“It’s funny, growing up you’re always told how ‘easy’ it is to get pregnant.
It only takes one time! Heck, people get pregnant on birth control!
You never imagine when you’re dreaming of starting your family that it’s not going to happen for you. But it happens. 1/8 woman struggle with infertility, but you never think that you will be one of them.
May 17, 2015, Our Wedding day. We decided that we were ready to start our family, we were going to have a baby! A few months go by and I start to get anxious and impatient. We were doing EVERYTHING possible! Calculating ovulation, taking supplements, eating pineapple core anything that might help… praying! But it didn’t happen. Month after month, a roller coaster! The hope, then the letdown. Spending so much money on pregnancy tests! Straining my eyes in hopes to see the faintest of a second line! But it’s never there, month after month. Until it is!
Finally, I hurry up and call Ben to excitedly share the news even though I had been planning secret ways to surprise him for a year, I just can’t wait another second! Everything is great, pure bliss!
Until it isn’t…. I wipe and there it is, a streak of blood. Oh God, No. Please! My stomach hits the floor.
I hurry up and call Ben, he says ‘Keep calm, babe. I’m sure everything is fine.’ All the meanwhile I can hear the panic in his voice.
That waiting room… the beige carpet, the brick wall, the baby registry magazines. The blood test, the urine test, the exam, the ultrasound, the internal ultrasound… ‘It appears you are having a miscarriage, there is nothing we can do to prevent this, go home and rest.’ I look over at Ben and the look on his face breaks me. He’s trying to be strong for me, but I see it in his eyes. I hate needles but the following week I go in every other day to get a blood draw to make sure my HCG is decreasing like it’s supposed to, but it isn’t… There it is, that stupid little glimmer of hope.
But then the stabbing pain begins, and it doubles me over in pain, holy hell that pain was unbearable. I didn’t want to, but I woke up Ben at 3am to take me to the emergency room because I’m panicking, hyperventilating. Here we go again, the blood test, the urine test, the exam, the ultrasound, the internal ultrasound. ‘it appears your having a miscarriage, there is nothing we can do to prevent this, go home and rest, take some Tylenol for the pain.’ but a few days later and the pain is worse, unbearable. Ben was at work, so I called my mom to drive me to the emergency room. By now, you know the test drill…
The next day my Dr. wants to do another eval, I can hear the annoyance in his voice as he talks to me again about miscarriages but wait… ‘it’s been a week and your bleeding is worse?’ ‘Your pain is worse?’ So, he rushes me off to an emergency surgery where he finally realizes that I’m 8 weeks pregnant, but the baby was growing in my fallopian tube and it ruptured, just a few more hours and I would have bled out internally. A few more hours and I would have lost my life.
A few months later and we decide we’re ready to try again, as ready as we can be. 7 months go by, is that a line? Retest, oh yeah that’s definitely a line. I excitedly call Ben because finally! Our rainbow baby! My Dr. gets me in right away for tests to monitor and make sure it’s not another ectopic, it’s not… ‘I’m so sorry, it appears you’re having a miscarriage, there is nothing we can do to prevent this, go home and rest.’ This time, I did my best not to look at Ben. I can’t handle that look on his face again. It’s not fair! God, why?! Please…
A few months later we hit the two-year mark. Together we decide that maybe it’s time to see a specialist, more tests. But now because my right fallopian tube is gone, our chances of getting pregnant are cut in half. And since I’m not ovulating from the side that my remaining fallopian tube is on, that makes it even harder. So, our specialist puts me on a medication called clomid, which we do for three cycles with no success. The trigger shots sit on the counter waiting for me, waiting to be used but it never happens. A constant reminder.
We decide to take a break, everything is too much right now. I checked out emotionally. I quit my job, because I just can’t anymore. I spend every minute of every day on the internet searching for tricks on ovulating and getting pregnant! Nothing made me happy, I don’t find it cute when Ben does those things that always used to make me laugh. I don’t want to hang out with my friends anymore because small talk is something I have somehow forgot how to do. I’m bitter, I’m hollow, I’m anxious, and I’m depressed. That’s what the doctor said when I told him how detached from myself, I felt. No one understood, I was ruining all of the important relationships in my life because I DIDN’T CARE. I didn’t care about anything. I felt like a hollow shell. I was spiraling out of control. I snapped at everyone for everything and I couldn’t make it stop. In the meantime, we lost two more babies.
Year three. We start to come to the realization that we may never have a biological child. I may never get to feel pregnancy. But damnit, isn’t it a rite of passage for women? As a woman shouldn’t I be able to carry a child, feel it kick, name it, love it. But by now, we’ve lost another baby. That’s five, five times I have felt the excitement of a positive pregnancy test and the hope of maybe this is the one. Five times of hearing those dreaded words that the baby is gone. Five times of shattered dreams.
A couple of months shy of four years since we started trying to build our family and everything is great. We are now foster parents, we are parents. And we are finally able to give our love to a child. I am on an antidepressant that makes me feel human again. I finally feel like myself for the first time in a very long time. My heart is so full with the love I have for the precious children God has placed in our home.
But then I realize that I’m late. No way we’re not even trying… but there it is. A positive test, clear as day. The word Pregnant. Again.
It feels right! This is so unexpected; this has got to be it! The sweet babe that we get to meet one day! So as usual, my doctor gets me in to start my tests. And the news is good! My HCG numbers are high and rising! We don’t normally allow ourselves to get this hopeful, but we are there! So hopeful, dreaming of names and pregnancy announcements! But then, that all too familiar sharp pain. Full panic mode sets in as I think about the last time, I had this pain and how close I was to not being on this earth anymore. So, I rush myself to the emergency room.
