Mase and I had been married for almost 4.5 years, and pretty early on, I had a very strong feeling that we would have a difficult time trying to conceive. After 5 months of marriage, we decided I would stop birth control and see if I would get pregnant. But, my heart and gut knew nothing was going to happen. After 1.5 years of trying naturally, I decided to go talk to a doctor. Through ultrasound and blood work, it was determined I had polycystic ovaries and a hormonal imbalance that effected ovulation. The doctor was awful, gave me zero hope, wrote a prescription for 1 year of Clomid refills, and sent me out the door. He did zero monitoring during the Clomid cycles. I educated myself and realized how dangerous that was and discontinued the Clomid after two months. Feeling discouraged and insecure about going back to a doctor, we continued trying naturally for 8 months. Nothing. I tried acupuncture and herbs for 6 months with weekly appointments. It definitely helped regulate my cycles but I was still not ovulating regularly which makes it impossible to conceive.
During these 3 years, my husband and I kept it very private. It wasn’t until we hit 2.5 years that we let my immediate family know as well as 4 of our closest friends. They were all sworn to secrecy. Infertility made me feel broken, insecure and there was no way I was going to let others know of my “down falls”.
Finally, April 2016, we decided to step out of the “infertility closet”, as we called it. This is when we hit 3 years of trying to conceive and thought National Infertility Awareness Week would be the perfect time to break our silence. We were overwhelmed with the amount of support and love. From there we learned about an amazing doctor in Arizona (we live in California) and decided to suck it up and see a specialist. Immediately, we felt at ease in his care. We immediately started oral medication and monitoring appointments for our first IUI. I felt great finally having hope again and moving forward with treatment. Unfortunately, our IUI cycle failed. We are 100% out of pocket paying for all tests and treatment. So, we had to take a few months break to save up for IVF.
We cycled one round of IVF while traveling back and forth between home in CA and our clinic in Arizona. Through that cycle, we collected 13 eggs, 11 were mature, 9 fertilized, and 5 made it to freeze.
After the retrieval, we traveled back home to CA to wait out a cycle and let my body recover. Then, it was time for FET (frozen embryo transfer) preparation. But, I had some tricks up my sleeve. I wasn’t about to let infertility steal the fun of trying to conceive/growing our family. So, while my husband knew of my trips for my monitoring appts, he didn’t know that I had a transfer date set. I may have tricked him and told him he needed to come to one of the appts to sign consent forms to move forward with the transfer. Once we arrived in Arizona at our hotel, I was able to surprise him with the real reason we were both there…The next day was actually our transfer day and we were finally bringing home two of our precious embryos! He was so surprised as it was SO worth keeping it a little secret. The transfer went smooth. 5 days later, I couldn’t take the anticipation any longer and decided to take a home pregnancy test. To our surprise, it was POSITIVE! Our first positive in almost 5 years of infertility. Lots of happy tears that night.
BETAs came back perfect and off to our first ultrasound. We saw two beautiful little babies. We were overjoyed and shocked! Unfortunately, at our 7 week ultrasound, we learned that baby B had stopped growing. We battled the war between being heartbroken for the baby we had lost and being so happy for the baby we were still carrying. A battle I don’t wish on anyone.
Today, I am happy to report that little Knox was born on April 3, 2018.
Infertility is a battle that is only for the toughest of tough. And at times, feels never ending. But I’m here to be a testimony to you that God is good…even when things suck. That prayers get answered. That miracles happen. That YOU will experience the fullest joy that will replace all of the heartache that we’ve all endured. Do not give up. Keep fighting that fight because your precious miracle is also fighting just as hard to join your family. Xoxo
You can find Tara here:
Instagram: @tara_ua_xoxo
