My husband and I married in 2002 and about 10 months later, I went off the birth control pill I'd been taking (horrid mood swings!!) and we moved to occasional prevention but other means. It only took about 6 months before we went from not-really-preventing to full fledged trying to conceive with basal body temping, checking my cervix, and my cervical mucus, etc.
Month after month as my period arrived I began to think that we were going to need medical assistance to conceive. We'd put so much of our life on hold "just in case" I got pregnant and it was starting to really affect me emotionally. Each time the red tide started rolling, so did the tears.
In September of 2005, after over 2 years of actively trying without success and without the financial means to seek medical help, we decided to stop putting our lives on hold. Enough was enough and there really was nothing more we could do.
We spent the "baby fund" on a new shed for the backyard and set the dates for a vacation with my parents to Tahiti for the following August. Tickets were purchased and we were moving on with our lives; there was no going back.
You know how so many people say that if you relax, it'll happen? That's kind of what happened, but not really. We never stopped actively trying (who can??) but quit letting it affect our life planning. Three and a half weeks after we assembled the shed and 2 weeks after purchasing non-refundable tickets, I realized my period was late and there was a tiny faint negative on my pregnancy test. I was shocked. Floored. Ecstatic. Scared. Terrified, actually. And so terribly grateful I thought my heart would burst with gratitude.
In June 2006, our daughter arrived safe and sound.
I'd beat infertility. I wasn't sure why it had taken so long to get pregnant, but I was sure we'd not have to deal with infertility again.
I should have known better. Without ever using any protection, it took us until July 2008 to get our next BFP. The waiting was agonizing as each month my baby grew older and older and the gap between her and any siblings grew. Everyone around me who had a baby around the same time I did had another one but there I was, with a continually empty womb and ache in my heart but an increasing level of gratitude for the daughter I did have.
My first post-partum pregnancy ended in miscarriage at 8 weeks or so. There was a pregnancy sac and a clear strand of tissue that looked rather like an umbilical cord, but no baby.
I know now that my clotting disorder was likely the culprit but at the time I had no clue I even had a clotting disorder.
It took another 14 months before I *again* became pregnant. Infertility is defined as the inability to get pregnant, and maintain pregnancy, after a year of unprotected sex. It was well over a year between each of my pregnancies and in the end, my second daughter was born just over 4 years after her big sister. My infertility was here to stay.
The age difference between them has not been as difficult as I had thought it would be. They are the best of friends and it makes me heart swell with pride to listen to them talk to each other, teach each other, and to share.
Unless I get pregnant in the next 2 cycles, a third child will have a greater age gap than my first and second. It is something that bothers me, even though I see how wonderful my daughters are together.
In the time I've been trying to conceive, a relative has given birth to 5 children, none of which were from a multiple birth, and she started trying almost two years after we did. My husband always figured we'd have four children and I don't think we'll stop trying until that happens or I turn 45 or so, which ever comes first.
We are finally seeing a reproductive endocrinologist and have some answers. The clotting disorder has been discovered so that we can help prevent miscarriages caused by that (I've had 4) and have a progesterone problem under control, too.
And, once the new year starts, so does our new insurance with IUI and IVF coverage. We hope it doesn't come to that, but only time will tell!
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