By: Kimberly Turner

When I was a little girl I always dreamed about growing up falling in love, getting married and then becoming a mom and having children of my very own. I never had a dream of a certain career; the only thing I ever felt destined to become was a mom. When I was 18 years old I ended up meeting the love of my life we truly are perfect together as we share the same stupid sense of humor and we both love to make up stupid songs about literally anything and everything and sing them around the house. Finally when I was age 24 we got married I thought soon after we would start trying to get pregnant but since I was the younger one in the relationship my husband being 8 years older I figured I’d wait for him to say he was ready to start a family. Well years ended up passing by and before I knew it I was already 28 and my husband 36. I always thought I’d have kids by now I really wanted to be a mom before I was 30. By this time I was tired of waiting around and I asked my husband like when are we going to have kids? What are we waiting for? We aren’t getting any younger. He agreed that it was time for us to start trying for a baby and finally start our family.

I started by going to the doctor and getting off the pill and having a pre pregnancy work up done which is really just a couple of blood tests. After going off the pill I noticed that my cycle lengths were no longer normal lengths they were bouncing all around ranging from 28–42 days and my periods had become very light and very short. I also want ovulating every month only some. The doctors ran some blood test and all of my hormone levels were normal so even though I had some PCOS symptoms I did not have PCOS. The doctors didn’t really see why I should have trouble really getting pregnant so after using ovulation predictor kits for several months and revolving each month around if I got a smiley face or not which meant I did or did not ovulate that month. It became 9 months of trying to get pregnant and using ovulation predictor kits and sometimes a special lubricant that’s sperm friendly called Pre Seed. My doctor thankfully was proactive and listened to me and suggested I start on Clomid. Clomid is a basic first attempt at using fertility drugs. She says all I have to do was take these 5 pills during my cycle as directed and most likely it would help me get pregnant. Well I tried this for 3 months and still no luck. At this point it has been a whole year of trying to get pregnant and I am being diagnosed with the dreaded diagnosis of unexplained infertility. She suggests my husband gets a sperm analysis done to make sure there is not something else going on. I can either stay with the OBGYN office at this point and continue being treated by them or make an appointment with an infertility specialist.

I make the decision at this point to move to a infertility specialist. Only you will know when it is time for you to make this move it’s your life and your living not the doctors. Boy I am glad that I chose this route because nothing about fertility treatment is quick or runs on a timeline. The whole process is very time and energy consuming and also expensive. About a month later we meet with the fertility specialist and he wants me to have some tests done to rule out certain things before moving ahead with treatment. He also wants my husband to have a second sperm analysis so the two can be compared. I go ahead and set up all the tests a couple of which I am very nervous to have. The HSG (hysterosalpingohram) is to check the Fallopian tubes to make sure neither of them are blocked. Be prepared to try and pronounce that name too because they do ask you to before doing the procedure. The HSG test is extremely uncomfortable and you have to have your butt propped up legs spread wide and you better be comfortable with 4 strangers staring into your vagina if not you might be after this. That test actually didn’t end up being the worst though the worst for me was the saline ultrasound which checks the shape of your uterus to make sure that it’s normal. This test was extremely uncomfortable and even painful it took 3 different people to be able to get the catheter in all the way through my cervix and into my uterus. I guess my cervix has somewhat of a curve to it both the hospital and doctors office had a hard time Getting through it. I am also orders several more blood tests to get. During this time the infertility specialist now goes over all of our options but suggests that if I am willing to be patient to give the pills one more shot. Which by the way is a great documentary title that you can watch on Netflix about infertility and one couples journey. I don’t want to be patient honestly I’m sick of it but then in the back of my mind I’m thinking of this could just work it could be cheaper as we all know it fertility treatments aren’t cheap. He switches me to Femara instead of Clomid this time and adds a couple more additional medications, Metformin and Levothyroxine which are for controlling your insulin and thyroid levels. The Metformin is really shitty literally when you first start taking it till your body adjusts get used to having diarrhea for a couple weeks. I don’t have issues with those things but they are commonly used drugs with fertility treatments. We also find out my husbands sperm quality is a little off in morphology but his count is great. We go ahead and try again for what ends up being another 4 months; the Femara does not cause me to ovulate so I ask the doctor to put me back on Clomid. During this time I have googled every wives tale of what foods to eat to boost fertility including pineapple, Brazil nuts, carrots, pomegranate juice, robitussin, mucinex, fertility shakes, and even touching the fertility statues at Ripleys.

