October 15th~ Wave of Light Ceremony!

Losing a pregnancy or infant changes you. The grief can create a world of darkness around you. All encompassing. Swirling questions, feelings of hopelessness, making it difficult to see out of.

While grief brings darkness, light on the other hand offers hope. Sight. A glimpse of what’s ahead. It is powerful and it breaks through the darkness, just enough to remind you what it’s like outside the darkness.
 
 October 15^th is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day.. and I would love all of my friends and family to participate in the "wave of light" in honor of Zoey and Piper! It takes a community to create this wave – those who are grieving and those who are supporting those who are grieving – and it remembers the too-short lives of lost babies and infants. It offers support and compassion in helping to break the darkness of grief that surrounds moms and dads, whose arms are empty.
You have the chance to offer light, to offer hope, to share in the compassion-giving and remind grieving families there is light outside of the darkness.



On October 15^th from 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm, in all time zones across the world, you can light a candle to remember the babies who have been lost from miscarriages, ectopic and molar pregnancies, born stillborn or lost to infant death. Because of the time zone differences, the lighting of these candles creates a “wave of light” across the world. It’s a beautiful, moving, and touching tribute to the families who have suffered. It’s not an image that will likely ever be seen, but if you are home on the 15th, even if it’s not at 7 pm, I ask you to light a candle for those who have lost their precious babies.
As these candles burn brightly, they offer a flame, a fire, the chance to light another fire and to bring more light into a dark and hopeless world of grief.

Support is like that. It offers light into a world of grief. It remembers. It gives hope that light is coming. It helps suffering families realize it’s possible to see. I can not tell you how much Will and I appreciate how supportive and loving everyone has been to us during our tumultuous battle and eventual defeat with infertility. I do hope you participate in the wave of light ceremony and help me remember Zoey and Piper, as well as any other babies lost too soon!

"That Time of Year"

Hi,
It's been quite a while since my last update, which was my failed IVF (#3).  Since then, we did a frozen embryo transfer with our last little embryo, and we got pregnant!  Our beta levels looked great and we were so very excited.  Then we got to the ultrasound.  Baby was measuring a week behind with a heart beat of 104 bpm (should have been minimum 140bpm.)  Everyone was pretty grim about the situation but our nurse told us it may be a slow grower and not to worry just yet.  We had another ultrasound scheduled one week later.  At that ultrasound, baby had regressed a day and there was only a "flicker" of a heartbeat.  In the nicest words possible, they told us our baby was dying, but we had to wait until the heart completely stopped to "confirm fetal demise" and schedule a D&C.  So, we had to wait another week and go in for another ultrasound.  2.5 weeks after getting the news that our baby wasn't going to make it, we went for our last ultrasound and were told the baby had, in fact, died.  I had a D&C 2 days later. 

But that's not really what triggered me to update the blog (the D&C was June 16).  Today I am blogging because I am struggling.

It is "that time of year".  The time of year that I start getting time hop memories of being pregnant with Zoey and Piper.  The time of year that I remember scheduling the gender ultrasound, planning the gender reveal party, thinking of a baby shower theme, creating my registry, hearing about how much bigger my belly was getting, and talking about how excited I was to be "half way there!!" 

I am not sure what it is, but I feel like the second year of this grief, for me, is harder than the first.  Maybe it's because I was still slightly numb that first year.  Maybe it's because, by this point, I honestly thought I would either be pregnant again or have a newborn.  Maybe it's because the ideas of "acts of kindness" or "having a memorial" or any of those distractions are not on my mind anymore... it's just grief that remains.  Raw, hard, sickening, take your breath away grief.

Once again (like last year) I am finding myself struggling with daily life.  It's so hard to deal with this kind of thing in my profession.  I am a first grade teacher!!! Synonymous with happy, bubbly, excited about the littlest things (example: today I had to throw a legit 30 second dance party for one of my kiddos reaching her 5 point goal on a reading app).  It's taking every ounce of strength and energy I have inside me to pull this off for my first graders every second of the day... to the point that when I am not in front of kids (walking down the hallway, at lunch, etc.) I feel like a zombie.. like my brain just needs to shut down for a second so it can gear up for the next facade session I put on for my kids. 

