Hi I’m Brooke and I’m infertile.
Flashback nearly 5 years ago when I experienced my first miscarriage. My fiancé (now husband) and I purchased our first home and not long after I found out I was pregnant. I’m going to jump around a bit here just to give you a little more information about me. I was diagnosed with type one diabetes at 18 months, whenever I tell a new doctor that they just cannot believe how young I was when I was diagnosed. So, before I found out I was pregnant I wasn’t feeling well in the middle of the night and I thought it was diabetes related, I’ve been hospitalized due to DKA a few times in my lifetime so I’m no stranger to the hospital and the symptoms. I go to the hospital and this was around March 2015. They hook me up to IV and ask a bunch of questions, finally a nurse blurts “YOURE PREGNANT” …what?… my cycles were completely irregular and I just didn’t expect that to come out of her mouth. I found out I was 8 weeks along. They release me and I go to work the next day, a few days go by and then bam, blood. I called my doctor and they said “as long as it doesn’t progress you should be fine” oh it progressed. By the end of the work day it was bad. I miscarried my baby later that night. I cannot even put into words how that entire night made me feel. I remember it like it was yesterday. Our house was a mess because we were still moving in, things were torn apart. It was just awful. A few weeks had gone by and my doctor was just making sure my HCG was going down and it finally did.
Fast forward to 2017. October 1 2017 I became Mrs. Brooke Stoner. It’s now close to the holidays and I told my husband “we’re having sex everyday until I get pregnant” of course he didn’t argue that😜 we had friends over for Friendsgiving and my best friend told me she was pregnant, I was thrilled, a new baby to the mix. But of course I thought to myself “when will it be my turn” we hadn’t been trying for long but when you’re trying, it just feels like a life time. That Sunday morning we were lying in bed and our English bulldog was extremely cuddly, much more cuddlier than normal so my husband said “take a pregnancy test” POSITIVE. I was in shock. I walked over and said “what does this say?” It was everything we hoped for. We got to surprise my parents for Hanukkah by telling them I was pregnant. I remember telling my best friend “someone else is pregnant too” and we were so excited to having babies so close together. Everything was falling into place. New Years came and I just felt off. My first ultrasound was coming up and my mom went with me. As soon as she told me to empty my bladder and used an internal ultrasound I knew something wasn’t right and boy was I right. “No heart beat” I’ve never cried so hard in my entire life. Another miscarriage? But why? Why does this keep happening? I rushed to my OBGYN and my options were 1. Let it pass naturally or 2. D&C. I chose to do a D&C, I needed this to be done ASAP. A few days later it was done and they even tested my baby, everything was normal, a normal babygirl. Until this day my heart hurts saying it. Not long after I was diagnosed with PCOS. Months went by with trying to convenience with letrozole and times intercourse with no results. We decided it was time to see a specialist. 27, diabetic, hypothyroidism, PCOS and infertile.
I go and see an RE, months go by with continue letrozole and nothing is happening, I ended up switching to a different clinic. At this new one we did three rounds of IUI, with one I did get pregnant but it was a bio chemical pregnancy. I then decided so much time is wasted. I am 100% out of pocket. I need another perspective on all of this. I’m now 29, with another new RE and that’s who I see now. I told him my history, my story and everything else. He said “as much as I’d like to try different things you’ve been at this for years now and I know you just want to have a baby” so he agreed to IVF. May 17, 2020 was my egg retrieval. They predicted I’d hyper stimulate and I did. I was so uncomfortable, so miserable but when the nurse asked me how I’m feeling I said “thankful” and she looked at me and said that’s amazing. 20 eggs were retrieved, 11 fertilized and 10 made it to freeze. I had many more obstacles after my egg retrieval. After one of my sonohystagrams they found scar tissue in my uterus, had surgery to remove it a few weeks later did a repeat sono, scar tissue was still there. What. A. Nightmare. The doctor put me on medication to bring on my cycle to see if that would clear me out, thankfully it did.
September 25, 2020 FET number 1. My best grades embryo. We were so excited. So hopeful, but geeze the TWW is awful! Unfortunately it was negative. We chose to take a few months off to relax, recoup, heal and just take time off. Fast forward to January 13, 2021 FET number 2, which resulted in a positive pregnancy.
Everything was going well, my beta was over 2000 right around 5 weeks. The night before I went in for my first ultrasound I was sitting on my couch and I just had a weird feeling and then it felt like I peed and I knew I just knew things were taking a turn. I called my doctor and he told me not to be concerned until I come in the next day. For the next few hours it was a nightmare. I went in for my ultrasound and there was a sac, I went back and spoke to the nurse and then my doctor walked in and I just started to break down. I told him that I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop. He told me that everything looked fine from the ultrasound but we just have to wait until my beta comes back. Waiting for those results felt like an eternity. Finally the nurse called me that evening and told me that my numbers didn’t increase enough.
IVF is hard. I give so much credit to anyone that has to go through all of this. Another loss, another round of starting over again. Most days I do my very best to remain hopeful but I won’t lie there are days I wonder if I’ll ever have my own baby.
I have so many mixed emotions. Mostly disappointed that my body failed. Angry that I had another miscarriage. And sad, gosh I can be driving somewhere and I just burst into tears for no reason. Some days are better than others.
This is hard. It‘s emotional. And it’s frustrating. But I will say this, I’m always thankful to have the opportunity to try and to keep trying.
We’re all warriors. 🍍
I’m now 30 but I’m hopeful. I’m hopeful for this transfer. So far everything has gone well. I’m also hopeful for the future, whatever that may be.
My Journey through Infertility 