Well since I posted my first post I have decided to split this section from Abby's actual adoption story. Maybe break it up a bit and shorten the posts some. AZ and I were married in July, 2000. I had always known I wanted to have kids. Growing up I loved playing with my dolls like they were my own real live babies. When we were dating we discussed kids and agreed it was something we both wanted. I knew it may be difficult for me to get pregnant as I never really had a period on my own, therefore never ovulated. I think we had been married 3-4 years when we decided we needed help with growing our family. After visiting with my local gynecologist, he referred us to a specialist 2 hours away. The first visit went good and we of course were very hopeful as they said, "we can help you get pregnant". Our first attempts were just to try fertility medications on our own with multiple scans to tell us when my egg follicles were mature enough and to induce ovulation with medication. Sounds easy enough! The plan they had for me included injectable medications, progesterone suppositories, and more injectibles. We made multiple trips to the office for scans, new orders, etc., but never felt like the doctor was on board as we only saw him the first visit. I can't even begin to describe the effect the medications had on me, not just physically but emotionally also. Once this round was complete and unsuccessful, AZ and I decided to look at other options. Because I never really felt comfortable at the specialist we were referred to, we did some looking and found a Fertility clinic in Kansas City with a female doctor.
We went to our first visit with more hope that she could help us in growing our family. She was very sincere and made me very comfortable from the start. She had gone over my history and gave us two options to try: IUI or IVF. She told us we could do the IUI and if it didn't work, go to IVF. Because we had already tried a round of fertility medications, we were both on board to go straight to IVF. IVF is a very expensive procedure that isn't normally covered by insurance. We signed up for a program through the clinic that would give us 3 tries at IVF and if it didn't work, would refund a % of the fee. We felt this was where God was leading us to go. So began more fertility medications, injections, office visits, scans. Then came the egg retrieval and fertilization. What a remember most about this was coming out of anesthesia asking how many eggs they got. I remember them telling me it was a good retrieval (I had 12 eggs). Then they took those eggs and fertilized them in a petrie dish. They watched them divide and graded them on the appearance under the microscope. It truly is an amazing science to have. Once they had matured they scheduled my transfer and placed 2 fertilized embryos and placed 6 more that had matured in the freezer for future attempts. 5 days later I had my first blood draw to check my HCG level. Those were the longest days of my life (to date)!!! The day I had my blood drawn, I got the call that I was pregnant!!! My levels would need to be checked 2 days later to make sure they doubled. 2 days later I got the call that my levels had gone up, but not doubled. I would need to have another draw the next day. The next day I got the call that it was not going to result in a pregnancy. Devastation!!! There were so many ups and downs that I was a mess! Along with all my hormones out of wack, it's a miracle I made it through. We tried one more round of IVF with the frozen embryos that stayed good after coming out of the freezer. This time I didn't have a positive HCG and I was done. I knew my body couldn't take anymore and we needed to look at other options for starting our family. God had a plan, I just had to wait!
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