Let’s Begin (Again), Shall We?

I admit, I’ve stayed quiet on my blog for a long period of time. Part of it was that I felt it took a lot of time to maintain it. Other times I felt like I had nothing of importance to say. But I do have a lot I want to get off my chest. It has just taken me this long to realize that I needed to get back to doing it in my “safe place.” Where I can hopefully get clarity by bringing these heavy, intense – sometimes crushing, “the whole weight of the world is on my shoulder” thoughts out of my mind.

So, – as in the incredible mini-series that EVERY woman should watch, “Let’s begin, shall we?”

I still need to read the book …

While I have a lot more pressing things on my mind, the one that I think I want to address first was one I should have written two weeks ago. Truth be told, it should have been written the day that Roe v Wade got overturned, but maybe – in my self-deprecating, “the world is on the brink of collapsing” attitude, I couldn’t find a way or the energy to write it.

No. What forced me to sit down and write was concerning the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that frozen embryos in storage are still considered unborn children under state law. That was on February 16th. I should have written something then. Or I should have pushed myself more when two of only eight IVF clinics paused ALL treatment, including those at the most critical part of the cycle – the transfer of the embryos into the uterus.

To be honest, I had very mixed feelings about this.

PREP

First and foremost, I am a STRONG proponent of Women’s Rights. A woman’s decision on how she wants to handle her reproductive life is her own. In a fantasy world, a woman would have the support she would need to help her work through these choices, but we all know that many women do not. OR many women decide to make their decisions on their own. Women’s Rights. AmIRight?

Second. Regarding IVF? Well … duh. Why did I start writing this blog? I’d say it’s simple … but there’s a reason I started this blog. Go here for the extremely shortened version of our story.

Hubby and I did everything we could to have a biological child of our own. It was important to us to have created a child that was half Hubby and Half me. We wanted to see how that child would look – Would they have the unique nose that everyone on my Dad’s side of the family seemed to get? Would they have flat feet like Hubby’s side of the family gets? Would they be quiet and reserved like Hubby or loud and talkative like me? Would we be able to see and experience Nature vs Nurture with our very own eyes?

Then there’s those milestones. First smile. First words. First steps. First day at preschool, 1st grade, middle school, high school. Prom. Graduation from college or university. Wedding. Grandchildren. Every. Single. Event. We will never experience.

And NO [slamming each letter on the keyboard as I type] it is NOT THAT EASY to JUST ADOPT.

I had to accept that all those “what if’s” and milestones would never happen. I couldn’t risk the chance of more rejection and failure after what we had been through. It was important for me to put my whole body, mind, and soul into adoption. 1 By the time I got around to accepting the fact that we would never have a bio child our own, we were already in our early to mid-40’s. Which meant we’d be in our mid-60’s by the time the child graduated from high school. How fair is that for a kid to be the one person around responsible of taking care of their parents?

But I digress. (As I do so, very often.)

MIX INGREDIENTS

Anyway, here’s where the mixed feeling come into play. When we decided to try IVF, it felt like we were literally signing our whole lives away. Lots of paperwork. One of the paperwork referred to any excess embryos that may result from the cycle. Did we want to destroy them right away or freeze the remaining healthy ones they feel may survive the (for lack of better words) “dethawing” process for a Frozen Cycle? If we decided to freeze the embryos, there’s a (rather hefty) fee to keep them which gets renewed every year. I remember jokingly calling it a lease for an apartment.

New to the IVF world at the time, that paperwork seemed bizarre to us. Destroy, Freeze, or Donate. If Freezing, then:  1) In the event of death or divorce, who would maintain “property” of the embryo.” 2) In the event neither is alive nor have the mental capacity to make medical decisions, who would be the decision-maker? If Donating, then: 1) donate for research? 2) donate for surrogacy?

Weird, right? But totally makes sense if you think about it. I mean, you can’t live in an apartment free of rent without there being some repercussions, right? Pay to stay. Also, if you think of it, the wording sounds exactly like a medical Advanced Directive.

I think it was at that moment that Hubby & I fully understood the significance of what we were doing.  We had no doubt that we’d proceed with IVF. We knew that this would be the last chance for us to conceive our own child and knew that if we didn’t, we would regret not trying. That day though, it suddenly felt physically real. I don’t know what it’s like (obviously), but I guess one might compare it to a soon-to-be parent hearing their child’s heartbeat for the first time. Excited and overjoyed yet feeling a bit overwhelmed and nervous.

