Overcoming Infertility: My Personal Journey

Hi everyone, this is your always smiling Nursing Coordinator, Twyla! The following is my personal journey overcoming infertility. I went through treatment over 10 years ago when I resided in Virginia. My experience is my own, and not what every woman has or will experience on the treatment I was on.

As I have shared with many, I had problems conceiving my daughter. I spent so long avoiding pregnancy until I was married, had a degree, was established in my nursing career, I never dreamed it would be hard to become pregnant. I just thought I would stop taking the birth control pill and “poof” pregnant I would be. Well, after a few years of trying to conceive without success, I went for a fertility evaluation.

My initial appointment was with my gynecologist office’s Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner: a nurse with an advanced practice degree specializing in women’s health. I showed up with a history of irregular periods and my stack of basal body temperature charts documenting the last 18 months of what I now know were cycles where ovulation was not occurring. She gave me a prescription for Clomid therapy and told me if I did not get pregnant this month to give the office a call because next month we would double the dose. I was so excited to have a plan!! I thought this would be the magic pill for pregnancy and my “poof” was on its way!! Boy, was I ever in for a rude awakening. I did not get pregnant by taking Clomid (un-monitored I may add).

I happily popped the little pills month after month on cycle days 3 through 7. I did not get pregnant. I did get angry all of the time, cry at the drop of a hat, fall into the deepest depression I had ever experienced to the point I could not bring myself to get out of bed in the morning or to take a shower. I dreaded going out because I couldn’t bear to look at families with babies. Looking down the baby item aisles at any store would cause a huge knot in my throat and the tears would follow. Not to mention how I felt attending a baby shower. My husband did not know what to do to help me, and nothing he tried ever worked but only seemed to make me feel worse. I am surprised he did not file for divorce. I was never counseled that these moody side effects could be related to the Clomid. Even going to work (at the time I was a labor and delivery nurse) triggered feelings of depression at an even higher level.

I finally just accepted a baby was never going to happen for us. We had now been married for 6 years, our families were on us every time we spoke to them asking “when are the grand kids gonna start coming??”. Neither of our parents had trouble getting pregnant. We didn’t share with anyone we were having problems. We were embarrassed. We only talked to each other. Well, I talked…my husband kept his feelings inside.

We looked in to adoption, but could not afford it.

I used food to cope and gained a lot of weight over several years. I had a very hard time loosing weight through diet and exercise and keeping it off. I Yo-Yo dieted for years. Then, I had gastric band surgery and lost 70 pounds over a nine-month period by following a portion restricted high protein low carbohydrate diet as was required post-op.

My periods started to come at the same time each month. Then, one month it did not come at all. I thought nothing of it, because I had irregular periods for so many years. Well, I decided to take a pregnancy test and to my surprise: I WAS PREGNANT!!

My amazing blessing of a daughter is now 8 years old.

Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome was not something mentioned to me as a possible reason for my trouble conceiving. I did not even find out I had PCOS until many years later. Once I had the proper diet my weight fell into a healthier range and my body ovulated on its own. Now, I am so glad I did not conceive from the un-monitored Clomid cycles, because who knows how many babies I would have ended up pregnant with all at once!!

I share my story, because I know how it feels to be exactly where many of you are as patients of our practice. I know the emotional roller coaster you are on because I have ridden it myself. There is hope. I wish we had access to a support group like the one we have at our office one Friday a month. I wish we had known so many others were going through the same thing. I wish we had an amazing team to help guide us through our journey, educate us, and do their very best to help us in every way they know how; just as we do here at Michigan Reproductive Medicine.

I feel blessed to be a part of our amazing team. We are all so dedicated and passionate about doing everything within our means to support every one who comes to us for care to succeed in fulfilling their dream of a family.