Alexus' Story

Well my story starts in April 2018. I got a new job with a good salary. My husband was in a good position in his job so we decided we wanted to start our family. We’d been together 2 years at that point, engaged and ready to be parents. However, I knew I had issues, I felt like from my early teenage years I had reproductive issues. My cycles were always irregular, heavy, painful and sometimes debilitating. I’d even go months without a cycle and would lie to my friends saying “oh I’m on my period” even if I wasn’t because I didn’t want people to think I was pregnant. For some reason knowing my cycles were so awful, I had a gut feeling getting pregnant wouldn’t be easy. We’re also an age gap relationship, 24 years apart so we knew time wasn’t exactly on our side but as you read my story, time wasn’t all we lost.

6.5 years, 4 miscarriages, 12 failed Letrozole cycles, several surgeries, IVF and a miracle naturally conceived pregnancy has lead us to soon welcoming our rainbow baby boy.

The day we started trying was April 9, 2018. That date is so specific because it was the first day of my period as well as my first day at my new job but my husband and I agree that after my next period we would start trying. My first pregnancy, I got pregnant right away but shortly miscarried, I had no idea what was going on. I had a positive test, hardly expecting it at all! Then 3 days later I felt immense pain, lots of bleeding and next thing I knew I was pulling a huge clot from my body. I knew I miscarried but had no idea what to do.

I had heard of a miscarriage, but didn’t know what it had entailed. I hadn’t told my husband yet, I just started a new job, and didn’t know who to talk to. I told my husband and we went to the ER that day, which confirmed I had miscarried. At the time I didn’t say anything to anyone, I didn’t take days off work, just carried on as normal but I was sad because it felt like it wasn’t real. The hospital didn’t offer resources either other than what to do when I got home like no baths, wear pads, come back if the bleeding continues and offered birth control.

A few months later I was pregnant for a second time and again a surprise considering my cycles were irregular, I had no idea what tracking ovulation was, when I was fertile, where I was at in my cycle. Same as my first pregnancy I had a positive test, I was terrified but I told my husband and we tried hoping for the best but my nightmares came true, I miscarried a few days later. Another ER trip, another doctor telling me to get on birth control, and keeping it to my self again. I had it in my head that miscarriage and talking about it was taboo, so only my husband knew. We continued to keep trying.

April 2019 came and I saw an OB, who diagnosed me with PCOS, offered no help with trying to conceive and didn’t care to help at all with my new diagnosis other than telling me to lose weight and eat less. 2019 was a hard year for us, my husband lost his mom, we moved across the country and I had to let go of my job due to immense stress and moving. October 2019, just after we moved across the country, I found out I was pregnant for a 3rd time, again wishing things would be different, we were hopeful, maybe our new start across the country would be the difference, but we miscarried again, but the same day I took the test I started bleeding and already knew I lost the baby again. Without health insurance I didn’t go to a doctor and miscarried at home, I knew the ER was expensive and no use to me.

For the next 2 years we tried, not so serious about it, nothing happened, I struggled badly with depression, after leaving my home, moving into a hole with my husbands dad, it was a stressful transition for me so the last thing on my mind was a baby, even though I wanted it so bad, I wasn’t in the right headspace. March 2020 I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and PCOS confirmed, June 2020 we went to a fertility clinic because I was desperate for answers and they were no help. $5000 later with no answers and no treatment plan, we gave up with them and continued on our own. 2021 was our next hardest year, losing my husbands dad was hard on us, our marriage and our trying to conceive journey. Not only did we lose a family member but we were also discouraged from not conceiving, doctors give the same advice to lose weight, eat healthy and it’ll happen. We felt like our worlds were falling apart and although we had each other, things were a bit rocky and we took a break for a few months to handle his dad’s passing.

January 2022 we started our journey with medicated cycles, 12 months of Letrozole. I finally found a doctor concerned with helping me conceive and addressing our issues. Over the year of 2022, different doses of Letrozole and no success we were referred to a fertility clinic.

