infertility

 

infertility: the inability to conceive or carry a pregnancy to term after 12 months of trying to conceive. 

After a year with no luck, we immediately sought the help from Dr. Keith Hansen, Reproductive Endocrinologist. We completed a fertility work-up and ended up with a diagnosis of male factor infertility.

male factor infertility:  male infertility often relates to sperm production, structural issues or immunological response. These disorders may be genetic or caused by exposure to radiation, medications, infection, or trauma. Hormonal imbalance can also be a factor. Typically, diagnosis is based on semen analysis. The lab will evaluate sperm count, movement, and shape. If one or more of these parameters are found to be abnormal, it's time to dicuss options for treatment.

Cody's semen analysis showed a significantly low sperm count. When treatments began, we didn't realize what a long process this was going to be. The first 9 months were consumed with "minimally invasive" treatments, waiting, re-checking, other specialists, and more waiting.

When nothing was working, we moved on to Artificial Insemination or IUI (intrauterine insemination)

intrauterine insemination: the placing of sperm into a woman's uterus when she is ovulating. IUI is often done in conjunction with ovulation-stimulating drugs.

Three consecutive cycles of IUI all produced negative results. We were willing to continue moving forward. Now, a year after our initial fertility work-up, we were going to begin our first round of IVF (InVitro Fertilization)

in vitro fertilization: a highly sophisticated, meticulously timed procedure, which involves removing repined eggs from the female's ovary, fertilizing it with semen, incubating the dividing cells in a laboratory dish and then replacing the develping embryo/s in the uterus at the appropriate time.

And because of the significance of Cody's low sperm count, we used the ICSI method (intracytoplasmic sperm injection)

intracytoplasmic sperm injection: instead of letting the egg and sperm meet together on their own, the egg is stabilized under a special microscope and an embryologist carefully selects a single sperm and injects it into the egg directly.

This was a huge undertaking for us. It consumed our life for 2 months. Unless you have walked in these shoes, you will never know how physically, emotionally, and financially taxing infertility can be.

In the end, we had 4 embryos that survived it all. We chose to transfer the two best embryos and we were able to freeze the other two (embryo cryopreservation) for possible future use.

embryo cryopreservation: a technique that slowly cools embryos in cryoprotectant fluid down to -385 degrees, at which the embryos are then stored in containers of liquid nitrogen.

I took a pregnancy test on December 4, 2009 and it was POSITIVE! Our first ultrasound on December 23, 2009 showed that we were having TWINS!! We were over the moon that our first attempt resulted in a positive pregnancy and that we were going to be blessed with 2 babies. Our twins, Kaden and Kenley, were born on July 22, 2010.

We knew we had two frozen embryos remaining. In June of 2011, we went back to Dr. Hansen to look at what the process would look like to do a frozen embryo transfer.

frozen embryo transfer: a process in which the frozen embryos, that have been thawed prior to the transfer, are placed into the uterus with the intent to establish a pregnancy.

We really were very lucky to have had two embryos that we were able to freeze. This was huge in the fact that we didn't have to start all over with a fresh IVF cycle when we wanted to become pregnant for a second time.

After transferring both remaining embryos, we received a POSITIVE pregnancy test on September 14, 2011! At 6 weeks, I woke up with significant cramping and bleeding. We were heartbroken. We knew our dream of having more children had come to an end. But our ultrasound still showed a beating heart. We were told it was likely I was pregnant again with twins, and had lost one of the babies. But I was still pregnant, with one very healthy baby. Paxton was born May 14, 2012.


Although we went through unbelievable heartache, that only those with infertility can understand, we have been blessed beyond words. Our God is an awesome God and we are now a family of 5!



{source:  resolve - The National Infertility Association}