Saturday, June 14, 2008

Today I took a test. It was early and the result was barely visible, but I swear I saw a line. After a few minutes – still in the bathroom – of careful consideration of the line, I carefully picked through the bathroom trash, where I’d thrown away the test I had taken yesterday. Yesterday I saw nothing. Very visibly nothing. Today, 24 hours later, there was a line. Two vertical lines; one on each test; two positives. It’s 6 am and I wake up Jeff. “I think I’m pregnant.” He smiles. For Jeff, at 6 am, that’s a very good thing.

We’ve had a rough go of things in this department. If the line tells me what I think it does, this will be my third pregnancy. The first two ended quickly although they did drag on. I’ve never seen a heartbeat. All I am thinking about now is a heartbeat.

My first pregnancy was technically over around 6 weeks. At 8 weeks I still hadn’t taken care of things naturally so we had to go to the hospital to end things. With some complications I ended up having to back eight weeks later for another procedure. I like to think Jeff and I handle all of life’s bumps with grace. We’re pretty laid back people – not easily upset. The stress and drama of all this took a toll and we decided to take a break from it all.

About a year later we were ready to give it another go. Once again we got pregnant very fast. Given my history, my doctor got me in for a blood test that week and saw my hormones weren’t at the right levels. I have the most wonderful, compassionate doctor in the world and she tried to let me down easy. Within just a few days I had started a new cycle. It was still tough though. What’s wrong with me? Actually those were my mother’s first words to me, “What’s wrong with you?” Nice Mom! My doctor said we could keep trying or we could go ahead and have things checked out. The very practical side of us led us to see an infertility specialist.

I’ve had a few friends see this doctor and my regular OB/GYN went to school with her as well, so she came highly recommended, personally and professionally. In one month we went through a whole series of tests – both me and Jeff. Jeff had no issues. In fact he was told his swimmers were “excellent.” It was my pool. Lots of minor things seemed to be going on; and lots of things that seemed borderline, although maybe not totally bad/wrong. But all this was good to know before we tried again and again.

Some of my issues:

• MTHFR mutation – about 10% of the world’s population has this mutation; it stands for methylene-tetrahydrofolate-reductase.
• Elevated homocysteine levels – this is caused by a deficiency in folic acid and is related a bit to the MTHFR mutation.
• Blood clotting – apparently I tend to easily clot; so I am taking a aspirin every day now and will eventually have to go on a blood thinning shot once I’m pregnant.
• Progesterone – my progesterone count was borderline low so I am supplementing progesterone

So, I started quite the prescription cocktail. In the morning I take two different folic acid supplements. Before bed I take a prenatal multivitamin (2 pills), another folic acid pill, an aspirin, and a progesterone suppository. That’s seven pills a day. Fun stuff. With the new strategy in place the infertility doctor gave us the green light to try again. In usual form for Jeff and me, I saw that faint little line within two months. Now, we wait for the heartbeat.