In January 2023 we started at our second clinic, distrustful, stressed but was our only next option. This clinic treated us much better, we were getting answers and I was diagnosed with Antiphospholipid Syndrome, a blood autoimmune disorder that was the best explanation for my previous miscarriages. My blood antibodies attacked foreign blood cells, the fetus, causing me to miscarry. I was also told I had one blocked fallopian tube and a possible uterine polyp, which they advised me to get removed before they could start any treatment for me. It threw me into another state of depression, I felt more lost and hopeless and held back. While doing labs, scans and tests with this new clinic, my diabetes was pretty bad so I was told to come back when my diabetes was better controlled. During the time after those diagnosis’s I worked on my health, my diabetes, living my life and put trying to conceive as a secondary priority. Especially after learning I only had one tube and my last pregnancy being 3.5 years prior, trying to conceive naturally seemed impossible.

In June 2023, I had a hysteroscopy procedure to remove the possible polyp and ended up having 3 removed during the procedure. I was told no getting pregnant for 2 months after the procedure so I continued to work on my health and my mental health.

By this time it’s been 4.5 years and we were impatient, losing hope, considering giving up. I’d lost 40 lbs, controlled my diabetes, and was getting ready to go back to the clinic for our next steps but this is also when my husband and I agreed we need to make a decision. We were following a loop of insanity, doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result. We agreed we’d spent so much money, time, and years, trying and what we were doing obviously wasn’t working. So we discussed moving on from this chapter in our life’s or to start IVF. It was the hardest conversation we had to date, I remember that day, both of us crying, knowing it was our last resort and possibly the only thing that would work, but it came with a heavy cost, lots of needles, and lots of demanding appointments. The other path came with no closure, accepting we’d done what we could with our available resources and move on with our lives. We decided to do IVF because we wanted no regrets in the future about not utilizing every resource possible.

Starting IVF I was scared, I never imagined I’d be an IVF patient, I’m terrified of needles! I hate getting shots or blood draws, but I have quite a few tattoos, different needle though. Either way IVF was scary; all the money, time, appointments, medications, do’s and do not’s, I felt all consumed by IVF and overwhelmed but hopeful, just a tad.

Yet, I pushed through despite my fears, worries and anxiety. I went on to have 2 egg retrievals and 2 transfers. Much of my IVF experience is fuzzy, considering it was not only traumatic but demanding and I felt like I was on autopilot the whole time.

My 1st egg retrieval resulted in 2 PGT normal embryos, one low level mosaic. we were grateful but shattered. Out of 17 retrieved eggs and 6 sent for testing, we had 2 good chances and had no idea if either one would work. It was also discouraging that my doctor said she rarely saw results like that with six embryos. We did our first transfer in January 2024 which resulted in a failed embryo implantation. With our hearts broken, our hope diminished, and knowing we only had one embryo left, we jumped into another egg retrieval. It wasn’t what I wanted to do, recovery was so hard the first time but I knew having only one chance left, another retrieval was inevitable.

Going into my second egg retrieval I was numb, hopeless, exhausted but we got even better news! 25 eggs retrieved, 7 sent for PGT testing and 6 PGT normal! We couldn’t believe it! It made it so worth it to have such a drastic change in our results. We were so pumped for our second transfer knowing we had 8 more chances left and that maybe the second transfer would work!

We went into our 2nd transfer, hopeful, cautious but excited. When it came to beta day I was so nervous, I hadn’t tested early, so waiting on the blood draw was torture. My nurse called with the results… <5 HCG and that I was more than likely going to have a chemical miscarriage. We had never felt more broken, it worked.. but didn’t. When I did my second beta it was 0, confirming I’d miscarried. It hurt so much, so much more than the others, we knew the gender, we went through so much to get pregnant for it to barely stick. It felt so heavy and so different.

Luckily I had the best support system, everyone rallied around us and showed us so much love, offered help, listened to us and let us grieve openly. I wish I’d known how much love and support we would’ve had before because it made a huge difference with our 4th loss. Even our doctors were sympathetic to us and offered counseling resources for navigating miscarriage and loss. It was a world of a difference compared to the years prior we’d had miscarriages and kept to ourselves and moved on as if it didn’t happen.

