 Real-life
inspiration:
FET (frozen embryo transfer) success story
As this story shows, couples will do anything to have a baby! Be inspired
and enjoy the story, and we hope you experience their good luck.
Jeni: 'His smile tells me everything we went through was worth it.'
When Wayne and I met, we knew we wanted to be together forever. That
wish was granted but we didn't know the rough ride we were in for when
we tried to start our family.
All about me…
Name: Jeni
Age: 25
Job: I was a sales manageress before I had Jacob but I'm not going
back now for the near future!
Lives: Merseyside
Significant others: Husband Wayne, son Jacob 5 months, doggie Clive
Type of treatment: ICSI and FET; was successful with the FET cycle
Trying for: five-and-a-half years
Advice for you…
Never give up. Sometimes it can work first time, sometimes it can work
third time, but if you give up after a failure, the next course of treatment
could have been your lucky one. It really is worth all the heartache in
the end and, although you do sometimes lose sight at the time, it definitely
is worth sticking at.
JENI'S FULL STORY
Wayne and I got together at the start of 2000. We'd known each other
for a while and just hit it off one night as a couple. Wayne moved into
my flat soon after and we knew we wanted children straight away, while
we were still 'young'! Little did we know back then what was to come.
We started trying for a baby in August. By the following January, nothing
had happened and my periods were absolutely awful. My doctor referred
me for a laparoscopy and I was told I had endometriosis, which at least
hadn't blocked my tubes. I was injected with a drug called Zoladex to
help. It gave me terrible side effects: night sweats, hot flushes, mood
swings, etc, basically putting me through the menopause to trick my body
so it wouldn't make the womb lining.
Six months later, I finished the course so we started trying again.
Each month was another huge disappointment. I felt terribly guilty about
Wayne as it was my stupid body letting us down. He never made me feel
bad and accepted this was just what was happening.
After a while, my periods got worse again and I knew the endometriosis
had returned. In June 2002, I had another laparoscopy, this time to laser
off the growths. After the operation I found out that my ovaries, bowel,
bladder, etc had fused together from the endometriosis but luckily the
surgeons managed to separate it all. After six weeks, Wayne and I could
try again, and surely it would be our time now?
Unfortunately nothing happened and I was getting really depressed. It
felt that my life had stopped. Everyone else seemed to be getting pregnant
and having babies while I remained childless. Every christening, children's
birthday party, even weddings with children sliding on the dance floor
hit me hard, reminding me that I was never going to be a mummy.
We had to go back to the hospital so they could test Wayne, and were
told the devastating news that Wayne had a huge problem with his sperm.
In the words of the doctor, "The ones that are left are swimming the wrong
way".
We had to accept that we would never fall pregnant without some sort
of fertility treatment. I'd never have that wonderful suspense of a late
period. I felt almost stupid about all those times I'd rushed to the pharmacy
for a pregnancy test when my period was only one day late.
Wayne seemed to handle it really well; men do on the outside, I think.
I knew he was devastated but he was being strong. However, I was a real
mess. It changed me as a person. I kept seeing us old and alone, with
little or none of those happy times that families have.
We were referred to the fertility clinic for the next stage in our journey.
By that time, I'd started to look at it in the clinical way you need to
when you go for fertility treatment; it's as if your mind takes over and
starts to process things differently. We had another round of tests and
were told we would need ICSI (Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection) treatment
and were put on the waiting list.
We finally went for our meeting in the summer of 2004 and began treatment
in September. By Christmas I hadn't responded as they had hoped so they
aborted the cycle till the new year. In January we started again and this
time everything went to plan. We got eight embryos, two which were placed
in me and three were frozen.
Unfortunately my period came two days before I was due to test. By this
time it wasn't just me and Wayne who were devastated; our close family
and friends had been going through it with us and they were also gutted.
After three months, we decided to go again with the frozen embryos. You
just have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get on with it.
The hospital decided to do a natural cycle with no drugs, so I had to
use an ovulation kit to say when to replace the embryos. However, it kept
showing 'no ovulation'. After another three months, on 25 June 2005, two
of the best embryos were replaced. I was due to test on Saturday 9 July
but on the Wednesday I felt rough and had a stye on my eye! I'd never
had one before and it made me wonder if I could be pregnant.
I had a supply of test kits so I did one and nearly fell on the bathroom
floor when it came up positive!
I stood there numb, for what seemed like eternity, and then rushed and
phoned Wayne to come home. He walked in and immediately thought I'd gotten
my period. I shook my head, "No I haven't but what are you doing for the
next nine months?". He was dumbstruck! He then hugged me and we stood
there in each other's arms for ages.
We told all the family and there were tears all round. Everyone was ecstatic
for us. Even though I knew we had to be careful till the 12-week stage,
there was no way I was going to keep quiet. I was pregnant and
wanted the whole world to know.When we went to the clinic to tell them
and get it confirmed, we took them all some chocolates!
From that point it was like none of the past had happened. I had horrible
morning sickness and moaned like hell. I know I'd wanted a baby for so
long but I didn't want to feel that rough! I had a few problems during
the pregnancy, and ended up under the early pregnancy unit with bleeding,
but all was fine.
The birth itself was horrendous. It lasted 36 hours and I ended up with
a ventouse delivery and two blood transfusions from haemorrhaging but
the result of that made up for it: Jacob James, my precious boy.
He is an absolute dream and his smile tells me everything we went through
was worth it. I don't care when he wakes me in the night, in fact I quite
like it as I miss him when he's asleep! I may be tired but who cares,
look at my little man! I think as a person now I'm much more different
to who I was at the start. Some of it isn't in a good way, if I'm honest.
I suffer from panic attacks, which started before the pregnancy, but I'm
slowly learning to control them. It does cause problems sometimes with
Wayne as he doesn't understand why I'm scared to do certain things such
as going abroad after the last time before we had Jacob. But everything
else has been fabulous.
When people say their children light up their lives, I know now what
they mean. I can't believe it's possible to love something so small so
much. And the same goes for Wayne and all the family: Jacob's just adored
by everyone.
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