MARINATE

Going through an IVF cycle is brutal. It is NOT for the faint of heart. It is NOT anything I wish upon anyone – whether it’s a couple, family, or single female. It is time consuming. The prep. The daily injections. The multiple pelvic ultrasounds. Anxiously anticipating (while hormonally charged, btw) when to be told when to come in to retrieve your eggs. Praying that there are enough healthy enough to use and waiting 4-5 days to see how many embryos are viable. If there are ones healthy enough, deciding on how many embryos can be safely implanted into the uterus and – freezing any excess embryos.

Then there’s the two week waiting period (no pun intended). Trying to stay positive. Trying to “relax,” like you’ve been told a million times before since the start of your infertility journey. 2 Thinking that if you lay down more than stand, the embryos will “stick.” Basically it’s 14 days of HELL hoping that you don’t get your period. Praying that when you have your follow up visit with the IVF specialist, that the pregnancy test comes back positive. YAY if you do … You have had a successful IVF Cycle! And if you have any leftover healthy embryos, you can choose to freeze them to be used later – or not!

What if the IVF cycle fails? Or if none of the embryos are viable to be transplanted? Well … then the decision is personal for every individual or couple.

PLACE IN OVEN AND BAKE

During our IVF cycle, 13 eggs were retrieved and 8 were successfully “fertilized.” From there, only 3 embryos viable enough to use, but only 2 were implanted due to health concerns. That one embryo was frozen. I remember being so excited afterwards. I was happy, for lack of better words, that we had done the best we could do to create our own family. I felt hopeful, which was something I hadn’t felt in a while. I saw the possibility of the future I always dreamed I’d have with Hubby.

I treated my belly as if I was already pregnant and that I was carrying our possible babies, that they’d eventually grow into a healthy fetus where I could hear a heartbeat. Where at 24 weeks, I’d know that they’d be healthy (though not strong) enough to survive outside of my womb. At the time of the implantation, our IVF specialist actual presented us with a picture of the two embryos (akin to getting that first baby ultrasound picture for many others), which for YEARS I called my “Maybe Babies.”  

FREEZE

But of course, our IVF cycle failed. And … well, you can read the many entries on this blog to see how I dealt with it. We were so heart-broken that we forgot about the one lonely frozen embryo until it came time to renew the “lease” a year later. When we got the invoice, I stood there for a bit, frozen (no pun intended). Though they never went away, the flood gates opened and all those emotions from the day I was told the IVF cycle failed came rushing back to me. I remember that invoice sitting on our table for about a week with Hubby & I trying our best to ignore it. Yet it kept mocking us as we walked by, knowing we had to have the discussion soon. I was pretty sure we were thinking the same thing, but I just had to take some time to accept that this was going to be my answer.

When we finally sat down to talk about it, we both agreed that it didn’t make sense to keep that one last “Maybe Baby.” There was little chance it would survive the process to unfreeze, let alone have a chance of successfully resulting in a pregnancy. Plus, that would mean another round of daily injections, multiple pelvic ultrasounds, etc. All of which were NOT covered by any health insurance at the time. We couldn’t afford a Frozen Cycle. We were both financially and emotionally spent.

Being of medical background, I considered donating to science. My conscience; however, couldn’t fathom the thought of hurting our embryo. Neither Hubby or I felt comfortable donating for surrogacy either, since it felt strange knowing that our bio baby could possibly be out there and we weren’t raising them. So, we decided to do the responsible thing and let our last Maybe Baby go.

DISCARD LEFTOVERS

It was NOT an easy decision. Not just because of the logical reasons listed above. For me, it was the last chance I would ever come close to creating a life form of my own. And while I know that technically this embryo is only a few cells and not even anything REMOTE to being a living, breathing being with a heart (or any organs for that matter) … it still hurt. That glimpse of my dream future, the excitement I had on major events in my life to that point (graduation, getting my RN license, wedding) … that disappeared. I felt like I just killed any chance of that future; severed myself from that timeline of possibilities. So yeah, maybe in a way, I thought it was a symbolic murder.

Do I consider what Hubby and I did as an abortion? No. Does it hurt like hell that we did what we did? Hell to the Yes. This wasn’t a choice we ever thought we would have to make. We had other ideas of how things would turn out. We thought our IVF would be successful. We thought that if it wasn’t, we’d be able to try for a frozen cycle. But it wasn’t successful. And it wasn’t financially or worth the risk to do a frozen cycle or to pay the rather costly rental fee.

