Recovery

I had my D&C yesterday, and it was a huge releif to get that done. They did it under ultrasound guidance and the doctor assured me he was going to be 'very gentle' and he reiterated, after surgery that he had been and that everything looked fine. No doctor actually wants to give their patient Asherman's syndrome--so fingers crossed.

Emotionally, I'm recovering at warp speed from what happened. I measure how I'm feeling by 2 yardsticks- 1) how much time I spend crying, and 2) What my zest/enthusiasm for life in general is. In the past 5 days, if you added up all the time I had been truly emotionally upset or cried, I doubt it would be for more than a 15 minute period, which is amazing. My enthusiasm for life is well and truely there,I'm enjoying the olympics, I want to go out and shop, I'm eager to tick off items off my New York Bucket list,  this feels *almost*  like a normal week in my life. I'm gobsmacked by how well I'm doing, all in all.

But---I've definitely not gotten away scot- free from what happened, that is impossible. The thought of being pregnant again almost makes me feel ill. If I go the pregnancy route again, I think it would likely trigger feelings akin to PTSD. A number of you cautioned me to go easy on myself, not to blame myself for what happened.

The thing is, I definitely don't think anything I did caused the loss. It was not the cup of coffee I drank daily, it was not the beer I had 3 days past ovulation (baby not implanted yet, that was my rationale:)), It was not my 6 hour walks across Manhattan- Nothing I did caused it. But most certainly, something that I am  that is responsible for my 3 losses. I'm not really angry with myself for that , but its more like a deep embarrassment, that I'm failing where most people succeed without trying. As I've said, that comes down to ego. I've always enjoyed perfect health and a body that works well, and when you are used to thinking of yourself a certain way, learning otherwise is going to sting. There is also a little teeny tiny nugget of rage at everybody who has succeeded here. The first step to recovery is awareness, I've really been talking out how I feel with my mom, which helps.

I got a call from my doctor this morning- they got the results of my RPL panel back. No immunological issues whatsoever, which is nice, because that is the mildly harder thing  to fix, and also given that my Vitamin D levels were nice and high, I expected my immune system to be bitch slapped into submission. And yeah, it was.

But--3 flags on genes linked to coagulopathy. MTHFR (I have 1 copy of the 'bad' gene), Something with the thrombin gene, and something with  PAI4G.  I asked my doctor to email me the actual lab reports, since these are complicated, and you need the details to figure out what is going on.  Then, I'm going to read up on all of this myself, so I can asses risk independent of my doctor.  True risk aside, the treatment is simple, lovenox.

All in all, I have 4 factors that *might* elevate risk for RPL, anti-thyroid antibodies, and the 3 genetic risk factors for thrombotic abnormalities. Uhh, there is  a little smoke, and there has definitely been a fire. Are they related?

Einstein famously said insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. Its not a 100 % true for infertility, sometimes, the 10th try may actually work. But I don't like such odds at all, and I refuse to keep gambling with them.  The next try is definitely going to be IVF, with PGD for all generated embryos. I"m seriously mulling adding surrogacy to the mix, for many, many reasons. Its around 20,000 $ in India- its very,very affordable.

But for now, I'm very, very ok.