Hello world. It's been 7 weeks and I'm so relieved to report that my HCG level is FINALLY back down to 1. We tested the Friday of Labor Day weekend and it came back at a 7. Ugh. One more trip last week and it's finally, officially over. We are now just waiting for my period to start and we can re-start our first cycle at CCRM. I am more than ready to get things rolling. We still haven't made any decisions on the Family Building Plan vs. a single cycle at CCRM. I really think we are just going to wait and see how the cycle is looking and what the recommendations are. For us it will most likely be a last min decision the day of retrieval. I am asking and trusting that God will guide us to make the right choice.
That's something I've been given a lot of thought to lately. Faith and trust in God and His plan. I recently spent some one on one time with a close friend of mine and while talking about moving forward with CCRM she had a lot of hard questions for me to answer. Basically she can't really understand after 3 retrievals, five transfers, and one spontaneous pregnancy why I think CCRM is going to be able help us. And while it's a stab to the heart it's a logical question. She's not the first to raise the question of when enough is enough and won't be the last. I wish more than anything my situation was black and white. But it's colored so many in between shades it's hard for me to even distinguish any more. Yes, we've been through 3 fresh cycles and in each one we retrieved more eggs than the cycle before. I've had an early miscarriage, a chemical, and finally this last spontaneous pregnancy that resulted in a miscarriage after we saw a heartbeat. Where the shades of gray fall are with all of the different aspects of each of those cycles. With the miscarriage the embryos were not CCS tested so we have no idea if they were genetically normal. With the chemical pregnancy the embryos were genetically tested but on Day 3, which Dr. Schoolcraft informed me could be fatally damaging to the embryos. If we had done five transfers of all "normal" embryos I would be ready to move on to a GC (even though nothing in all of the millions of tests they have ran is indicating I would have any problems carrying a baby). If we had retrieved and tested all of these eggs/embryos and none of them came back normal I would know that it's time to look into donor eggs. But for me it seems to be a mix of both. I did get genetically normal embryos, but they were most likely damaged by the day 3 genetic testing. So now I feel like my judgement is clouded and that there's no clear next path.
My simple answer for my friend is I have faith in CCRM because of their lab. Even my genetically normal embryos from my local clinic weren't perfect or even great quality. My hope is that CCRM can help us produce MORE mature eggs and their lab can help us get more, QUALITY blasts. My hope is that our "golden" egg will be found here, providing I really can carry a child. And while we are definitely open to using a GC or donor eggs, until we cycle at CCRM I don't feel like either path is clear for us.
But to my friend's point there's a very good possibility that we'll cycle at CCRM and it WON'T work. And that is going to be absolutely devastating. It's taking every last penny we have to cycle with them and if we get through this and discover that we do need a donor or a GC there's not going to be any money left at this time to explore that option. And that absolutely terrifies me. But when it comes down to it this entire journey has been blind faith. There are no guarantees. No amount of hard work, dedication, or shear desire will make this successful. We have no control over the outcome no matter what supplements I take, food or drinks I give up, or how much I exercise or take care of my body. Yes there's things we can to do help but ultimately it's out of our control.
So to me it becomes a choice. I can give up or I can have faith. Blind trust in God and His plan. Even after ALL of our failures and everything we've been through I still feel in my gut that I am meant to be a mother. Honestly (and I may just be in severe denial here) but I still feel like I will carry that child. There's definitely days that I'm more sure than others, and there's also days where I feel like giving up. But one thing I know for sure is at this time there's too many unknowns. And only one way to truly get some answers. Whatever the outcome I'm ready to know.