And that’s, I suppose, where the mixed feeling come from. Ours isn’t everyone else’s experience. Everyone has their RIGHT to decide how they want to proceed. The right to choose. ALL. THE. WAY.

REVIEW MISTAKES OR MISHAPS

Going back to Alabama and their Supreme Court ruling, it’s not so much their decision that I’m having a hard time with. I strongly disagree with that. Even though Alabama Legislation provided a temporary fix to restart IVF treatments in their state, I am still angry. That legislation only covers liability for the providers (-ie doctors, clinics, etc) and suppliers (labs, medical equipment companies) and still doesn’t address the main issue of women’s rights.

What I’m truly angry about is the responses from the US Legislative branch of the Federal Government. I find it repulsive that there are many Senators and Congressional Members that have stated to be “all for IVF,” but their previous actions say otherwise.

For example. US Representative House Speaker Mike Johnson has stated recently,

AND YET, he is the co-sponsor and writer of the Life at Conception Act, which defines life as beginning “at the moment of fertilization.”

A-hem. IVF = In vitro FERTILIZATION.

In the US Senate, despite being brought up a second time, the Access to Family Building Act was rejected unanimously by the Republicans. 3 Yet here we have Senator Roger Marshall, R-KS, saying,

I’m almost positive that those US Senators & House Reps are up for re-election this year and are just “playing the game” to get the votes; biding their time to win so they can go back to denying women’s reproductive rights.

I won’t even get into the Christian Evangelical side of things. That would just get me going even more.

Here’s where I get a bit confused. You’re pro-life but you don’t support artificial means of creating life. You support pregnancy but you deny funding for care that women need reproductive care the most. You don’t support any type of medications that may help prevent, not only a pregnancy (unplanned or otherwise), but help with other female related reproductive issues that have NOTHNG to do with child-bearing. You think that a woman should be kept alive to birth the baby, even though her life is severely at risk. You believe a woman should carry an unborn child to term knowing that the baby has already expired or will die immediately or shortly after birth.

That is my definition of cruel and unusual punishment. And the men (or women, I should add) who have no education or experience in practicing medicine should NOT be making or signing any legislation about what should happen to a woman and her body.

MAKE AND BE THE VOICE OF CHANGE

I have been extremely angry for a VERY long time about the reversal of Roe v Wade. For the past two years I’ve been trying to find a way to voice my opinion about it in a public manor. Sure, I’ve talked about it with other friends and like-minded peers. And sure, I’ve discussed it with some Pro-lifers, but not to the extent either of us wanted to. Over the years, I’ve become more of an introvert and prefer not to be out of the house too much. But this time … this IVF issue really hit too close to home. Which is why I finally picked up the pen – err, dusted off my keyboard – and decided to write again.

Maybe by putting words down for people to read (and hopefully learn more about the other side of any issue) will make a difference in helping people understand.

  1. If you are one of those that can do that readily, then I’m happy for you. Unfortunately, I am not. ↩︎
  2. NEVER, EVER helpful at all, BTW ↩︎
  3. Not that I mean to single out a particular political party. Okay, yeah, I do. ↩︎

Infertility Bets On Hold, Part 2

(If you missed Part 1, click here … )

While I’ve pretty much begun to resolve those particular grief issues, there’s still that lack of strength that I feel I need in order to go through the entire adoption process.  Because it takes someone who really has enough strength to climb over the proverbial brick wall getting in the way of having a child. And specifically, I’m talking about all the rules and reg­u­la­tions and inves­ti­ga­tions into your pri­vate lives just to raise a child that is not bio­log­i­cally your own. Quite frankly, I know that I don’t have what it takes to go through that.

Why do I say that? (And Kelly … hopefully, this will help answer the question you posed to me at one time … ) Well first of all, I just know what I’m capable of handling emotionally, and I know that I wouldn’t be able to survive any further disappointment or heartache. Or as my new favorite quote from Pam says:

It got to the point where the potential for more heartbreak was more overwhelming than the glimmer of very small hope.

The second reason I feel as if I have little strength is because I have little confidence that things will come relatively straightforward and simple to us.

Not that I expect adoption to be an easy path. If we did decide to adopt, I have this very strong suspicion that we’d have so many more walls to climb. Give me a chance to explain … and I’d absolutely love to hear what others have to say to contribute to this discussion.