If your looking for a really good protein powder get Performance Inspired it’s the best I’m still drinking protein shakes pretty much every morning I love them. However none of this works I’m really starting to freak out am I really going to be somebody who needs IVF treatment to have a baby of my own. We make a follow up appointment with the doctor and somehow the appointment ends up needing to be rescheduled I am very upset I know that I would not mess something this important up my husband and I had both been looking forward to finding out what treatment was next and getting started with it. Anyways we were forced to reschedule and now it has been 6 whole months later. During this time I am waiting for my upcoming appointment with the doctor I decide to start acupuncture which is not cheap by the way but I felt like I needed to be doing something and not wasting any time. Did I mention I’m scared of needles but I was really willing to try anything. So I stuck with acupuncture treatments for the next several weeks what could it hurt. Big props to my hubby he brought me to and sat with me during every appointment and he hates to get up early especially on a Saturday when there’s no work we really were in this together we were a team.

We meet again with the doctor and we decide that we are ready to move to the next step in fertility treatment which is an IUI which most be know as artificial insemination. I really only was interested in doing one of these because success rates really aren’t that high an it’s costly as well. The doctor was also going to have me use injectible medication. I was kind of terrified of the idea of injecting any needle into myself I’ve always been scared of needles but when you want something his bad you just do it. So many things at this point start running through your head so many questions. I ended up finding out that I have no fertility coverage through my insurance but I wasn’t surprised because most people don’t. I did at least have coverage though for fertility medications with my prescription insurance which is CVS Caremark Specialty which was something anything helps. Some of the medications did require authorizations though. This ended up causing a lot of headaches, phone calls and emails back and forth, crying and me beginning to think I was going to go insane and the doctors office must think I’m crazy. I start to panic wondering if I’m going to be able to get all my medications In time to start for the upcoming cycle. For this IUI cycle I would call the doctors office on day one of my cycle and then be instructed to come in for a baseline ultrasound and blood work. They would then tell me when to proceed with taking the Femara and which days to do my Gonal F injections. Thankfully thanks to a huge life saver I am given some freeze spray to do my injections with by an orthopedic surgeon who works in the same building as me, it works like a charm. I go back a week later for more monitoring and they want me to do a couple more injections. I am told to return for monitoring Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I am anxiously awaiting for my nurse to call and tell me when to do my trigger shot to induce ovulation. When she calls us we have some big choices to make thrown our way. I have 5 follicles at this point so there is a potential risk for 5 eggs and for multiples. We do not like the idea of selective reduction and neither does the doctor but he is willing to move foreword with whatever choice we make that is one of the best things about Dr. Abuzeid is that he presents you with all of the information and allows you to make your own educated choice of what you want and never pressures you. We are freaking out what do we do move forward and take the risk, cancel this cycle all together or convert to mini IVF.

Things start to change quickly and by the grace of family members we are able to move forward and make the choice to convert to mini IVF. Now if your wondering what mini IVF is in short you use less medications to get fewer eggs but hopefully better in quality but you may not have any left to freeze in the end, but it also is cheaper than traditional IVF. I’m basically thinking OMG ins doing IVF this could really be it. We are told to trigger with Novarel later that night. We now have to drive up to the doctors office to get a different trigger shot that is stronger. At exactly 10 PM my husband has to jab a huge needle in my butt, we are both terrified and our hearts are racing. My egg retrieval is scheduled for Tuesday June 5th (5 is my favorite number) at 10 AM this is really happening and by the way the trigger shot wasn’t actually that bad but I’m sure if I had to do it again I’d freak out all over again that needle is scary as hell. It’s retrieval day I’m super nervous but excitement prevails. Before leaving I make sure to wear my TICDA (today I can do anything) hope shirt that I ordered specifically to wear for this day along with my fuzzy socks! I ask my husband to take a photo while I hold two thumbs up and shout eggs! We both bust out laughing. When I get called back to the OR the nurse has me change into a gown, booties, and a hair net, my husband also has to put on the outfit along with a mask.

