What a week!!!

I am just grabbing a minute to give a quick update as I have my youngest son home after he was a very brave little soldier yesterday having 4 adult and one baby tooth out under a general anaesthetic.
He has some condition where his adult teeth are not all forming normally and are very weak.

An update, I am no longer in no mans land as such as my first post miscarriage period has hit like a hurricane. Today is cd3 and I have been in agony since yesterday morning (which made being at the hospital even harder of course) I had read that the first one after a miscarriage can be rough as there is sometimes more stuff to lose (without being too graphic)
But I was not prepared for it being so much like reliving the miscarriage and so physically painful too.

I started back on my Clomid last night too, that was horrible as I really do suffer with side effects from it and it feels like another kick in the teeth to be having to take it again so soon.
We are due to see the fertility specialist next month, I say "We" but I have no idea whether it will be just me to see them again as hubby has not said a word each time I mention it and is still so moody it is not worth starting the whole debate until nearer the time.

I will be taking the Clomid until Monday (cd6) and then will need to start the whole hassle of testing for ovulation a week later.
I dread to think how many ovulation tests I must have taken on this journey but it must be at least 100 plus as I take several a day and as I ovulate late it goes on for most of each month.

My kids break up for half term soon and that is when I should have been having my 12 week scan, I try not to think of these dates etc as they cut too deep but I really cannot help it.

Anyway think I am babbling here, I am soooooo tired.

I will update again soon, wonder when I might ovulate THIS cycle, even on Clomid it is not consistant.

Still in no man's land

I am on cd (cycle day) 39 today, that is counting from the start of my miscarriage. I know not all women count that as a a proper cycle and obvious;y a miscarriage is not a period, but as we are trying to conceive again I thought it was the best way to keep some sort of track of what my body thinks it is doing, if it has a clue of course.
I got my positive opk on cd24 but I am all too aware that that does not guarentee that I released an egg at all. Counting from 2 days after that (allowing for 24 hours after positive opk to ovulate) today I am 14 dpo (days past ovulation) so should be due to start my next cycle today.
My luteal phase (the phase of cycle between ovulation and period) has been 14 days every cycle for ages no matter how long each cycle has been this has stayed the same.
I am not sure whether this is something the miscarriage might have an effect on, I hope not, it has taken more than enough away from me already to be honest and not only my baby.

I did break and take a First Response pregnancy test yesterday, only because the month I did get pregnant I managed to get my bfp (big fat positive) on 12/13dpo but it was negative. I have had people tell me it could be too early as it would depend on when anything might have implanted, but I am not holding my breath.
I just wish my dreaded period would come if I am not blessed this month so I can get on with it and start back on my horrible Clomid medication with all it's side effects.

I am due to see the fertility specialist again next month, I am not sure whether hubby will be coming with me this time, I would really like him to as apart from us meant to be in this together, he did not come to our last appointment back in December due to work. I am worried what they might say, whether they will say they cannot do anything else to help (NHS restrictions possibly) or that they will not see me anymore as I did manage to get pregnant.
Strangely a lot of people seem to think that is some sort of comfort, yes it is agony being so scared I will never get pregnant again, but to finally achieve that only to have it ripped away from me is torture and has left me with the fear that that was it, my one chance or that it will just keep happening.

I have mentioned the appointment more than once and he has not said a word, we even found out he is next due to get his INR (blood clotting) level checked at the hospital the same day.

I would have been 10 weeks pregnant yesterday, I know I am tormenting myself by keeping track of these things but I just cannot help it.
I can't stop thinking about the fact that in a couple of weeks time it would have been my scan, it was booked by the hospital for June 6th and I am dreading that day now.

It will be half term soon and although I have heard nothing from them I think my parents might actually visit me and the kids then, they still know nothing about the baby/loss and I cannot imagine sitting in a room with them. I have not been planning on telling them as I don't feel able to, but I think I might end up blurting it out to them.

I managed to go back to my Zumba class last week and am due to go again tonight, it was totally exhausting and I felt strangely emotional, luckily there were not as many people as usual there which was a bit better.

I am so up and down still, there is not a minute when little one is not on my mind and I feel totally isolated in this, I go online everyday to look for support, there is so little in the "real world"
One online group I am part of were having an interesting discussion last week about naming lost little ones and some of them had named theirs that they had lost as early as me, this has got me thinking about names, it is strange but the name Grace has kept coming to me, it is not a name I would ever have chosen myself but it just keeps popping into my head.
I have mentioned the naming thing to hubby but he was not keen, he felt it was morbid I think and said he prefers calling it bubba or little one like he would have if I was still pregnant.
Not totally sure what I think or feel, I struggle to let myself think about it.

