Taking a leap into the unknown: when fertility treatment finally works

I’ve been waiting for the right moment to talk about where I am at right now and today felt like the day!

We are very cautiously expecting a miracle…a 10 week old very fragile and precious miracle and we’re feeling very nervous and excited and totally out of our depth!

We’ve gotten so used to being the people “trying” for a baby but never quite making it, nearly getting the prize but having it quickly taken away and watching everyone else’s swelling bellies and screaming kids that we’re a bit lost in this new unchartered territory.

Part of the confusion is that we’re still not out of the “danger zone” yet; that glorious 12 week mark where it seems suddenly your baby has found its seatbelt and is firmly strapped in for the long haul. (I obviously realise that miscarriage can occur at any point during the 9 months but the statistics show a huge drop in risk after 12 weeks). These “limbo” weeks where you go through all the motions of being pregnant ie. doctors appointments, midwife appointments, even seeing the baby on a scan, still aren’t enough to make me believe it’s happening for real this time, as we’ve seen these things before and still ended up with no baby.

Trying to look into this dark unknown abyss and figure out which way it’s going to go is something I find myself doing constantly, but serves no purpose really. In the end, as the saying goes “what will be, will be” and quite frankly that’s terrifying!

It feels like I’m neither properly pregnant, not unpregnant, I’m just expecting. That’s actually a really good word for it! Expecting something to happening but not entirely sure what yet.

So while I sit here expecting, rubbing my tummy wondering if there is still a heartbeat in there I thought I’d share some of my thoughts on how I’m navigating this no-mans land.

Believing in your pregnancy after miscarriage

• Thinking about the right now

I think this more than anything helps me when I have wobbly moments, just bringing myself back to what’s happening right now and right now, I’m not having a miscarriage, as far as I know the baby is still alive and healthy as I’ve no reason to believe otherwise.

• Treating each pregnancy as totally separate events

Which they are. Previous failures and miscarriages bare very little if any relevance to your current   pregnancy (unless the doctor has told you otherwise but this is very rare.) Just because you started bleeding around week 6 last time doesn’t mean it will happen again, and even if you do it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re miscarrying (I did bleed red blood at weeks 7 and 8 but it only lasted a few minutes and scans since have shown everything was fine).

• Trusting that your body can do this

After going through the trauma and confusion of miscarriage, and especially multiple miscarriage, it’s easy to think that there’s something wrong with your body or that your body can’t sustain a pregnancy but this is so often not the case. Most miscarriages are spontaneous events due to an abnormality with the embryo as opposed to anything to do with your body’s capacity to stay pregnant. As every embryo is different, you have every chance of having a successful pregnancy with this one.

I’m hoping we can get to the exciting stage very soon and leave the danger zone firmly behind us. We’re not in any denial that we’ll find other things to be anxious about in the second trimester, or third or the birth or the next 18 years! That’s the wonder of parenthood I guess and we’ll have to take on whatever gets thrown at us as those stages too. Hopefully having been through everything we have, will give us the strength and resilience to cope with whatever’s in store for us and this baby.

Are you also in the tentative first trimester after fertility treatment? How are you coping with the unknowns? Wherever you are on your journey, I’d love to hear from you!

Speak soon

Julia x