Biopsy

Doesn't that sound fun? I feel so sorry for D. It seems like the theme song for his life this last month has been the line from "Tick Tock"... "Boys trying to touch my junk, junk." He gets a kick out of singing that line over and over. I think he's dealing with all of this through his humor. After hearing about the next appointment though, he did get pretty down. He's just tired of having to go through all of the procedures.

As for the appointment, his blood work and the ultrasound came back fine. His second SA came back with the same results as the first... zero. He's being referred to a fertility specialist who will biopsy his "down-there's", looking for two things: blockage and swimmers. If there's a blockage, he will go ahead and fix it and if he finds swimmers, they'll take them out and freeze them. So we still really won't know anything until the biopsy is done. D's consult appointment is January 19th... so lucky us- more waiting!

Nerves

Apprehensive. Anxious. Nervous. Ready for it to be over with. Tomorrow is the appointment and we are both balls of nerves... no pun intended.

I know that I'm just ready for answers and to be pointed in one direction or another. However, I know that whatever the news is tomorrow, it will be hard on D. We were planning on going to his parents tomorrow to start our Christmas holidays, but decided we'd leave Thursday. I'm so glad we did this. It will give us time to ourselves after hearing whatever the doctor tells us before having to face the world.

I'll try to get on here tomorrow to update, but can't make any promises. If I don't, have a Merry Christmas!

More appointments

Well, we didn't really hear what we wanted to hear, but still don't have any set answers yet, either. The doctor today was the first to use the A word with us... Azoospermia. We asked about what the other doctor told us, but he said that with varicocele there would be some swimmers present. With D's first SA, there were none. We do have a couple of appointments within the next couple of weeks. Next week D has an ultrasound scheduled as well as another SA. We'll meet back with the doctor December 23rd.

I'm glad I took the whole day off. It's given me a chance to really digest all of this. I think we're both still in some degree of shock/denial. The reality is that we may not have children of our own. That will be hard for both of us to accept, but we know that we will still have a family. Adoption has always had a special place in my heart, but I know that D will have a much harder time accepting that he won't have his own genetic creation running around in the world. With me, I think the hardest aspect is not being able to be pregnant. Pregnancy is such a miracle and I think pregnant women are so beautiful. I've always wanted to be able to experience that.

Whatever we find out December 23rd, the holidays will have a totally different feeling this year than any we've ever had together.

I can't believe it

D had his doctor's appointment today to get his referral to see a urologist. The appointment went well and the doctor even told him what he thought might be the issue and if that's what it is, it's completely treatable. Of course, we don't know that for sure, but at least it was good news. Even better news is that D's urologist appointment is Thursday! As the title says, I can't believe that he could get in that soon! Of course, I'm not getting my hopes up that we'll have any answers from this first appointment, but at least he's being seen before Christmas.

Question: Do I go with D to this first appointment? What should we expect from this first visit?


This whole journey is such a roller coaster. I'm excited about him being seen, but terrified of the answers we might receive. Such conflicting emotions!

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is D's appointment to get the referral for the Urology appointment. He'll be having a physical done and some blood work (he requested that) so hopefully by this time tomorrow, we'll have a day and time for the first Big Appointment.

The fact that its taken two months to finally get to this appointment, which isn't even the one we'd like to be having, is so frustrating that I almost have to laugh. As my sister said on the phone last night when I talked to her about this, "It's a step in the right direction."

I wish it was a giant leap.

Punch in the Gut

Sweet 5 year-old kindergarten student: Mrs. B, do you only want to be a teacher?

Me: thinks, "No, I'd also really like to be a mother."
says, "I've always wanted to be a teacher."

Good job on avoiding the question. If only that will work at all the Christmas family get-togethers we'll be enduring. I can't believe I'm dreading Christmas. Am I really letting IF take all the joy out of my life?

If the funk I've been in is any clue to the answer to that question, then it's yes.

Seriously?!

If you notice, I now have our time line of our journey posted on the sidebar. Hopefully, I'll keep that updated even if I don't post. :)

Since the last post, D spent almost a month trying to get a referral from my doctor (who ordered the testing) only to find out that he would need to get a referral from his own doctor. This wouldn't be a problem except that he never goes to the doctor and hasn't been since he graduated from college and started his job. So now D finds a doctor and makes an appointment so he can eventually receive a referral to see the doctor he actually needs to see. The date for this appointment: December 9th. Then we'll probably have a month wait to get in to see the Urologist that he needs to go see. Can I get an extra dose of patience?!

As the holidays approach, I'm starting to get this feeling in the pit of my stomach. It's like at even the mention of Christmas, I just want to curl up into the fetal position and cry. Thanksgiving and Christmas are so difficult for me. It's another event that reminds me of the one thing we don't have yet. My arms are still empty.

To add to it, in the past week we've gotten pregnancy announcements from two other couples. It's so hard to be genuinely happy when I'm questioning why? Why them? Why not us? And I feel so guilty for having such a selfish outlook. I mean, why not us? Why shouldn't we be the couple going through this process?

