Pregnancy after infertility...

After 4 years and putting my reproductive system through WWIII my uterus finally surrendered and conceived. OMG YAY!!!! Right? Wrong... They forget to mention after years of infertility and seeing negative home pregnancy test after negative home pregnancy test how I am supposed to feel when it finally happens. Am I happy? Yes! Am I scared? Yes! Am I petrified? Hell Yes!

I believe that most hardcore infertiles are informed infertiles. We knew what we were getting into when we started this: nightly shots, fun suppositories, blood work and that wonderful wand-like probe to explore our nether regions... We all dreamed of the day when we would finally get the good news YOU'RE PREGNANT. Notice I said dreamed because for some of us we never believed it would happen. Not that we didn't hope like hell it would, but after all we've been through how could it possibly work? So when it finally does we just wait for the other shoe to drop. So it feels like every day is a hurdle. Nothing is normal about an infertile's pregnancy from day one. We don't even get to think of cutesy ways to tell our significant other because THEY KNOW when your beta is and THEY KNOW if you are going to use a home pregnancy test. Some *might* be able to surprise their hubbies if they go to work before you wake up to take a home pregnancy test, but not me... I had the perfect opportunity, but I was too impatient to wait to see if the test was actually positive. It darn well looked negative to me. DH found it hours later barely positive, but it was there. So in this case he knew before me. Isn't that just ironic? Here I am carrying this child and I have no idea I'm even pregnant. But I digress...

So the first hurdle is your first beta which tell you pretty much nothing other than the fact that you are pregnant. The second beta is what you really are looking for. So here you are freaking out wondering if the number doubled in the allotted amount of time. The number comes back and phew! Another hurdle down! Then comes the first ultrasound. My doctor is a bit anal about it and wants one at 5 weeks instead of the normal 6 weeks. I'm totally okay with that. I needed a little reaffirmation that I was pregnant. Got to see the sac... another hurdle down. The next hurdle I am still working on... the heartbeat! It's not game on until you get to see that tiny flicker of light. Once you see the heartbeat over 100 your chances for miscarriage go down to about 10%... wahooo! Another hurdle! Then it's making it to your 13th week of pregnancy or your second trimester. Once you make it out of the first trimester your chances for miscarriage drop even more. Keep us readers we are doing marathon hurdles not a sprint! There's another whole trimester to make it to without any gross chromosomal abnormalities and for us IVFers the increased risk for preterm labor.... So you can see why the next 8 months for me is terrifying.

I think we informed infertiles would give anything to have a completely stress free pregnancy. Ignorance of the dangers is bliss. Infertility is almost like surviving a war. It never leaves you even in times of peace and prosperity. It's always there lurking in the back of your mind. You can quite relate to those who haven't been through it. You can't join in on the pregnancy gripe sessions because this is something you wanted worse than anything and it almost seems sacrilegious to complain about horrible morning sickness. Then after the baby is born it's hard to join in the conversation of "Oh when will you start trying for another one?" 18 months, 2 years, oh... yeah When the magical fairies come and leave us $10,000? Some women will conceive naturally after an IVF childbirth. Generally it's those who have unexplained infertility, but they are few and far between. So either you go through another IVF or your first child becomes an only child (unless you adopt, but if you have that kind of money most people will opt to try IVF again because "it worked once").

So I'm done ranting... think it the hormones. 3 days until we jump another hurdle and 241 days until the marathon is over (hopefully).