Umm well I am not exactly sure were to start with this blog, I nearly wasn’t going to be writing one ever again. I was so fed up and in bits with the whole fertility/IVF/Pregnancy games that I had lost all hope. Some of our friends on twitter will already know that early in the hours on Wednesday morning (2am) I was woken by a scream from the bathroom so bad. I knew straight away what it meant jumped up and rushed to find Liz sobbing as she had found a very bad bleed. We were so happy almost getting to the point of thinking of telling work colleagues etc what had happened. We were over 10 weeks pregnant and getting so close to hitting the 12 week mark. We had no reason to worry as everything had been going so well, Liz had been very tired and poorly in the mornings but nothing to worry us about the pregnancy. Then in an instant the whole world seemed to come crashing down around us.

We sat up from 2am desperately looking on the Internet for information on heavy bleeding (bright red). We did find some glimpses of hope and people on twitter had some positive thoughts for us which helped. It was a very anxious wait to get to the doctors first thing. By this time the bleeding had eased up and Liz still had no pain. However we had really started to lose hope, you see we have already had 2 miscarriages before. 1 between our 2 sons and on after our youngest. We have been down this road before, rushing to doctors and arranging scans. These rooms are filled with horrible memory’s of Nurses and doctors telling us our babies have died. Nothing positive has ever happened when we have had this before. We had shed a few tears during the night and talked through all sorts of possibilities. Could it be due to the progesterone tablets stopping or because of the IVF in general or was it because our baby had died.

Anyone who has suffered fertility and pregnancy problems will appreciate all of the above. The anxiety around all of it is immense, we have been under increadible stress for over 6 months now and more long term 9 years! We have scrimped and saved the money to pay for our treatment, tried in vain to get pregnant naturally and the horrible feeling each month when you fail. We have started IVF treatment and gone through the drugs, the waiting, the indignity of some of the procedures, the happiness at getting pregnant, the worry of reaching each milestone along the way. Each time followed by moments of immense joy when you get good news. Just a week or 2 ago we had been on cloud nine to see our baby growing with a heartbeat at 8 weeks.

As we waited at the hospital to see the scan we almost ran out. Thinking if we didn’t see it had died we could pretend just a bit longer we were going to have a baby. We had dared to look in baby magazines and shops dreaming of all the wonderful things we need to get for our new arrival. Happiness surging through our veins, it was beautiful. After all we had been waiting years to get to this point. Why not enjoy it! We didn’t run and we waited patiently to be seen, I must just say the hospital was so good! I know the NHS get grief but we were seen so quickly and by such kind informative supportive staff. I think the nurses knew we had lost hope, they said not give up just yet and that a lot of ladies do bleed a lot. The only time Liz has ever bleed is when we have lost babies so we doubted it.

Anyways our names got called and we marched off in almost in tears. The lady who performed the scan said she might be a while taking a look and not to worry if she didn’t say anything for a minute or two. We have heard all this before and was almost zombie like to events around us. Then something amazing happened she said here is your baby wriggling about a bit but it looks perfect complete with heartbeat and snug as a bug! I didn’t really take it in, I had to take a double take. Liz was in tears of joy this time, we didn’t care what the bleed was about at that moment in time our baby was alive! We had sat in that room to devastating news before, this just wasn’t normal. I think for a few hours we sat in total shock at home, the nurses had said they cant really explain the bleeding and it might last a few more days and return on and off.

Its a few days since now and Liz still has some light bleeding but no pain and the nurses say it is just the original bleed running its course. For the moment we are just taking it a day at a time, we don’t have another scan for a couple of weeks and we just want to make that so much. This little baby is already just as much as trouble as our two little guys here already! We are relieved but also so worried again. We had talked during that night about starting all over again on IVF and if we could do it. In that moment we didn’t really think we could. The immense stress of all of it is huge and added to years of fertility struggles is even worse. We would have to move on in our lives with the family we have now. Its not that our two boys are not enough, they are amazing and we are blessed to have them. We  appreciate that fact already. But we had our eldest at 17 years old, we had to bring him up in basic circumstances. We worked our socks off to be the family that we are and after a miscarriage we were blessed with our youngest. Again we were only 20 and as time went on we wanted to have more babies and grow our family as we had matured. We now had the house and financial security to do things how we wanted, not how we had to. It was a case of managing as best we could before, not that we are complaining, those were great times! We don’t want to seem selfish in wanting more children, it is just something we all want to do so much and have done for a long long time. Even every pregnancy has been a struggle, our eldest was very premature and almost died, he had pneumonia and respiratory problems on birth. He was in hospital for a long time after a C section birth and pulled through. Then our youngest was over due and had a few problems. Thank god we had these guys young in our lives or I don’t know what we would do. It was hard at the time but obviously that was the path that had been chosen for us. I just hope this little bubba is also part of our path. I really really really hope this little bubba comes along nicely and without troubles. However in the cold light of day we just want them hear with us. We can look back in a years time and say you know what that was hell but it was all worth it! Because at the end of the day it is

But to everyone out there who is pregnant, struggling to get pregnant, been pregnant, having IVF, miscarried, etc it is horrible at times but also wonderful and we feel both your joy and pain. I hope you all get the lucky breaks we seem to have gotten this time.