And that's where I stop.

It hurts too much.

Results

Well, D received a phone call today from my doctor with the results from his test. Needless to say, they weren't good. He called me in tears. In the 9 years we've been together, I have never felt so helpless. I just wanted to hug him.

My doctor says that it could be a fluke, but she wants him to see a urologist to have more testing done. I'm not sure when that will happen, but hopefully soon.

It's weird, but I've had a feeling that this is how it would turn out. And I thought I was going to be really upset at the prospect of never being pregnant. But all I could think about was that D wouldn't be able to pass on his great personality, his athletic abilities, his blond hair and bright blue eyes... it's like I'm mourning the loss of a child that never existed.

I'm pretty sure we won't go down the donor road, so it stands to reason that I would be upset that my traits wouldn't be passed on. But for some reason, I can handle that.

I have felt for some time that we were to adopt, whether we could have kids of our own or not. So adoption is definitely the way we would want to go.

But this journey's not over. We'll have more appointments and tests run just to be sure. Please keep us in your prayers.

Time for an update

A post have been long over-due... I can't believe it's already October. I'm ready for changes in the weather, holidays, new fall decorations. I'm really just ready for change, period. First I'll fill you in on what's been going on...

Where to start? I finally got the nerve up to make the fertility work-up appointment. Both D and I went September 22nd to meet with my doctor to see what the next steps would be. Since my cycle has been pretty normal for the past half-year or so, she wanted to go ahead and do some checks on the hubby. Needless to say, we left the office with two cups in a brown paper bag...

After D's tests are done and if everything comes back normal, then the next step is for me to schedule an HSG. Yeah, look that one up. Sounds delightful, huh? A couple of years ago, if you had told me that I would allow something like that to be done to me so I could have a baby, I'd probably say you were crazy. Not that I didn't want children, but just that I never imagined myself in this position. However, there's not much I wouldn't do now to one day be able to be a mother.

When D and I got married, we of course talked about children and starting a family. I always told him that I didn't want to get crazy-obsessed with baby-making when the time came. I just wanted it to happen. This sounds like such an ideal picture... for a Miracle to just happen. But over the past year that we've been trying and the year before that when my heart began aching for a baby, I've lost hope. I don't even start out the cycle thinking that I'll get pregnant. I told myself that I'm just not getting my hopes up. But now, I really believe it. I believe each month will be another failure. I believe that next summer, we will be on another vacation instead of at home with a newborn. I believe that another Christmas will pass without the fun "We're Expecting" Christmas cards being sent out.

But what I really struggle with is this: should I be longing for a child so much that it hurts? Does this mean that I'm not content? I love D, can't imagine living without him, but if this is what God has planned for us, is it enough? Tears are streaming down my face just thinking about this. I pray that I find satisfaction in God and that's the only place I look. That God will be enough for me. I look to Him to satisfy this longing.

Please, fill me up.

I am empty.

Decisions, decisions.

The last cycle pre-"fertility work-up appointment" has come and gone. That's right. It's done. And now it's time to make decisions. Wow. I never thought that I would be making this appointment. I never thought that I would try for over a year to get pregnant. And still not be pregnant.

A friend asked if I was ticked. And I'm sure I will be. I guess right now, I'm just still in shock. I still hold onto the hope that this will happen on our own. I guess I'm still in denial. Sunday night, D and I sat down and pored over a website about the whole infertility "process". While it was nice to educate ourselves together, I so wish our struggle had been with deciding which crib would work best in our nursery, instead of trying to predict which procedure we would have to endure.

And infertility has changed my life in other ways, too. Like today, when a teacher at my school was carrying around her new baby this afternoon, I found myself avoiding her. Avoiding the baby. Avoiding the feelings that I knew would bubble to the surface. I'm so tired of hiding those emotions. This weekend, we've been invited to one of D's 2nd cousin's 1st birthday party. And we're not going. Last summer when we started trying, I helped throw a baby shower for the little one and couldn't help thinking that we'd be joining them soon. We all know how that has turned out. And now I can't even celebrate his 1st birthday without remembering. Without thinking about how it was supposed to be.

Looking ahead...
I will be making an appointment soon (when I get the nerve, so pray for courage). Pray for answers!

Summer, baby!

As a teacher, my ideal time for our baby to be born would be the summer. I would be able to have a couple extra months to spend with the little one before going back to school. And yes, I will go back to work. I would love to stay at home, but that's just not possible right now. We've crunched and re-crunched the numbers. But the great thing is that we live right by my school and I would love to find someone in the neighborhood to take care of baby B while I'm at work. I know where my lunches would be spent!

To be completely honest, though, I really do not care when our baby is born, what gender it is, whose eyes it has, etc. As long as it's healthy, my heart will be more than content. There are days that I just get so excited about meeting our little one- and they haven't even been conceived yet!

