20 July 2015

The things you do to have a baby

What would you do to have a healthy, happy, bouncing baby?

What if you couldn't have a baby? 

Would you adopt, find a surrogate, try IVF? 

What if the doctors told you couldn't fall pregnant or it was dangerous? 

Would you still try?


Some couples use all of their life savings to try for a baby through IVF, we were fortunate enough not have to go down that path. 

For my husband and I, we had to consider was it worth having another high-risk pregnancy, when trying for our second daughter Cherub.


I thought by sharing our story here I could encourage those Mumma's who are afraid of taking a risk, that there is hope.

After the ordeal we went through with Popette, we were terrified that the same thing might happen again. However, we were reassured by both my OB and renal physician, that it would be safe for us to try again.

Trying for Cherub didn't come easy. As a 38 year old Mumma with a history of PCOS, pregnancy-induced hypertension, and Popette's early birth, we had a few obstacles in our way.

We tried to conceive for 6 months but nothing happened, on the advice of my OB I started taking Clomid to help stimulate my ovaries. We were advised to take note of our window of opportunity to conceive, then go for it!

It was disappointing when I would visit my OB to get told that I hadn't ovulated that month, and that we would need to take another course of Clomid, and try again!

The same feeling of disappointment came when my period hadn't arrived, and we thought I might be pregnant only to find a negative result display on the test strip.

After 3 courses of Clomid and nearly 12 months of trying to conceive we finally fell pregnant with Cherub!

Due to the risks of me developing pre-eclampsia, I was placed on various medications throughout the pregnancy - Aldomet (to control my blood pressure) twice a day, Cartia (low dose aspirin to thin the blood), Metformin (to help with insulin levels from PCOS), and Clexane injections (from 7 weeks gest to 6 weeks post birth).

I never thought I would be able to inject myself with a needle. I remember when we were first told I felt squeamish and didn't think I would be able to do it and said to my Husband that he would need to do it for me. Well after a couple of painful injections - I took over from him!

There was a 10-15% chance of me suffering pre-eclampsia again, so the little pain I had to suffer was something I was willing to endure to have a healthy baby.

Fortunately all the precautions and close observation by my doctors paid off. Cherub was born healthy at 38 weeks by cesarean. I would have liked to have tried delivering her naturally, however the risk of me developing severe pre-eclampsia past 38 weeks was just too high. 


Its not to say we didn't have complications.

At 7 weeks, just after starting the clexane, I started bleeding heavily. I thought we were going to lose our baby, and was beside myself while waiting in the Emergency department at the hospital. The ER doctors couldn't tell me at that stage if the baby was going to be OK, as it was still a little early to hear the heartbeat. 

A follow-up appointment a few days later confirmed that everything was alright with the baby, however the bleeding continued on until I was in my 2nd trimester. 

When Cherub was born my blood pressure became unstable resulting in me staying in the hospital a lot longer than I wanted. Thankfully it wasn't anything like Popette's birth, and only required an adjustment on my meds and bed rest.

I sometimes wonder why it was so hard for us to have a healthy, happy baby. I am just grateful that we didn't give up hope, and listened to our doctors and took on their advice, otherwise we wouldn't have our beautiful girl with us here today.

4 comments:

  1. Oh Julie - you guys went through so much... YOU went through so much for those beautiful babies but I have no doubt you would go through it all over again if you had to for them. I would too... oh man now my ovaries are getting all twitchy and leaking emotional clucky hormones lol. Much love to you and your beautiful family hun xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hahaha, now stop it Son! Oh look you've got me all clucky now! I love my girls sooo much. Yes I'd definitely would do it all over again. Thanks lovely xx :)

      Delete
  2. Congratulations on your two girls! It's not easy when you have challenges to have babies, I did 3 IVF cycles to get my first and my second came naturally. You will do almost anything if the desire is strong enough. And yes, so much easier to do your own injections! #FYBF

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Haidee! Congrats on your two also! Thats wonderful that you didn't have to go through IVF a second time.

      Delete

Hello! Thanks for popping by, I love hearing from my readers. Feel free to leave your comment here :)