What I did differently

I know there was a lot of luck involved in us getting pregnant in April. There was also a lot of prayer (I truly believe my Grandma had something to do with it! When we told her we were pregnant she said, "There's only one baby in there? With how hard I've been praying I was expecting at least two!").

In addition to luck and prayers, I made some pretty big changes to my diet and daily habits in the 3-4 months prior to Ponyo. I made the changes because I wanted to feel like I was doing something to increase our chances of success even though my husband and I had both resigned ourselves to the fact that nothing would be possible until after my laparoscopy. I am by no means a medical expert, and I don't claim to be, but here are the changes I made based on what a friend dealing with infertility told me, lots of research online, and reading these books:

The Infertility Cure: The Ancient Chinese Wellness Program for Getting Pregnant and Having Healthy Babies by Randine Lewis  

Recipes for the Endometriosis Diet by Carolyn Levett 

Endometriosis: A Key to Healing and Fertility Through Nutrition by Dian Shepperson Mills & Michael Vernon

The 9-Day Liver Detox Diet by Patrick Holford and Fiona McDonald Joyce

First, what my friend told me: She and her husband were seeing a specialist who was trained in NFP. Their doctor told them that over 30% of couples struggling with infertility conceive after 3 months of taking this combination of vitamins:

Vitamin C (1000 mg)
Calcium made with D3 (500mg)
D3 (2000 I.U.)
Magnesium (250 mg)
Stress B-Complex
Zinc (30 mg)
(My friend also took Flaxseed oil, which I skipped due to the warning about blood clotting and surgery risks)

I did some research and found that endometriosis and low progesterone can be linked to deficiencies in some of these vitamins (especially Magnesium). PCOS is also affected by these vitamins! I picked up the vitamins and the nice pharmacist at the grocery store even gave me a pill case to use so I wouldn't have to open 6 bottles every night when I took my many pills with dinner. I also gave my husband the same Vitamin C and D3 that I was taking as well as a normal multivitamin. Maybe it was a coincidence, but both my friend and I are now pregnant (due about 3 weeks apart) after both of us trying for about 2 years, which seems too weird.

I did some simple liver detox. In The Infertility Cure, I read that endometriosis can be caused by "stagnation of the liver." Sounds awesome, right? So I decided to read The 9-Day Liver Detox Diet. The detox book listed 5 habits to break:
1. Wheat
2. Milk
3. Caffeine
4. Alcohol
5. Bad fats

Interestingly, ALL FIVE of these things are to be avoided by women dealing with endometriosis (as mentioned in Recipes for the Endometriosis Diet and Endometriosis: A Key to Healing and Fertility Through Nutrition). So, I got super serious about going gluten free. No more cookies. No more sandwiches, or Triscuits (my fave snack!), or pita bread, or traditional pasta. I cut back on dairy. No more Kefir, limited cheese, limited yogurt, limited ice cream. I stopped drinking coffee, tea and alcohol. Once you cut out all of that, you pretty much cut out all bad fats, too, so that was taken care of!

I started drinking lemon water every morning. I started eating at least one serving of broccoli, spinach, or kale every day (these green veggies are good for you and also are known to help your body get rid of excess estrogens). 

To help rid my body of even more excess estrogen (excess estrogen is what causes endometriosis) I started using natural body products. I gave up scented soaps and used Kirk's Castile which is a coconut and vegetable glycerin soap. I started making my own deodorant out of coconut oil, baking soda, and arrowroot powder (I do still use normal deodorant for working out or very hot days even though the coconut deodorant works really well). I am still using my normal make-up and shampoo/conditioner although I am thinking of moving to healthier brands after I use everything I already have.

Because this post is getting so long, I'll do another where I'll write about the results I noticed after the changes.

The hurt doesn't end

Yesterday The Bee and I attended a birthday party for a friend's 2-year-old twins. We love the family and my BFF and her husband are close to them, too. The three of us girls have known each other since 6th grade and our now husbands have become friends through our close relationships. Part way through the party our friend (with the twins and also a 3-year-old) approached the four of us and said,


"I wanted to share something with you. There is this place that is NFP based and they can help you, you know, since you can't do In Vitro or anything. I can't remember what it is called, though. Hold on, let me ask K."


