My 22-day journey to artificial insemination. Discover they can no longer have children naturally can be, for some women, devastating. Especially if this happens a few months after your wedding. You had everything done on your project "have a family" and suddenly you feel as old as never before, your self-esteem in your shoes.
Then you come to a clinic specializing in infertility, and a bit 'as happens in normal pregnancies at the beginning are a bit' unconscious. Do not you know what you're going to meet, learn everything slowly. Before an exam, then another, then they tell you that you need an operation and therefore do, other tests, medicines ... And you go on, as driven by a current that seems to say:
"Do it like that va bene”! Ad un certo punto, finito il
“pre-testing” come lo chiamano negli States, se sei sufficientemente fortunata da essere ritenuta idonea ai protocolli di inseminazione artificiale, inizia il vero e proprio IVF CYCLE, cioè inizi la stimolazione ovarica che ti porterà, sempre aiutata dalla fortuna, al cd. EGG RETRIEVAL (all'espianto degli ovociti) e se proprio ancora hai una botta di c...., al cd. TRANSFER (all'impianto dell'embrione/i) e dopo 12 giorni al tanto sospirato test di gravidanza.
Quando ti spiegano il protocollo che ti è stato assegnato in base ai risultati dei tuoi test, ancora NON SAI a cosa in realtà ti sottoporrai!
Lo scopri giorno per giorno...e most go on, more questions and doubts are growing, until at some point you're so confused and stressed that he come to think
"What am I doing?! Possible that a healthy person like me should get sick to get pregnant? ". But you're going ... you have started treatment, bites, pills, monitoring almost daily and then go ... because you have focused your goal: to make more eggs as possible!
The first week of stimulation is the simplest. But this comes only the second week when you go to the clinic every morning before 8 for blood test and transvaginal ultrasound, when your belly è diventata verde dai lividi delle 4 punture quotidiane e ti senti talmente gonfia che non hai nemmeno voglia di guardarti allo specchio e il solo abbigliamento che sopporti addosso è la tuta da ginnastica!
Guardi tuo marito e ti senti malissimo per essere responsabile di fargli vivere una situazione così, anche se sai che non è colpa tua. Ma lui è un amore, ha sempre il sorriso anche quando è stanco, ti abbraccia e ti coccola, ti riassicura...ti dice:
“Sei bellissima, non ti preoccupare che andrà tutto bene”. A volte la sera a letto parla alla tua pancia indolenzita, dicendo alle potenziali uova:
“Brave, crescete e venite a giocare..” e a te ti viene da piangere. Every morning and every night makes you worried about the bites hurt, and there is a check.
The last few days are crazy! Every morning, go to the control and the only thing you have in mind are the measures of your follicles, ie the shell which should contain the eggs. Yes, because you can not see if there are actually inside the eggs that are maturing. So inside you know that there is a chance that you're doing all this for nothing! The only thing I know is that the follicles must be at least 15mm more follicles and of course there are, the greater the chances of the eggs, even if you do not know if they are of good quality.
listening the nurse who called these assistant and numbers by hand accounts ... and pray that says yet another number, tall, handsome. Then you have to wait for phone to tell you if you continue the treatment another day or the next step.
finally comes the long-awaited shot that marks the beginning of the second phase
. You have to do it late at night, at a precise time that you give them based on time of your appointment for the removal of the oocytes. From the puncture must pass exactly 36 hours! At the clinic do not you do it because they are closed at this hour in the evening, the hospital and you're not even there that think like you do. Do not you dare to take a bite so important to your husband, even if they have made a sort of lesson. Eventually I get a half-unknown wife of a friend who is a nurse. The EEG power
days RETRIEVAL 're pretty quiet. Schedule time but you are stuck in morning traffic. After half an hour you are about to stop the panic! You can not get tardiii! They pass you in the mind images of all the bites and the controls that you did and you can not imagine the traffic mess it up! At the end came, and travel in a bad mood. It is not a good start. However, try to relax. Then they call you and you start.
Go into the operating room and the sight of the gynecological changed you will despair. Not so much fear, but to the disgust of the situation do you think .. your husband after a while 'will go in room 301' to gather the seed "... that romance! L 'anesthesiologist idiot claims to thread the needle in hand, you have veins that easy! Chaos. Remove and replace that needle 2 or 3 times and now you're angry forever! When they begin to say
"Hey, I'm still awake" ... and they'll respond that you are only preparing for the surgery. While praying that the medicine to take effect quickly, once you say
"God, what am I doing?" but now you are asleep.
When you wake up you say that there were 6 eggs (about 8 follicles start, they've already lost you 2 .. girano, ma va bene lo stesso: alla fine, te ne serve uno solo! Poteva andare peggio). Non sai altro; neanche loro lo sanno perché devono ancora esaminarle. Ti dicono che ti telefoneranno domani per farti sapere la loro qualità, se hanno retto la fecondazione, se insomma sarai promossa alla fase successiva, l'impianto. Sei FELICE, anche se hai paura di esserlo: Odi dover fronteggiare le false speranze, sei una che gioisce solo alla fine!
Smaltita l'anestesia, passi un pomeriggio in preda a crampi addominali assurdi. E ti dici:
“Ma guarda cosa mi tocca fare!! E non so neanche se funzionerà” .
Il giorno dopo vivi col cellulare attaccato al corpo in attesa della telefonata...sai che più whether or not you call in the early afternoon, but by 11 you feel later. And then ... drinnn ....