I hate this.  I hate having to muster up a ridiculous amount of energy just to fake happy.  I hate having nothing left to give anyone else because I give it all within the 4 walls of my classroom.  But in a weird way, I also love it.  I love this time of year because I get to remember my baby girls.  I spend 9-10 months out of the year shoving their memory to the back corners of my mind so I can survive like a normal person.  But these 3 months are dedicated to them.  These 3 months let me relive my time with them, to feel the pain, because the pain shows how much I love them. 

For me, time is not healing these wounds.  In fact, this year is actually harder than last year, because there is nothing there to mask my pain (oh I'm so sad, but I'm planning a memorial! Oh I'm so sad, but we are starting this fertility treatment!) I'm just.. sad.

I'm just sad.

Infertility-9 Tifani-0

Sorry for the hiatus friends.  Last time I posted was our egg retrieval day because, well, that was the last appointment in which I felt good about this cycle.  We went to our transfer on Sunday and I had all the same feelings I had during the last transfer.  We were waiting for the embryologist and I was sweating bullets thinking of everything that could go wrong and just praying for at least one perfect embryo.  But the difference was, I kept talking myself off the ledge.  I kept thinking 'you had a perfect one before, you will have a perfect one again, everything is fine..."  Remember we decided if we had one perfect embryo, we would transfer one, but anything less than perfect, we would do 2.  So when the embryologist walked in with pictures of 2 embryos, my heart sunk.  That meant we did not have very good embryos, and I knew it.  She was also a newer embryologist and did not have a very good poker face.  She basically said "okay, so you have a 1BB and an EBB, which is an early blast." so, somewhere along the way, our embryos slowed way down in growth and did not even make it to where they needed to be on day 5.  My heart kept saying "this won't work, this isn't going to work."  She was rambling on about assisted hatching, fragmentation, growing the others another day to see about freezing, blah blah blah but all I heard was my brain screaming, negative.  Not pregnant.  SO sorry.  I basically knew it was over before they ever transferred those 2 crappy embryos. 

We went forward with the transfer and went home to drag through the two week wait until the pregnancy test.  I never really thought I was pregnant.  So the pregnancy test was really just a formality.  Of course, we go for the blood draw and the results come back negative.  Shocker.

Mainly I was mad.  Why?!!! What went wrong?!!? Everything looked EXACTLY like it did with the girls cycle.  I was so confused.  When  I talked to my doctor, he basically said he felt the same way.  He didn't know what went wrong either.  He said everything was identical, and in one cycle, both implanted, and in the other, neither implanted.  He was like it just doesn't make sense.. but that's the frustrating thing ... the unpredictability of the reproductive system.  You can't control everything.  He thinks the embryos may be getting "lost" when they are transferred into my uterus and are unable to find their way to my uterine lining to implant.  Obviously the have their mother's sense of direction...

Going forward.. we are planning to transfer our little frozen embryo this month!  He grew for an extra day, and actually turned out a pretty dang good quality.  He is a 4BB, which is almost an A.  My doctor is putting me on an aspirin regimen this time, which will thin my blood and my it flow more freely into my uterus to make my lining more receptive to baby 4BB.  We will also be doing an endometrial biopsy this month.  Basically, the doctor will go in and my a cut inside my uterus (let that sink in.. he is going to make a CUT, on the INSIDE of my uterus...) The research shows that after making this cut, my body will send healthy blood cells to heal the injury, and in essence "guide" my lost little embryo to the lining and help him implant.  We are hoping adding these two things will make this baby stick around for 9 months!

Yes, we are upset this cycle did not work.  But honestly, losing the girls changed my entire outlook on stuff like this.  I remember my first failed cycle, I was DEVASTATED.  Like, couldn't get out of bed for a week, crying sobbing mess, thought my world had crashed around me, my life sucks why is it so easy for everyone else I hate all the things ahhhh poor pitiful me!!!!!!!! Little did I know, I didn't even know pain back then.  But now, with this cycle, I am just like, I have been through so much worse than this.  This pain is nothing.  I didn't even cry.  So it failed.. and?  I didn't miscarry.  I didn't lose another child.  We are getting reimbursed through insurance so it's not like we are out a bunch of money.  We have the money and the drive to try again this month and we have an embryo to try with.  This. Is. Nothing.!

So, As of right now, I am scheduled to willingly allow a doctor to make a pretty dang painful cut on the inside of my uterus on March 24th.  It's about as exciting as it sounds, but if it helps, so be it.  We plan to transfer little 4BB the week of April 25th.  If this doesn't work, we will plan to do full fledged IVF #39857397124 (..4) this summer.  But we will cross that bridge when we come to it.