K is her father-in-law. So she drags him over to where we are sitting and he starts talking about NaPro Technology and how they find out "what is wrong with you" and help you "without unnatural intervention." So here are the four of us getting fertility advice from our friend's father-in-law in the middle of a birthday party. We told this friend about some of our struggle IN CONFIDENCE. All she knows is that we have been trying to conceive since August 2010 and that things haven't gone as planned. She doesn't know anything about us seeing specialists, or my MRI, blood tests, ultrasounds, endometriosis diagnosis, the surgery I was supposed to be having at the end of this week...


It felt like a huge breach of trust. After he finished talking to us (and to his credit, I believe he was trying to be considerate and helpful...he doesn't know that our friend shouldn't have shared info about what we are going through) my friend started up again talking about how bad most fertility treatments are and how Catholic people can't do IVF. I sat there with my lips mostly zipped. This friend knows that our niece and nephew were IVF encouraged. Also, she has no idea what it is like to struggle with infertility. She got pregnant with her 3-year-old within 4 months of starting to try and then got pregnant with twin girls BY SURPRISE less than a year after their first daughter was born. To say I was steamed by her comments is an understatement. All I really added to the conversation was that, yes, I already know about NaPro Technology because one of my cousins worked with Thomas W. Hilgers (the doctor who is kind of the head of NaPro Technology) in Nebraska when she was finishing her residency while becoming a doctor.


I am still hoping and praying for good news on Wednesday. And you can bet your bottom dollar that I won't be sharing our (hopefully) good news with this friend until the beginning of our second trimester.

My first appointment

I had my first appointment November 22, 2011 at 7pm. I chose this day and time for several reasons:
1. I followed my doctor's orders from August and had completed 3 months of bbt charting
2. It was late enough in the day that I didn't have to miss any work or make sub plans (I HATE making sub plans!)
3. It was our last day of school before a 5 day weekend over Thanksgiving (I figured this would give me more than enough time to compose myself before being back in the classroom if I was a complete wreck after the appointment).

I took it easy that day at work, knowing that the kids would be crazy (being the last day of our first trimester at school and the last day before 5 glorious days off!) and that many of my students would be gone on vacation already (the families at my school are notorious for taking off early before any scheduled break). So I pretty much got to watch A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving 7 times and had the kids draw Peanuts characters in their sketchbooks (we are in Minnesota so I gave a mini lesson on Charles Schultz who was a Minnesota born artist which made me feel a little less guilty about being so lazy!) while I finished up my grades for all of my 360 kids.

At 3:20, I shot out of school like a bat out of hell. I wanted to shower and make myself look polished for the appointment. I knew if I went in looking like what Oprah calls a 'shlumpadinka' I would feel rotten from the get go and cry through the whole appointment. So, I showered, put on a new dress and cardigan that I got while visiting my sister in Wisconsin the previous weekend, a pair of cute tights and my favorite slouch boots.  I blow-dried and flat-ironed my hair and did my make-up.  I ate dinner by myself (The Bee was working late that night) and called my Mom. By 6:15 I was on the road.

I got to the appointment 10 minutes early, checked in, and started reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in the waiting room (I know I am way behind the times...I refused to read the Harry Potter series when they came out but my brother-in-law finally convinced me and they are really fun!). They called me in, weighed me (I've lost 5lbs since August, btw, which is either due to stress, the gluten free [well, gluten-greatly-limited] diet I put myself on last August because my stomach was always hurting, my new yoga classes or a combination of these things. This puts me at about 108lbs and my Mom is CONVINCED that I just need to gain weight since that worked for her with her 4th pregnancy which took over a year for my parents to conceive. If I thought it was that easy, trust me, I'd be pigging out! And I am only 5'4" so I am not skeletal or anything.), took my temperature and blood pressure. Then she asked me why I was there. This is still the nurses aide, mind you, and not even the doctor. And I cried. I told her that my husband and I have been trying to conceive for over a year with no luck. I told her that my doctor asked me to chart my bbt for three months and then schedule this appointment. She said, "I am so sorry that this is so hard on you. You'll get through it. Lots of people struggle through things like this and you are not alone" She was very sweet and I appreciated her patience and the Kleenex she kept handing to me while she asked all of the normal questions (about smoking, alcohol, caffeine, my cycles, has my husband been tested, etc).

