Flashback four years, I was engaged to my now husband and working on my BA in Political Science. As most couple do, Tony and I had discussed what we wanted out of life and where we saw ourselves down the road. We both knew we wanted to children, and were excited to start a family together. I figured the ideal plan would be to get married, focus on my career for a year then start trying. After all, I was only 24 at the time so I had plenty of time for babies. Tony and I got married in May of 2015, shortly after I graduated college. It was a beautiful wedding, followed by an awesome honeymoon. Once home however, I decided to shake thing up and throw the pills out the window! Yup, no more "plan", I went with the "lets see what happens" method, and boy did a lot happen. The first month I ended up getting a rather large and painful ovarian cyst. The doctor said this wouldn't prevent me from getting pregnant, but they did need to monitor it to make sure it shrank. Over the next few months I had countess appointments and that annoying cyst wasn't going anywhere. Finally I was given the option to restart birth control, or have it surgically removed. I gave it another 6 weeks and ultimately decided on surgery. I was referred to a fertility doctor that specialized in robotics, providing a less invasive procedure. The surgery was outpatient and went great! They were able to successfully remove the cyst, laser out the endometriosis they found and flush my tubes. I was cleared to start trying on my next cycle, and was so excited!
My surgery was in November and when December rolled around I found myself looking at a positive pregnancy test! Woohoo! I immediately called the doctor and went in for a blood draw. My numbers came back on the lower side, but indicated a definite positive :) Since the numbers were low though, they did a second blood test the following week to make sure they were increasing. The next day I received the results and unfortunately they had remained the same. The nurse informed me that this was an indication of a biochemical pregnancy, and I would most likely start my period within a week. I was devastated. To be so excited at the possibility then be immediately disappointed was a lot to take in. I cried, a lot. It took a little time, but I soon came to terms with everything. I convinced myself that it was all part of a bigger plan, and I knew it could always be worse. I was determined to keep trying & decided to give fertility treatments a try. The first month I started on a pill similar to clomid (I can't remember the exact name), then gave myself a trigger shot. We had the choice to do insemination, but ultimately decided against it for personal reasons. After taking the pills I experienced terrible side effects due to the hormones. I was having night sweats soaking through my clothing and sheets, crying at the drop of a hat, migraines, and body aches. It was horrible. On top of all that, it didn't work. We did two rounds of this and after the second round failed I told Tony that I needed a break. He agreed. Our one year anniversary was coming up, so I thought it would be fun to take a road trip to celebrate. We started planning an extended weekend to New Orleans and I was really looking forward to it. Also, one of my good friends had a fun weekend in Nashville planned for her bachelorette! It was going to be an eventful next few months to say the least!
After coming off the clomid I started to feeling like myself again. A month or so passed and before I knew it, that time of month had approached. At this point I was a master at keeping track of my cycle so I patiently waited day after day. soon it was day 28 and still nothing, not even a cramp. The next morning I thought what the hell, so I took a test while Tony was sleeping. It was a faint positive. Instead of waking Tony up, I went off to work. Trying not to get too excited, I took another one. Positive. I immediately text and called Tony, sent him pictures, and told him excitedly that we were in fact pregnant! I don't think he believed me at first but he was soon convinced. I went to the doctor the following week and my numbers came back much higher! Soon we had our first ultrasound and saw the little spec that is now our baby girl Ariana :)
After coming off the clomid I started to feeling like myself again. A month or so passed and before I knew it, that time of month had approached. At this point I was a master at keeping track of my cycle so I patiently waited day after day. soon it was day 28 and still nothing, not even a cramp. The next morning I thought what the hell, so I took a test while Tony was sleeping. It was a faint positive. Instead of waking Tony up, I went off to work. Trying not to get too excited, I took another one. Positive. I immediately text and called Tony, sent him pictures, and told him excitedly that we were in fact pregnant! I don't think he believed me at first but he was soon convinced. I went to the doctor the following week and my numbers came back much higher! Soon we had our first ultrasound and saw the little spec that is now our baby girl Ariana :)
The whole process took about 11 months. Though it isn't common to try treatments that quickly, I think because of my surgery and the fact my surgeon specialized in fertility, there was an exception. I know women that go through far worse and my heart goes out to them 100%. I truly believe that once you make the decision to have a child, no matter how long it takes, it is very difficult to not see results right away. Now with saying that, I look back and know everything happened for a reason. The end result is more than I could ever hope for.
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