US

Me

It is a relief to know that I will never need to put my body through the rigors of IVF ever again.  9 years of trying to have a baby, 20 IVF cycles and 9 surgeries, I am exhausted.

I am very sad that I will never know what it feels like to be pregnant, to carry and nurture my baby through to birth. I am sad that I will never see my sister, my mother or my Nan in my children.

But I do know that if I am lucky enough to have children to call my own, then these things won’t matter at all.

Foo

This is not only my story; it is Foo’s story too. I am hoping that he will have something to say on here as I have been doing all the storytelling. Until then, there are some things I need to tell you about him. Foo is the most amazing, supportive, husband I could have wished for. We could not have continued on this journey for so long if it wasn’t for his patient easy going attitude.  He is my strength, my humour, my love, my friend. Thank you Fooey xx

The Finale

Dr Bowman phoned to tell us we had reached the end of the line in our Fertility treatment. We cannot make quality embryos most likely because of my eggs. Therefore we did not qualify for surrogacy. In most cases like this he would recommend trying with donor eggs but because we had already done this and were unsuccessful he would only be prepared to try once more using donor eggs.

It had been almost 2 years since Rach first donated her eggs to us. She couldn’t wait to jump in and do whatever we needed her to do. Looking back now at what she went through she possibly would have hesitated just a little bit before saying yes.

The logistics of organising a donor egg IVF cycle can be quite involved let alone when your egg donor lives in WA, your clinic is in Sydney and you live in Tassie.

Rach probably remembers this cycle more vividly than I do. The regime was a little different to last time and what could go wrong, did.

 Firstly, the medications get lost in transit. Then Rach’s bloods end up in Darwin, and then apparently they are lost, so she has to go for more tests. At this point we were liaising with several different nurses at the clinic and getting mixed messages.

The day Rach had to fly out was a disaster for her. She lives over an hour from the airport and was to have a scan and a blood test in the city before she left.

 Lesson learned: never organise anything the morning of your flight.

The next sequence of events goes something like this:

• Caught in heavy traffic on the way to the city
• Arrive late for scan
• No sonographer working today ( nurses forgot )
• Flight time looming
• Go to another clinic
• Can’t find reception
• Nearly twists ankle running around the hospital!
• Panic about missing flight
• Scan and bloods done
• Car crashes into Rach as she is leaving car park
• Cutting it fine, but makes it in time for her flight

Sounds stressful huh? Then try adding in IVF medication. I felt so bad for Rach. It was such a relief when we all arrived in Sydney. We had such a great time and Rach was such a trooper. I could feel her nerves before the egg collection (without sedation) like they were my own.

We all had such a great time, Mum and Madi joined us for that last part of the trip. Things were looking really good. We ended up with 3 Grade A Blastocysts (5 Day old Embryos) and we transferred two. This was the first time we had transferred such strong embryos and we were all feeling very positive.  Thanks to Rach, we had the best possible chance of pregnancy we were ever going to have.

“Dear Rach

Foo and I will be forever grateful to you for the hope and support you have given us.

You are an amazing person and deserve so much good in your life.

I am sorry for both of us that we haven’t been able to make it happen.

We can never tell you how much what you did for us means. You gave us hope when we didn’t have any. You will always be so special to us and we will never forget how much you tried for us.

Thank you with all our heart.

We love you very much.

Love Ange xxxxxx”

Cold hard facts

 Sydney IVF like to keep you awake during the procedures, Not very appealing after spending the last 8 years sedated throughout my procedures. I was just a little nervous about my endometrial biopsy but much more nervous about flying to Sydney to have it done. My darling Nan came along to hold my hand, I could not have survived this journey without my beautiful family and friends. I was armed with My Nan and a little bit of chemical help thanks to my GP , a special friend of mine highly recommends everyone have a stash of valium in their handbag for emergencies, I tend to agree!

Endometrial Biopsy- now if you are googling this because you are about to have this procedure- cold hard facts….It hurts like hell but it is over in a flash.

Thanks Nan for looking after me xx.

The Biopsy results came back clear so we were good to go ahead with our treatment plan.

