

When I made our fertility struggles and miscarriage public I felt such a sense of relief that our news was out for our friends, family, co workers to all be aware of.  The thing I was not quite expecting was the private messages from women also going through infertility, also experiencing miscarriages.  Our culture is one in which these topics are kept quiet, not discussed.  Pregnant women often wait until after the first trimester to announce, so if a miscarriage occurs they do not have to tell many people. 

I understand, to each their own... but I wish that this stigma and tradition would stop.  We need to talk about these issues to support one another.  During these life events of infertility and miscarriage is when we need the most support, not to feel more alone.  Whether if you find a few friends or go public please don't face these struggles alone, it is already such a lonesome time that doesn't have to be. I am always here for any and all, even if I don't have answers (obviously don't even have my own answers) but I can be an ear to hear your frustrations, someone to agree and say "This sucks".

Grey Faith

I have to be completely honest to you and myself when writing this, there have been many times that I have questioned God and questioned why this was happening to us.

The questions that go through my head relating to God:

• Why does this have to happen to me?
• Why does God make things difficult for me to conceive a child?
• I feel like I am a good person who tries to do good things, but yet I am punished?
• Why wont God listen to my prayers?
• Why do I feel so alone?
• Why can drug addict mothers have multiple children but yet I struggle to get any?
• Why would God let us suffer and go through such rough times?
• Why would God let us have a baby just to take it away?
• Why does God's hate me?

That's a lot isn't it? It's the truth. These questions that have gone through my head, through my prayers, asking God why and when he will answer our prayers? 

I find it hard to go to work some times and see these moms come through that either didn't want the baby, knowingly did drugs/alcohol while pregnant, abuse their children, and they come through time and time again having more children... more children taken away into the CPS system.  Those are the patients that sting the most and make me question things the most.  WHY do these women get to have children and I do not. 

I know many of these questions I will never know the answer for.  I also know that there are lots of other things of which we cannot explain (cancer, childhood illness, car accidents, terrorism, etc..) but for now I question the fertility portion. And, I'm still at a loss of words.

I don't know if this makes me a weaker Christian because I have these questions. I try to remain positive and try to say my prayers, and praises to God.  But I have to say.... Sometimes its HARD.

I try to follow religious people on social media to surround myself on all sides with the words of God.  There is a part of me yet that wonders why there is this bad for such good people. I read blogs, and forums of other women going through what we are to gain support. I have friends/co-workers who so graciously provide me with books to read and bible verses to ponder. 

I am a work in progress and trying to hold on to my faith in God, that someday his reasons will shine through. I pray that he has a plan for me, but I don't understand why his plan had to include our journey of infertility, of a chemical pregnancy, a miscarriage and still the unknown if we will have another child.

I know that God is real.  I know that heaven is real. Sometimes there is no black and white... sometimes all I can see is grey.  Grey is not comforting.

Beautiful Gifts

We have the absolute best friends, family, co-workers.  We have from the beginning felt so much love, and support.  We are so appreciative for all that you guys have given us, from prayers, well wishes, and asking how things are going.

We thank you for the beautiful flowers, momma relaxing items, dinners and prayers.  We feel so loved.  We have also received the most beautiful book from my parents entitled 'Mommy, Please Don't Cry' by Linda Deymaz.  I have to admit the night that we got it, Derrick and I sat down to look at it we couldn't get past the second page, the emotions were too raw.  The words spoke too true to our hearts.  I couldn't handle it.

After a few days, I was able to get the book back out and made my way through the pages that comforted my soul.  I would highly suggest this book for a family that experiences a miscarriage or loss of a child.  I believe my parents found it at a local religious store called Gloria Deo their link is here: Gloria Deo .  There is a lovely journal section in the back of the book to write down prayers, thoughts, dreams that you had for the baby, that later I can reflect on.

I also feel like one of the things that we were given at the hospital on the day of our D&C.  The hospital gives out a beautiful golden baby ring.  The ring is so tiny.  I put it on my necklace that holds a charm that Derrick gave me when we had Jackson.  Now I have my two babies together close to my heart.  This ring will always be a special reminder of our baby.

Our baby will be buried this coming October at Lincoln Memorial Cemetery in a special area called baby land.

Time off

Well the last 4 months have been a crazy whirlwind of a time.  We have had about as much as we can process and take for now.  Thankfully, we can move at our own pace.