So just to finish as things stand right now I am waiting for period (af) to start, I have not got any spotting or anything as yet.
I might take another pregnancy test tomorrow or the next day if nothing happens by then.
Will update....

Halfway through the two week wait I should not be having

I am now on cycle day 32 and counting from 2 days after my positive ovulation test I am halfway through my two week wait - 7DPO (Days Past Ovulation)
I HATE that I am back to this stage again when what I SHOULD be is 9 weeks 1 day pregnant today and looking forward to my first scan in  a few weeks time (It was booked for June 6th)

Yesterday it was exactly 1 month since my miscarriage. I got a letter back from the fertility department after I wrote to let them know what had happened.
The letter was nice of course but so hard seeing it in an official letter.
They have said I should just take my Clomid next cycle and as I am due to see them again on June 25th they did not say much else.

Hubby told me to order yet more ovulation tests as I have used soooooo many this cycle as I ovulated late and had been so worried about missing it and so had tested obsessively.
He kept saying he hoped I would not need them next cycle as he so hopes I fall pregnant again, but I am not getting my hopes up.
He seriously does not me to have to take Clomid again as I get quite serious side effects and really struggle with them, ass if needing to take them is not bad enough.
I do have a couple more First Response pregnany tests in the bathroom cabinet and did order another pack of the Clearblue digital ones too.
Going by the days past ovulation I am assuming my af (period) is due this coming weekend, but that is only if my luteal phase has routine has not been messed up by the miscarriage too as apparently it can mess everything up. I am hoping  it hasn't as it was early, but who knows.

When I got my so long yearned and tried for BFP last cycle it was on 12DPO, I had ovulated earlier on about cd16/17 so the cycle was not as long as this one will be.
I don't know when or even if I will test, I know my will power is rubbish so I probably will but part of me wants to put it off as seeing yet another BFN (Big Fat Negative) will kill me (I cannot even count how many of those I must have seen over 31 months (More than 2 and a half years)

I still have not felt able to tell my parents about the miscarriage and I don't know whether I will ever be able to which is a horrible feeling and very lonely.
Lonely is a feeling that remains constant at the moment, unbelievably lonely and invisable sums it up.

So for now there are no updates, but I will of course blog if and when there is anything to blog about.

A little light in the darkness

I just had to give a little update, as I said in my last blog I have been obsessively testing with ovulation tests for weeks and getting more and stressed as I have had what seemed to me to be possible ovulation symptoms only to have so many negative test results.

Well today is cycle day 24, I say cycle day as not sure what else to call it when you are counting days from something so awful.
After testing 3 times yesterday and getting negatives all day,I tested again this morning and was gutted and confused to get yet another negative.
I was down to my last test (having had 25 tests in the cupboard this cycle) and took that about 2pm this afternoon and got...

Yes...a positive OPK at last. I know it does not guarentee anything but it is the first tiny glimmer of hope I have had and I am clinging to it.

If nothing else it helps me to work out when my first period will be due (around May 21st)

So here we go again I guess.



Driving myself crazy

I cannot stop taking these poxy ovulation tests. I last wrote on my blog on Tuesday and since then I dread to think of how many of the little sticks and also the digital ones (what makes me think they are going to be any different I do not know)

I am torturing myself searching with a magnofying eye glass, desperate to see what I can call an even vaguely positive looking line and once or twice I have almost been able to fool myself that the line is a little darker or more red than the last one. But if I am honest there has been nothing like I have been getting on my normal cycles, especially the ones I have taken Clomid on to make me ovulate.

So now on top of everything else I am in limbo not knowing whether I have already ovulated, whether I am GOING to ovulate or when I might get that dreaded first period.
Hubby is still trying to seem positive which I know is only to try to keep me going, he really believes I will or have ovulated and will by some miracle fall pregnant without getting a period.
He says the only thing that is going to ease my pain will be getting pregnant again which really scares me as it already feels like nothing can ease this so IF I never manage to get pregnant again (which is a real fear after it taking years for it to happen this time) it will never get any easier.

