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Friday, April 5, 2013

TTC Sucks

TTC is draining.

It starts with "It has been three months and I'm still not pregnant", but then three turns to six, and six turns to however many months you're at right now.

For us, our bump in the road (not in my abdomen) came six months in. I stopped taking the pill and we decided to let things happen naturally. Naturally, nothing happened.

My OB/GYN told me that if we didn't have any results within six months to come in to talk to her. I went in, but figured it wasn't a big deal, it was only six months. I was diagnosed very young with PCOS, so I kind of knew, even if I didn't fully understand, that it wasn't going to be as easy for us as it would be for some people. At the same time, I felt the extreme disappointment of every failed pregnancy test. And when I started ovulation tests, those negatives hurt too.

The thing about trouble TTC is that it is all negative. The test results, your feelings, your attitude. All negative. Your plus one is really a minus one. The dream of eating for two is really eating for yourself and in my case, my feelings (ice cream works wonders). If someone gets pregnant, it's hard to be happy. Which in turn, makes you feel negatively about yourself for feeling negatively about them.

I don't know that there is a standard protocol for the time limit between TTC with no issues, and trouble TTC. We went nearly two years before we saw our RE for the first time, and I think that is rather excessive.

My OB/GYN wanted to try to make me lose weight, and was reluctant to let me try some of the oral medications that help many women get pregnant. She has an extremely natural approach to medicine (I don't think she is even with the practice any more because she went somewhere to do holistic things). She said that I have anovulatory cycles which is the absence of a cycle at all. I don't ovulate on my own, and while Clomid is the most commonly used treatment to this, she wanted to try a natural way. Being uninformed about my options, I went with it. She was my doctor, she would know what was best, right?

I'm not an all natural kind of person. Don't get me wrong, my boobs are real. I don't buy organic (no offense intended if you do) and in my eyes, "all natural" reads as "higher cost". I don't really care to eat tons of chemicals, but I think organic ketchup is a joke. Organic canned food? Really? It's canned. But I digress. When it comes to wanting a baby, I didn't feel that all natural was the way to go.

When I went off of the pill I stopped having periods at all. It was amazing. No cramps, no bleeding, but also, no baby. For the first time in my life I wanted a period. It was so weird. My doctor started me on Prometrium to induce a period. Thinking this was my only option (surely my doctor would give me something cheaper if it were available, right?) I took it. And I took it. And I took it. And nothing happened. My doctor didn't have me doing anything besides having a period every month. Fabulous. Once it was apparent that I wasn't going to start ovulating on my own, she switched me to a progesterone cream that I had to order from a special pharmacy that would make and mail it to me. I had to rotate the locations that I applied the cream twice a day (wrists, shoulders, neck, or knee pit). This allowed me to have a cycle, but it was only 20 days long. And we were still doing nothing to encourage ovulation.

To be honest, I should have taken a stand for my own health long before I did, but that is neither here nor there. When I finally had enough, I switched doctors. The new doctor listened to my wishes, and immediately got me prepared to start the medications my other doctor had been holding back on.

I did four cycles of Clomid at 100mg before my OB/GYN decided to send me to the RE. I was having headaches on the Clomid (but I also ovulated once) and she was concerned of my risk of stroke. Honestly, and maybe carelessly, I wasn't concerned about stroke. I was concerned about being pregnant. I was pissed that she gave up so easily. I didn't want to see the RE because nothing was wrong with me. I wasn't infertile and she was a quitter.

Several weeks and many breakdowns later, I made the appointment with our RE. That post is coming up soon.

How long did you wait to move on to the next step?


1 comment:

  1. "The thing about trouble TTC is that it is all negative. The test results, your feelings, your attitude. All negative."

    Oh my gosh this post. Seriously. We tried for almost two years before I had enough symptoms for my OBGYN to diagnose me with PCOS and refer me to an RE, and then it was tests and tests, and yes all the negatives. We're coming up on almost three years of "trying" and are contemplating an IUI (what the RE recommended as our best shot at getting pregnant).

    I've been slack about commenting but absolutely love your posts - thanks for sharing all this!

    ReplyDelete

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