Our Story

Good morning guys and gals! I know I've shared our story in bits and pieces but I wanted to share our beginning to our end. I shared a good chunk of this story at It's Positive this week, but I wanted to make sure my readers, friends, and family were all aware of our life the past two years.

 

Life Before Our Diagnosis

April 26, 2014 was the best day of my life. It was the day I vowed to spend forever with my husband Mike. We both come from divorced parents (mine were separated when I was two) and we knew that divorce would never be an option for us. We spent our wedding day surrounded by our friends and family rejoicing in all that God had given to us. After years and years of seeking male approval, it was amazing to see God answer my prayer for a husband who was also pursuing God.

April 26, 2014 also marks the day we started trying to conceive a baby. At this point, my periods were inconsistent, but my physician told me not to worry about it because it probably was due to stress from the wedding. She also told me that once we were married I would start having normal cycles again. She couldn’t have been more wrong.

By August 2014, I had only had one period and I was still worried. This time when I went to the doctor to ask about what could be wrong, she said, “Oh sometimes these things take longer to adjust themselves back to normal.”I’m just going to pause here for a moment and say this: If you feel something is wrong with your body, seek a second opinion. If I had, maybe things would have progressed a bit faster in my story.

All the while, Mike and I were adjusting to married life pretty well and things were great. He moved down to my home town, we both got new jobs, found an apartment, started attending our amazing church as a married couple, and I became more active on the worship team. At this point, I wasn’t praying to be pregnant. I wasn’t praying for answers. I wasn’t actively trying anything. I was just hoping it would kind of happen on its own. It had only been a few months, so I didn’t need to see an OB/GYN.

January 2015 came around and I had only had 3 cycles since getting married. I knew now something was wrong, so I made my first OB/GYN appointment. At first, I loved my OB/GYN. She asked me far more questions than my physician asked. She seemed to care that first day. After asking
about my cycles and history, she said once I started my next cycle we would do day 3 lab work to see if I could be diagnosed with anything. I wouldn’t have those labs done for 3 more months.

Diagnosis

On April 6, 2015 (also my husband’s birthday) I received a call from the doctor. “PCOS.” I was at rehearsal for a play when I got the call, and I really didn’t hear much after she said PCOS. I had no idea what it meant — both what the abbreviation meant and what it would mean for us going forward. The doctor told me to call her when I started my next cycle and we would start my first round of Clomid (an ovulation-inducing drug).

This was where I started to panic. I started to freak out. Why are women getting pregnant all the time, and yet here I am almost a year into trying and just getting a diagnosis to why I couldn’t be one of those women. I realized then that I needed to turn my focus toward God and not myself. I had started a blog but wasn’t using it very much, but I realized at that point that I needed to start using it as an outlet to keep myself leveled.

The past year (April 2015-2016) has been so hard on me, and yet I have never felt closer to the Lord. Six failed rounds of Clomid really does something to a woman psychologically. Each month I would think, “Yep, this is it. I ovulated, we did it, I’m going to be pregnant.” And like clockwork every month, I would take between 3 and 7 pregnancy tests — all negative. “Maybe I won’t get a positive until later after my missed period. Nope, here’s Aunt Flo, Amanda. Start again.” After my 4th failed round, I needed a break. The hot flashes, the emotions, the hormones, the tiredness — it was all catching up to me and I just couldn’t do another round. We took a cycle break (which lasted 3 months) only to do 2 more rounds of Clomid in January and February, which both failed.

Where Are We Now?

On March 21st, Mike and I went to IVFNE for our first meeting with a specialist. We sat and went over previous test results, discussed medical history for both of us, what we had done for the past 2 years of TTC, and things started looking up. We left the appointment thinking "Wow, this woman actually cares about us getting pregnant. She wants to see this happen!" We left the meeting knowing we were going on vacation a few weeks later. Once we came back from Disney I would go in for blood work and an ultra sound to confirm that I hadn't ovulated and wasn't pregnant, and then would start back on Provera to get things started again.

Well, this week (or course, on our 2 year wedding anniversary) Day 1 came, I did Day 3 blood work (10 vials I might add) and an ultra sound. Today the nurse called and said everything looked normal except my thyroid levels are at a 2.7 which isn't normally high, but she would like them at 2.5 so they'll retest me next week when I go in for a SHG.

So that's our story. Two years of trying, 13 cycles in that time (note: there should have been 24-26 if I was normal), no babies, lots of heart ache, but a lot of love. In a situation where Satan could have ripped us apart and made us resent each other, we sought God and he pulled us closer than I thought was imaginable, and I trust he will continue to keep us growing closer to each other.

May we continue to seek after God and follow his lead as we try to navigate through life.

Amanda