Haisla's Adventures in Endoland

So it turns out you can't buy peace of mind.

I received the second beta results on Friday evening but just couldn't bring myself to check them that night. M. was going to the pub with a friend, so I wanted him to have a nice night out and I certainly didn't want to be alone facing the news should they turn out to be bad. I'm so glad I didn't. Besides, I just wanted to spend one more night pregnant.

Yesterday, on the other hand, I spent crying.

We checked the results together first thing in the morning. It was a sobering moment. We both took our turns crying in the shower (there's something about running water that turns the waterworks on). It was really heartbreaking to see that M. was as devastated by the news as I.  He really wanted this to work out. He left for work (poor thing) and I proceeded with spending my day on the sofa with a box of tissues at hand.

Some of you may think that our reaction is a bit premature; my numbers aren't going down yet, I'm not spotting or bleeding, but the numbers speak volumes. Plus my peesticks are getting gradually lighter. I still have some residual pregnancy symptoms (sore boobs, tiredness, keen sense of smell), but then again, I also have some residual hCG lingering (or very slowly doubling) in my system.

According to an online hCG calculator our pregnancy looks something like this:

Doesn't look normal, does it?

Doubling time of 132.39 hours (i.e. 5 and a bit days) and an increase of 28.6%. Not good.

Did I scour the Internet to find similar stories that ended up with healthy babies? Of course I did. And for a little while it gave me some hope. Hope against hope. But I did also have to face the facts and recognise that those stories were in the minority. They were the 1% unicorn stories.

Yesterday I was devastated and unsure how I'd ever get over this.

This morning I woke up with a greater sense of zen. I decided that the only way for me to get over the overwhelming sense of devastation was to stop dwelling on it and move on. Which wasn't to say that I didn't love our little failing embie-baby with all my heart. I just felt that unless I moved forward, I'd never get past the sadness. I thought to myself that I might revisit it again, if and when I started bleeding or my fallopian tube exploded, but for now I needed to look forward and let go. We had 7 blastocysts in ice for pete's sake and a FET to get on with.

Turns out I was a bit premature in my attempt to move on, but it did help me to get out of the house this morning. The problem is, I still feel pregnant. I cannot escape the symptoms that remind me of exactly where I am; in the no-man's land of abnormal beta results.

Since this morning I have vacillated wildly between absurd bouts of hopefulness, moments of reluctant acceptance and periods overwhelming sadness.

I emailed our clinic with the beta results and asked them for guidance, only to receive back an automated message that told me to ring up and leave a message if I wasn't reporting a day one of my cycle on the email I had sent. I was furious. So you are asking me to leave a voicemail in the midst of all my snot and tears..? Why can't they have a freaking email account for enquiries such as these (i.e. ones that aren't related to medical emergencies but are still pretty important)? I'd much rather take my time to compose a nice non-neurotic sounding email than to sob down their answering machine.

Anyway, I doubt that anyone will get back to me before Tuesday as it is a Bank Holiday weekend and all they do during weekends is scans, retrievals and transfers. It's a pared down service.

It's good though. If I can convince them to give me another blood test (free of charge this time - I can't afford any further Harley Street charges this month) at least it'll be far enough apart from the last one to hopefully give us more definite news. Surely they can't deny me that? I'm in a risk group for having an ectopic now, am I not?

So that's what's happening in Endoland. The bizarre and head-spinning journey continues.