Let’s start off with Domestic Adoption:

  • Hubby & I both Asian American; Filipino American, to be specific.
  • How often do you suppose any Potential Birth Moms (PBM) would look at our dossier and — just by looks alone — think that we’d make great parents when their child will (most likely) not look at all similar to the adoptive couple that they’d hope to raise their child?
  • Or that the PBM might worry that their child would face more barriers having Asian American parents?
  • How often are Asian American babies given up for adoption; especially if the PBM is also Asian or Asian American? Culture dictates that family is important. If the child is not wanted in the immediate family; chances are that there is another family member (aunt, cousin, third uncle twice removed) that is willing to raise the child. Unfortunately, that’s a situation that’s likely never going to happen to us.

Moving onto International Adoption:

  • There are stricter laws and regulations from various countries in effect.
  • Some specific countries, like Russia and Guatemala, have either suspended or have placed holds on any adoptions to the US.
  • Wait time. Even for Filipino adoptions there are certain stipulations on how and when a child can be adopted; when the child can come back to the US with the adopted parents. And quite frankly, I don’t think I can afford the three-year wait in order to adopt a child from my native country.

And finally other, all-encompassing barriers:

  • Age: Let’s face it. Hubby & I are currently pushing 40. And yes, I know that there are couples out there that are raising babies that are much older than us. But there was a reason why Hubby & I started trying to conceive within a year of marriage: I had always seen me as a younger mother; one that wanted to finish having babies before the age of 30. There was a specific reason behind that: my mother and I are exactly 3o years apart in age (sorry Mom!). Growing up (particularly in high school), not only did I deal with a cultural barrier, but I also dealt with a huge generational gap. Both my parents were pre-baby boomer, while I was most definitely a Gen-Xer. Even though after I turned 30, I knew that this was something beyond my control, adopting now — especially as the rules and regs of adoption have gotten more strict — well, it no longer seems prudent for both Hubby & my sake.
  • Energy: Along with age, this is the second biggest concern that I have. And, if I was honest with myself, the flimsiest barrier of all. Because, really this has to do with energy and stamina. It’s one thing to raise a child with the thought in mind that you’ll be young enough to (somewhat) keep up with their needs. It’s quite another thing knowing that I can no longer wake myself up in the morning without hitting the snooze button a dozen times. Would I be able to care for another life if I can barely care for my own? Like I said, flimsy … but I’m just being honest.

I don’t bring up these points to be negative in any way, shape or form. I’m simply stating facts that appear to be the most obvious barriers for our individual case when it comes to adopting a child. And that’s assuming that we would ever go down that route. And, as I said above, I’d love to hear your thoughts on what I perceive as barriers.

*****

As it is, I feel that we’ve already played our game of Infertility Roulette. We’ve already placed all the bets we wanted to at this time in our lives. And we lost that bet. With adoption (or h*ll, even if we ever decided to go through IVF again), I want something I can be sure of … something I can count on.

I hesitate using the word “guarantee” … since nothing in life is ever guaranteed, but after more than ten years of fighting the odds and now facing even greater odds against us (age, finances, etc), Hubby & I opted to get out of the betting pool.

And this is why, at least in my eyes, it’s never as simple to “just adopt.” It’s never easy to go through another round of IVF.

This is why Hubby & I have decided to “cut our loss” … or in this case, “cut the strings” … and live child-free after infertility.

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Related Links:

Cutting The Strings

Infertility Bets On Hold, Part 1

Thoughts on Adoption

Information on Filipino Adoptions

Wiki Info on the Pre-Baby Boom Generation

Wiki Info on Generation X

ADdressing Infertility

Recently, the New York Times wrote an article about a new reality series that TLC began airing strictly on their website. “A Conception Story,” a Web-only show follows the lives of 6 women as they try to conceive over the next seven months. Which, seeing that this is the same network that airs “A Wedding Story” and “A Baby Story,” makes perfect sense.

Meet Kristen, one of the six women in "A Conception Story"

I mean really … what better way to bridge the “gap” between the Wedding Planning and the arrival of a newborn baby by filming a show about Family Planning?

No. Really … I’m not being sarcastic. Even though at first I was hesitant to watch the show, I must admit that curiosity got the best of me. While it’s currently just wrapped up it’s second month of video entries, I’m actually invested in watching these six women’s stories.

