Playing the waiting game

Yesterday was the HSG I had been dreading for so long. A horrid, intrusive examination to find out if there is something wrong with me, the results of which I won't know for 3 whole months.
It marks the end of our examinations for now and also the beginning of a long wait.
The doctors have our results but stupidly we have to wait til our next appointment. I can't believe that from August, when we had our last apoinment, there were no available dates til February in which to see us!
Next week it will be a year since we first went to the hospital (not to mention the 8 years I have been going to the doctors to petition to them to send me to the hospital) and where are we exactly? We have not started treatment, we don't know what's wrong, we are no more wiser than when we started. It makes me sick sometimes to think about it.
Al and I have taken matters into our own hands and are both taking zinc tablets and I have Agnus Castus three times a day, although not knowing what it is that's wrong with us, it might all be for nothing.
It's amazing that the fate of your future and of your children is in other people's hands and the results are all there written on a piece of paper. The only people that can't see the results are the ones that are affected by them the most.

I went into the scanning room and was asked to give a water sample before undressing and putting on one of those awful hospital gowns (you know, with the open back).
Then I was sat down and a nurse sat next to me to discuss all the risks involved, have me sign lots of disclaimers, and to tell me what I was about to go through.
Then another nurse came in holding my pot in her hand and informed me that I was not pregant. You don't say!

The examination was uncomfortable enough. A girl younger than me carried it out whilst two others watched the screen where the pictures of my fallopian tubes and womb were being transmitted to. I couldn't help thinking how unnatural this was. It's the most natural thing in the world to have a baby, and here I am being prodded and probed and radiated.
Too much thought has gone into it. I wanted dearly to never have to 'try' for a baby but for it to surprise me nicely and for everyone to be amazed and excited.
Now it's almost like a chore and if it ever does happen, everyone will be like 'well, thank God, at last!'
I never want to have to lie in bed with my legs raised against the wall - I don't want it to be that forced.
I've got a pack of ovulation testing strips next to my bed, and a thermometer - I feel like a machine - one that doesn't work.

I felt like I had the worst period pains on that table, and I felt so ridiculous with a horrible tube inside me. So undignified. One day my kid is going to ask me where they came from, and I'll have all sorts of tales to tell about blood tests, and samples and doctors, and instruments and thermometers!

What's really got me this week is this awful story about Baby P who was killed following a year of abuse and toture from his mother and her partner. How the heck can people like that have children and not me??? I know, I have turned the story on its side and being very selfish about it. The story is not about me at all. But it does make me question why some people can have kids and others can't.
How can that mother not be grateful for what she has been given though? How can she not love it like I already love my future children?
And it upsets me too as I have been looking into adoption, and in this country it can take from 2 to 10 years for an adoption to go through - that long. I could have looked after Baby P and he'd have been healthy and happy and loved.
I have to go through all kinds of tests and interviews to be able to look after a child. My home has to be visited and I have to be analysed. But any evil and cruel person can give birth to a child and not have any of these tests!!! How does that work??

I don't know. I am feeling so low and fragile at the mo and it just cannot be doing me any good at all, especially in trying to have a baby. Let's forget about the hospital yesterday and just keep going.

Operation Baby Baby

We have just got back from the Women's Hospital.

It always seems so empty there. There are no patients waiting to be seen at all, and the staff are all really friendly and have loads of time for you.
We saw Mr. Russell this time, who was really young and very nice.
He is taking us very seriously and wanted to know if our priority will be to regulate my periods, or to have a baby.

My partner answered for me, saying that he wanted a baby as his priority, which I was made up about! I wanted to give him a huge squeeze right there and then.
He knows I have a phobia of being an old mum! It's not that I am getting old as I am only 27, but my parents were 20 when they had me, and I just think that they are such a great age now as we are on fairly the same wave-length and can still go out and have a proper friendship together.
Most of my friends parents were 10 years older than mine when they had children and you can see the difference. Of course I am going to be more the age of my friends parents when I have kids, but I just dont want to be much older than that! In my eyes, knowing what I have always wanted, 27 is about 2 years older than I wanted.

Probably all women feel this, but I kept having a little niggling thought that I was dragging my partner into this and forcing him to think about it. But just that second when he answered the doctor's question, I realised that he wants this as much as I do.

So, now all the tests start properly.
I have to have 2 blood tests this month at various stages of my cycle. Then, in December, I have to go for this lovely procedure where they fill my tubes with dye and look to see if they are all open properly with no blockages or anything. Just lovely!!
I am already taking folic acid daily which the doctor commended.

I feel like a writing a book on this!

Private Parts

I'm a notoriously private person. I'm not the kind of person to indulge in girly talking about personal matters. I cringe when my female colleagues come in and announce they are 'on' or that they have bladder infections or anything like that.
I dont talk about sex, female problems or anything really that is private and personal to me.

So when I have had to go in and out of doctors and talk about my period pains and worse, it has just been horrible.

I kept it a secret for ages that I was having problems. I even kept it a secret from my boyfriend (I hate him knowing that I'm on my period and would prefer to just avoid him touching me, knowing that he will realise in a few days).
And then eventually I started to email a friend about it. I was very concerned in case she really didnt want to talk about that kind of thing, and sure enough she never did comment. She would reply to my emails but never ever mentioned the things I wanted her to talk about.
So in the end, I went to the doctor again.

I had been a few times in the last 5 years and each time had been tested for chlamydia, been told I was negative, and then given another contraceptive pill to take. The pill would work for a few months and then all the symptoms would break through again.
But when I actually started to get really bad symptoms - awful pain and discomfort and nausea and all sorts of things - I went to see my new doctor and finally was taken notice of.

But it was awful talking about all those things with her and every time I mentioned the word 'Sex' I would say it in a very quiet, hushed voice, almost hoping she hadn't heard what I had said.

When I got told a few weeks later that I had endometriosis and then that I couldnt have children, I was devestated and almost wished I would have been so much more forthcoming in the past few years. Perhaps I would have known sooner and been able to do something about it.

Anyway, then I had to go to the doctors with my boyfriend and talk about it all in front of him. Women's things!

Please don't get me wrong, I'm not prudish at all. But I just don't like to talk about it. I don'tknow - I just like to keep thos ethings to myself and I think I like to protect my boyfriend from it all really. When my friends talk about periods and PMT and urine infections I just think it is so unflattering. Not that I am vain or think I am super-human or anything. I just don't really want people to associate me with that kind of thing. There are definitely some people that I know and I just could never really get over the fact that they had told me something a bit sordid or a bit personal. I dont want people to think of me like that.

And when I had to tell my mum and dad about it all, that was hard too, because I felt that we were almost talking about sex (even though we weren't at all), but come on, you have to have sex to have kids, and there I was talking about fertility treatment with them.

Loads of people have such open relationships with their parents and they talk about everything. Well, my parents are like my best friends - they really are - I can talk to them about everything, and I speak to them every few days for like an hour each. But, I dont talk about sex with ANYONE.

So now I face the prospect of loads more testing and then fertility treatment which I know is important, but at the same time, so so so invasive. The thing I least like to talk about, is going to be the thing I am going to have to talk most about - with a lot of people!