I can't think of a more fitting meme for how I feel right now!

 

Egg Retrieval

Yesterday was my egg retrieval!  I was very ready to have some relief from getting these eggs taken out.  They were able to get 16 eggs.  That's 2 more than how many we retrieved during my girls' cycle.  I think they threw those in their for themselves, one extra for Zo and one extra for Pip!  Just another way of them showing us they are with us.  I actually felt a lot better this time than I did last egg retrieval.  They gave me different pain medicine and gave me some Zofran for nausea, so I woke up a little sore but not bad at all.  Today I was even able to go to an all day training for work and felt fine.  The embryologist called and said they were able to ICSI (insert sperm into egg) on 12 eggs, and 7 have fertilized.  That is 2 less than the girls, once again a sign from them!  I feel like those 2 less embryos are their way of reminding me of my favorite 2 embryos in heaven.  My mom thinks Zoey and Piper got rid of the boy embryos, haha!

I'm going to be honest and say I am a little disappointed with only 7 fertilized eggs.  I just feel like it is kind of a low number and it is freaking me out.  But, even the paper they gave us says on average only half of the eggs retrieved are usable, and of those, only half fertilize.  Based on that, we are slightly above average, but I still wish we had more.  We had 9 fertilized eggs with the girls, and by the 5 day transfer only 3 were good enough quality to implant/freeze, so maybe that is what has my nerves messed up.  I don't know.  I guess in my perfect world, I would have 14 or 15 fertilized eggs!  It is both a curse and a blessing to have a successful cycle to compare to this one.  It's great because the similarities between the 2 cycles are so reassuring, but then if something is different it freaks me out.  All we can do is wait for the voicemail tomorrow about how our embryos are growing, and then see what we have to work with on transfer day Sunday.  I am praying my 7 little embies grow big and strong and we have at least 3 or 4 to work with!

Third Ultrasound

So today I went for my third ultrasound!  I was actually scanned by the new NFC doctor, who was great!  He was very detailed, showed me where the needle would go to aspirate my follicles, told me my lining and follicle measurements, he was great!  He said it is normal for one ovary to work better than the other, and in my case my left ovary is the "work horse" of this cycle.  He then said he thought my follicles would need another couple of days worth of stimulation meds, and I probably wouldn't be able to trigger on Sunday.  So I was thinking my retrieval wouldn't be until maybe Wednesday or even Thursday!

Well, apparently Zoey and Piper were having none of that!! The doctor just called me and said my E2 was 2100 and after looking at my follicles, he sees that I will indeed be able to trigger Sunday night.  So, exactly like the girls cycle, I take my trigger shots Sunday at 9:45pm and will have my egg retrieval 8:45 Tuesday morning! 

I love having my 2 little cheerleaders guiding this cycle every step of the way.  I will update you after the egg retrieval :-)


                                 My ovaries right now.. except Gonal-F/Menopur.. not Clomid!

                                           
                                                             Current Mindset <3 <3

Ultrasound #2, signs from my girls

Remember when I said I wouldn't blog as much this cycle?  Well, I lied :-)

Today I had ultrasound #2.  It was the normal bloodwork to test estrogen levels and then ultrasound to measure follicle sizes.  After the ultrasound I met with Tina to do a med count and just talk.  She said she and Dr. Hill keep flipping back and comparing this cycle with our last cycle.  Everything is still weirdly similar.  I am on the exact same medication, my appointments are on the exact same days of the week, bloodwork numbers are almost identical.  This fact is so bittersweet to me.  On the one hand, its wonderful, because the girls' cycle went perfect.  Great quality embryos, both implanted, healthy.  I would have 2 beautiful baby girls if it wasn't for my stupid defective cervix.  On the other hand, the similarities are making me miss Zo and Pip so much.  It's not that I have forgotten them over the past 15 months, but I have compartmentalized and pushed my grief to the back of my mind.  But being back in cycle and reading over my posts from this time in their cycle, its bringing up so many memories and making me sad.  I hate that I didn't know about my incompetent cervix.  I hate that my body couldn't hold on just 8 or 10 more weeks for them.  I hate that I have to move on without them.  But then I like to think the fact that this cycle is so much like their cycle might be a little sign from them.  Like they are saying "look mom! you can do this.  Look how good you are doing!  You conceived us, now you can conceive our sibling the same way!" It makes my heart happy, and I like to think about a cute pregnancy announcement and newborn photos with Zoey and Piper's memory bears and their newborn baby brother or sister. 

