Down, but Not Out

Wednesday marked the one year anniversary of our decision to try to have another child.  One year, two miscarriages.

We're now one for four.

I had my second consecutive miscarriage in March.  I didn't write about the pregnancy this time because I knew it was all wrong from the beginning.  I won't bore you with the details, but I was in hell for a month.  I was actually relieved when the pregnancy was over, since I was pretty sure it had to end that way anyway.  We don't know exactly what went wrong this time because I didn't have to go through the D&C, but after three failed pregnancies, I decided that there might be something more going on than just "advanced maternal age."

Seeing even more doctors is just about the last thing I want to do right now, but I've started going to a fertility specialist.  I thought fertility doctors were for people who couldn't get pregnant, but apparently they can help people like us, too.  They're doing karyotypes on both me and Adam, and I'm having just about every conceivable blood test.  We're waiting on the results of the bloodwork, and I know they've found something because I got a message on my voicemail the other day saying, "there were a couple of things that were just a little bit off."  My appointment to find out what those things are is this Thursday.

The thing is, even if we find some particular problem, I'm not so sure we'd get any kind of treatment for it.  Most of the common, easy problems are not likely in our case.  There are things that can be done for certain genetic issues, but they are very expensive and have a low success rate.

We really want another child, but I don't think we want one that badly.  I mean, it's hard to say at this point, but we're pretty happy with our family of three.  Neither Adam nor I have the kind of burning, relentless desire that I've seen other couples have when trying for subsequent children.  But who knows - maybe there is something reasonable that we would do to improve our odds.  What I really want from this is to find out if we should even bother trying any more.  I want to know that I explored all the options, and I want to know that, if we're going to keep trying, that we have a reasonable chance at success.  And if we are going to keep trying, I want to have every bit of data available to me to try to make it happen, instead of just taking my chances.

So we've been banned from trying to conceive until the doctor has more information.  I haven't had a regular cycle yet anyway, but we might have to wait an extra month or so to get started again, if we choose to do so.

So, one year and counting.  But you know what?  It took two years and one month to produce Sam, from decision to birth.  We can still beat that record!