Nine months.
Nine months of trying and failing.
Nine months of waking up, taking my temperature and recording it, peeing on a stick, and lining them up to determine a pattern.
Nine months of trial and error with anything I read that could possibly be causing us to fail: switching to glass products instead of plastic, giving up caffeine, alcohol, dairy and gluten, eliminating Claritin, switching to only organic foods and grass fed meat, starting acupuncture and Chinese herbs.
Nine months of observing others Facebook pregnancy announcements and gender reveals (most of which started trying after us-I am happy for them, but it is a constant reminder of our loss and unanswered prayers.)
What is wrong? Why can’t my body do the one thing, the most feminine basic task that all women were created to do? I waited for a sign that never came.
While I do know that it can take healthy couples up to one year to conceive, I know in my gut that something is wrong with me. I have now had 2 early miscarriages (one from a previous life that I won’t mention again), and a gut feeling that something was not right. I felt it for months and yet I blindly followed my Gyno’s advice to keep trying because “we are young”, “it’s totally normal”, “keep trying”. It was around this time that I could no longer continue riding the bus of my life that someone else was driving. I had to advocate and listen to my instincts. The morning of my appointment I had a positive home pregnancy test. I was hesitant because I needed it to be confirmed by a doctor before I got excited. The nurse had me give a urine sample and reported to me that it was negative.
My gyno entered the room, hugged me, offered up a “congrats” and told me not to worry because the urine tests are not always accurate and I should go get a blood test. Tears rolled down my cheeks because I knew that this could not be real. In the event that I was right, I wanted to solidify our “plan B”. I told her that a visit with her every 3 months was not working for me and I needed to move forward with testing. She obliged, although I know that she felt it wasn’t needed yet.
The HcG blood test (beta) came back negative. So…this was either a false positive pregnancy test, or a biochemical pregnancy (early miscarriage). Either way, it feels like another loss, and messes with your emotions. My cycle started 2 days later and I had to get blood work done on days 3 and 21 of that cycle, as well as an HSG test. The timing of all of this was a struggle for me because it coincided with both mothers day and the date that I would have delivered our honeymoon baby. I can’t help but think about what could have been.
“I don’t know what this is or what it isn’t
But it feels like we’ve got unfinished business
Cause we left blood on the tracks
Sweat on the saddle
Fire in the hills
A bullet in the barrel
Words never said in a story that didn’t end
Looks like you’re on the mend and I’m on the bottle
We folded our hands with money on the table
Tried moving on but I keep coming back again
To what could’ve been…”
What Could’ve Been by Gone West
breakdown and rally 