As long as I can remember I have always dreamed of being a mom. I can remember being 14 years old and planing my life. I had it all down, graduate high school at 18, graduate university at 22, work for two years and get married in that two years and then at the age of 24 have my first baby. The year would have been 2000, and at the age of 14 I thought that would be cool. As I grew older and smarter I realized that my goals were a bit too ambitious. After multiple failed relationships I threw myself into my career. The next thing I know I'm in my 30's, still single, working 70 hour weeks, and still no baby. My career had brought me 2000 kms from home, working in a big city and commuting most of my day. Nothing was going as I had planned so I made the big move back home. Sold my condo moved in with my parents while I house hunted and luckily I was able to transfer with my job. So now I'm home again, still working more then ever but I'm happier. I think for the first time in years I felt open to finding love and settling down.
It didn't take long to get my life back on that track I planned when I was 14 years old, I met my now husband at my new work location and within a few months we were dating. I decided to buy into a new executive townhouse development and 10 months later when the house was ready we moved in together. Neither of us really dreamed of getting married although we both wanted to be married. We figured eventually we would elope Vegas style, which we did a couple years later. We decided to start trying to conceive about 10 months after moving in. At first that just meant me coming off the pill. We figured that would do it...... Nope! And then came the ovulation tests, surely that would do it..... Nope! After many discussions with my doctor and following her instructions month after month I started to realize there must be a problem. I could count on one hand the amount of times I have been sick in my life so I just always assumed getting pregnant would be easy for me. My doctor sent me for tests and instructed my husband get tested by his doctor. Mine came back fine, he delayed in getting his done. And then all of the sudden I lost my job.
I had given 12 years of my life to that company and now here I am jobless. I was more panicked about the fact that we were trying to have a baby then I was about the fact that I lost my job. All I could think about was that I was 34 years old and my time clock was ticking. After many tears I finally got myself together and pounded the internet pavement. It took several months to get a new job and when I finally did it came with a one year probation period, Doh! Again my baby making plans need to wait, I couldn't bear the thought of walking into my new bosses office and saying I'm pregnant before I became permanent.
So nine months pass, my husband finally goes for his tests and we start trying again. His doctor says his are normal too. I convince myself that our past failure was from the stress of my old job, and now I am beyond happy in my new job and working half as many hours. Surely we will have success now.... Nope! I return to my doctor and tell her that we have never stopped trying, a little white lie as I know she won't refer me to a fertility clinic unless we have been trying over a year. She refers me immediately to the one and only assisted reproductive therapies (ART) clinic in my province. Luckily I was able to get an appointment about a month later.
Going to my appointment I expected they would say our issue was unknown infertility and prescribe some sort of fertility drugs for me. Instead I was hit in the face with a brick wall, figuratively speaking. She sits down and say "So you have a male factor problem" What?! She said it like I should have known that already. I responded by saying not that I was aware of, my husbands test came back normal. She hesitates opens my file and says "No I am looking at the correct file these aren't normal" WTF! Okay so now what??? "Your best option is IVF" she says and hands me a package. What?! This is not what I expected, I thought she'd give me some chlomid and in a month I'd be pregnant. The meeting was short and to the point she left and here I was sitting with a package. I was so blown away that I just left and returned to work. After a few hours of letting it sink in I decided I need to know what the next step is. So I call the clinic and ask. They tell me to attend their IVF information session.
Really for me there wasn't a question as to whether we would do IVF it was how soon can we start. So began the testing, and more testing, and further testing. Everything came back good until my hysterosonogram. They find cysts in both of my ovaries, not on them in them. Bam! Another brick wall in the face. They said I needed an MRI so they could get a better picture of what they were seeing. And of course months go by and I wait and wait for my MRI. As I watched each month pass that I could have been starting my heart would break. Finally my day comes which happens to be day 20 of my cycle. I call my clinic and ask if my results are good could I start the next day as it is my day 21 and that's when the meds start in an IVF cycle. "Sure" the nurse says!! And I am on cloud 9, nervous but excited. I go to the MRI ask the technician how fast he can send the results and he say they are immediate on the hospital system that is visible by most clinics. Woo Hoo!!! I jump in my car drive to my clinic.
They did get my results and as expected I have dermoid cysts in my ovaries, two on one side and one on the other. I'm worried as the doctor, a older man , takes his sweet time reading them to me. In my head I'm screaming "JUST TELL ME" He indicates that surgery would be an option, if they were any bigger it wouldn't be but that mine I could decide to wait and do it later or do it now. He goes on to say there would be risks either way. Surgery, I could lose my ovaries. No surgery, I may have problems producing enough eggs and they may have issues retrieving them. So it wasn't a decision for me at all, No Surgery! Can I get started now???? Please!!!! He hesitates and says yes, finally my journey has begun!!!