"You did very well" those words make you tremble. Walk up and down the room while the nurse tells you that 5 eggs were fertilized and gives you all the information for the facility which will be after 3 days. You talk but you, between the English and the emotion, you know ... your mind is very strong in that sentence:
"I have good news ... you did good ... 5 embryos. you end the call quickly to enjoy your time.
Here, you're still on the couch and weep with joy at last! Would you say
"I did it" but you are afraid that bad luck. You stay calm. Call your husband and when you hear his voice excited cry again. Found
calm, remember that doctors do not know how many embryos do you want me to be put back inside. Called but there's no way to talk to the clinic. We always respond to the receptionist when you leave a message.
"will call you back." But no one calls. Then you mount the anger that can not understand how important it is to recall a patient to whom are handling the future?! Even if only to answer trivia questions, or to say "Do not worry
! You are paranoid ideas that now they do not know and maybe something will go wrong, you get irritated more and more, 're tired indefinitely, since the previous sleepless night.
The next morning at 7.30 to ask Scott to call, maybe his English will have a better effect. Instead the usual spiel .. "The call". And finally calls you explaining that the fact that the embryos are fertilized is not the final step. They must grow in a certain way and do not always grow. Everything will be discussed on the morning of the system, based on the real development of embryos. Stay
stone! But that uncertainty is more familiar to you the joy of the first ... you almost feel better, more comfortable. Breathe. You say, "Sabry
Force."
In the afternoon you receive another call .. almost paura di rispondere...
“Perché mi richiamano? Non c'è motivo...l'appuntamento è per domattina alle 10. Fine”. Inceve ti chiedono se vuoi fare un test genetico sui TRE embrioni rimasti. Balbetti che ti affidi ai suggerimenti del medico perché non conosci lo stato di salute dei tuoi embrioni e la voce dall'altro capo dice che la Dott.ssa Greenseid non lo raccomanda. Ok, allora niente test aggiuntivo.
Oddio,
Due sono morti . Un po' ti senti morire anche te. Vivere una situazione così innaturale come una gravidanza in vitro produce dei meccanismi mentali strani. Conosci in anticipo l'esatto momento della fecondazione, quel “qualcosa” che avviene mentre fai l'amore col tuo uomo...e you feel the first mother to find out a pregnancy test. Two dead embryos. Two children who will never have.
You focus on the fact that 3 are still there ... trying to become a blastocyst, "or something like that ... in other words they are trying to create a human being again.
know that the transfer is not a guarantee that you are pregnant. And 'the last step in the cycle of artificial insemination. Then it's just your body to decide. You are a very bad mood, do not even know why. Do you think that everything goes wrong, stress makes you lose some 'of your usual lucidity and this irritates you.
The night before the
SYSTEM not sleep, but finally it is time to leave. First stop acupuncturist, then ospedale e poi di nuovo agopuntore.
Alle 10 esatte fai il check in al Saint Barnabas Hospital e cominci a bere dalla bottiglia che ti hanno detto di portare. Per l'occasione hai scelto una bottiglia europea, Evian, l'unica acqua che ti ricorda un po' casa. Poi ti chiamano. Solita routine: ti spogli, ti metti la “divisa” da sala operatoria, parli con le infermiere, pressione, temperatura, ecc. Chiamano Scott e finalmente arriva il medico. E' la stessa dottoressa dell'espianto: una minuscola creatura cinese; mani minuscole, occhiali minuscoli. Ti dici:
“Meglio, visto che deve maneggiare oggetti minuscoli” ! Vi informa che purtroppo un altro dei vostri embrioni non è sopravvissuto, ma ne restano two: an 8-cell and a 4. We are reminded of all the things you read on the subject and say
"Ah, 8-cell is good, is strong." "Yes," answered "
but also that of 4 is growing so we're good." 's time to go. Kiss your husband, see his worried look, tell
"So then they call you, but do you mind and let them think they should do so to assist the partner in this process so important: the bottom of the seed is the his! The transfer is very fast and without anesthesia. You can follow all the steps from the monitor. You are afraid, but basically you're not hearing a lot more di un esame ginecologico. E poi arriva! Il momento in cui i tuoi embrioni sono introdotti nell'utero. Non senti niente, ma vedi la cannula che entra in questo ovale bianco nello schermo e due pallini saltarci dentro. Senti tutti li dentro esultare e dire:
“Great! Done!”. Capisci che tutto è andato alla perfezione e la dott.ssa Chen te lo conferma.
Sei un po' frastornata. Ti appoggiano sul petto la foto dei tuoi embrioni. Quei cerchi ti sembrano la cosa più bella del mondo. Ti viene da piangere ma non puoi... le contrazioni addominali potrebbero, non so, disturbare il tutto!! Adesso devi stare sdraiata per una mezzora e poi FATTO! Puoi andare.
Quando rivedi Scott is particularly excited. She showed him the pictures of your embryos, which are now inside of you. He kisses, caresses, the eyes shine. I touch your belly and talks to him:
"Welcome home!" . He explains that in 2-5 days the plant should be in your uterus and if all goes well in 2 weeks the pregnancy test is positive!
the adventure is not over yet, missing the final rush. But after 22 days from the actual cycle of artificial insemination and more than four months after the discovery of your low fertility, grant you to be happy today.
REALLY HAPPY!