This past year as we've been trying to start a family, we've told our secret to a few select friends and family members. And this is where I struggle. It's so hard to put on a happy face around those that don't know. I find myself not wanting to do things with them because it's so exhausting. Our friends are all relatively close to our age and starting families are on most of their minds. It's so hard listening to their plans without feeling cynical about it. It's hard having to float around the issue when our plans for starting a family are asked about. So we tend to not hang around those friends.

In the meantime, we keep praying for our miracle.

I would die for that...

Our story

My husband and I met in October of 1998 and instantly became friends. I was at the bottom of the totem pole in Jr. High- he was a freshman in high school. We found ourselves going to the same church and our love of sports drew us together. In April of 2000, we officially became an item, but went on our first date the following Valentine's Day. We dated through high school and married the summer after I graduated from high school.

D was entering his junior year at the University of Texas at Austin and I joined him as a freshman. We loved our college days... things were so simple. The peanut butter and jelly sandwiches we packed for lunch on campus, the Torch Light Ralley, the Hex Ralley- we loved our university. After graduating (D- December 2006; me- May 2007), I began teaching kindergarten at a private Christian school. This is where the next part of the story begins...

One morning that September, I woke up feeling so dizzy and light-headed. I have never felt that way before. I couldn't walk around the house or even get ready to begin the school day. Needless to say, I used my first sick day. The feeling passed later that afternoon, but not before a fellow teacher called to check up on me and asked if I could be pregnant. We had been preventing this from happening, but I know that things like this happen all the time- so I started researching it on the internet. Since I couldn't get a 100% positive answer, I decided I had better stop taking my birth control just to make sure. I completely expected that once off of birth control, my cycle would start up. But it didn't. And I started to feel other symptoms. Pulls. Twinges. Exhaustion. Metallic taste in my mouth. Feeling out of breath. I remember testing shortly after and not getting a positive result, but I don't think I ever tested again. This went on for 2 weeks and I finally made a Dr. appointment to figure this all out. The week before the appointment, I started bleeding and cramping like I've never cramped before. It was awful. Even without knowing for sure whether I was pregnant or not, I couldn't help imagining that I was. And now all those dreams went down the drain. I remember crying myself to sleep. I remember looking out my classroom window and seeing the little ones being dropped off for Mother's Day Out and feeling devastated. I remember this desire growing inside to become a mother, to take care of someone else, to love someone so much, to experience Life's Miracle.

However, D was not on board. Sure, he wanted kids... just not now. And he made sense. We didn't own our own home. We wanted to have our new SUV paid off. We wanted to get some of our career under our belt. So we agreed to start trying the following summer- the summer of 2008. By this time, we had bought our home and were very close to paying off our vehicle. I was so excited to start trying. I just knew that we would get pregnant within the first 3 months. I bought all kinds of pregnancy books, for me and for hubby. I read them cover to cover. Three months came and went and still, I was not pregnant. In fact, my cycle was getting wackier by the month. I was getting frustrated. As the new year began, I had hit a new low in my life. I felt hopeless. I was angry with God. I was frustrated with Him. How could He not want two people who had served him to become parents? I was filled with fear that this would never happen. I started bargaining with God, thinking that I had something to offer Him that would change His mind. Then Esther came along...

Well, not literally, but Beth Moore's new study on her did. And I felt like I learned so much from it. Fear is not of God. Bring your needs to Him. Lay them at His feet... and leave them there. So that's what I did. In April, as the study was ending, I decided to do something I hadn't done in a long time. See, when I was feeling hopeless, I was also feeling frustrated with my body. It had continued to let me down, month after month. So for the first time in three months, I decided to take an ovulation predictor kit. The very first time I took it, it came back positive. And the next day. And the next. Yay! My body was getting back to normal. Now four months have passed with my cycle staying the same length each month. As the one year mark arrived and still no baby, I made an appointment with my Dr.

July 2009
My appointment with my doctor went really well. The nurse was so sweet and told me after I told her that we'd been trying for one year, "Don't you worry sweetie. We'll get it all figured out." And as I explained the past year to my doctor, she said what I had been thinking for the past month or so, "L, this just might not have been the time for this to happen." We decided to give it three more months since my cycle has become more consistent, and if nothing has happened, then I'll make an appointment for an inferitility work-up.

Now, the part of me that is listening to that whole "no fear" thing believes that I will be pregnant before then. This would give me a summer baby which is the ideal situation for a teacher. My sister and my sister-in-law are both trying and I have always thought that it would be so much fun for us to be pregnant at the same time. And I can't wait any longer. I can't. We can't. D is so on board with all of this. He wants to go to dr. appointments with me. He talks about what our kids will look like, what they'll be like. He prays each night at dinner that we would get pregnant and have a healthy baby. He prays for me.

Which leads us to the other side of me- the side that fears that I can't have kids. That this will be a much longer road than what we've already traveled. That I will stand on the sidelines and watch those around me get pregnant and have babies. That my husband and I will continue to wait on our world to change.