After the IVF

I have been feeling compelled lately, right or wrong, to share my ivf story with women who have no children. I have a few friends, past child-bearing years who for each of their own reasons (from too young hysterectomy to infertility to ?), have no children. They find out I am expecting and they are like most people, happy to hear my news. I guess what I am trying to say is (especially to those I know or suspect that infertility was an issue) to let them know it wasn't that easy for me to get pregnant. My DH feels that our ivf is our private business, but I want to let people know that IVF is OK, a wonderful thing that helped us! Perhaps I think that people who have children easily won't understand ivf (perhaps this is what my DH is wanting to protect us from) and so I choose to share thie with those who might need to hear it. The following is a story of why it can be helpful to let people know!

My reproductive endocrinologist was looking to build a new clinic and she found the perfect piece of land, near the hospital. Many people had tried to buy the land, including many of the up and coming physicians in our community (cardiologists), and other business people but she would not sell it. When my RE inquired, the owner, an elderly lady, asked what the land would be used for. Dr. RE replied that it was to be an infertility clinic offering many procedures include IVF. The owner told her that she, herself, had always wanted to have children of her own but could not conceive. She decided to sell my doctor the land for her clinic.

I passed the magic 1st trimester mark last week and started to let people know (and let my mom & mother in law spread the news). Some of my friends in my service club wanted me to put it in the monthly newsletter. I said I no, just let me stick out and people will know...I also said I was embarassed. I am not sure that was really the right word,; I am not really embarassed...I am proud and happy, but in my own little world. I actually meant "I had to go thru a lot to have this baby and I am still scared I might lose it so I don't want to make a big deal about and have to explain later." I keep telling people its so early and they laugh and say, no, you are not early. Personally I probably would have not announced it publically until the baby was coming out of me (ha, ha). I guess now I have to deal with letting the world into my world...its not really bad, just scary. I will never be able to take being pregnant for granted.

Most of the people who know I am pregnant (close loved ones) have been checking on me lately...lots of are you doing ok's. It is nice to have so many people concerned about my pregnancy/ health/ baby. I have been feeling pretty good for the most part, good appetite, sleeping ok, energy ok.

I think about how the ivf procedures were quite secret compared to now...only my husband, mom, and sister really knew the details of what was going on. I really felt lousy at times then and probably could have used more "are you ok's" but it may not have been enough especially when things weren't going well. And I didn't really feel like sharing much what was happening to me... I had to keep a "normal" face to the outside world and cry at home in the safe place of my husband's arms.

But even with the anguish of having to do things that might not work, I knew that whatever the outcome, I would know I tried everything I could. I knew I would survive either way.

We went to the OB's on Friday and had a speedy check. Fetal heart tones!!! Everything ok...follow-up in 1 month.

So I think the shorter the visit the better...it means things are going well.

A bit nauseated and moody today...cried at one part of "Miss Congeniality." Weird!

I was cleaning up a bit in dh's study and found one of his old Playboy magazines. I took a break and browsed a bit thru the magazine. All the women looked like Barbie dolls to me. Big boobs, tiny waist, shaved down there to almost nothing, big hair on their heads. With the exception of a few, almost no ass. I finished cleaning and went to clean up. After my shower, I looked at my body...seems like it is changing every day. Big boobs (I used to have small to medium), pouching, round belly (no waist), not shaved (itches), flat hair, rounder ass (I am Asian so I usually have a flat ass) and for some reason, my arms and legs look like sticks (maybe in proportion to the rest of my body. I decided I liked it just fine. My dh also likes it more every day as it becomes rounder and squishier. And this may be in my imagination, but it seems like when I go out, men seem to be turning to look at me like when I was in the bloom of my late teen years. Who knew? A pregnant body is a sexy body. (Maybe my recent absentmindedness is a result of enlarging mammaries....DUH)

They're baaaack!!! I have been floating along merrily, thinking the hormonal surges of the past were behind me. I had blamed it all on the ivf drugs/ PIO shots making me be one the of the biggest bitches in recent history. But, of course, they came back in rare form last night. My poor DH got in the firing line of my ire. It is amazing what my brain can dig up to gripe about. DH forgave me and said I was tired and just being "goofy." He is so nice to me. This morning I was tearful and feeling emotional also. What a rollercoaster. I know, I know, you told me so.