Today is 3 weeks exactly since I lost my little one, I know that is not really any time at all but it feels like I have been in this hole for ages, it is actually hard to remember the last time I didn't feel unbelievably sad, actually that isn't strictly true, it was when that second pregnancy test came up with PREGNANT 1-2 WEEKS.

I am sorry this whole blog has become so depressing,but as the whole thing is about trying for baby number 4 and this was meant to be the end of that journey.
I have been writing this blog since January 2011 (17 months!) and I still can't believe that after everything I/we have been through.

All the doctors and then hospital appointments, month after month after month of ovulation tests and all the stress of taking them and them being negative, or thinking they are positive only to still end up with negative pregnancy tests, studying the tests with a magnifying glass to try to see the hint of a line that was never really there.
Then there was the trying any new gimmick or theory I have read about, this has included taking Soy Isoflavones for 3 months in the hope they would regulate my cycles and make me ovulate while waiting for the hospital to put me on something to help, then there was softcups, these things were meant to be an alternative to tampons and pads but the TTC community had discovered they could be used to help keep the swimmers close to where they need to be, we tried these for a couple of months but these made no difference either.

There was also the 2 types of special fertility lubricants we tried, Conceive Plus and Preseed, all these have done is make things a bit more comfortable but like everything else have not been the answer we were /I was looking for.
I also have to admit to the crushing hurt and jealousy I have felt everytime someone around me seemed to fall pregnant so easily and in all the time we have been trying you can imagine how many people that is, I smile and congratulate them all of course and I AM happy for them but I end up in tears every time and I feel guilty for that too.

There have also of course been the scary, degrading and uncomfortable hospital tests, these have included so many blood tests, ultrasounds (external and internal) hubby's 2 semen analysis,  and of course the worst of them, the HSG xray with special dye injected into my tubes.
We have constantly worried about whether we were trying at the right time of the month or not, countless 2 week waits with 2 weeks of longing to and dreading taking yet another pregnancy test and trying to tell myself I have tested too early when the test is negative yet again and even when the period starts fooling myself it might be implantation bleeding instead, every single month for years.
Then there was the mixed emotions of being told it is me with the problem and being put on fertility drugs and all the risks and raised hopes they bring.

That feeling of taking them for the first time is something I will always remember, especially as hubby had been admitted to hospital the same day.
Of course there was the awful side effects of the drug, I seemed to get all of them and more, the disappointment of the negative test the second cycle of taking them hurt like hell as I knew nothing would happen the first month as hubby had been too ill to try much.
Then of course I tried very hard not to get my hopes up when it came to the 3rd month as it was to be the first month we would be able to try properly with the medication and amazingly it DID work, I WAS pregnant, but not for long and I can't help being scared that was IT the miracle I had been waiting such a long time for and I somehow blew it.
It just seems just too cruel after going through all of that that we finally got there only to have it ripped away and be left with this pain, as if secondary infertility is not agonising enough.

Hubby is getting really worried about me bless him as he sees I am not getting any better, but as he says it has only been 3 weeks and I have/am dealing with it mostly alone and I guess there are no rules on how to cope.

Waiting, more and more waiting

What is left of my heart is achingly desperate to be pregnant again. On the day I lost my little one I spoke to my doctor on the phone and he brought up the issue of trying again as he knows we have been trying for years and that I had now been put on fertility medication.
He said that they are told to advise people to wait for their first normal period after the loss, he said it was only so they would be able to be more accurate in working out dates.
He said that it should come four weeks afterwards, seems so clinical and so hard to believe things just somehow go back to "normal"

I have been searching  for, I don't know, comfort, reassurance I guess from online as it seems that is the only place to find it. There really are some amazing women out there willing and wanting to show love and support to people they have never even met while they are themselves going through the same agony.
I have read other people's experiences of trying after going through this hell, but cannot find any comfort there as it seems to vary so much.
Some women seem to ovulate the perfect 14 days later and are amazingly able to conceive again as quickly as that.
Others ovulate and still get that dreaded period 4 weeks after their loss.
Then there are the women I am scared of joining, the ones who like me have been trying to conceive for such a long time and are obsessively taking ovulation tests only to never get that positive giving the hope that their fertility has not been further damaged, that not only has their baby been taken away, but also the hope of another too.

I am taking sooooo many ovulation tests I am driving myself more insane. Today is cycle day 18 if I count from that awful awful day and so far no positive result. It not only means I stand no chance of conceiving it also means my cycle will be even longer and more messed up.
Next cycle I have to start on my Clomid with its horrible side effects all over again.
It is another kick in the teeth to be back at square one with the whole secondary infertility hurt.

