Monday, April 28, 2014

Another long road over

This particular road has been long and bumpy, but i'm glad to say we're now over the hump, out of the woods and can see the future clearly again. The cytotec didn't work. The week after I took it we had a Saline Ultrasound appointment at Boston IVF, which our wonderful Dr. Lannon did. He found more tissue, well embedded, that would need removal via hysteroscopy. The news hit hard, but at least I could see forward, and at least it was now clear why nearly 8 weeks later I was still bleeding.

The next day the nurse called with our schedule for the hysteroscopy. I have to say that was the hardest day of this whole process - over 5 weeks they needed us to wait because of scheduling, meaning 5 more weeks of miscarrying. Suddenly I couldn't see the future, I couldn't see the way forward and I couldn't cope. The first time I think I have ever felt like that. Even through the initial miscarriage I could still look at baby things and think 'one day', suddenly the thought of another 5 weeks of miscarrying, another 5 weeks before they potentially found more wrong, another 5 weeks of bleeding and inability to 'get back to normal', another 5 weeks with a piece of what was once such joy to us still inside me, was too much to bare. I wanted to try cytotec again, I wanted drugs to induce a period, I wanted to do something, because sitting miscarrying for another 5 weeks just wasn't going to cut it for me. I really never want to feel like that again, and even starting thinking maybe this just wasn't for me, maybe we should move to adoption right now. No one could help either, though B tried, there was really nothing that could make me feel better, I just felt empty, defeated, alone.

Luckily within a week they called back with a cancellation, I could have the hysteroscopy on the 23rd April, nearly 10 weeks since the miscarriage. It went well, though my usual grogginess with anesthesia, Dr Lannon found the piece and managed to pull it free without cutting. Even more of a relief is he found nothing else in there, no morphological reason for the miscarriage and everything looked great. So great in fact we're on for June, and the evening of the surgery I started estrogen (as a substitute for the pill).

I should be elated, but it's hard. I can see the future again, which is good. I can look at baby things and think one day B and I will have our chance to go wild and spoil our children. But I also feel like we're right back at the beginning, right back where we started, only 6 months older, 6 months further along. I want to be hopeful, but it's still a slim chance it'll even work again, let alone get us to the point of being terrified we'll miscarry again. I found myself thinking again of what we could do differently next time to prevent a miscarriage (in reality nothing) and it suddenly struck me we might not even get pregnant, it's only a 30% chance we will.....

So here we go again.....we start injectables on the 30th May....

Friday, April 4, 2014

Cytotec

6 weeks came and went a week ago, 7 weeks will be tomorrow. This feels like the longest miscarriage ever, but I know from internet searching that isn't true. It's certainly a long one. This week I went back to the OB/GYN to talk about why I was still bleeding. After an exam they sent me for an ultrasound and found that I still have 'remains' inside my uterus, and that is why i'm still bleeding. On the good news my iron is back to normal so I can stop taking iron pills (3 less pills a day - woo hoo!) and my HCG is finally zero.

But because there is still stuff inside last night I took a dose of cytotec to get the rest out. This drug is used to induce labor and to aid in miscarriages. I so wish i'd never heard of it until labor needed inducing, but in many ways this is hopefully the end of that chapter and beginning of a new one. Next week i'm due for another saline ultrasound to check out what's going on inside there. The IVF center says that if that is all good and my baseline bloodwork comes back okay that we can go on the May cycle. Though that would be awesome and just what I/We need, i'm not going to believe it until that first injection. This is already two months later than we wanted to get back on the wagon, i'm just having a hard time believing this miscarriage will ever end at the moment.

The cytotec has been going okay so far, I took the day off work as they said it could take three days, which should get me to the end of the weekend, so hopefully i'll be okay by monday. Some nausea and cramps, dizziness and some 'stuff' is definitely coming out, but nothing like those initial days. No major bleeding either, just stuff. Maybe that'll change, either way, I really hope this is it.....