The lead up to this cycle was a little more stressful, I felt like we had so much more riding on the treatment. A little visit to my lovely counsellor to clear my head and prepare myself was all I needed to pluck up the positivity and get started. We had reduced my medication so physically I felt a lot better than usual. Thank you to Aunty Louie for escorting me on the flight to Sydney and of course the shopping time.

Egg Collection – now if you are googling because you are about to have this procedure done without sedation-cold hard facts….uncomfortable but not painful.

The anxiety I had about having this done without sedation was enough to keep me awake for a few nights before the procedure, I was so tired that I nearly fell asleep during the procedure.

7 eggs, impressive, we were very excited.

0 fertilization. We were devastated.

We got the next flight out the following morning.

Dr Bowman

I had been feeling like we were nearing the end of the road on our IVF journey, but we needed to be sure that we had exhausted every avenue before calling it quits. Or maybe I just needed someone to tell me that enough was enough. We had heard that Sydney IVF was the Rolls Royce of fertility clinics, so we made an appointment with the managing director Dr Mark Bowman, just to get one last opinion.

We made our appointments, booked a lovely hotel overlooking the Opera House and were accompanied by Mum and Aunty Louie. We had a fabulous couple of days.

If you have ever watched an Australian program about infertility it is likely that you have come across Dr Bowman. He is a lovely, compassionate man who tells it like it is.

 We had 3 questions for him:

1. Are there any tests we haven’t had done that we should?
2. Do we qualify for surrogacy?
3. Is it likely we will ever get pregnant?

He had 3 answers for us:

1. Yes, we can do an endometrial biopsy (sounds like fun L) to check for disorders of your uterine lining.
2. No, multiple IVF failure does not qualify us for surrogacy, I would need to have either no uterus or a medical condition that could be fatal if I was to fall pregnant.  The process could take up to 2 years and he would not be prepared to put us up before the ethics board at this stage.
3. He promised to give us an answer within 12 months.

 Dr Bowman was keen to establish as best he could if it was my eggs or my uterus compromising our ability to conceive.  His plan was to grow our embryos to blastocyst stage (approximately 5 days old) and hopefully have something to transfer. If we successfully transfer healthy looking blastocysts several times with no pregnancy then it becomes obvious that our problem is my uterus.

In most cases fertility issues arise from poor egg or sperm quality, It is quite unusual for the problems to lie with the uterus and rare for the problems to be caused by both.

If we have an egg issue then surrogacy will not help us. If we have a uterine issue we may be able to look further into surrogacy. My amazing sister was still sitting on the sidelines waiting to do whatever she could to help us.

I was feeling a mix of emotions as we left Sydney, relieved and overwhelmed, so much so that I had a fully fledged panic attack on the plane back to Launceston.

My Sister's Gift

Our first donor cycle with Rach was a wonderful family experience and one I will treasure forever. A donor cycle takes a lot more co-ordination than a normal IVF cycle so Rach began her medications in Western Australia before coming to Tassie. Injections and giving blood were not her favourite things to do, let alone having to administer them to herself. She did it with no fuss at all. Rach took it all in her stride and never once made me feel guilty. She truly is an amazing person and a wonderful sister.

Mum and Madi joined us on our road trip to Hobart, we had a fabulous time ( I can say that because I wasn’t the one having a big needle in my yoo hoo!)

Have you ever had one of those moments that will stand still in time and you will never forget where you were and what you were doing at the time? …..I can think of a few….The Port Arthur Massacre, The death of Princess Diana, The World Trade Centre attack, The Bali Bombings, The death of Michael Jackson ( R.I.P MJ x).

Another time that will stand still for me forever and I am sure Mum and Rach feel the same, was receiving the result of this cycle.

We were racing against the clock to get to pathology before they closed for the weekend, otherwise we were going to have to wait until Monday…..We were not going to let that happen!

The phone rang unexpectedly as we were travelling over the Don bridge heading to Devonport. We were not pregnant.

I was so sad for us and especially sad for Rach as I know just how much she wanted to help us.

We love you Rach xx