Wednesday, April 21, 2010

No Pot of Gold Under This Rainbow

We waited for what seemed like an eternity and then the day finally came. To find out your results, you go have your blood drawn in the morning and then call the patient line after 3:00 PM. It's weird because the nurses record a message for you to listen to. I suppose because they don't want to have to personally talk to you if it is bad news.

After our attempt at IVF, we called the patient line and got bad news. I was not pregnant. The nurse said in the message that they would discuss our case at their next team meeting and our doctors would figure out what our next step should be. They always record on there that if you need emotional or mental support to contact them so you can meet with one of the therapists on call.

I needed more than a therapist at that point! Good thing that my husband had a strong shoulder to cry on because I needed it. I felt like nothing in my life had ever been easy and hadn't I been challenged enough by God already? If he had a plan for us, why was he making us suffer so much? Why all the heartache and defeat?

I was really angry at the world and one day in the shower I actually had to hold onto the side because I was crying so hard. I never in my life have experienced emotions like this and really didn't know how to handle it.

We had only told our closet friends and family about IVF at this point. That made it really difficult to cope when it didn't work because people didn't know what we had been through. To the outside world, we were two teachers enjoying their summer off, but that certainly was not the case. We had to put on a constant face that showed everything was fine, when in reality, we were both barely holding on.

I remember having to leave parties and social functions that summer to have Eric give me my timed shots during the preparation period and people asking why we had to leave early. How do you explain it without lying or having to tell your whole story? It makes for a very weird, depressing conversation that can really put a damper on a party.

We chose to be private about it and I often felt very offended when people knew second hand information about our situation. People told others about it and I felt it wasn't their information to tell. The reason why that upset me was that it took away my right to tell people our full story when we were ready to do so.

After a couple of weeks the doctors contacted us and we set up an appointment. At our appointment they explained to us what they had learned from our first attempt and what we could try differently next time. I was pretty hesitant to say right away if I wanted to try again using IVF. I wasn't sure if I could handle it all over again. That meant more shots, more medicine, more procedures, and more keeping secrets from people about what was going on in our lives. My husband and I discussed it over the course of a few days and decided that on the clinic's next up-time (the times when they are doing IVF and not just woman's medicine) we would try again. They put us on the list for the next round and that was that.

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