I met my husband in college, stalked him for a few months, and convinced him to fall in love with me. We dated for years, moved around for medical school and jobs, and finally got married seven years later, in April of 2011. Of course I had been dreaming about the super adorable children that we would have since the first time I spotted him in the college dining hall...and now we could finally make it happen! We both had good jobs, an adorable 4 bedroom house, a savings account (mostly empty, but still!) Now all we had do to was throw away the birth control pills and Magnum condoms (you're welcome, honey) and get busy! Right!?
We tried (and tried, and tried, and tried) to get pregnant the old fashioned way. At first it was fun! Unprotected sex felt exhilarating and dangerous, like when I stole a lip gloss from Claire's in the seventh grade. "This could be it. The day that I got pregnant! I am such an adult with my hip unprotected sex." I thought to myself each time. But after months had passed without so much as a pregnancy scare, I went to the doctor to figure out what was up. I assumed they would tell me that I was just being anxious and that I was perfect and healthy with A+ quality ovaries filled with little baby-making eggs. Instead, they told me that my ovaries were covered in cysts, and that I wasn't ovulating. No ovulation, no pregnancy. Epic fail. They diagnosed me with "lean PCOS" and sent me home with a pamphlet and a prescription.
I thought that the diagnosis of PCOS was devastating, but quickly learned that all I needed was a little bit of Clomid to help me ovulate every month. HUZZAH! I am victorious! Just needed a some light medical intervention in the form of a tiny white pill that makes me super mean and gives me headaches of doom and intense hot flashes. Right?! Well it turned out that I wasn't the only one with a problem. Despite more and more unprotected sexy time, complete with eggs galore, I still had no baby.
My husband's sperm was tested and it turns out that they are the only part of him that has ever "underachieved" at anything. This guy is brilliant and kind and handsome as hell, but evidently his sperm did not get the memo. A urologist couldn't find any medical reason, and although his counts were bad, they weren't terrible, so I put him on some supplements I found on Amazon (they are legit! I promise!) and we moved on to IUI to improve our chances.
Had an IUI in August of 2013. I waited patiently for 11 days without peeing on a single stick. Got home from an exhausting day of work and took a pregnancy test. POSITIVE. Holy shit. We did it. THERE IS A TINY BABY IN THERE! Got through the blood draws, the first ultrasound (heard the heartbeat!), blood panels and tests, 12 week ultrasound, more tests. Everything was perfect. I could feel the baby kicking. We told everyone, and counted down the days until our 20 week appointment/ultrasound where we would find out the gender of our little bean.
This is where shit gets real. My husband and I walk into the appointment filled with joy and anticipation. The dreams we have for our family are immense, and filled with a million possibilities. I secretly want a little girl, and I know he wants a little boy...but I don't really care either way because the two of us made a baby and he/she will be perfect.
Two hours later, we walk out of the office completely devastated. Our baby has been diagnosed with a fatal short rib polydactyly syndrome (exact type unknown, they needed to do a series of extensive genetic tests.) Before we left, we scheduled an appointment two days later to terminate the pregnancy. The little one would never be able to breathe on his own because his lungs could not develop due to his extremely short ribs and small chest. He had heart and brain defects and limb deformities. He didn't even have 10 fingers or 10 toes. How many times do you hear the doctor on television say "Congrats! A healthy baby with 10 fingers and 10 toes!" Well, if you are me...you don't.
The news got harder. Whatever syndrome our little one had is almost certainly auto-recessive. This means that my husband and I both carry a silent genetic mutation and have a 25% change of passing this terrible syndrome on to a baby. Right now we are still waiting on the genetic tests to get a definitive diagnosis, but 1 in 4 is always 25%, no matter what the official diagnosis is. I thought getting pregnant was the hard part, but now I realize how it was just the first step in a terrifyingly difficult process.
Fast forward 6 weeks, and here I am. The procedure is done, and the physical healing was quick. The emotional part of me is something that has been irrevocably changed. I am starting to feel "normal" again, but my new normal is different. The thing I struggle most with is how badly I want to be pregnant again. I yearn for it, I crave it, I think about it all the time. But now I understand that simply being pregnant is not enough. I want something which I had always assumed would be a given; I want to be pregnant with a healthy baby. One with ten fingers and ten toes. One in the 75%. One that I can bring home.
