Our little phantom menace

I really wish I had a punching bag right about now.  Maybe it’s the progesterone dropping or maybe it’s just that this phantom menace is taking its sweet ass time to leave my body already and I just want it out.  Just go already!  

We had our final, follow-up ultrasound to confirm what we really already knew – not viable, no embryo, just an empty gestational sac and yolk sac. The ultrasound tech was the same woman we had back in November.  “Wow, you sure don’t have very good luck with us, do you?”  I said.  It really helped that she is now about 6 months pregnant - what a fertile jerk!  I think that the next time I am in Johnson’s office, I might ask if one of the requirements for ultrasound tech is social awkwardness and the ability to be completely silent.  I wanted to let her know that we already knew the bad news, so she didn’t have to act all weird around us, unless that was just her personality. 

Johnson wasn’t there to talk with us afterwards, but we met with another OB.  He actually was Johnson’s wingman during the hysteroscopy procedure in April.  He’s nice and fatherly.  We asked him about further testing and what he thought we should do next and he gave us some good advice, “Nothing really.” It seems that he is in agreement that we are just really unlucky.  And, there are so many things that can go wrong in a pregnancy and so few real fixes for them.  He says to just keep trying.  He advised that the next time I am pregnant I should definitely take progesterone, not because he thinks it does all that much, but it doesn’t hurt to take it. 

He explained again about the misoprostol/cytotex that I opted to take to bring on the miscarriage and how that would work and sent us on our way.  So yesterday morning, I rose bright and early and inserted 3 of the 6 tablets.  Then I waited.  I waited for what I’d read and heard would be intense cramps/contractions as my cervix dilated and my uterus started to expel everything.  I made coffee, made breakfast, watched some of Season 1 of ‘Dawson’s Creek’ – kickin’ it old school this summer as far as television goes.  Then I decided I might as well take a shower and get presentable; no reason to look crappy on a day like today.  By now, it was nearly 10:30 and I had taken the pills at 6:30.  I finally started mild cramping.  I thought it was going to get worse, so I took a vicodin, read a book and waited.  Felt pretty good, spaced out a bit.  And still nothing. 

By now, those of you who know me pretty well will guess what comes next. I became super bored of hanging around doing nothing, especially on such an awesome summer day.  So I decided to stain some wood pieces and finish working on the façade in the front of the house. Did some light gardening and rearranging the bedroom furniture. I had some lunch and still, nothing.  By 3 p.m., it was clear that nothing was going to happen.  I called the on-call doctor and she advised that I take 2 more pills at what would be 12 hours from the initial dose.  So we drank some Peroni, had some pizza and at 6:30, I took 2 more.  I watched ‘2010,’ read some, and then finally realizing that nothing was going to happen, went to bed.

It’s now 11 am on Sunday.  I spoke with the on-call doctor again this morning.  After some confusion about how much I had already taken and for how long, it was finally determined that I could do one more days worth of pills.  She called in the prescription to Fred’s.  They could not understand her message, so we had to wait for her to call back and for them to fill the prescription, so after 2.5 hours after my initial call this morning, I was able to start the 2^nd day of the meds.  I will take 2 pills every 6 hours for a 24-hour period.  I can’t think of the last time that I saw midnight, but guess I will tonight.  If this does not do the trick, then it means two things.  I am one of the unlucky 10% of folks who these pills do not work for (of course) and our only option will be a D&C. The one thing we were hoping to avoid at all costs.  I’m just really, really pissed right now.  I can’t seem to get pregnant and when I do and there’s no actual embryo, I can’t get rid of the damned thing.  If my grandmother didn’t read this blog, I’d be inserting so many f-bombs this page would be flagged as entirely inappropriate (do they do even do that?).

The only saving grace is that I plan on taking more vicodin in about an hour.  I am not very optimistic that the pills will work – why, you ask?  Because nothing so far in this stupid journey has worked, why would this go smoothly for us? Bitter and angry, yet? Check.  Annoyed and frustrated, yet?  Check.  Ready to move on?  Desperately so.