Anyway, Tina called me and said my estrodial went up to a 900 which is wonderful.  She said Dr. Hill is very pleased with how this cycle is going.  We will go back on Saturday and again on Monday, when we will have a better idea of and egg retrieval date.  If Zoey and Piper have anything to do with it, it will be on Tuesday morning!

I like to think of Zoey and Piper saying this to me as they see me struggle with my emotions during this cycle.  Love my baby girls!!

Ultrasound #1

Today I went to my first ultrasound since starting stims this cycle!  I went by myself this time because I was going to go to work after, but school was cancelled for snow!! So, I had a day off :)

Tina called with the results and said she and Dr. Hill compared notes with this cycle and last (Zoey and Piper's cycle) and said everything looks "right on the money".. meaning everything is looking about the same.  My E2 today was 320 and I had bunches of little eggies growing!  I have to go back for my 2nd ultrasound Thursday, and again on Saturday.  If this cycle continues to go like the girls' cycle, I will probably have my egg retrieval on Tuesday morning, then transfer Sunday.  I feel like this is going so fast! 

If I have learned anything from our long journey thus far, it is to find humor in the madness.  Sorry to my first grade babies and to my work friends for my crazy mood swings!! :-)

 This is a legit problem...

Suppression Check

Hi everyone!
Boy, time sure does fly when you are doing IVF while working.  I have only done IVF when I am out of school for summer, so time seemed to draaaaag on.  But I had my suppression check on Tuesday, and here it is, Friday evening, and I am like AH! I forgot to blog!! SO, sorry friends!!

We went in for our suppression check on Tuesday to make sure my little ovaries are nice and settled, so we can SHOVE THEM FULL OF HORMONES AND GROW SO MANY EGGS THAT THEY ARE JUST ABOUT TO EXPLODE!!!! so.. we did our normal bloodwork and then went in for the ultrasound.  I was so excited because this was the FIRST time I would actually get to see my TAC!! I told the ultrasound tech about it and she said I was only the second patient EVER in the history of Nashville Fertility Center to have a TAC, so she was pretty excited to see it as well.  It basically just looked like a bright white line.  All I could think was, Praise God, that bright white line is going to stop me from ever losing another baby.  That bright white line is going to bring a baby into this world. That bright white line healed my broken body.  That bright white line could have saved my girls if circumstances were different.  That bright white line is going to save their brother or sister.  Needless to say I almost lost it right there on the table.  Of course the hormones didn't help any!! After seeing the TAC, the tech said I had lots of little micro follicles and everything looked great!

After the ultrasound, we met with our nurse, Tina.  Tina was with us for our cycle with the girls, and she was with us for our failed FET cycle, so we are pretty close to her.  She went over the medication (a mere formality, Lord knows I could take all this medicine with my eyes closed) and then she tentatively asked me how many embryos we were planning to transfer this time.  Honestly, I feel like we are stuck between a rock and a hard place.  Yes, I know my TAC can hold twins, but there are soo many other complications with twin pregnancies, AND I would have so many awful flashbacks, I would basically be terrified the entire  time.  I would not enjoy my pregnancy at all.  I know I would be so much more relaxed if we only transfer one.  But, we did just transfer one for our frozen transfer, and that was an epic fail.  It didn't even take.  So, There are pros and serious cons to both.  I told her I didn't know what to do.  So, she said if we have a perfect embryo, grade A, already hatching, extremely high probability of taking, then we would do one.  Anything less than perfect, we would transfer 2.  I feel comfortable with that.  So, we won't know how many embryos we will transfer until the actual transfer day!

After that difficult discussion, I had to have another trial embryo transfer, which sucked, as usual.  It feels like the worst period cramps you could ever have.  They basically insert a catheter and essentially "draw a map" of where they had to go left or right to navigate the catheter from the cervix into the uterus, so there is no guess work when they try to get in there with an actual embryo.  Everyone was nervous and did not know what to expect with the TAC in place.  Luckily, the catheter went in easily and with no problems! yay!