For those that were as skeptical (or perhaps jaded?) about watching ecstatic BFP (“big fat positive” … as in a positive pregnancy test) announcements via the web, I’ll spare you the heartache to let you know, as of today, there has been only one person who saw the two pink lines thus far. And it’s a couple that had been been trying to conceive for close to three years.

Which is another thing. Out of the six couples we’re initially introduced to, half of them have been experiencing difficulty trying to conceive. The others that are just “starting” their quest to have a baby (or add another one to their family); well, it would appear that they, too, may be finding out that getting pregnant isn’t quite as easy as the rest of the world makes it seem to be. Or as easy as the proverbial “birds and bees” theory that we were taught in school.

Speaking of the birds and the bees …

About two weeks ago, I stumbled on another article in an Austin** newspaper. It’s this article that led me to this website and the humorous, but spot-on videos about a Bird and a Bee dealing with infertility. If you haven’t watched them, I urge you to do so, if only to empathize with what any infertile couple can encounter.

Both “A Conception Story” and the “Increase Your Chances” vignettes  (also spotlighted in this article in Salon, an award-winning online news and entertainment Web site) are probably one of the first real advertisements highlighting the difficulties in trying to conceive.

The Bird and the Bee

And when I say “advertisements” in relationship to the TLC story, I do mean advertisement. Because although the stories being told in “A Conception Story” are in “real time” (as evidenced by the journals that these women write for the show), the whole she-bang is sponsored by First Response, whose products focus on all aspects of pregnancy planning. And it’s quite evident the moment you click on the TLC website for the show, that they’ve invested a lot of money into advertising their products.

But getting back to these advertising campaigns, it’s quite refreshing to know that there are companies*** out there that are willing to go that in-depth with the emotional side of infertility. Because, face it: thus far, any advertisements for infertility I’ve heard were for Infertility Clinics or Hospital Networks. And it’s typically only a 30- to 60-second spot.

Yeah; that’ll never be enough time to go into depth about the multiple layers of Infertility.

As happy as I am about Infertility getting its fair share of air time, it’s sad to see that other people still may not empathize with what an infertile couple go through both physically and emotionally. All you have to do is look at some of the comments made in regards to such articles that brought these ads to the forefront.

One person commented:

Couldn’t it be that if you can’t get pregnant on your own that it means that god didn’t want you to have kids?

[Duh. Don’t think that I haven’t already thought about that. And oh, by the way … I believe if we’re talking about one G*d, I believe it’s common respect to address him/her formally; not with a lower case “g.” I’m just saying … ]

While another person wrote:

The best way to become a parent is to chose to have your children during your most fertile years, not when you are old.

[Hmm … maybe some of us did choose to become parents when we were supposed to be most fertile? And so what if we started later in life? What does it matter to you?]

And yet another person stated the obvious:

If you can’t have babies, why not just adopt?

[Because clearly adopting a child is such a simple task. And, unlike infertility treatments, there’s no financial or emotional stress involved in the adoption process. NOT!]

But this one … for me, this one is the kicker of them all:

Infertility, especially in developed nations like the US, is probably a good thing. I think it’s reprehensible that big pharma and the medical community is encouraging people to have children.

That last statement is what probably angered me the most. Even more than the “G*d didn’t mean for you to have kids” statement. To me, this statement has the potential to dig deeper than the emotional turmoil an infertile couple can feel. As if feeling like failure for not being able to reproduce wasn’t bad enough … it is statements like that which can strip away any sense of support that an Infertile can turn to outside of the Adoption, Loss & Infertility (ALI) Community.

But that’s my own humble opinion. Because really, when *I* look at both the “Increase Your Chances” advertisement and TLC’s “A Conception Story” Web series, I don’t immediately think about running to the first Infertility Specialist I know. And I don’t make a mad dash to the drug store to pick up more Home Pregnancy Tests.

No. The first thing I think of is that it’s about d*mn time that Infertility is getting its time in the spotlight. Just like Cancer, Diabetes, Coronary Artery Disease … and pretty much every other health condition (Erectile Dysfunction anyone?) has.

Don't you think this 24 & 25 yo newlywed couple deserved to have kids? We started trying about a year after our honeymoon and kept trying for more than 10 years.

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**How much do you love me, Kate? 😛

***EMD Serono, a Massachusetts-based maker of fertility drugs, sponsors the Increase Your Chances campaign)

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Related Links:

TLC’s “A Conception Story

NYTimes Article

Increase Your Chances Website

The Statesman Article (Austin Newspaper)

Salon e-News & Entertainment Article