Thursday, March 26, 2020

We Are Pregnant With Twins

Posted by JustPJ at 6:24 PM 0 comments
You read the title of this post right. We are pregnant and on our 3rd trimester of our pregnancy. This is the reason why I have not been updating my blog because I am enjoying every second of our pregnancy.

While on 2 week wait, I told myself I will not test this time and wait for my beta HCG instead for fear that ... oh, never mind. However, I gave in based on the illustration below, I tested at 5DP5DT and got a 2nd line in 2 minutes window. The line is not faint so no need to squint, turn the test around or put it in to a light to see it coz it is there (my photo below just did not give justice on it). I cried and run unto my husband to show the first ever darkest line that we ever had in our TTC journey. We’re happy but at the same time scared coz the line should go darker in a day right and not lighter like we had last year which resulted in a chemical pregnancy. However, my 6DP5DT test shows a more darker line than yesterday.




From then on, I peed every morning on a stick until 9DP5DT and we are beyond happy that all of our HPTs are getting darker each day. I also tried using a digital test at 10DP5DT and we can't believe we are pregnant at 2-3 weeks.



God is truly amazing, our beta HCG which I did last 11 and 17 October 2019 also came back positive with a whooping promising numbers of 880 and 5,884. We are so pregnant and there is so much tears of joy flowing in our home.



God finally saw us and blessed us with the desire of our hearts...to become parents with not 1 but with 2 rainbow babies to love, care and pamper for the rest of our lives. Below is our diploma from Conceptia Clinic showing 2 sac and 2 fetus in our 6 November 2019 ultrasound. This is also our last day with them as we finally, finally graduate with infertility. I am also attaching our total expenses for our 2nd round of IVF with ICSI and TESA.



TOTAL EXPENSES FOR OUR 2ND ROUND OF IVF WITH ICSI AND TESA CAD13,385.21 

Below is our pregnancy announcement on our social media accounts last 7 November 2019.


“I will not cause pain without allowing something new to be born, says the Lord.” -Isaiah 66:9
The pain and tears we have gone through last year will not go in vain, our little ones in heaven came back and we are so beyond happy to finally reveal our little secret and shout to the whole wide world...WE ARE PREGNANT.

It took us 4,015 days; numerous clomid cycles, fertility drugs, supplements and vitamins; 5 RE doctors and Fertility Clinics; 1 change of country; almost 200 Canadian needles; 2 surgeries for Ronnel; 2 HSGs and countless TVUs for me; 1 biopsy: 1 MRI; 2 artificial insemination; 2 Egg Retrievals; 2 IVF with ICSI; 2 Fresh Embryo Transfers; 1 Chemical Pregnancy; and 1 Amazing God to show the world that miracles do really exist by never giving up on your dream. We have cried, fought, prayed and waited for this day to come and finally God has blessed us not only with 1 but 2 rainbow babies to love, care and pamper for the rest of our lives. He has given us TWINS to fulfill our hearts desire of becoming parents to little Rs. Yes, we are expecting a double blessing and we saw their hearts flicker during our first scan.

Infertility has taught us to become the toughest fighter alive and has brought us closer together as husband and wife. It has taught us to never give up hope. If we fail, stumble and fall in our procedures, we learned to stand back up together us a married couple. Sometimes it will take us longer but we still stand up and keeps on fighting for our ultimate dream of becoming parents. Through our 11 years ordeal with infertility, Ronnel and I stand together by FAITH, HOPE and PATIENCE that someday, somehow God will see us through and He did, not in our time but, in His most precious perfect time. All glory and praise belongs to our Almighty God.

We wanted to thank our respective parents, siblings, nephews and nieces for being with us and praying for us since day 1 of our TTC journey. To my mom (and dad) for always crying with me, listening and advising me on my struggles. To my dad, it saddens me that I will never witness you cuddle and pamper our babies but I know too that it was you and Ran who made all these possible by helping us appeal to our dear Father God. Thank you families; our closest friends here and overseas; some co-workers; our respective supervisors for your prayers, support, happiness and most especially for keeping our little secret, also to L_____ S__ Photograhy for capturing this precious wonderful moment of our married life.


To my TTC community, my sisters here and around the world, you were my strongest virtual support system for the past 11 years. Thank you for always, always, always being there for me in our ups and downs when most of us are struggling in our own infertility journey. To those who are still waiting, please know we will keep on praying for your little miracle, just hang in there and never give up hope no matter what the emotional attack is because my husband and I waited for 11 years and we are both turning 40 before 2019 ends but i tell you every pain, procedures, needles, sadness and depressions we experienced, everything will all be worth it at the end because God sees our pain and He will provide. We are one of the living proof that God can move mountains and works miracles in His time.


