Melissa i
Strong

Sisyphus was condemned to move a stone up a hill repeatedly.  Today, I chose a similar fate for myself as I picked up as many logs as my fragile self would allow from the pile of wood in the front yard.  I walked the logs 10 to 25 feet, stacking them into a wall.   This wall of wood took eight hours to construct as I slowly and methodically moved each log.   Not sitting idle was my goal, and this task was the solution.  My knee, still swollen and not recovered from my ACL replacement surgery, kept me from moving fast, but what was the hurry?  All I had to do was wait.  Wait for a phone call that would tell me if my surgery that morning could possibly result in us having a baby.

 

For a few years, we have explored the possibility of having a child through in vitro fertilization.  I had no idea the road to one trial of in vitro would take about a year, but for us, it did.  It started with tests, medication, and hope.  Then we kept getting delayed – apparently, you cannot have your cycle over the holidays because for about 10 days prior to egg retrieval surgery, you have to go to the doctor's office every day for labs and ultrasound, and being that they are closed a few days another month was pushed off.  Then, my body did not react well to the birth control cycle—before the 10 days of injections prior to the egg retrieval, they gave me birth control pills that resulted in temporary cysts that would only hurt our chances.  Then, obviously, while I was facing ACL surgery and recovery, a few more months went by.

 

Finally, our time had come.  I was excited about the possible outcome but not the journey.  One of my nurses explained to me that this process was natural because I was going to inject hormones my body naturally produces.  This was a nice attempt to ease my mind, but in no way was this process natural.  When the FedEx man arrived with a large box of medication that cost about $7500, it was one of my first freak-outs.  This exorbitant price was only a tiny bit of the cost, which, of course, added stress.  But the fact that I had to take the entire content of that box and inject it into myself over a 10 -13 day period was extremely traumatic for me.

 

Somehow, when the time came, I accepted what I was calling hell week with grace. I blundered the first injection badly and used the gigantic mixing needle to inject myself instead of the smaller injection needle.  Mixing the medication and then pinching the skin to inject while watching the video, I just wanted it over.  As one video rolled into the other, I missed the part about switching the needle.  When I picked up the video again, it said to put the entire needle into your abdomen— and inject subcutaneously.  I felt the muscle wall, and the needle was still not in, so I aimed it sideways, trying to get it all in; then I started to panic and plunged the contents in, leaving a burning lump of fluid between my skin and muscle.  I screamed, and tears welled into my eyes—how on earth could I do this 3-4 times a day for the next week or more, I thought.  I was relieved when I realized my mistake, and the injections got easier.

 

Each morning, I woke early, injected and got in the car, and drove from 3 hours to 4 and a half hours round trip depending on the day and what office was open.  I did this for 10 days.  Each day, I got an update on my follicle growth—not enough at first, but then I got what they needed to do the egg extraction. We waited, and they saw more growth.  I had 7-8 mature follicles, and the time had come for the trigger shot and then surgery.  I did very well emotionally despite the severe hormone manipulation.  With this many follicles, I went in with a lot of hope, but I am not sure what happened.  I feel like they waited a day too long, and when I woke up, they told me they only got two eggs.  Two is better than none, I consoled myself.

 

Four hours had passed as the log wall grew larger and the woodpile receded, and then the phone call came—one egg fertilized.   One is better than none, I thought, but I knew the chance of a successful transfer with just one was a long shot.

 

I asked the universe to make it stop now if this was the case.  If it wasn't going to transfer, if I was going to lose it after a transfer—just please, let's stop now.  We had 5-6 days to wait to see if the fertilized egg made it to the blastocyst stage.  Each day, I tried not to focus on our lonely little egg struggling and continued to move wood.  The great wall of wood was now growing into a second row, and I tried to live normally.   I got updates that the egg was still growing, and so much hope grew in my heart.  Then, on day six, the phone rang.  Adam was home for lunch, and I was just finishing up some physical therapy for my knee and rolling out a mat to do an ab workout.  I could hear it in her voice before she said anything of importance--the empathy was audible.  The egg did not mature; the blastocyst stage was never achieved.  Adam could tell by my reaction.  I tried to choke the tears back when I ended the call.  He hugged me and told me he would see me through another round if I wanted.  He assured me he loved me and we would be just fine.  I accepted his love and told him I guessed I had better do my ab workout and to please get online and buy tickets to Australia.  If we weren't going to have a kid, I wanted to continue living like a parentless couple, and jetting off to an adventure far away was the best consolation I could think of.

 

And it helped. I am sitting in our rented cabin in the Grampians, Australia, wiping the tears away as I type this, but I am happy.  I know how to live this life.  It is a life I have lived for a while now it is a life without children but a life filled with love and happiness.  Obviously, if I have come this far without children, I have never been chomping at the bit to have them.  I have never been the person to just love babies or kids in general so we waited.  Maybe a bit too long if we wanted the opposite to happen.  Despite not having a natural in general love for kids, my regrets will be with me, not having anyone to pass my love and memories along to, not seeing Adam's eyes light up, seeing the baby we made, and there are many more.  But I have to put my faith in the fact that I believe this is the universe's way of taking care of me and protecting us from something that could have been horrible and traumatic.  I have my "kids," and plenty of people I care for, and I will continue to do so.  Now it is time to live life happily and move on with my regrets, knowing I tried.   And yes, there could be a second round of in vitro, but (it is funny how this worked out) when we first started trying, I said I would not turn to science.  Then, when I did, I said I would give it only one chance, and for now, I am sticking with that.