Well this is probably the longest most rambled blog I have written hope it might offer others some hope in times of worry. Hopefully the next blog I write will be on a succesful and happy 12 week scan. Liz is currently on enforced bed rest, not by the doctors or hospital but by me and the boys! We are not letting her out of our sight!

Max

Hello!

We found out yesterday we actually had 20 eggs not 19. I am going to have to take responsibility for that as Liz was out of it.

Over the last few days Liz has had some pain from the retrieval but she is doing ok.

We had a phone call from the clinic yesterday morning to say we have 17 fertilised eggs from the 20. 3 are abnormal and will not progress, 4 are of an ok grade and 10 are excellent very good grade. This is so good to have so many viable embies, we were told we can go to blastocycst stage and a day five Monday transfer.

They are going to call Monday morning with an appointment time of probably late afternoon. They are very pleased with how it has gone, all bloods look good for Liz. I think we must have a decent shot from here and if it fails we know it can work for us. After all these years we are so used to things not working it is just good to know that over maybe three cycles we must have a high chance. We both hope so as Christmas might be hard otherwise. But in the same way we can role our sleves up and try again.

I will post how Monday goes and Liz wanted me to say that retrieval is uncomfortable but she really cant remember much about it now.

Fingers crossed the transfer goes well on Monday and we get a growing embie in Liz! Hopefully it will stay and grow! Fingers and toes crossed.

Max

Hello

Well what a day, started with a 2 hour drive from home to the clinic. It normally takes 20 mins but we have such heavy snow. Really really deep, luckily I have a 4×4 pickup truck so we got through.

On top of that our kids schools were shut son we had to sort childcare out as well, thanks. Grandma!

Once we got the clinic the nurses were good as they had difficulty getting to work as well. We were seen on time, Liz had her pre med and did bloods etc. I had to provide a sample which is obviously simple in comparison to what Liz has been through.

We went into the collection room and Liz was sedated quite a bit. She was squashing my hand really hard and it hurt her a lot. She battled through it and we got 15 good size eggs which is very promising of getting to 5 days and blastocyst stage. Liz was pretty out of it for a good while and doesn’t remember to much about the collection. Which is kinda good as i don’t think it was very nice.

Anyway we are so happy with getting so many eggs and we now just hope they get fertilised and grow well. We find out how they have done on Friday morning and get a decision on Saturday or Monday for putting them back. We also hope ton maybe get some good eggs for frosties.

Its been a long hard day and it now looks like we are getting snowed in full stop in Yorkshire. Still we can get on the sledge maybe tomorrow, perhaps not Liz though.

It’s weird to think right now our next child could be developing in a lab somewhere, ivf is both amazing and confusing. But we are grateful it exists and hope it can work for us.

Thanks again to everyone on Twitter.

Max

Hello!

Well Liz has been taking her injections each night. We went for a 2nd scan yesterday and she has 19 follies. They seemed slightly concerned with this number and advised that over stimulation is a possibility. However after some info from all the wonderful people on Twitter we are not so worried. Liz has been drinking tons of water and isotronic drinks to try to help.

Liz had her pregnal last night and we are all set for a retrival first thing in the morning. She has 600mg of pain killers ready from the clinic and her dressing gown, slippers etc. She is nervous about it but excited as well. We hope we get some good size follies and lost of good eggs. We also hope over stim is not an issue, Liz feels fine so we are hopeful it is ok. All been well some healthy fertilized eggs will go back on Saturday or Monday. Then we start another and probably what will feel like the longest wait.

It is good Liz has responded well to the drugs, our problem has always been her blocked tubes so we are really hopeful now. She has a fibroid which is pretty large but apparently should not cause a problem.

I will post on the retrieval tomorrow night and then regular after that, we want a diary to look back on. I need to keep this up to date.

Thanks again to everyone on Twitter and fingers crossed things ok tomorrow. All this snow isn’t helping, it will be a challenge just getting to the clinic I think.

Max

Hello again! Sorry for the delay in getting this out. I have been working so much it has been difficult to get things written down.