The nurse comes back and puts in my IV and soon after takes my husband to go and take care of his business. While he’s gone I’m wondering what it’s like in that room kind of but not really, gross. Instead what I imagine is that scene from Daddy’s Home where Will Ferrell has to go produce a semen sample and the blinds fall down and everyone at this Birthday party start laughing at him and can see his junk. Thankfully they don’t take me for my retrieval until my husband comes back and I know all went well with the semen sample. They take me in the room and have me immediately lay down and strap my legs up on some stirrup like objects then the anesthesiologist has me verify who I am and they start the Anesteshia and bam before I know it I’m waking up back in the room. I am able to get dressed and while leaving the doctor lets us know that 4 of the 5 eggs that were retrieved were mature. This is good news! Now I have to wait until the next day for the report on how many of the eggs have been fertilized. This wait is agonizing thankfully I had this day off work and was with my mom spending time and also my special chocolates came in the mail from Phillips Chocolates in Boston which are Marks favorite but we will get to that later. Yummy!

Times goes by and the doctors office is about to close and no report still so I call and leave a message on the nurses line. Finally at around 6 PM they finally call me back and the nurse apologizes to me saying they normally call by now. The nurse that’s me know that 3 of my eggs have fertilized they will watch them over the next day and call me to let me know if I will be having a 3 or a 5 day embryo transfer. Both can be equally successful but a 5 day transfer is usually preferred so the embryo has more time to develop. We get the call the next day that we will indeed be having a 3 days embryo transfer.

We head in the next morning for the most anticipated embryo transfer on the morning of June 8th I change into my get up again and they give me some Valium to help me relax.

I’m nervous for this part because of all the trouble they had before getting through my cervix. Meanwhile they tell you before coming in to have a full balder so naturally I went and picked up some super cute miniature bottles of Aqua Hydrate from Nino’s for this occasion.

Well I seriously need to pee now and they are not even ready yet. The nurse tells me to go to the bathroom and to just let a little out. Ha! Easier said than done I go to the restroom and start to pee and can’t stop! Now I’m freaking out so I start to drink some more. They take me in to do the transfer and they look by ultrasound to see how full my bladder is and by much surprise it’s still to full I am told to the same thing again and of course I cannot control my pee one more time. But somehow my bladder isn’t even empty yet unbelievable. We end up finding out that we have only 2 embryos left and that they will be transferring both! This is super exciting news! They procedure is pretty quick itself but before they could get started the doctor had to remove a stitch. It didn’t hurt but they held it up after removing it and damn it was huge. He then proceeds to place my embryos inside me uterus you see a quick flash on the screen and bam the embryos are in it’s like magic.

You hope with every fiber of your being that these 2 little embabies are going to snuggle in real nice and stick with you for the long haul for the next 9 months. Or at least one of them but now you want both. I have never felt filled with so much hope in my entire life. The embryologist walks though the room and says do you feel pregnant yet? LOL on the way home I instruct my husband to stop at McDonald’s for some French fries and Nino’s for some pineapple I have to follow the good luck traditions and who doesn’t want French fries.

