Twisted Ovaries

The Crappiest Club Ever

I had another acupuncture treatment yesterday.  I kind of like them, because they really want to know the details of bodily fluids.  Mucus?  Let's describe the consistency.  Bloating?  Let's examine.  Blood clots?  Squealy delight of all the gory detail.  It's like being in biology class and being allowed to actually discuss how a blow job hitting a gag reflex makes your sphincter tighten, or English class, where you have a teacher that throws Silas Marner across the room with a thud and sighs, conceding that it really is one of the most boring books written, ever. 

I tell her about the period I just had, aka "The Hemorrhage-Soon to Be a Major Motion Picture Starring Sarah Michelle Gellar".  It only lasted for three days but was so forceful it was like hooking a fire hose to my snatch and putting out a block of council flat fires.  The cramps on day one had me heaving over a toilet they hurt so badly.  But hey-three days.  Not bad. 

And it was virtually clot-free, which is unusual for me-I usually look like I've dropped a toilet bowl full of M&Ms the first three days, so clotty am I (hope you don't have a high squick factor, as I'm going all out on this one.)  The acupuncturist says that's the work of the acupuncture-the design is to maximize blood flow to the uterus-the treatment should prevent clotting in general. 

So slap my face and call me a convert, because it worked.

I tell her about the concrete uterus I had, and how actually, post period, it still feels like that.  She nods sympathetically (she is very sympathetic, which is great.  She also has no issues talking about bodily fluids, which makes her my most favorite acupuncturist in the world.)  She tells me that it's a side effect of miscarriage, and I may feel that way for a while.

Excellent.

Which brings me to my Crappiest Club Ever. 

Miscarriage is something that affects many, many women.  Too many, sadly.  There are Grief Forums, there are books, and there is, of course, the best helper ever-alcohol.  But what there seems to be is a lack of information.  This blog gets a lot of hits from women Googling about miscarriage, and it seems to me that we women?  We just don't have all the answers about what the hell is happening from a physical perspective. Miscarriage is the dirty little secret, that thing you whisper about in the hallways.

So lemme correct something:

MISCARRIAGE HAPPENS AND IT FUCKING SUCKS, SO DEAL WITH US AND EXPLAIN WHAT MAY HAPPEN TO OUR BODIES.

Yes, we bleed.

Yes, we cramp.

Yes, we have big blood clots, the size of which make us wail as we understand what's happening.

You know what else we can have?  Concrete uteruses (is that uteri?  I never know.)  We get really, really hormonal-mine came up in the form of severe almost PMS-like bitchiness.  What comes out of us, well...truthfully, it doesn't smell very nice.  We can have headaches and are really tired.  The bleeding is composed of absolutely incredible quantities.  Some pregnancy symptoms may continue-I still threw up a lot, but the breast tenderness went away, as did the smell/food aversions.  We may have some or all of these symptoms...but no one tells you.

A lot of that goes away with the first period (which can take 6-8 weeks to arrive), but as has now been explained to me, the body sometimes needs two cycles to get over itself.

And that's just the physical stuff. 

Emotionally you're a fucking basket case.

I couldn't watch anything with pregnancy, babies, or fertility.  I still can't read blogs of people that are knocked up.  I watched mindless TV.  I watched films I knew were safe (note to infertiles who are not knocked up and are bitter about it: Children of Men is a good film to watch.  It's about a future where people can't get pregnant.  It'll feel like old hat to you.  I could've watched that fucking film over and over again, I was all: Thank God, a film where there is only one baby, and it's a metaphor.  And when the woman had the baby?  It was animatronic. Yessssssss.)  You may cry.  A lot.  You may drink.  A lot.  You will most likely rage about how unfair it is.  A lot.

It's the Crappiest Club Ever.  I thought about starting a web page, a forum for women.  You have IVF Connections, how about Crappiest Club Ever connections, where you'd never tell another woman, "I'm so sorry.  But hey-children are exhausting!  Want one of mine?"  Where the support would come in the form of lots of swearing, and more than a little: "I'm here-want to talk?" in the middle of the night, when the nightmares are too much for you and you just can't bear the idea of "why?" anymore.

Not sure, maybe I will.  It occurs to me that a miscarriage is a time when a woman needs support the most.  Then again, we all grieve differently.

For me, it was good to know that one more period is maybe what I'll need to get rid of my hard uterus.  Still on track for kicking off the next cycle in January.  I am still feeling positive about the cycle, too.

I am an idiot, of course.

The End of the Beginning

The bleeding is (finally) nearly done.

It's true that my breasts went down in size overnight, but the hcg still wrecked havoc on me for several days, meaning that I was still nauseaous.  That too has now passed. 

I had the classical symptoms of pregnancy-heightened sense of smell, nausea, exhaustion, night sweats, larger breasts, and the frequent need to pee (due to the kidneys working overtime, not due to heavy baby on bladder).

I have just had all of the classic signs of miscarriage-fading pregnancy symptoms, bleeding and/or passing of tissue or blood clots, and period-like cramps.

There are other side effects of miscarriage that they don't talk about.  Your face breaks out, and it does it badly.  I had more spots on my chin that I did in my entire teenage life. 

The bleeding isn't just "a little bit of blood"-I bled and bled and bled.  Blood clots and tissue came out at various times and here's something they also don't tell you-it doesn't smell good.  You get the indignation of not only bleeding out that "perfect lining" you worked so hard to build up, but you are also a walking personal disgrace.  I'm a neat freak and I wasn't remotely happy that the stuff coming out didn't smell nice (a common side effect, my RE said.  Funny how no web pages talk about that.)