Well we are now at the stage of starting of scans, Liz had a trial run to make sure they could put everything back in place after they have done the magic. Apparently that went well!

She has been injecting into her stomach every evening to turn her hormones off etc. It really itches afterwards but she has been coping pretty well. She has had some pretty crazy dreams and been a bit tired but ok so far. She has a scan on Friday to see how the down regulation has gone before starting some injections in her leg along with the stomach ones! These ones are to stimulate things ready for egg retrieval which we think will be in a couple of weeks or so now. Liz is worried about time off work which is tricky, but it is unavoidable so we will work it out. I am kind of lucky as I work for myself,having said that I need to keep my customers happy. But it is all small fry to achieve our goal of a baby!

Liz has had some crazy dreams, some pretty random but some centred around hospitals and babies. Side effect of the stress and drugs I guess. She is taking Buserelin at the moment to down reg. It seems to have a variety of side effects, but the dreams are not so bad.

She has a further scan on the 26th to see how things are going before scans the following week to decide when to retrieve. It is very scary that time is just rushing past. Once we get to the two week wait I bet it will feel like time has stopped.

Anyway I will be posting more frequently from here on in as all the exciting stuff starts to happen. Didn’t have anything exciting to say for a while

Thanks for reading our journey.

Max n Liz

Well we are only a week away from our group meeting, anyone ever had of those? I guess it is more a question and answer session?

We have had all our blood tests and sample tests, all fine so hopefully once we get through next Friday we can look to have a proper attempt in October. I think our IVF consultant plans this for us anyway.

Its a bit like waiting for Christmas at the minute but also we are full of fears and worries about how we would deal with a failed attempt. For the minute we want to stay positive as I think it helps, well I hope so.

Keep hearing all sorts of stories about how it worked first time for this person and hasnt worked in 5 attempts for another. We just so desperatly want it to work

Anyway once we have had this meeting we will post all about it.

Thanks

Max n Liz

Hello and again sorry for the lack of a recent post, purely due to work and the kids been off school. Only 2 weeks of that to go now!

The kids seem to have slowly increased bed time to later and later all through the school holidays, good work by them I must say

We just dont get online enough these days, we are making a concious effort to keep the laptops away and try to spend as much time with these lovely boys during the holidays. Plus we both work so much its just difficult.

Anyway to give a quick update, Liz had her blood test last week so we are another step nearer. We have our group session on the 17th of September and hopefully we can get properly started very soon after that. We were originally told that we could start our 1st run in October time but that might be slightly delayed we are not sure.

Just want to wish everyone out there the very best of luck, we have been trying to keep up with tweets of those currently going through a full IVF cycle. You are in our thoughts and we really hope it goes well

Oh and our eldest son has been totally fine since his faint, that is good news. He has his follow up in October but all looks well so far.

Take it easy everyone and as soon as we really get going with the treatment we will be posting much more regularly.

Cant wait to get going really

Hello again

Sorry for the lack of twitter and posts on here been so busy with work it is unreal. With the kids on school holidays as well it has been near impossible to get a minute to myself.

The good news is our eldest son seems no worse for wear, he has been fine since his faint. He has to wait until mid October for his follow up appointment at the hospital. Speedy NHS! NOT! But we are just please he is ok, we kept him in and off his gadgets for a few days. This made him very moody and I think he was suffering some severe withdrawal symptoms from his Ipod touch and games consoles. Apparently his whole life depends on them we are just a bit nervous about the small screens and fast images until we know what actually happened to him. He doesn’t realise it is all because he has caring loving parents. He just thinks he has bossy parents who don’t understand Guess he is only 6 months from officially been a teenager.

We have Liz’s dad and step mum over from California in a week, that should be fun it has been ages since we saw them.

On the IVF front progress is been made, I had my test results back and everything was fine their. Liz has to have her blood samples in a couple of weeks, then we have a group session mid October before I guess the real fun begins?

Anyway I just wanted to let everyone know we are still blogging/tweeting just maybe a bit less often until these kids go back to school in 22 days, not that I am counting

Max

Well time is ticking until our first IVF appointment, we are both feeling excited and anxious about it all at the same time

We have been thinking of making our first IVF appointment for over 2 years so to finally get here is pretty amazing.

We have to be at the IVF clinic for 6:15pm, not sure how long we will be there?

Max is a big baby and hates neddles so  I am sure he won’t enjoy giving his blood samples. He better not complain though

Hopefully they give us a clear path for our IVF treatment and things move quickly from here onwards.

Please check the forum out and post here or on there, we really want to get some help and feedback with our IVF.

Just a picture to relax me

We now have a live support forum for IVF, please join and post your comments and thoughts.

Max did a lot of work on this so hopefully it works!