It’s been hard to write. It feels overwhelming. I wanted so much for this blog to be happy. I had hoped that I would be able to quickly find the rainbow after the storm. But that’s not my story. Everything is still hard. Life is still stormy. It feels as though life will never get better most days.
I have found out a lot of information. I wish answers help with the blame and helped me sustain a pregnancy. But it hasn’t get. I went on a very difficult and long search for answers after the second loss.
My OB ran a loss panel searching for lots of different kinds of common problems for loss. The only thing that came back was heterozygous for MTHFR A1298C. I did a ton of research. I was consumed and obsessed. My OB said that mutation was not a concern. I saw a hematologist. She said there were no hematology concerns. I asked my primary care physician to run some tests. She ran some of them but said everything looked fine. I knew there had to be more.
Based on the information from MTHFR, I decided to go gluten and dairy free at the end of April. I had made another appointment with another physician that I hoped would run more tests, but I couldn’t wait the nearly two months until the appointment. I couldn’t try to get pregnant without some kind of change. The thought of miscarrying for the rest of my life was too much.
Something unexpected happened. I felt a lot better. And very quickly! Over the next two months, I learned a lot about food, and I slowly made more changes to my diet. Some of my symptoms started coming back, but I still felt immensely better than I had in years.
Fast forward to my appointment and the next month when I got test results – I have hashimoto’s disease. It’s an autoimmune disease that affects the thyroid. At first I was so excited to find out what was going on in my body. I had answers! And not only for my miscarriages, but also for the numerous health conditions I’ve had over the past ten years. But then it started to set in that I had a chronic illness. And unfortunately it became clear that even the doctor who had diagnosed me was not well qualified to treat me.
I have since found that I can slow the progression of the disease and potentially reverse it through many lifestyle changes. This journey to health has a lot of meaning for me. Not only do I want desperately to be able to have a living child, but I cannot just sit back and wait for my body to destroy me when I have the power to have change in my life.
I am now on the autoimmune protocol. It’s extremely restrictive in diet adds a lot of stress reducing activities, appropriate sleep encouragement, and exercise. Everything about the disease is debated. But I hope to find what works for me.
As the months drag on, it sets in more and more how far I have come from having a living child. I feel like I never stop grieving because there is so much to grieve.
I grieve for the children I have lost. I grieve for the life I wish I had. I grieve for the four month old baby I was suppose to have. I grieve for the dates coming up soon where I will have gotten to a year after finding out about the first lost. I grieve for the due date coming up of my second loss.
I grieve for the autoimmune disease I am faced with. I grieve for how difficult it is just to remain healthy. I grieve for how challenging my life has become. I grieve for how I have had to redefine my life to include enjoyment and socialization without food. I grieve for the lack of support without knowledgeable doctors. I grieve for the lost time as I research everyday and go to multiple appointments a week.
I grieve for my diagnosis of infertility. I grieve for this the hardest right now. It has set in hard. And it’s miserable. I try to fathom my life without children. I try to decide what interventions I could handle. I try to think about if we could handle other options to create a family. There are no good options. It’s all miserable. It’s all consuming.
But I have to keep fighting. Even when I am at my slowest. I don’t feel like I have a choice. I go to therapy. I started acupuncture. I meditate daily. I try to do yoga. I take baths several times a week. I have been painting my nails more.
I have good days and bad days. I try to focus on my accomplishments. I fight. And it’s so so hard. And I keep fighting. So here’s to fighting; to the misery every single day; to the successes with the little progress; and to the story that continues no matter what happens.