Just finished watching a program called "Inside (out): Cindy Margolis." It is a documentary of CM going thru IVF to have a 2nd child. She had 4 ivf's (last one with GIFT) to have her 1st child. I liked that they showed the shots, procedures, blood draws and her ever-changing hormones. Of course, she has a wonderful DH like most of us. She is also very rich, blonde, and has really big (fake) boobs, and has made her career on her beautiful body. I just had to cry whenever she cried, especially at the end. I know everyone is entitled to their privacy...I haven't told many people I did IVF, but I am glad some of the "celebrities" are telling their story. Those stories and the blogs/ BB's somehow bring me some comfort that I am not alone in all of this. It also reminds me that those "stars" like Celine Dion and Brooke Shields are human also.

With all the uncertainty that infertility treatment brings, I have struggled with being able to make committments. As a rule, I don't say "YES" to something unless I can really give my attention to it and give it my best. I hate doing something half-assed and without my full attention. As a result of this and other reasons, I am often asked to be a part of this or that in my community and in the organizations I am a member of. Even thinking about a vacation a few months ahead for the last 2 years has been hard because of the scheduling and possible outcomes of infertility procedures. Can't get those non-refundable cruise tickets, might be in the middle of a cycle then. Can't promise to be vice-president of the club as I might miss some meetings because of treatment/ bedrest. Can't go to Girl Scout camp as there is no refrigeration for my meds there in the wilderness. We did take a break this last summer to do a lot of traveling, which we definately needed. I guess I can say it makes the sacrifices you make for children/ family start just a bit earlier than expected.

As I have progressed along, now into the 10th week of BFP, I have discovered the many odd superhero powers that have developed. I have not figured out why each exists, although I assume they are protective of my offspring. My "What to Expect" book doesn't explain much about these superpowers.

1. Smell-o-matic: I can smell everything, anything, and even from 1-2 rooms away. I smell every molecule of sweat on my husband's shirts after work (one of his best qualities is excellent hygiene and lack of body odor), the horrible stench of my cat's poo from the litter box 2 rooms away (sometimes he is lazy in covering it completely up), food microwave smells from the breakroom down the hall at work (frickin' hot pockets), and of course the assault of perfumes/ colognes on people I encounter during the day.

2. Bodacious belly pants styling: Somehow, every pair of pants I can fit into automatically adjusts into bikini/ low rider status onto my body. Even with the mom style higher waisted pants, they manage to slide out and under. I feel like those men with beer bellies that wear all their jeans/ pants on their hips. I am a bit worried my pants will slide off as I am not that hippy, but somehow my butt seems to be growing.

3. Food aversions: I either really, really like something or really, really hate it, like can't eat more than 1-2 bites of it...this is really not like me at all. So far, Blobby really likes: McDonald's french fries, mashed potatoes, low-sodium V-8 juice, rice, milk (whole only), vanilla ice cream Cheerios, cheeseburgers. He/she hates (i.e. heartburn): spaghetti with tomato sauce, curry, sharp cheese, ground turkey, green beans, grilled chicken breast with lemon, and toast. I wonder if this will correlate with my child's future eating habits.

This month's issue of Good Housekeeping (which I think is kind of a stodgy title, but I still enjoy the magazine) has two seperate stories in it that mention IVF and infertility. One is about a lady who had ivf (husband had vasectomy) and a subsequent miscarriage and found out that it happened because of a genetic disease. They were able to use PGD to have a healthy baby. The other article is about real life women weight loss stories (I think every issue has an article like this one!) One lady gained a lot of weight during infertility treatments and made a committment to lose weight after her baby was born. For me it was nice to see the media acknowledge infertility and ivf as real and not so weird...that their readers' would be interested in knowing more about women who go thru this.

After all the scurry and hurry of the iui/ivf/etc. treatments, now my days and weeks are filled with pauses. These pauses consist of time periods that I remember that I am pregnant now (NOTICE I am using the P word). I pull out my "What to Expect" and "It could happen to you" books and ruminate an hour or two here and there. There are also pauses in between doctor visits and those seem especially long to me. After going every other day for 3 weeks to my RE, I last saw my OB about 2 weeks ago...sounds short, but seems long to me. I will not see him for another 2 weeks. I know at this point, if I had a fetal doppler I could listen in on Blobby's heartbeat...but alas, my best friend (an OB) is out of town. Another pause is to contemplate the daycare/ nanny/ work rearranging combinations/ permutations that will be possible for our family. And sometimes in the middle of all of this, I pause to think about how wonderful it is that ivf worked for me.

Every few years, there are cautionary articles published about how women wait too late to have babies because of careers and how doomed they are. These articles have their good points in that fertility does truly change as women age and may be a wake up call for those few of us who were truly in the dark about having kids. But, I suspect, for the rest of us, it is just adds to our insecurity about being a woman. The articles usually never really explain truly in detail why all this late age childbearing is happening, only, at worst, seeming to imply that women who wait to have children are selfish and foolish.