Then I waited for the doctor. It was a very long 20 minutes before the she came in but at least good old Harry Potter was there for me. She came in, asked a few questions and looked at my Fertility Friend charts. And I cried. I asked about my low temperatures and she said they are within normal range and probably nothing to worry about. She asked if we were interested in fertility drugs. I asked if it looked like I am not ovulating on my own? She said it looks like I am, but for November she is pretty sure I ovulated 4 days later than Fertility Friend said I did (which would mean cd19 which would be really late for me from what I have always observed using NFP...although that has obviously not worked so well for us! Ha!). She gave me a referral for the fertility specialist who actually does fertility treatments (the doctor I saw just does the testing), gave me a paper ordering a pelvic ultrasound and ordered some blood tests to check some hormone levels. Then I was off to the lab!

The lab guy is the same one who took my blood in August to check my thyroid levels (which were good!). He is a painter and had told me in August to make time for my own art. He remembered me and asked if I had been painting. I said, "Not as much as I'd like." Then he asked how my day was going. I said, "Oh, it has been good." And then I cried. He said, "Why are you crying?! You lied to me! Your day hasn't been good at all!" I replied, "Work was fine. The reason I am here just really stinks." Then he said, "Do you KNOW that or are you assuming the worst?" "I guess I am assuming the worst," I cried. "Well, these results will tell you a lot and you should get a call about them as early as Friday. Take care of yourself, and paint!"

On my way out of the doctor's office, I stopped at the appointment desk to set up the pelvic ultrasound. The doctor said it is "just to check for basic anatomy." I have that set for December 7 and have to make sub plans - YUCK! I decided to take the whole day off, using one of the many sick days I have been saving for the maternity leave THAT I HAVEN'T NEEDED. I have only used 1.5 sick days in the 3 years and 4 months I have been a teacher and we can only carry over 30. I am at 30.5 and since I am not having a baby this school year I am using the day without feeling bad (even though we can't use sick days for scheduled doctor's appointments!).

Sorry for the long post. I'll make it to be continued...

History

I have been married to The Bee for just over four years now.  We are high school sweethearts so we've really been together for 10 years (that looks crazy in writing but it has indeed been a decade!).  We waited to have sex until our honeymoon (gasp!) which most of our high school friends still don't know. We find it hilarious that a few of the guys practically obsess over it now and again - Did you or didn't you?! I'll go into the waiting 'til marriage stuff another time - please don't write me off as judgemental or a prude.

We have been using Natural Family Planning (NFP) all along. I use the Creighton Model where you record cervical mucus (cm) observations only (no physically checking your cervix or charting basal body temperature [bbt]). For the first 3 years of marriage, we were still getting our career lives in order and used NFP to avoid pregnancy. I was in my masters program for education our first year of marriage and then in my first 2 years teaching visual arts to elementary and middle schoolers. The Bee was looking for work that actually used his degrees in Math and Physics (he is a brainiac!). I can go more into NFP in later posts (why we chose that as our family planning method and such).

We decided to start trying to conceive (ttc) on our third anniversary. Because my cycles have always been pretty regular and I have been charting fertile signs since a year before we were married, we thought it would happen right away for us. No such luck. As of today, we have been ttc for 15 months. I saw my doctor in August and she told me to start charting my bbt and then to see the fertility specialist at the clinic after 3 months.  Last week, I called and made the appointment. I'll be meeting with her before Thanksgiving, which is sort of a relief but also feels like failure. So many people can reproduce with no trouble, no outside help, even by accident!  I am from a large family and never imagined being in this spot. Technically, I COULD be pregnant as I type this. I'll find out officially on Halloween. I don't think I am, though, and my bbt chart doesn't look promising. 

That is why I am starting this blog. I have become consumed by my inability to become pregnant, to be a mother. I cry too often. I feel angry and resentful too easily. I am still excited when others announce their pregnancies but it hurts a little, too. I hope that writing my thoughts provides some comfort and helps me on my path to becoming myself again (I've always been a crier, but the anger and resentfulness are new - and they feel AWFUL).