July 20, 2020
Life in the times of quarantine has kept me quiet. I feel like the past four months have been a version of some sort of nightmare I am waiting to wake up from. Surely we won’t be living like this much longer, right? I keep waiting for the news that we’ve made it to the other side. But yet another day and week goes by, and nothing is much different. In fact, it’s getting worse in many states.
I’ve come to the conclusion that this is our reality for now. If I don’t start pushing myself and crawling out of my mental cave, a big chunk of life will have passed me by.
For the past year, we have contemplated whether to try IVF again. The months that followed our chemical pregnancy in 2017 were brutal. I found myself back in therapy and eventually went back on anti-anxiety medication late last year.
After seventeen years together, L and I reached a breaking point in our relationship. It felt like we just weren’t on the same page. We were fighting more than ever. We sought help with a couples counselor and it was the best decision we have ever made for our relationship. Nothing is perfect, but we feel stable and happy again.
There is so much that has gone on “behind the scenes”. It sounds cliche, but true: you truly never know what is happening behind closed doors. The decision to pursue IVF again wasn’t one that came easily to us. It has literally taken years. But time is no longer on our side in terms of fertility and if we are going to take the plunge, now is the time.
About a month ago, I returned to the IVF clinic in Seattle where we had done our last cycle. So many hard conversations took place between those walls. My first appointment was a simple blood draw to figure out where my body was at. I hadn’t undergone ovarian reserve testing in over a year, but I didn’t think much of it. My numbers have never been a problem.
Later that evening, I got a call from the fertility clinic. They wanted to let me know my blood results were back. Everything was generally ok, but my AMH blood results revealed my ovarian reserve had dropped drastically since the last time I had it measured. My number was 0.64 down from 1.3 or so since the last time I was tested. I quickly asked the nurse what that meant, because it didn’t sound like good news. She said the number was low and it could mean an increased chance of cycle cancellation. But nothing was written in stone and they would have to see how things looked at my baseline ultrasound and beyond.
I hung up the phone. For the first time I felt the full weight of trying to conceive at almost 40. My fertility was dwindling.
