Yep. That's me. I know I'm not alone. There are too many of us for whom the unbridled optimism, excitement and promise of ivf has long since worn off. We're the ones no one embarking on ivf for the first time likes to think about. We are the anomalies. Well, not really, but you wouldn't know it because long term ivf failure seems to be a taboo topic. Perhaps we are just meant to fade away, forget about it and concentrate on something else.
So what do we do?
Do we keep going? (Who knows. Unlikely, but maybe....)
Can we let go, give up on the dream we have made the focus of our lives for so long? (Right now it seems impossible to contemplate....)
For people like us the "promise" of ivf turned out to be as empty as our uteruses.
I, for one, refuse to go away just yet. How about you?
Hi N2L I hear you and at one stage I felt the same. I went through 2 IUI's 4 stim cycles and 9 frozen transfers and lets no forget every test under the sun. If someone had told me that I would have to go through all that to hold baby "G" I would have taken it in a heart beat. The journey though is tough and not always fair it tests our resolve but it always makes us stronger. I get the feeling from what you wrote that you won't give up. I was pretty much the same I always had faith and I always believed I'd be a mum. Just for my sanity though I also had a plan
B buried deep inside me.
I think you should start this as a discussion thread for the long timers as the thoughts and feelings are quiet different.
I was talking to a friend yesterday and mentioned we are doing ivf the first thing she said was are you excited ? uuumm no because that doesn't mean i'll actually end up with a baby, its not exciting to me, actually its terrifying but the average person doesn't understand that.
I don't know how you give up on the dream and walk away, i know im not there yet, i can only hope when the time comes i will be able to do it, for us the last 7 years have been about ttc, we had fertility problems from the word go and i think it would be very hard to get out of that mentality of knowing where you are in your cycle and maybe just you *could* be in with a chance, i don't know how you switch that off.
Terry: i get what you are saying and for those who get the baby it makes it all worth while but for those who don't it must be very hard to deal with going through all that and ending up with nothing. I don't have a plan B, maybe i should think of one......
Yep, that was me. What do we do? We hold our head high and we keep putting one foot in front of the other because if we dont than all the miracles that we do have in our life will lose the one important thing that matters to them. Do we give up? For me, no. But it also meant I turned to other things, I focused on 'us' instead of that baby we so desperately wanted. We induldged in things we couldnt do had we had a bub. It didnt take away the pain and it was always the elephant in the room.
I hated Christmas, Easter and everything that is generally focused around children. I was angry at the world and those scars still run very deeply. That pang of jealousy of people who fall pregnant so easily is still there, but for me now I also have an overwhelming burden of guilt of having been able to conceive.
The promise of IVF is such a strong promise, its almost a guarantee! We were told on our first cycle 'hey, you're 21, all you need is one egg'. Turns out 5 years and 11 A/C cycles later we didnt just need 1 egg We were almost cast aside, we had nowhere to turn unless we were going to do another cycle.
n2l, do not go away, dont ever go away. You deserve your miracle and like I said hold you head high and dont you ever lose that tiny glimmer that is hiding somewhere in your mind because without that what keeps us going in achieving what we desire. You are an unbelievably strong and amazing person, you might think you did what you had to and nothing more but the person you are now is a very different person to what you would have been had you not travelled this long hard road
We have spent $70,000 out of pocket so far, with nothing more than a chemical or two to show for it. It seems stupid to keep going iykwim. Just throwing good money after bad. Plus it's hard physically. This last cycle was particularly difficult. I was on so many drugs. I struggled with it. Which would have been fine if I had got a result but to go through it all for nothing...
I don't think people who haven't been through it can really appreciate how hard it is.
I can't even begin to explain the emotional toll. IVF is pretty much the end of the road when it comes to assisted conception. When it doesn't work, what then??
Juniper - it is so enormous to contemplate isnt it?
Hun, I've been reading but didn't feel right about posting given I haven't done cycle after cycle of IVF but your last post about people not going through / gone through IVF can't appreciate how hard it is - you are so right there. I don't wish any type of AC upon anyone. ((hugs))
Dear N2L, like Rhi, I also didn't feel right about posting given we did eventually get there. However, in the leadup to our last cycle, we all (including our FS) were assuming things weren't going to work and we had agreed that enough was enough. During that time, I fell into a big black pit and I couldn't see my way out, to the point that I was seeing a psychologist because, as you say, it is a huge, huge thing to come to terms with and I could not fathom how our life as we had always expected was not going to eventuate.
I find it really upsetting that many people seem to assume that being able to have a family is something to be taken for granted, not realising just how blessed they are. They have NO clue of the toll AC takes and how emotionally damaging it can be. I agree with Lily when she says about the burden of having conceived and I often find myself randomly in tears because I am in a place that eighteen months ago I never thought I was going to be lucky enough to be.
IVF is such a cruel thing in that you go through all of the emotional and physical trauma with no guarantees at the end of the day. And as you say, what happens after that? I love your signature. I so wish you could be blessed with your miracle. The unfailing support you constantly provide to so many people here on BB when your own world is so difficult just proves how unfair life is. I hope that 2013 brings you joy as you are so deserving of it.
LTTTC After Repeated IVF Failure
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We were almost cast aside, we had nowhere to turn unless we were going to do another cycle.
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