..How does anyone prepare for the worst..

No one is ever prepared when they get shocking devastating news!

This happened to me yesterday...came out of the blue as a complete shock!

I'm part of an online support group with other fellow woman suffering with infertility and I decided instead of writing my story out again, that I would paste my journal that I wrote today on my message board of infertile friends! These woman have been amazing in supporting me and each other and I can't thank them enough for all their continued support and prayers!=)

Here is my journal post from today from Dailystrength:

This journal is a hard one for me to write. I'm so confused and upset right now that I can't even think straight. I've always known that eventually somewhere down the road that I would have to have a hysterectomy due to the severity of my endo. I always thought it would be after we had babies. I've had a total of 3 surgeries: Laprascopy in July 08, Laparotomy Jan 09 (removal of left ovary), and another Laprascopy in March 10. A year ago when we first started the IVF process my ovary was in descent shape and I had an FSH of 12.4. High but not too too high to not be fit to use my own eggs. We had an unsuccessful cycle as many of you know and always wondered why and what all the reasons were. Now things make more sense. At this time my right ovary had endo spots but not a lot and nothing to worry about just yet. Then this year my cysts grew back out of control and had to be removed. They took over my ovary and I remember my OBGYN saying that they tried to save as much of the ovary as they could. She teamed up with a specialist surgeon with my surgery and felt I was in the best hands. So from here, we knew we had to act quick on having a baby because of my ovary that was in poor shape. Never ever did I think it was this bad. 

Being on Lupron for 3 mo we never noticed anything different because I couldn't have periods while on Lupron. I felt awful, gained weight, was tired all the time, and just wasn't myself. We've been waiting for 10 weeks for my period to start and I could tell yesterday that my Dr was concerned. Something wasn't right. When my thyroid came back elevated deep down I knew things were not going in the right direction. But this is a fixable thing. When my nurse told me that my RE wanted to speak with me further that afternoon, the anxiety hit me. What was he going to tell me? 

I have never in my entire life felt this much pain and sadness. He said to me that he hated having to tell me this over the phone but wanted me to be prepared for when I see him next. He basically said based on the blood tests that he ran, my ovary is so severly damaged that there is hardly any good ovarian tissue left. That it's damaged from the endo/surgeries. Ok, I kinda knew this but didn't know how bad this could really get. Then here is the kicker. He said my FSH went from 12.4 - 45!!!!!!!!!! WTF!! I asked him if this could be from the Lupron and he said no that Lupron would actually lower my FSH. He said I know this isn't what you want to hear but we may have to start think about another plan that we didn't anticipate and that is donor eggs! OMG, are you serious? Now, before I've even had the chance to have my own child. I asked him if he thought my surgery could have caused this and he said maybe some, but you have an underlining condition that is causing you to have surgery that it's inevitable that you are going to have damage down there. He said that he wanted to pursue the special thyroid testing and to come in to see him ASAP. I'm going to see him Friday at 8 am to discuss everything and what our options are now. He felt so bad telling me this over the phone. Having an FSH this high makes it basically impossible to have our own children with the added damaged ovary. We are trying to stay positive and wait to hear everything on Friday but it's so hard. I'm devastated! I've dreamt my whole life of having my own child and especially a little girl. I can accept God's will for our lives, but it doesn't mean that it doesn't make me incredibly sad! 

I have a wonderful DH who is so supportive. He is ok with the fact that we may have to use donor eggs. He sees it as our child no matter where it comes from. I do too, I just can't get past this sadness and pain right now. I feel like I have been cheated out of a dream of mine and that I didn't do anything wrong to deserve this. My other concern is our insurance now and in Jan with my new job if they cover donor ivf cycles! If they don't, I have no clue how we will afford this. So I have some calls to make today. I know we will get through this, it's just not something I expected to hear yesterday. I am in shock with how high my FSH is! Doesn't make sense to me how it sky rocketed like this in 1 yr. 

I will know more Friday and I'm so anxious to hear where we go from here. We are in need of many prayers right now and I thank all my DS

We are in good hands with a wonderful RE and I trust that he will take us down the right path to get to our take home baby! 