Here we go again, the blood test, the urine test, the exam, the ultrasound, the internal ultrasound, ‘ We don’t see anything in your fallopian tube but it appears your having a miscarriage, there is nothing we can do to prevent this, go home and rest, take some Tylenol for the pain.’ This is all too familiar.
So, life goes on, we continue with our daily responsibilities waiting… Every time I go to the bathroom is torture. Waiting for it to begin. Waiting for the miscarriage to start. Waiting to lose my baby. Finally, after a week, there it is. The streak of blood I have dreaded but welcome so this can finally be over. This time, the pain is unimaginable. None of the other miscarriages have been so painful, as I pass what would have been. I spent that entire evening loaded up on Norco, but it never touched the pain. The only bit of relief was soaking in our tub filled with scolding hot water.
This damn waiting room! I’m so sick of it! I hate this carpet; I hate the brick walls and I hate the damn baby registry magazines. I have a new doctor this time… she says that my remaining fallopian tube is acidic. The acidity is killing my sweet babies. She says, without IVF we most likely will never have a viable pregnancy. NEVER. HAVE. A. VIABLE. PREGNANCY.
We stop trying because it’s exhausting mentally and physically. I’m drained. But then I’m late. I call the Dr. Who tells me to come in right away to start the tests. One and a half weeks later as I’m driving to my Dr. Apt, I got a pain that was unlike any other. A pain that no matter what I did would not alleviate. So, my Dr. Tells me to go to the emergency room.
Here we freaking go again and I just can’t. ‘I’m so sorry, it appears you’re having a miscarriage, there is nothing we can do to prevent this, go home and rest.’ Ok.
They gave me some pain meds and sent me on my way. At this point I’m numb. Ben is at work, so I ask my grandma to come watch the kids while I sleep the pain meds off. I doze in and out all day. Waking up only to puke and then have an intense feeling of passing out. I would call my grandma in to hold my hand and make sure I wasn’t dying. That happened probably 8-10 times throughout the day. But when I try to get up to go to the bathroom, I can’t. I can’t move without the intense wave of passing out coming over me. I call Ben and tell him to come home and take me to the emergency room, but he can’t get me out of bed. I can’t stand up without blacking out. So, he called an ambulance.
Out of all of our losses, this one was the most terrifying because I thought I was going to die. The ER Dr. does an ultrasound on my abdomen and sees it’s filled with blood and rushes me straight into emergency surgery. I remember trying to stay strong for Ben and my family but when I got to that bright, white room again I panicked and I grabbed the nurses hand and begged her not to let me die as I drifted off my sweet Dr. Patting my arm to calm me. When I woke up, they told me I was lucky to be alive with the amount of blood I had lost. I was literally bleeding out inside my own body. Another ectopic pregnancy. Another lost baby. My remaining Fallopian tube gone and with that my last chance of conceiving without IVF.
Ben is so strong for me; he is so sweet to me. Why? I’m the one killing his babies. Killing his dreams. But he has been so supportive through all of this. He has been the rock to lean on, every time. He has never made me feel less then. Broken. (The way I feel inside.) He is a gift sent straight from God. Did you know we met in church 7 1/2 years ago? God literally brought us together….
Anyways, life goes on. Our first foster love goes home, and we are left with two amazing boys. A little, chubby, curly, white haired little boy and his beautiful red headed big brother. We got them when they were 1 and 2 years old and at this time, they were 3 and 4. They fulfilled us and completed our lives. Then we were asked to adopt big brother. (Different dads which hindered us from also adopting baby boy.)
Let me tell you about this boy, the boy that the Lord hand-picked for us. He has gorgeous auburn hair (just like Ben’s side of the family) and he has beautiful blue/green eyes just like me. He is so kind and caring. He is so calm and chill. (Like Ben.) but also very outspoken and social. (Like me.) He is the perfect mix of the two of us.
September 22, 2015, I laid in bed recovering emotionally and physically from the exhausting week of losing my baby and Fallopian tube. September 27, 2015 my sweet boy was born. This is no coincidence. God hand chose this boy for us I have no doubt in my mind.
May 29, 2019, we adopted our gift from God. Drayten Bruce.
Bear with me, I’m almost done. But I need to talk about God for a minute, and how I failed him. How I lost my way from him through our journey. And how I found my way back. Every time I walked past the baby aisle or saw another pregnancy announcement on Facebook. Every time I saw some pregnant woman smoking a cigarette, or heard about another baby being born drug addicted… I questioned how in the world he could be giving all of these women these babies and they can’t even take care of them? We can… It’s not fair, why would he give me this longing to be a mother if he wasn’t going to allow me to be a mother but friends, he knew what he was doing! The whole time, I just didn’t see it.
‘He gives the childless woman a family, making her a happy Mother. Praise the Lord.’ Psalms 113:9
I stumbled across this saying and it hit me like a semi-truck. ‘We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.’ all along God was trying to give us signs. We just ignored them. He chose us, he set us aside to be parents. He gave us this longing and this love so we could love his children. The motherless child.
We have decided that we are done trying to have a biological child. We don’t need our child to biologically ours to love and cherish them. We are not going to pursue IVF. God has given us a child to be ours forever. And we will love and cherish this sweet boy for the rest of our lives.
And if you are 1/8 struggling with Infertility and reading this, you are not alone. And there is light at the end of the tunnel! It may not be the path you’ve chosen for yourself, but God will show you a path to parenthood!”
**This story was written by Kyla Throckmorton. Used with permission. See more from Kyla on her Instagram page.
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