We will be taking roughly six months off of fertility treatments and IVF.  We need time to recover emotionally and financially from the last 3 rounds of FET.  We hope to in this time center ourselves again and find the positivity to go forward.  I hope to find my complete strength and faith in God during this time.  I struggle with my faith during these hard times. More on that later...

In the mean time, we will discuss with Dr. Maud her suggestions with doing some testing on our remaining embryos.  We have 6 remaining embryos in Omaha and ideally would like 1-2 more children.  With transferring 2 embryos at a time that would mean 3 more transfers before needing a fresh IVF cycle again. 

http://blog.drmalpani.com/2014/08/pgs-preimplantation-genetic-screening.html

The genetic testing that we are looking into doing is call PGS (Pre-Implantation Genetic Screening), there is really wonderful information and a video that explains the amazing process that they go through to test our embryos.  This screening would let us know if our remaining embryos are genetically normal and would therefore yield a higher success rate for pregnancy and hopefully diminish our chances of miscarriage or no implantation. 

Preimplantation Genetic Screening Preimplanation Genetic Screening

Unfortunately, the embryo's do run risks by being thawed-frozen, then re-thawed when we use them for a transfer.  However, we will have to roll the dice somewhere... This whole process is such a risk and gamble, we just pray we are making the right choices.

Typically, this screening would be done on fresh embryos from a fresh IVF cycle, and not ones that have already been frozen, however our clinic didn't do this screening back when we did our fresh IVF cycle over 3 years ago.

My HCG lab came back today as 20. So it has gone down quite a bit since our D&C which is good.  For now we will continue to decide what we will want to do with screening for our embryos and possibly do that over the next 2-3 months.  Hopefully good news from them. 

Cost for PGS screening for our 6 embryo's: $1,900

D&C

After finding out that our baby was no longer with us we knew there were two options for how to proceed.  We could either wait and pass the baby at home on our own.  Or, we could have a surgical procedure called a D&C (Dilation and Curettage).  We talked with both of our physicians (Dr. Oakes, and Dr. Friesen) and spoke about the pro's and con's for each with our specific situation.  We decided that a D&C would be the best option for us.  This whole topic is a bit rough and I really don't want to offend anyone when I talk about this.  I know that some of you might be very against this procedure and would rather pass the baby naturally, and that is 100% okay, which ever you decide just as I have said before make sure you make an informed choice.

Mayo Clinic- D&C

I called and made an appointment for surgery with Dr. Friesen for Friday January 6th.  We decided to do the surgery in Lincoln as it is much cheaper with insurance.

Friday morning we got up bright and early at 4:15AM and went to the hospital and got checked in around 5:00AM.  The nurse went through some questions on my medical history, medication history, and did her absolute best to be sympathetic to the reason we were there.  The nurse came in to start my IV, and lab came in to draw 3 tubes of blood, thank goodness I have great veins.

Both the anesthesiologist and Dr. Friesen stopped in to talk and go over some questions and hear our history.  Then around 6:45AM they wheeled me back to the OR.  I hated this part because I had to take out my contacts and I am blind as a bat, and couldn't make out a single persons face.  Once we got into the OR my nurse introduced me to the other surgical nurses and personnel in the room.  I slid over to the OR bed and laid back as they hooked me up to monitors, and put some "feel good" medication through my IV.  At that time the anesthesiologist put a mask over my face and out I went.

I woke up maybe 30-40 minutes later to the PACU nurse rubbing my shoulder saying "how are you feeling Stephanie".  I thankfully didn't have any nausea and no pain (Thanks to some zofran and toradol through my IV).  After waking up a tiny bit more in the PACU they wheeled me back into my outpatient surgery room where Derrick was waiting.  I continued to drift in and out of sleep while the nurse came in to monitor my blood pressure and any bleeding I was having along with any pain.

After about 90 minutes I felt a little more awake.  I still wasn't having any pain, or nausea and minimal bleeding.  Once I felt a little better I was asked to get up to try to use the bathroom, once I could urinate I was able to get dressed and ready to head home.  The nurse again came in to go over dismissal instructions, medications, follow up appointments, and what to expect.

Overall the staff did a wonderful job of allowing us space to breathe and process together, but yet were available to answer questions and let us know that we were being cared for.  We went home and spent the rest of the day resting, sleeping, and watching movies.

Emotionally during my time at the hospital I tried my hardest to keep it together, to not show the hurt and scared side of my heart.  It wasn't until close before we went back for surgery that I broke down.  Derrick and I yet again found ourselves tangled together holding each other, crying, praying, and sharing one of the worst two days of our lives.