God, please send me peace and the strength to get through this difficult time! Thank you for your never ending LOVE!!!!!!! 

Much love, 

Lauren

No one is ever prepared for this kind of news!  I sure wasn't.  I've always know that my issues were serious.  I knew that eventually I would have to have a hysterectomy because of my endo but I always thought I would have a baby first.  There are no words to describe how I feel right now.  I wasn't expecting to hear this news.  I knew that I was in the early stages of premature ovarian reserve (early menopause) but I never thought it would get so bad so quickly.  The damage on my ovary isn't surprising to me and I had high hopes that it would be healthy enough for at least one more IVF cycle.  The FSH is what puzzles me.  I could see it going from 12.4 - to like 20 but from 12.4 - 45 in one year?  What happened?  I don't understand and I'm so confused by this.  A FSH of 45 is like being a 40-45 year old woman.  I'm no where near this age and it's shocking to hear that my body is shutting down reproductively.  

I'm thankful that my Dr called to prepare me so that I would be so shocked and surprised at my appointment on Friday.  This shows me he really cares.  He was so shocked himself.  We know the odds of a regular IVF cycle working with my eggs and we accept this!  Even if there is a small chance it could work, it's too much of risk for us to take without knowing the outcome.  I want to hear my Dr's opinion and to hear exactly what we are up against and what the donor egg route looks like.  This can be a complicated matter when dealing with insurance companies because most don't cover IVF donor cycles. I found out today that my previous employer gave me wrong information about my infertility benefits and even though we changed plans, because I have already exhausted my lifetime maximum of $12,500 with Cigna (insurance before now) that I have no benefits left under my new plan.  It's because my previous employer capped the lifetime at $12,500 under any plan.  Are you kidding me?  We were about to go down this path of starting this IVF cycle and if we did none of it would have been covered.  So even without all these current new issues, we couldn't do IVF right now.  We are crossing our fingers that my current job becomes perm so that I can go on their benefits.  They offer 4 IVF cycles but we are unsure if and what their lifetime maximum is.  I believe is $50,000.  This would mean they would deduct my already used $12,500 from previous insurance and minus it from the $50,000 and the remaining amount would be what I have to cover any IVF cycles.  Since I'm not an employee yet, just a temp I'm not sure how much information I can find out about their benefits.  So this added to my day of "wonderful" news!  I just can't believe no one every told me this or explained it to me in this way.  I'm so glad I called.   So now we wait until Jan. to start this cycle.  For now, we will go forward with the thyroid testing and treat this and get it under control to be ready and prepared for this upcoming IVF cycle.  As crappy as it is that we can't start right now, I wouldn't be able to anyways as soon as I wanted because I have to get my thyroid regulated first and this can take a month or so.  So this gives me some peace about things.

We know that everything in the end will work out.  It just isn't clear right now.  I will be a Mommy one way or another!!!  According to my sweet grandpa, he knows that there is a baby out there waiting for us!  I don't believe in "those kind of feelings/premonitions" but for some reason when my grandpa says these things, he's right! Kinda creepy but in a good way!=)  We have amazing family and friends who are super supportive and loving and without them we could get through this.  Things really do make sense now that my tests came back that my thyroid is elevated.  My body has been so out of wack that I just thought I was getting older and this is what it felt like.  The hot flashes are what clued me in and the weight gain.  Darn hormones!  It will all work out, I just have to trust in the Lord and believe that we will be parents!!!!!  God doesn't give us anything we can't handle...I just want to get to this point where I believe this.  

We appreciate all the prayers!!!!!  We need them.  I'm anxious for our appt on Friday at 8 am.  I will try to update you all sometime Friday, but depending on how I feel will depend on how soon I get to posting.  

Thank you again, for your continued support and for continuing to follow on my journey towards mommyhood!

~*STICKY BABY DUST TO ALL AND CONGRATS TO ALL THE NEW BFP'S AND BIRTHS OF YOUR BEAUTIFUL LITTLE ONES!*~

-LAUREN