After I was cleared for another transfer we started prepping for our 3rd transfer. I was heartbroken, I started thinking a lot, wondering if the clinic could’ve prevented the miscarriage, wondering if they did enough to make my attempt successful. I asked for a protocol change and they refused, this got my gears turning. I was angry, thinking, frustrated and hurt. I hesitated but continued with the protocol, everything was looking perfect until a week before transfer, my body ovulated on its own. I was beyond frustrated at this point, maybe if they monitored me better they see I was about to ovulate and could’ve intercepted it! But they didn’t so my FET was cancelled and was told to report back with my next cycle. The next cycle came, I started transfer prep again… 3 weeks of meds, all day taking pills to prep my uterus, everything looked great 1 week before transfer, my lining was perfect, my labs were perfect. However I got a call that afternoon from one of the doctors, one I don’t normally see, advising me to cancel my transfer because I was over the weight limit parameters for a transfer. I couldn’t believe what I’d just heard, my weight was an issue?

I started to distrust my clinic, but after the cancellation of my 2nd attempt at my 3rd FET I’d had enough. Not only did I believe they’d jeopardized my transfers but they didn’t want me as a patient and it was clear they didn’t care to keep me as a patient. I also had a feeling they would jeopardize my future transfers so I decided to switch clinics. It was a long, tedious and stressful process. It also costed us an additional $2,000 out of pocket to transport and store our embryos along with an initial consult with the new clinic.

The process of transferring clinics was even worse, my old clinic didn’t want to help, they sucked at communicating and even filled out legal documents wrong which I had to redo a few times. 2.5 months after my cancelled FET I finally got my embryos to the new clinic and had my initial consultation to start my 3rd attempt at my 3rd FET. The appointment went well, we were hopeful and had a totally new protocol with the new clinic. I was to start the protocol once I got my period. My period was suppose to start within days of the appointment because I was already late by 2 days which wasn’t unusual and given the immense stress I was under from the transfer of care to a new clinic, I wasn’t surprised I was late. I told my new clinic that I would call with my period and to go ahead and send over whatever I needed to get this third FET started.

Well, for all intents and purposes the very next morning I took a pregnancy test because usually that’s what gets my period to start, take a test, it’s negative and then my period is here.

I took the test, I left it on my counter, and I went about my morning, I went and got a trash bag for my bathroom and when I came back, I happened to glance at the test which had two lines. It didn’t register with me right away that it was a positive pregnancy test, my immediate thought was that I took an ovulation test and that it was so dark because I was ovulating. So I took the package out of the trash, looked at it, and it said it was a pregnancy test! I was absolutely shocked, I thought it was a faulty test. There’s no way that I can get pregnant on my own? I have one closed fallopian tube and 6 1/2 years of trying, I haven’t been pregnant naturally since October 2019. There’s no way that I’m pregnant nearly 5 years later.

My immediate reaction wasn’t joy, it was more shock and fear because with this being a natural pregnancy after just having a miscarriage from an IVF transfer, I was so scared that I was just going to miscarry again because I miscarried all my natural pregnancies and an IVF pregnancy, my body was just not capable of holding onto a pregnancy. I was pregnant naturally in the midst of IVF treatment. Of course I was terrified so I immediately called my fertility clinic because I didn’t know who else to call and they brought me in for a beta hCG that day. They continued to monitor my pregnancy up until eight weeks and I just have to give kudos to them because they were amazing to me! They did all of my betas, they did two ultrasounds for me and they took great care of me and even started me on Lovenox, which would help with my antiphospholipid syndrome!

Fast-forward to now, I’m currently 27 weeks pregnant with my miracle rainbow baby boy.

If you made it this far, thank you for reading my story, there’s a lot packed into this and in the end, it was 100% worth it. I would go through it again for my son and I can’t wait to meet him!