The cramps, too, aren't period cramps.  I'm a tough chick when it comes to pain (but I often have bad period cramps severe enough to send me running for the hardcore ibuprofen).  These cramps beat those cramps without question-the only time I've ever felt worse than what I just had was on my very first IVF cycle, I had what was recently diagnosed a mild case of OHSS.  Then, even walking was an agony worthy of screaming crying jags.  The miscarriage cramps were not the blue ribbon winner of cramps but came second worst in history, equivalent to the cramps I had after egg retrieval this last time, where they gave me pethidine.  One week ago today I was still potentially viably pregnant, so all I could take was paracetamol and curl up and breathe through my mouth as each cramp came and went.

The bleeding was constant but, for the first time in my life, managed with regular or lite tampons.  My insides though are so incredibly sore that often I resorted to pads because I simply couldn't bear the agony of the tampon applicator.

In short, this has been the worst experience of my life so far.

I read other blogs where the bloggers can't wait to finish miscarrying so they can get started on their next cycle.  I can't wait to finish simply because I want the symptoms to all go away.  My next cycle is (period dependent) end of the year-the RE wants me to have two periods and I think that's imminently sensible, too.  I need time to not only recover but to emotionally prepare myself, but my next cycle feels so fucking far away.

I also know other bloggers seem to have a great sense of humor about miscarrying, but I'm struggling with it. 

Tuesday on that horrible drive home, Aidan asked me what I wanted.  I sat there and thought before replying:  "I want unpasteurized cheese.  With a side of uncooked shellfish."

He looked over at me.  "Undercooked eggs on the side?"

"Yes please.  And some pt."

We laughed.  And then I cried.  And when he went to the shops to get food, I had-for the first time in a month-written down something I wanted. 

He bought me chocolate chip cookies.

He did not bring home the other thing I had on the list-"Mind Altering Drugs". 

Friday we broke open the champagne and celebrated the end of the worst week of our lives, and the end of August 2006-a month of startling highs and stunning lows.

The truth is, I do feel pretty positive about cycling again.  While I'd hate to hear it from others, the good news is that I am indeed able to get pregnant and stay pregnant-true, we miscarried but the RE said it's most likely I miscarried because there was something genetically wrong with the child, not because I'd done something wrong and not because my body couldn't manage it (the u/s where we saw the one embryo also looked good, so I feel reasonably ok about that.)

What I do worry about is the 2ww + 2 weeks before scan next time.  I have a feeling I'm going to be supremely worried. 

I don't ever want to feel like this again.

I suppose what gets me most of all is the fact that everything I dreamt came true.  I dreamt of positive pregnancy tests and I got them.  I dreamt of one implanting and I got that too.  Then I dreamt of a toilet bowl full of blood-a toilet in a public place I had never seen before-and a week later I got that, too.  It was exactly as I had seen it in my dream, and when I saw it I freaked out in the hospital and started sobbing and shaking.

Everyone looked at me like I was crazy.

And then two nights ago I dreamt I took a pregnancy test.  It was one I hadn't seen before, it was some kind of test that showed a "+" in a window, and the + comes up in pink?  Rings any bells, or just my imagination?  Anyway, the + has one line that's a control line, and the other part of the +, if it appears, means a positive result (is this a real test or should I up my dosage?).  In my dream, the line was faint but it was there-there was a positive pregnancy.

Maybe it'll happen, maybe it won't. 

I still cry a lot, but at least I am trying to look forward-but most IF and pregnancy sites are far too hard to deal with and at least one blogger has been stricken off, so don't be angry if I'm not around for a while. 

It's called, ironically, baby steps.

-PS-I am trying to move my site.  I have a new domain set up but it's not ready yet.  When it's moved, it will be here.

Thursday

So I've had what's called a complete miscarriage-that means no medical intervention needed, the body is taking care of itself.  I'm still bleeding and will continue for about another week, then all should be ok.  The good news is I get to wear tampons now.

The bad news is I'm no longer pregnant.

I think I maybe suspected that when, late Sunday night, I had a blood clot the size of my palm come out.  Whether that was the end of the embryo or I had passed it much earlier I don't know, all I know is that our hopes and dreams for IVF #4/2 are now property of Southeast Water. 

I still have pregnancy symptoms, which both pisses me off and depresses me horribly.  I'm waiting for the hcg to work its way out of my system. 

I rang the fertility clinic and talked to them about another egg share cycle.  They said that I would need to wait minimum until my next period before treatment, but they prefer that two natural periods have passed as it improves the success rate and reduces my chances of another miscarriage.  A period post-miscarriage can take anywhere from 6-8 weeks to pop up.

So we have a long wait.

We have also agreed to not have any part of waiting-2ww or the 2 weeks after that, should it have worked-during a bank holiday.  On IVF #1 I was pregnant (for a period of days only) but lost out over the Christmas break.  On this cycle we lost out over the August Bank Holiday. 

From here on, from implantation on, we've agreed that there will be no bank holidays in between.

We have also been taken on the egg share cycle again-they're looking to match us up to someone who once again will get half my stock of eggs.  The plan is to have a few months now of periods, travelling, and managing to get through.  I will begin down-regulation over Christmas, with stimming and retrieval in January.  Although this likely interferes with/postpones the big away February holiday we usually take with his kids, we thought that this would give us something to look forward to in the new year. 

We need something to look forward to in the new year.

I can't read most other blogs right now, I just can't face it.  So if you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant, I am silently rooting for you but I can't handle it just now (and if you're an IF'er, I think and hope you understand).  For the two others that also miscarried the same time I did, I'll be around. 

I cry a lot.

Sometimes I sit there and think: I've forgotten something, I'm missing something.  What is it?

Then I remember.

I apologize for not being funny. 

Mostly, I apologize for not being.

Results

Complete Miscarriage.

We've lost the baby.