I want to write a different, more detailed view of why all this is an issue now, with FACTS, not just opinion.

1. Women make up the majority of college students in the U.S. now.
2. In medical school and law school, it is at least 50/50 in most schools in the gender ratio.
3. Most employers do not have paid maternity leave and even those who are unpaid, 6 weeks is the best most get. FMLA provides for 12 weeks unpaid leave, but many of us work in small businesses that don't have to abide by FMLA.
4. Daycare is usually not available at one's place of work. Sick daycare is even rarer.
5. Average age of marriage for both women and men have risen in the last 30 years, now being 26 for women and 28 for men.
6. Reliable, affordable birth control is available to let women choose when they will have kids.
7. Nearly two-thirds of women in the United States with a child under age one are in the paid labor force.

So let's put this into a few scenarios

Sally A. enters college at 18, law school at 23, clerks for a BIG firm for 3-4 years until she quits, moves up, or gets fired. She's had reliable birth control, a few boyfriends, even a fiancee who has just proposed. She marries at age 28 (takes a year to plan a wedding). Because of a downturn in the economy, she must continue working full time as her husband is a low income documentary film maker. At 30, they decide to start having kids.

Amanda P. is a brillant scientist who graduates from college at 23, enters a prestigious PhD program and takes 6 years to finish as her Professor/ mentor decides to relocate in the middle of her project and she must move to Chicago to finish her degree. She takes a post-doc position with the US government, moving to Maryland. At 30, she takes a job at a Southern college, the 1st woman in her department in the history of the university. The next 3 years are spent writing grants and securing funding as well as building up her department and projects. In her spare time, she is active in her church. She meets her husband there and they marry, she is 33.

Melody M. is a 24 year old nurse who is the indispensible right hand of Dr. H. She is married to her high school sweetheart and they decide to have a child. She requests a maternity leave of 6 weeks. At 2 weeks in, her boss calls her and asks her to hurry up and get back to work as the place is falling apart. She compromises and says she will be there at 4 weeks. With her next child, she leaves her job and does not return until 7 years later when her children are in full day school.

I know there are no easy answers, but I think people need to stop fooling themselves that women are bad because they aren't all child bearing in their 20s. It is not because women are selfish, but that they are not really in a system that supports early child bearing. I don't really want to go back to the old "1950s" system where only men got to have interesting careers and the perks of a stay at home wife, but you can't expect to have a 1950s life in the year 2005. I say, live in the present and find compromises/ solutions to help people have work and life balanced.

My Ob called this AM and said the glucose tolerance test looked fine to him. I guess I am a bit too pessimistic about all this getting pregnant and being pregnant stuff. So I passed my test and can eat normally. I am still going to watch my carbs and not OD on the sugar/ refined carbs. I just can't wait until he clears me to exercise again (really miss the regular walking).

Perhaps my test anxiety stems from too many years of testing and schooling. But all along, even in my pessimism, my thoughts on my fetus (Blobby) were that he/she was doing just fine....I want to be optimistic for my child.

I am currently in the middle of a 3 hour glucose tolerance test and am currently flunking it. Normally, a pregnant woman wouldn't be doing this until about 20-25 weeks, but of course, I am special. So special. I was worried about this and actually dreamed about going to Las Vegas and being served a large dessert buffet...cheese cake, chocolate pie, cakes, etc. I like sweets even though I am always an "in moderation" person. I like to think in spite of all the goofy problems my body has that my baby is growing and healthy...he/she always looks so good on the ultrasounds. So now I have another diagnosis to add to my list.

1. Gestational Diabetes
2. Polycystic Ovarian Disease
3. Hashimoto's Thyroiditis

At least I am not like my sister-in-law who can't eat gluten (wheat) or my sister (lactose intolerant/ Irritible Bowel Syndrome).

I had my 1st official "normal pregnancy" OB visit last Thursday. My doc is very nice and nurturing and he did another ultrasound (for my benefit really) and gushed over how beautiful it looked. I did see the heartbeat clearly and the limb buds...totally cute. The only goofy thing was that I had 3+ glucose in my urine and had to take home a bottle of Glucola to do a 1 hour glucose tolerance test on myself. I know, its early, but I had a feeling this might happen as I have PCOS. Of course, I failed the test (twice) and will have to do the 3 hour OGTT. Yay. I knew I shouldn't have had 2 waffles, syrup, pineapple, and the big glass of Hawaiian punch before my doctor's visit (but I was so hungry!) Now I am really trying to be careful...more whole grains, less refined sugar.