To our Conceptia Team, it was a bittersweet day to bid goodbye to all of you during our first ultrasound but please know how grateful we are with all the care you have given us for the past 2 years and for being God’s instrument for us to achieve this pregnancy. We will surely visit you next year with our twins. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
To our little rainbow babies, please know you are both so much loved already and we can’t wait to see and hold you in our arms. You are our greatest miracle and blessing from up above...made with love, patience, hope, faith and a little bit of science. We know we still have a long way to go but through prayers and God’s guidance we will get by the ups and downs of these 7 remaining months of waiting.


Thank you for reading families, relatives and friends. I wanted this pregnancy announcement to be short as it can be but this is the shortest that an overly overwhelmed mama to be can do. Thank you in advance for your love, support, happiness and prayers. Please be with us in prayers as we hurddle yet another 7 months of our pregnancy.


On 2 February 2020, we did our Gender Reveal Party and our little miracles sent from above are 2 fraternal rainbow baby boys.



From infertility to fertile couple, thank you dear Father God. All glory and praise belong to our Almighty God.


IVF Round 2

Posted by JustPJ at 5:18 PM 0 comments
I finally found the time to sit down and update our TTC journey on our IVF Round 2.

A lot has happened before we did our IVF Round 2 last 30 September 2019. In my last post, I mentioned that DH underwent a SCSA DNA fragmentation test in 2018 to which it came back above the normal range of 24%, 31% to be exact. So, our clinic referred my DH to a Urologist where he underwent TESA surgery on September 2018, see below illustration. They collected 2 vials of his sperm and were put to freeze by our clinic for us to use with our 2nd round of IVF with ICSI.


After our chemical pregnancy in April 2018, we were supposed to repeat our IVF/ICSI procedure last November 2018 but had to terminate it because of my dad's passing in 25 October 2018. On January 2019, we were hoping to do our IVF/ICSI again but our Clinic have to do numerous tests on me and give additional medicines because of my border to high cholesterol, insulin and prolactin levels. When I finally passed my cholesterol and insulin levels (pending an MRI procedure to check a tumor under my brain), we were given a go signal to do IVF/ICSI in April, but my mom underwent a triple bypass operation and have to cancel our procedure again. Thankfully, my mom's operation is a success.

In July of 2019, DH and I decided to do a round of artificial insemination (IUI) while putting back all our sanity together. Too much had happened and I can't go directly to IVF/ICSI if I am not ready yet plus we did a TESA procedure which is a new one for us and it might, well, work. Sadly, it did not so IVF/ICSI it is but before doing so I underwent a MRI procedure to check if I have a tumor below my brain which is causing my prolactin to go up and down to which I did not.

Thus, in August 2019, I started taking my birth control pills and we went directly to our  short protocol stimulations for our IVF/ICSI/TESA. Below is our IVF/ICSI/TESA calendar:


We did our Egg Retrieval Day on 28 September 2018 where the Clinic retrieved 11 eggs, 7 of them fertilized naturally. On Day 3 we had 5 embryos at Grade 2 and 2 at Grade 3. I honestly don't know how the grading is but Grade 2 on my understanding is that our embryos divided 3-8 cells while Grade 3 9-10 cells. We were then scheduled for our Transfer Day on 30 September 2018 since our embryos are doing well on Day 3. 

We did our Fresh Transfer on Day 5 of our embryos. DH and I decided to transfer 2 embabies again with a much better quality this time: 1 BA and 1 AA embryos:



Then the dreadful 2 week wait. See below how the embryos develop inside my uterus.

As, we wait for the 2 weeks period, I have been listening to nursery rhymes again (just like our 1st IVF round) plus I have been eating brazil nuts, promegranate and pineapple core everyday to help our embabies stick on my uterus.

Our IVF round 2 is a journey to 64 stims of puregon, luveris, suprefact and 1 shot of ovidrel plus 11 bloodworks which totals to 76 needles; and a lot of oral supplements and fertility drugs which comes down to a more good quality of 4AA and 4BA embabies on board mama’s womb. We have 2 3BBs on our first try and like last year none of our 5 embryos made it to freeze and were arrested “again” on day 6 but we cling unto hope with what we have now and believe this time we’re pregnant through God’s grace.


Every night when I pray, I only asked our Father God to grant us even 1 child and that I always tell Him that I honestly do not know now how to pray but for Him to look in our hearts and in our tears that all we ever wanted is to become parents...and that He eventually blessed us with our child. There is a lot of anxiety and fear that DH and I have felt on our 2nd round of IVF, especially coming from a chemical pregnancy, but deep inside our hearts we have hope and faith that He will eventually see us through.

 

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