Intro after 1st IVF failure and a longer road ahead than expected

liljoy-2

I am so glad I have found this board since I can't talk to my family or close friends about this (I feel so inadequate and dislike self-pity), and my husband is starting taking this whole situation hard. On top of that, although we have been together for a long time and care about each other a lot, I've been unhappy for quite some time.  

Anyhow, my background is that I had endometriomas removed from one ovary in March (apparently leaving me with only a few follicles) after two months of excruciating pain. We've been TTC since then, with a ticking bomb above my head since the endometriosis could return at any time leading to more surgery if I don't get pregnant.

I'm 36 and DH is 40 with low total count. My blood tests are normal. I've failed a natural IUI and then discovered I had uterine polyps, as if the endometriosis, fibroids and MF were not enough. I'm worried sick about this (will take them out soon). 

I also failed my first IVF (it was a micro-IVF protocol with only Clomid and Ovidrel trigger). The doctor missed my mature egg and collected only a M1 egg that fertilized but didn't develop past day 2.. I am taking this way harder than I expected and have felt physically sick and depressed for the last few days. I think I reached the point where I begin to lose some hope. 

December will be the holiday season and the most I can hope for is an IUI if it's not around Christmas when they're closed (and according to the calendar, that's exactly when I will probably ovulate). So now I have to wait until January to try a mini-IVF with some injections too...it will be a long road since my goal is to do freeze-all cycles to have about 4 embryos for PGS... I will probably change my mind about PGS since all this seems harder than expected. 

Sorry for being a downer (a few months ago when I decided to go the IVF route, I didn't buy a ski pass for this winter thinking I should be pregnant by then, right? Now here I am knowing for sure I won't be this winter..) 

Being on this board and reading all your experiences seems to be helpful and I got so many answers just by reading through.. 

oxinfree

@bestofjoy - This journey is so so hard, and a complicated diagnosis is never easy to swallow.

If you're wanting to go with PGS I'm curious why you are doing mini IVF. Wouldn't you want to potentially get as many embryos as possible to test? I know mini IVF is more cost effective (and some may argue quality over quantity) but if you want to do pgs this may be something to consider....

FX 2017 is your year! Hope you and your RE will find a solution and you'll have baby in your arms soon. Big hugs. Welcome, and nice to meet you!  

mandasd

I also had a failed IVF cycle...it sucks and definitely depressed but we have to keep moving forward! 

liljoy-2

Thank you, ladies for the replies. 
@oxinfree I'm doing mini-IVF for a few reasons: less hormones/side-effects, I also have only a few follicles left on my ovary from the lap and don't want to have longer gaps between cycles. But I'm starting to reconsider the PGS thing because only day 5 can be frozen/PGSed and I might not have any embryos developing past day 3...I have a month to think hard of my next step in January. 

rainbowwishes5

Welcome! Everyone here is lovely 

KLake42

My journey has definitely been longer than I expected.  I'll be starting a reciprocal IVF cycle (my wife's eggs, my uterus) right at the 2 year mark. 

One thing that's helped has been to make plans for fun things, even if you might not be able to do the fun thing if you're pregnant.  I've got tickets to DragonCon (like Comic Con) around Labor Day 2017.  Hopefully, I'll be preggers and tired and not interested in spending the day on my feet, but it will still be fun to find a nerdy pregnant costume and sit and watch the crowd.  And if I'm not pregnant, well, we'll be ready to blow off some steam.

Is it too late to get a ski pass?  Don't let life pass you by while you're traveling this journey.

mtpbadger

I'm sorry you find yourself here but agree with @klake42, you can't let this process consume you and you have to keep living your life. Sometimes that's easier said than done. There have definitely been things we have delayed or put off thinking "I might be pregnant then" only to be still going through treatment and looking back I wish I wouldn't have passed on the opportunity.

I know it's frustrating to be delayed due to your clinics schedule. I'm on hold as my clinic won't do transfers during the Christmas holiday so nothing for me until January. It sucks but it's allowing me to actually enjoy life again and not think about treatments, injections, monitoring appointments, etc. for a few weeks. 

Can you get a partial season ski pass?  

liljoy-2

Thanks for the good thoughts. I will go skiing and try to enjoy Christmas instead of thinking constantly about this. I even started having constant dreams about the treatments and I know it happens haha.

hellobabyLC

I'm new to this communit, too. A wonderful community, but I'm sorry you have to belong. I'm sorry for your failed IVF - i don't know a feeling more devastating. Wishing so much love and luck in 2017 ❤️

IfYouCanDreamIt

bestofjoy I'm sorry for everything you are going through. This is so hard journey that none of us would like to take and it helps when you can share your experiences with others who've been there or still are. The holiday season is especially tough, sending you virtual hugs and prayers. 

funkykey

Hi @bestofjoy - I'm so sorry, that sucks. The polyps, the fibroids, the endo, the failed min-IVF. All of it. I'm also sorry about the holiday closure - I ovulate during my clinic's holiday closure too, and I am SO upset about it. I don't like self-pity either, but man, this past year I have thrown myself more wine-fueled pity parties than I know what to do with. I don't know what I would do without the T-TTC board; I found it just when I was at my lowest point, and it has helped so much. 

I notice you mentioned being unhappy and your marriage. I (obviously) don't know the details, but I thought I'd share - I've been a disaster this entire time we've been trying for a baby, and even the months beforehand, when I was ready to start trying and my husband was not. I think about having a baby every day - almost every hour. I am obsessive, distraught, and hopeful all at once. My husband doesn't know what to do; he loves me, but keeps wanting to solve the problem by just saying: "look, we don't need a baby, I'm happy", and is totally confused when that just makes me cry harder. The infertility has definitely taken a toll on me, which has in turn taken a toll on my husband and our marriage.