We got our new voicemail box (repeat customers: mailbox #5), then we went to go file our taxes and have a nice lunch.  When I finally called my mailbox, Tina said my E2 level was 32, so I am officially suppressed.  I start the big guns (Gonal-F and Menopur) tomorrow evening, then have ultrasounds Tuesday, Friday, and Monday.  Hopefully on Monday we will have an egg retrieval date!

I did not get a picture of my TAC, but I found someone else's picture of what mine looked like (obviously, mine is minus the baby... for now!!).  I love my bright white line!!!

And in honor of starting 3 more injections tomorrow...

Medicine during the Snowpocalypse

So I know I said I wouldn't blog about every little thing this time, but I feel like the medicine crisis of 2016 is blog worthy!

I ordered my medicine on Wednesday, 01/20.  I was so excited because our insurance lowered the price from about $2800 down to $350, which is out of this world amazing.  So the lady said she could ship them on Thursday and have them here by Friday, so I could begin Lupron on Monday.  Great!  Not great.. Because on Friday mother nature decided to give Tennessee the most snow it has seen in 30 years and shut down the entire state!  So I am freaking out because this medicine needs to be refrigerated or it will spoil and I will have to file a claim and order more medicine and go through insurance again and explain what happened and... all before Monday when I am supposed to start Lupron.  When I was able to reach someone at Fed Ex, she says "well, the Nashville office closed at 12 (it is 3pm) so you can try tomorrow."  Basically I am seeing my whole IVF cycle go down the tubes and am thinking I will have to start all over next month.

The next day, Saturday, I call again to see if they will possibly be able to deliver the package.  I explain the whole situation and in now so nice words explain how this is $3000 of medication, not a trinket from the QVC channel, and she reluctantly begins researching where my package is.  After 45 minutes, she tells me my package was left on the truck all night after everyone apparently abandoned ship after 3 snowflakes accumulated on the ground.  At least it was cold enough to prevent it from spoiling.  She said someone would call me when my package was taken off the truck and said they would refrigerate it for me.  3 hours later a Fed Ex worker called me to let me know the package was put in the refrigerator and would be delivered Monday morning.  At this point I am just praying it is delivered before 12pm, because if I take it later than that and then take another shot Tuesday morning, it will make me sick, due to being taken too close together.

So, I finally got my medicine today at 11:15!  I unpacked that box, stabbed myself with a lupron needle, put the rest of the medicine in my refrigerator,  and took a deep breath.  What a mess! Thankfully, I am still on schedule for my suppression check on Feb. 2nd and all is well with the world.

Here we have a picture of snowpocalypse 2016, and the box of medicine that took about 5 years off my life!!

 

IVF #3!

Hi everyone!  Wow, I feel like it has been forever since I have done an update.  Not much has been going on, we have just been waiting around for our new insurance to become effective (01/01/16) to begin a new cycle.  We officially started our IVF cycle last Sunday!  I doubt I will be so detailed with blogging this time around, just because I feel like it is exhausting and redundant for those that have been following since 2011.. BUT I will be posting the important stuff (egg retrieval, transfer, etc.)  Right now I am taking birth control and getting ready to start the lupron on 01/25.. then our suppression check will be on February 2nd (Happy birthday Will!! lol)  From there we will start stimulating and go for a ton of bloodwork and ultrasounds, and finally my egg retrieval is scheduled for the week of 02/15 (Happy Valentine's Day!)  I feel like I really skimmed over this huge process but, you all know this isn't my first rodeo.  I am just praying this time we get our living baby!! OH, and the best news ever is that I don't have to take those awful intramuscular progesterone shots this time!! My nurse said that because insurance covers meds, I can use a cream instead of the shots.  Will had to give me those terrible, awful, no good very bad (teacher moment) shots for like 13 weeks with the girls, so needless to say he is about as excited as I am about this.

Sidebar~ Thank you to EVERYONE who comments  their support on my blog!  I literally had NO idea people were even commenting until I went back and re-read my last post to see where I left off.  I was like "wait what? 4 comments?!"  Honestly, this is an outlet for me, I really just type whatever comes to my brain at the moment, post it, and go on with life.  I never go back and re-read so, I am sorry to anyone who has asked questions or showed love on my posts, I promise I am not ignoring you! I'm not a very good blogger, haha! I will try to do better from now on.


So, there you have it folks!! IVF- take 3!! Please please pray for us <3 <3