Lee’s Story

By Lee

My husband Rick and I were married a week before my 34th birthday. I had never been married before but my Rick had and had three daughters from his previous marriage. Rick was not ready to have more children right away but I was hearing the clock ticking so after I turned 35 we started trying to conceive. I really thought I would get pregnant as soon as I went off the pill but nothing happened. After a year of trying, I started fertility testing with my OB/GYN and could find nothing wrong. After 3 rounds of the fertility drug Clomid, I asked to be referred to a reproductive endocrinologist or RE, my OB/GYN was not too happy but did it anyway. The RE started me on injectable drugs and to make a long story short, after 4 rounds of drugs and one surgery and three artificial inseminations, I was finally pregnant.

My pregnancy started out with a painful side effect of fertility drugs called ovarian hyperstimulation. I was on bed rest (so they thought any way) for about 5 days but I didn't care, I was finally pregnant after over two years of trying. I found out after about a week that I was pregnant with twins. Rick and I were completely in shock, it never entered our minds that we would have twins. I guess we should have thought that with ten eggs it was a possibility.

At my 7 week ultrasound everything looked great and both babies had beating hearts and were the same size. We were getting excited about the prospect of twins and I was bonding with them big time. At my 13 week ultrasound we could see one perfect baby and one empty sac. I was so sad, there I was looking at a perfect baby but all I could see was the empty sac. I allowed myself to grieve for a few days for my lost baby but I had to get on with being happy for the one I was still blessed with.

I loved being pregnant and had very little discomfort, basically I felt great. When Rick and I went to the hospital for our 20 week ultrasound we were so excited and couldn't wait to find out the sex of the baby. Rick didn't think with his track record of girls that we could possibly be having a boy but I thought all along that's what it was, I had been praying for a son to give my husband, he said he didn't care but I knew he had secretly always wanted a boy. When the technician started the U/S she started with the cervix. I could tell there was a problem and the doctor was called in. They called my OB's office and then kept on with the U/S. During the exam, we saw a perfect baby and she said she thought it was a boy but couldn't be sure because he was moving so much. After she was done she told me not to get up and that my doctor was coming from the office. After a few minutes they wheeled me up to the labor and delivery floor and put me in a room, we still had no idea what was going on. My husband went out to find the doctor and I heard them talking in the hall. He was saying that it was very serious and I could loose the baby.

The Doctor came in and told me my cervix was open about one and a half centimeters and the bag of waters was protruding. He actually had Rick look down there to see the bag, that was way more than Rick wanted to see and he actually had to go into the bathroom and lie down on the floor as he thought he was going to pass out. Next thing I know, I'm being wheeled into surgery for a rescue cerclage. I came out of the surgery intact and was back on the labor floor. Two days later the doctor came to check me again and said the cerclage wasn't holding and I was soon getting my second cerclage. The OB knew how much we wanted this baby and was going to try anything to save him. This time I had an epidural instead of a general anesthesia and when he started to put the stitch in I could feel it, the epidural wasn't working. I had to really concentrate on my breathing not to move and to be able to withstand the pain. Well, I made it through my second cerclage and was released from the hospital three days later.

I was sent home and put on strict bed rest, bathroom only, and followed this to the letter of the law. I made it through one week and the cerclage was still holding. On the morning of my second clerclage check appointment, I could feel a strange sensation in my vagina. When I was checked by the doctor he confirmed my fears, my bag of waters was hanging down into my vagina. I was sent immediately to the hospital and was told I would be there until I delivered. The next morning around five, my water broke, I called Rick and told him to come right over. The doctor explained to us that since the waters had broken there was a very real chance of infection and that the baby had no chance of survival, I was exactly 22 weeks. The doctor was concerned about preserving my fertility and didn't want me to get an infection that could scar my uterus and thought we should induce labor. This was a hard decision because I felt like I was killing my baby but we knew he didn't have a chance and we wanted to have the option of trying again. The doctor gave me a vaginal suppository and was going to leave until I asked him if he was going to take out my cerclage, oh yeah, he forgot, snip, snip, it was out and he said we'd probably be there most of the day. I started praying to God to make this nightmare short and I was only in labor for an hour and a half. I didn't even know I was fully dilated and needing to push, I just felt like I had to pee. Soon our perfect baby was stillborn and when the doctor told us it was a boy, it was more than either one of us could bare, we just sobbed. I was able to hold my dear son Jacob for a long time but Rick couldn't find the strength, it was too much, he finally had the son he had always wanted and he was gone. Our Pastor came to the hospital and blessed us all. Three days later it was Mother's Day, yippee.

Just when I thought things couldn't get worse I developed a high fever a week later. I called the doctor and told him I had a fever and was worried about a uterine infection. I kept remembering what he said about scaring and was very worried. It was a Sunday so he prescribed antibiotics over the phone but he wasn't worried because I had no other symptoms. A few days later I still had a fever and insisted on being checked out in the office. They did a blood test to check my white blood count which I was told would tell if I had an infection, it came back normal so I was patted on the head and sent home. A week and a half later and Rick and I were back at the doctors. He had wanted to talk to us to see how we were handling our grief. This doctor was very considerate of our feelings and seemed to really be concerned about us, this is pretty unusual from other peoples experiences I've read about. While I was there I told him that I had been calling the office and talking to the nurses because I had continued to run a fever and my bleeding had become heavier, especially when I tried to do anything physical, they told me I was fine and so did the doctor. Later that evening (my mother had come to visit) I was laying on the couch when I felt a gush of blood. I ran to the bathroom and my pants were covered in blood, then I passed a clot the size of a cantaloupe. I called the doctor and he told me I could pass a clot the size of a watermelon and be just fine and he thought I was panicking. I called him back an hour and a half later and had lost so much blood that I could barely hold my head up. He agreed that I should be checked out a the hospital and when I stood up to get dressed I passed out in the bathroom and hit my head on the sink on the way down. My husband and mother put me in the car and off we went, it's a 45 minute drive. By the time I got to the hospital I needed a blood transfusion, I only had half the blood in my body that I should have had. The next morning I had a D&E and they determined that there was "debris" left in my uterus. Next came a raging infection of my uterine lining (the one I was so afraid of) and five more days in the hospital fighting a 104 degree fever.

It has now been three months since this ordeal and even though I haven't gotten a period yet I have just started infertility injections again. I have also met with a perinatologist and we have mapped out a game plan. All of us know the pain of IC but I hope we can all find joy in our future. Even though I have sad times in every day, I am hopeful for what the future will bring. I love and miss Jacob so much but I know he's in God's loving arms and we'll see him one day. I wish you all luck in the future.

Feel free to email Lee at rickleez@aol.com