Those people who say: "Having a baby won't fix your marriage" obviously did not have marital problems stemming from unwanted childlessnes. My parents had trouble conceiving me, and my dad says that it was, hands down, the most difficult time in their marriage. He said, and I quote: "A lot of people say having kids is hard, that you'll fight, but at least they're there. They're alive, and you love them. Wanting kids and not having them - trying repeatedly to have them and not... It was the single hardest period of our marriage." I don't know if that's what you are experiencing, but that advice - from someone who has experienced both infertility and then being a parent - has been so grounding for me through this.

Anyway, best of luck to you. I agree with everyone else - get your ski pass! Maybe even do one of those cool ski weekend clinics!

liljoy-2

@funkykey Thank you very much for your words. Yes, infertility sucks and it does impact our marriage. I'm mostly depressed and fearful, agitated and impatient. He's also feeling the pressure and very edgy when it comes to his "low count"; I know men are extremely sensitive about this topic but I thought he'd be more mature about it, given that I openly admit I have fertility issues. 

We want to go to a couple therapist again, too, to diffuse some of these negative feelings. I'm lucky that he is open to fertility treatments and encouraging, but probably all this pressure is making him angry inside and it shows on the outside too. Instead of taking it easy on me he gets angry very easily, which in turn makes me even more depressed, etc. It's a vicious circle. Infertility is such a big misfortune, ugh.

Today I read the laparoscopy report from a few months back and I shuddered, it was way more severe than I was told (so it figures why I have such a hard time getting pregnant). My ob-gyn keeps telling me "you're young, you're fine"...but with such severe endo he should know better than to lead me on. The RE is less optimistic about the endo. 

funkykey

Ugh, I'm so sorry re: laparoscopy. That's awful.

My DH can be short with me too when I am grieving our IF, and I wish he were softer/more gentle - we have had lots of fights about it (so many! some of which have been nasty, and one of which I've talked about on these boards), but it helps when I can find humour in it. One of the things that's so tough about IF is that the accompanying depression can suck the joy right out of you; on my bad days (like BFN days), I am totally humourless. That's when we usually fight the most. Also, when I take a step back, I know my DH is short because he can't fix it. I can't imagine how tough it would be if he had just suffered a blow like yours too. I think it's totally understandable for you to feel hopeless - sounds like you two have had a really shitty year.

It's also funny to me that the time in our lives - for my DH and I - where we could use a tropical holiday the most (to just lie on the beach together), is also the time when we are least likely to spring for it, as I want to be sure we can pay for IVF, and I am terrified of Zika. I hate Zika. If I had known last year that I was going to be IF, I would have gone somewhere hot and cheap and spent a week sunning myself before all of this. Instead, I was like: "Ah, we shouldn't. We might conceive any day!" SMH.

For me, it really helps when I remember what fools DH and I both are, just doddling along, doing our best. And also that everything we are going through, lots of couples have been through before. I am definitely not the first wife who has been left slack-jawed after their husband has said: "Come on honey, if we don't have a baby, is that really the worst thing?" My husband is definitely not the first one who has tried to solve the infertility problem by avoiding it. (Nor am I the first wife who has responded by throwing their hands up in the air and saying: "Avoid, avoid, avoid!")

I don't think that fighting during infertility is a sign of a bad marriage, I just think it's a sign that you are both dealing with a really tough situation. When you decide to be with someone in sickness and in health, obviously the sickness periods are going to be a lot harder than the healthy periods - that's why "sickness and health" is part of the vows. (OMG I have re-read my marriage vows so many times this past year.)
 
Good luck breaking the vicious circle - I'm sure you can do it! IF is a beast!

Also, just in case you need a laugh, the New Yorker marriage cartoons always do it for me, particularly after DH & I have squabbled:

liljoy-2

@funkykey You really made us laugh, thank you! And yeah, how I can relate to that "anytime now, so no ski pass for me darlin". Ha, now I ended up getting one after all, it's going to be a looong road ahead. 

MariaBend25

@bestofjoy I am sorry for your situation and hope you find comfort in this community. I don't know what advice to give regarding your diagnosis as I am new to all this myself. With your husband I hope you two can come together during this time. No matter what happens on your journey to hopeful parenthood the one thing that will remain is your marriage. So make sure you both take time for each other, do a staycation or a real vacation, relax and love each other. The Infertility can take a lot out of you and him and it sounds like you both cope differently (as most gals and guys do). Just don't lose sight of your love and marriage in the pursuit of a bundle of joy because you will want and need a strong marriage when that baby does come and even more so if what we all fear most becomes reality. I know that can be a downer of a thought but I remind myself of that when DH and I have an off day and it makes it easier to understand that where he might be in the coping process may not match where I am...and that is ok. I am sometimes over passionate on this because I saw a friend go through IF, finally conceive a baby, and by the time their daughter arrived there was nothing left to the marriage but bitterness and exhaustion and they ended up splitting. I would never want any of you ladies to go through that. 

AlohaKumu

I can so relate to what many of you saying about grief due to infertility and the conflict it can cause. My DH and I have both been grieving at different times with different triggers. Yesterday he sat us at the "family table" at his work holiday party and I almost broke down sobbing. We ended up going for a walk in the middle of the party and he apologized, not thinking how upsetting it might be for me to be surrounded by strangers and their babies. I had to apologize to him the other day when he found my old "health chart" behind the bedroom door and I snapped at him saying that it doesn't even matter anymore. It's not always easy, but talking about it (once we cool down) really helps.

I hope you enjoy your skiing trip @bestofjoy and thank you for sharing your story with our community. Sending you warm wishes!

(I love those comics, @funkykey!)