I start taking pregnancy tests 2 days after the transfer to test out the trigger shot so I would know when I had a true positive. This day I also had to do my one last injection they call a booster which is a small amount of HCG used to help support a pregnancy. I go into dollar general and buy 12 pregnancy tests. I also have to start some new medications now which include vaginal suppositories yuck! One is a blue pill Estradiol which is estrogen the other is Crinone which is a clear gel and is progesterone. Overtime these creat big chunky clumps of blue shit that eventually falls out of your vagina but is still packed up there. It is so gross I wish the doctor would have told me your supposed to reach up and scoop some out every couple days which I read on Google but I guess eventually it will plop out anyways. This was truly disgusting and scared the shit out of me I ended up naming it smurf throw up. I’m beginning to have super achy breasts though; I’m super exhausted and hungry all the time. I am taking different medications 4 times throughout the day and am making sure to wear my fuzzy socks everyday even in the hot June weather and eating a warm diet for the next 2 weeks until my beta test which is the first blood pregnancy test that is performed by the doctors office.

Every morning I race to the toilet to pee on a stick it remains positive and by day 9 I feel pretty confident that I can officially call this test my first true positive test! I am feeling blessed beyond belief I just can’t believe these two pink lines are finally staring back at me after just over 2 years of trying to get pregnant.

This was also Father’s Day it just felt so perfect. At this point only my husband and I knew over the next few days we kept it to ourselves until the following Sunday aside from the people in my online support group. On this day we asked my mother in law to go with us to George George Memorial Park and help us to take a pregnancy announcement photo.

I felt confident that I was pregnant and that I was staying that way. I had gradually watched my pregnancy tests darken over the last week and they really couldn’t get any darker.

The beta test was the next day I go I that morning for a blood draw and then have to wait anxiously all day at work for yet another phone call by the nurse I finally get the call by the end of the day I swear they just love to torture you. The nurse goes on to tell me that my HCG level is a lot lower than they like to see it at this point. And that this means that it may not be a good pregnancy but that they would recheck my levels in a couple days. I was completely shocked that she said that to me I honestly thought that she was being very insensitive; I may have even referred to her as the B word. Who am I kidding I did refer to her as a bitch I was a complete hormonal wreck. I had been watching my tests become super dark at home though so I really didn’t believe what she was saying besides I have heard many stories of people who had low first betas and went on to have totally normal and healthy pregnancies why should mine be any different. The nurse calls me again after my second beta on June 27th at 3:30PM and she goes on to tell me my worst fear that my HCG was just not getting high enough and to expect a miscarriage and to stop all medications and that I would begin to bleed. My heart felt like it had dropped out of me I immediately started balling my eyes out everything had been ripped from me in that one moment. I repeat back to her what she’s told me to do while gasping for air. I can’t believe this is happening to me. The most horrible thing that has ever happened to me has just happened and I’m at work. I hung up and ran out of the lunch room sobbing and make my way quickly into an empty room my face is swelling up, snots running down my face my eyes burning. I have never felt this amount of pain, shock or grief in my entire life. Some workers from the office form my building come to console me. I ended up taking the next 2 days off of work and then had the weekend I had to return to work on Monday in all honesty I want ready to face the world yet but just because my world has stopped the rest of it continued to go on. If you ever have to suffer this type of loss take the time you need grieve don’t let anyone tell you how to feel. The first week was the hardest I cried everyday I was in so much pain emotionally which caused me headaches everyday for a month straight. Eventually I stopped crying because it really takes a tole on your body and makes you feel physically even shittier. Even to this day I’d I allowed myself to I could cry everyday but I push it down. The first couple weeks felt impossible especially at work people wondered why I looked so sad, what was wrong with me but you don’t just want to tell any stranger what your going though. I struggle through each day trying not to cry and to just get to the point where I could just go home and sit on my couch and eat ice cream, snuggle my best friends my fur babies, and hopefully catch some reruns of Blue Bloods. I stopped going to church on Sunday’s which I had been doing for the previous several months and I stopped going to my exercise class which I had been going to for the last year I only did the things that I absolutely had to do. Some people have there opinions that just because I was 5 weeks pregnant that it was still really early that it’s not an big deal and that it happens all the time but the hurt was tremendous and any loss is a loss. After all I had been though I had been trying for so long and to all of the sudden finally be pregnant and just that quick all of the sudden I was not pregnant this was devastating. Even though I only got to carry my embabies for a few short weeks I still felt a complete connection with them they were a part of me for those couple weeks. I would pray 3 times a day and after every time I would rub my belly and sing to them Skinni Marinky Dinky Doo. I loved them.