I have not heard anything back from the hospital, not that I think they will do anything anyway.
We went to see the inlaws this weekend, hubby had told them our bad news on the phone earlier in the week.
I was terrified of seeing them, just like I feel everytime I am seeing someone I have not seen since before this happened to me.
My mother in law hugged me as soon as we walked through the door like she always does and the tears instantly appeared in my eyes yet again.
She did not say anything just hugged a little tighter than usual.
She did ask hubby how I really was when they were alone and he says he told her I was "fragile" it's a word he keeps using to describe me and I guess is a pretty good one.
Father in law of course said nothing, not to me or his son, seems a lot of people who do not instantly know what to say think it better to say nothing.

My middle son is being fiercely protective of me and while it makes me so proud that he is so sensitive to people's feelings I do worry how it all affects him.

I am trying so hard to at least pretend to be back to some attempt at normality (whatever that is) mainly for my kids and hubby's sake who have more than enough to deal with.
I am even going to try going back to my Zumba classes this evening, not sure whether I will manage the whole hour and I know I will not manage the usual high energy, but I guess I have start somewhere.

Next day  - update I just could not face Zumba in the end, feel a total failure but I just could not face a room full of people, my lovely, but pregnant instructor and I don't think I have enough energy in me for it either, so I didn't go in the end.
I think it makes it even harder that today should have been my antenatal booking in appointment at the hospital and that is killing me.
Just to rub yet more salt in the wound, I still have to go to the hospital as my youngest is having some teeth out under a general anaesthetic and today is his pre operative assessment.

When does it stop hurting?

I am really trying to pick myself up, I have had no choice but to get on with the day to day stuff, housework, hubby's hospital appointments, school runs, appointments with the kids etc but inside I just hurt!

I got my letter from the hospital this weekend, I knew it would come sooner or later but it was still like I have this massive bruise and someone was punching it so hard.
There was one letter giving the date of my ante-natal booking in appointment, for next Tuesday and it talked about meeting my midwife and having all my blood tests done,
the other letter in with it broke my heart, it gave the date for what would have been my first ultrasound scan, when I would get to see my such a long time longed for baby for the very first time, that would have been June 6th when I would have been 12 weeks and 3 days pregnant.

I could not bring myself to talk to them on the phone or worse pop into the maternity department while at the hospital with my youngest son today and tell them I was not pregnant anymore, so I wrote them a letter telling them what has happened.

I also wrote to my fertility consultant telling him what had happened (My GP had advised me to let him know, I don't know why they could not do it for me but hey)
I have also mentioned in my letter to the fertility consultant that I have only ever been monitored via one cd21 blood test on one of the 3 months I have been on Clomid so far (I have another 3 months left of my prescriptionn)

We have decided not to wait for my first period to start trying again, my GP had said the only reason we would need to wait was to make it easier to date any pregnancy that might happen, but I am using my ovulation tests yet again and if anything somehow happens then they would be able to work out dates from that.

As much as I want/need to try again it is so sad and just reminds me what I have lost and the first time we tried I ended up in tears again.
We are planning to try to follow the same pattern of trying that we did last month, only this time I have not been able to take my Clomid as it needs to be taken from cycle day 2 and as it was not a period I was not able to take it, but if nothing happens for us and I do get my period in a few weeks time I will have to start back on my Clomid.
I am dreading that as I really struggle with the side effects as it is and everything I have read says the first period after a miscarriage is often much heavier and more painful, as I already have endometriosis mine are already horrendous.

I was really touched this weekend when I got a gift from the ladies I talk to in an online trying to conceive forum, they sent me this angel called Bright Star from Willow Tree 

We still have not told our families about the baby or losing him/her which really gets to me as it is so sad in some ways and seems insulting to baby, like they were never real and they were so real to me even if it was only for a short time.

Hubby thought it would be too upsetting to tell my family and he has said he will tell his "Eventually"

I have told him he can obviously tell them whenever he feels like it but I cannot face seeing them while they do not know as I just could not pretend everything is fine.

I am not even sure whether any of my emotions make sense as they are all over the place.

Physically I am still getting quite a bit of lower back pain so have not been able to go back to Zumba yet, I have missed 2 weeks.

I am not really losing anything else now so that is a good sign I guess and all pregnancy tests are now negative.