To Bleed Or Not To Bleed...that is the question

To bleed or not to bleed, that is the question I ask of thee...Dr. OB! My mother said that I need to start reading poetry to the baby in the womb, so I thought it would be appropriate to start waxing poetically today with a little Shakespearean spinoff! Appropriately spun to reflect the fact that I started bleeding on Saturday. I'm concerned because it is almost as if I started a period again, and since it is now going on the 3rd day of light to medium bleeding, it's starting to make me think there is something wrong, like an early miscarriage, rather than an innocent thing like implantation bleeding or something. I've not had any other symptoms that I read usually accompany a miscarriage, no extreme cramping or pain, and nothing like the pain and heavy bleeding that occurred back in February when I miscarried with a tubal pregnancy. I went to the OB this morning so they could draw blood and they should call me back this afternoon with my HCG and progesterone results. I pray that they will be normal and that this is just a scary little bump in the road. Both my hubby and I have read numerous articles on the internet of women who have experienced the same thing, and worse, and have had healthy pregnancies and deliveries. So i'm hopeful that I will fall into that category. After seeing the "I Didnt Know I Was Pregnant" shows on TV, nothing should really surprise me anymore about pregnancy!

Well, the previous paragraph was written this afternoon before I found out the results of my blood tests. The fertility center called me at 5:00 pm with the results, and after a day of impatiently waiting and trying to be as positive as I could, my fears were confirmed. I miscarried. My HCG levels plummeted down to zero. Honestly, i kind of new something was wrong when i started bleeding this weekend. It was too much like a normal period. But I wanted to believe that maybe it wasn't. It's just so funny, okay not funny, but puzzling, a year ago a doctor told me that my eggs were old and i'd most likely never conceive naturally. And look at us, we've conceived naturally twice this year, but they've just not been able to develop like they should. I don't get it.

At church on Sunday I kept looking for a message within the pastor's sermon. I so much wanted some sort of sign that everything was going to work out this time, or some sort of sign that it wasn't, but there was a pretty darn good reason why. I didn't get it. No message. Not specific to me and my fertility issues at least. My mind keeps going back to something the dentist at my health care facility said to me one day. He is a small town guy, he works at the healthcare facility where I work during the week as a dentist and he pastors a small, very small, like 20 people, congregation on sundays in his home town. The thing I LOVE about recruiting is that I get to build relationships with these doctors prior to them even becoming employees. Once they are on board, they report up to our Medical Director, but there is a special place for them in my recruiting heart that keeps them coming back to the HR office for some one on one chat time with me. About 6 months ago he and I were discussing our personal efforts and such, his being to build his congregation, get his son off to the Air Force successfully and to tame his teenage daughter... mine, to get pregnant. He looked at me and said "are ya livin' right?". To which I said, "of course". But am I? It really makes me wonder, as my mind always goes back to those words of his. I wouldn't say they haunt me, but they linger in my head quite a bit. There has to be a reason why they do. Wouldn't you say?

After work I came home and went across the street to my friends house. I say friends, but we are really just getting to know each other. They haven't lived there very long, less than a year if I was to guess. Celeste and Jeremy are their names. They are our age'ish and we seem to have much in common. They are a great couple, and they just had their first baby last week. He is absolutely gorgeous! I'm trying to get as much "neighbor baby cuddling" time in as possible! I told her the bad news of my miscarriage, shared in a couple of her post delivery stories, and then I was on my way.

I decided that retail therapy was the way to go this evening. Since my husband is in St. Louis at the baseball All Star Game with his dad and my mom and sister are on a cruise to the Caribbean, and my mother-n-law is all the way in Arkansas, my love for shopping was my un-judging companion this evening. $300 bucks later, I'm not much happier, but my wardrobe is a bit more stylish, and I know I'll at least look good as my belly bloating goes down for a while.

I asked the fertility nurse today what our options are. She said that since I'm having a "period" we could consider this a new cycle and start a fertility round this month. So I said...OK. Tomorrow morning I go in for a baseline ultrasound to check out my ovaries and uterus. Since I'm only about 3 days into my period, we are still good this month. I will then start a 5 day cycle of the drug Clomid, a fertility drug to help get my eggs nice and big and healthy. Then a few days later, I'll give myself what they call a "trigger shot", which is literally a shot, with a needle and everything, that I'll give myself in the stomach, to trigger my eggs to drop. The next day we will match up sperms with eggs and hopefully have a good healthy pregnancy. Keep praying. We are going to keep trying until we get it right!