The first and most important thing you need to know if you are battling infertility is that hope is powerful and that hope is the only thing stronger than fear. Some days may be harder than others but no matter what you do hold onto that thread of hope no matter what. It is also said that if you have hope than you are already half way there. The next important thing is that you need to have some sort of support. One of my friends who also went through infertility invited me to an online support group. After joining that group I also joined another additional support group that is full of over 400+ amazing women who are all going through infertility and are all from Michigan. Even if you don’t feel comfortable yet sharing your story this is a safe space to ask questions or just read other people’s posts, you will end up learning so much. Infertility is truly an emotional roller coaster you will end up feeling so many different emotions all at the same time it’s pretty intense. The thing is no matter what is do I still end up feeling irrevocably lonely and incomplete it’s like a hunger that just keeps gnawing at you. You wonder through the process why is this happening to me, why can’t I just be normal, am I being punished, what did I do to deserve this, why do some people he to have kids that didn’t even want them or don’t take care of them or hurt them, it’s just so unfair. It makes you feel like for some reason you’re just not good enough and you begins to have a poor self image of your body let’s just say it infertility really does suck.

While going though infertility you have to find other things to keep you going even if they might seem silly. For me it’s been following Mark Wahlberg. When I first got diagnosed with unexplained infertility I had a dream about Mark and from then on I felt like I was thinking about him quite often for whatever reason. He helped to keep my mind busy by keeping up with everything he’s involved with. He’s not just nice to look at he really is a great role model and inspiration. Along either trying to get pregnant it became one of my goals to meet Mark and hopefully by the end of the year. I wanted to meet him and tell him how he gave me strength and inspired me. I even had a special gift made for him. I ended up being able to meet Mark in December at an event that he did at Meijer it really was a dream come true.

I never thought I’d meet freakin Mark Wahlberg before getting pregnant. One day I just know I am going to have my baby shower in a Wahlburgers it is my happy place and I just love Mark and Donnie so much! Another thing that helps is music. Music is one thing I could never imagine being without in life. Music is the best type of therapy. I feel so strongly about this that I got my one and only tattoo of a music symbol that’s also in the shape of a heart on my left wrist.

Here’s a list of a few songs that are on my go to fertility soundtrack.

Hilary Scott- Thy will

Hillsong United- Even when it hurts

Luke Bryan- Drink a beer

Katy Perry- Firework

Miley Cyrus- The Climb

Rachel Platten- Fight Song

Niall Horan- Flicker

Imagine Dragons- Whatever it Takes

NKOTB- Thankful

Florida Georgia Line & Bebe Rexha- Meant to be

Thomas Rhett- Life Changes

Another thing to keep in mind when battling infertility is take what people say to you with a grain of salt people say stupid shit. If you yourself are not going through infertility yourself people don’t want to hear your advice they only want to be comforted and maybe given a hug. The worst thing you can say to somebody going through inferiority is that it will happen if it’s meant to be or that it will happen if hey just stop trying and for those people who don’t believe in IVF mind your own. God would not have given me such a strong will to be a mother unless it was truly what he wanted for me. I am so happy that I get to live in a time where science has made such incredible advances and we are given the opportunity of various fertility treatments to choose from. When going through infertility you will find out how truly strong you are as a human being. Somebody told me this while sharing part of my journey “you are truly an amazing individual; it takes great courage and strength to get through what you are going through best of luck to you on your endeavor”. I wish to share this message with every other women who is fighting this fight. We are 1 in 8 we are warriors, we are strong, never give up hope.

Right now I am on birth control for the next 40 days before I can start my second mini IVF cycle I just want it to be freaking October already. I’m sick of my life being on pause. I’m ready. I know that one day I am going to pick this pen back up and I am going to finish this story and it’s going to be spectacular. It’s going to end with my rainbow!

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